By Laia Delgado Callico, PhD Physics, Department of Physics
At King’s I am surrounded by extremely talented people who can nourish my daily learning, like my colleagues who are always happy to discuss results or help if you are stuck debugging a piece of code.
Last year, as a Masters student at King’s, I was the student representative of my course, a role that offered me the chance to gain useful transferable skills in negotiation and conflict management. Currently, I am the postgraduate representative for both of the student societies in the Department of Physics, a position which has boosted my organisation and communication skills.
During my first year as a PhD, I have already attended an international conference, where I presented a poster, and, later this year, I am attending a Theoretical Chemistry summer school at Oxford University, where I will be presenting a poster as well.
Within the Department of Physics there are weekly seminars given by international outstanding researchers. There are also the Maxwell Lectures, where successful speakers are invited to give a talk. As a member of the Women in Physics Society, we have organised a one-day conference and a workshop to learn LaTeX. I also volunteered for ‘Pint of Science‘, in order to give a hand on the day of the event.
As a postgraduate student I have attended training such as: an Unconscious Bias workshop, a Preparing to Teach course and a Microteaching course. This training has provided me with better tools for my job as a Graduate Teaching Assistant, where I demonstrate in the Introduction to Numerical Modelling module and mark several first year modules. Accordingly, I am looking forward to gaining the Higher Education Academy (HEA) recognition as an Associate Fellow.
I have also enjoyed plenty of opportunities to develop my career: I attended several events on Entrepreneurship and Leadership, and others organized by the Business School or by King’s Academy, like the Excellence in Teaching Conference. All of these have happened in just over a year, so as you can see, the amount of opportunities you have at King’s to develop your career are infinite, and the list of activities I take part in will definitely continue adding up in the next three years.
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