Category: Research (Page 2 of 2)

PhDeets Podcast – Talking about all things PhD

04/05/2021 / Jo Stephenson

Blog post by Carolin Oetzmann, Katie White & Nicol Bergou.

The PhD Journey can be a turbulent one – from finding the right program to navigating supervisor struggles, and all the madness in between! PhDeets is a podcast aimed at current and prospective PhD students to share experiences and help those trying to figure it out.

About the hosts

Carolin

We are three researchers working and studying at King’s College London’s Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience. Each of us are in a different stage of our PhD journey. Katie is in her second year of a part-time PhD, alongside a research assistant role. Nicol is in her first year of a 1+3 programme funded by the Medical Research Council. Carolin is due to start her MRC funded PhD in September 2021, after contemplating whether doing a PhD was the right next step for her.

Nicol

All three of us are the first in our families to do a PhD and we struggled to make sense of the different PhD programmes, funding options, application processes, career pathways and other things that are difficult to figure out without having a friend or relative who can answer your questions along the way. There is information online, but we wanted to create a platform where diverse student voices could be heard. Being avid podcast listeners, we decided to start a podcast ourselves.

Katie

About PhDeets

PhDeets is the podcast we wish we had when we were applying for our PhDs. Its target audience is current PhD students at all stages, as well as people who are deciding whether or not to apply, or those currently going through the ups and downs of the application process. We interview current PhD students, postdocs, lecturers, professors, people who left academia during or after their PhDs, those who are recruiting people with PhDs into industry positions, career advisers and really anyone who has any useful insights into the academic journey.

Previous episodes

We use our experiences to inform the topics we cover, but we also reach out to people to ask what topics they’d like to hear about. Some of our previous episodes are:

Neurodiversity at university – Panel discussion of neurodivergent researchers Claire, Katrina and Sheila about what being neurodivergent means to them, how it impacts their university life, what support they find helpful, diagnosis and labels, and more.
Luke’s journey to becoming a lecturer – We interviewed Luke Devereux, a lecturer at Middlesex University about his journey from PhD to becoming a lecturer, changing topics between undergrad ad postgrad, getting teaching experience, and balancing teaching and research responsibilities.
More than one way to do a PhD – Another panel discussion with PhD students Jaya, Shaheim, Victoria and Fiyory about the differences and similarities between their PhD programmes, including a partnership with the industry, self-funded PhD, 1+3 programmes, student versus supervisor driven applications, our reasons for doing a PhD, and applying for funding as an international student in the UK.

If you’d like to propose a topic for a future episode, or get in touch about anything to do with the podcast, you can message us on Twitter @PhDeets_podcast or you can email us at podcast@phdeets.com

You can find the podcast on our website phdeets.com or wherever you get your podcast.

Science Communication Fellowship at the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology

02/03/2021 / Jo Stephenson

Blog post by Emily Prpa, PGR student in Diabetes & Nutritional Sciences

The Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology offer a range of different Fellowships to UK PhD students (in 2^nd year or above) in biology and health sciences, energy and environment, physical and digital sciences, and social sciences. The Fellowships give students the chance to work with POST or other teams within Parliament, such as the House of Commons and House of Lords Libraries and the Select Committees. I carried out my 3-month POST Fellowship between September and December 2020, extending the final year of my PhD at King’s College London. Despite being part of the first intake of PhD students to participate in this scheme remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic, I have still taken away invaluable knowledge, skills and lasting friendships.

I worked on a project researching the reformulation of food and drink products. This required me to scope the research area and conduct interviews with stakeholders in order to write a 4-page summary on the topic, known as a POSTnote. A POSTnote is an impartial, balanced and peer-reviewed analysis of new and emerging research evidence which is provided to the UK Parliament. As a POST Fellow you are immediately given a great deal of responsibility – within my first few weeks I was interviewing key stakeholders (from across academia, government, industry and the not-for-profit sector) and planning the first draft of the POSTnote. However, during my time at POST, I worked collaboratively with my supervisor, editing and redrafting the report to produce a balanced, impartial and succinct overview of the topic. The final draft was reviewed by POST scientific advisers, board members and interviewed stakeholders.

The finished POSTnote on food and drink reformulation to reduce sugar, salt and fat levels can be found here. In brief, food and drink reformulation is one tool used to promote healthier diets and reduce the risk of diseases such as cardiovascular disease. The POSTnote highlights that it is difficult to measure whether current UK policies encouraging product reformulation (voluntary and fiscal measures) have had a direct positive impact on public health. It also describes challenges and opportunities for reformulation such as product quality, industry engagement and consumer attitudes. Finally, it highlights that improving public health through better diet requires a number of complementary policy approaches alongside reformulation, including incentivising healthy food and creating a healthy food environment.

I am proud to be an author of this POSTnote. However, I came away from the Fellowship with so much more than this publication. Firstly, I learnt a unique style of written science communication – given that MPs and Peers are extremely busy, I crafted the skill of translating complex scientific information into concise lay terms. I was also exposed to the inner workings of Parliament and built important relationships with key stakeholders (such as Public Health England, the Food & Drink Federation and leading academic researchers). I delved into a novel and exciting topic of food science by using a range of resources including government reports, publications from the House of Commons and Lords libraries and grey literature – stepping out of my comfort zone by not solely relying on academic research.

I was worried that carrying out my Fellowship during the COVID-19 pandemic would affect the overall experience. However, I needn’t have worried. During my time at POST, I attended conferences on nutrition and policy, had a tour of Parliament and joined coffee breaks to meet other advisers and Fellows at POST – all virtual of course. The team at POST helped create a community between all the current Fellows and organised additional workshops for us, including a QnA session on policy careers.

I strongly encourage any PhD student to apply for this scheme. You can sign-up to the POST newsletter or follow @POST_UK on Twitter to stay updated on the Fellowship opportunities available at POST. These are also a great way to see newly approved POSTnote topics; if any are within your field of research, it is worth getting in touch with the lead adviser because your expertise could be valued.

Resources

Institute of Food Science and Technology Fellowship 2020/2021

Bridging research and policy – POST Parliament

POST Parliament resources

How to write a policy briefing

POST Parliament Fellowship