The STFC Public Engagement Early-Career Researcher Forum supports talented scientists and engineers in the early stages of their career to develop their public engagement and outreach goals.
This is to ensure the next generation of STFC scientists and engineers continue to deliver the highest quality of purposeful, audience-driven public engagement.
Dawn Geatches
Hello, I'm Dawn Geatches, a Project Scientist in the Computational Chemistry Group of the Scientific Computing Department of STFC, Daresbury Laboratory (Cheshire). My research is quantum mechanics applied to materials, and I work with university and industry partners exploring the fundamental properties and behaviour of materials in different environments. My PE work includes volunteering at STFC Open Days, giving a talk to the general public, mentoring and supervising work experience students. I enjoy it because I can be enthusiastic about science, encourage the same spark of scientific curiosity in others and of course, it's really good fun!
(Credit: STFC)
Greg Corbett
Greg is a Software Engineer in STFC Scientific Computing Department and holds a Masters Degree in Computer Science. He is a STEM Ambassador and published author in academic science journals. When not writing code or engaging the public, he enjoys playing board games, watching bad movies and drinking real ale.
(Credit: G Corbett)
Josie Rawes
Josie currently works as a Teaching Associate in the School of Physics at the University of Bristol. Prior to this, she helped to coordinate a mobile outreach project called ‘Lab in a Lorry’. This project toured schools in Wales aiming to promote physics and inspire the next generation of scientists.
(Credit: J Rawes)
Kristin Lohwasser
Kristin Lohwasser is a researcher at the University of Sheffield, investigating fundamental particles and their interactions at the ATLAS experiment in CERN, Geneva. She completed her physics degree at Dortmund University and also finished a degree in journalism, including a one-year internship at a newspaper. After her undergraduate, she completed a DPhil at Oxford and worked as post-doc at Freiburg University and at DESY.
(Credit: Susann Niedworok, DESY)
Laura Kent
Following a PhD in materials chemistry at the University of Surrey, Laura joined the electronics and magnetic materials group at NPL. Laura has been involved in numerous public engagement events including developing science engagement activities for primary schools and introducing the three minute thesis competition to the University’s postgraduate conference.
(Credit: L Kent)
Martin Black
My name is Martin Black. I completed my undergraduate degree in Astronomy and Physics at the University of Glasgow. Having enjoyed my optical and practical courses, I decided to transition into engineering. I applied to join STFC, at the UK Astronomy Technology Centre, as an Optical Engineer. Since then I've worked on about 10 different project for astronomy, medical imaging, and Earth observation.
(Credit: M Black)
Sally Cooper
Sally is a Research Associate at the Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics, University of Manchester. Her research is on searching for pulsars using the next generation of radio telescopes, like the Square Kilometre Array. Part of Sally's research is to learn how to train computers to help identify pulsars using machine learning techniques.
(Credit: RADA Big Data)
Sabrina Gaertner
Sabrina’s background lies in laboratory astrophysics and astrochemistry, in particular studying gas-phase ion chemistry in star forming regions. Now she is an Instrument Scientist at the ISIS Neutron and Muon Source focussing on the structure of water ice, and uses many outreach opportunities to promote what I consider to be interesting science!
(Credit: STFC)
William Taylor
Willian has been based at the Royal Observatory Edinburgh for the last ten years. Starting with his PhD through the University of Edinburgh and then literally moving down the corridor to join STFC’s UK Astronomy Technology Centre. He now works as a Project Scientist: splitting his time between research into Massive Stars and more technical work to help build new instruments for telescopes.
(Credit: W Taylor)
William Trickey
William Trickey is a PhD student at the University of York. His research involves the study of extreme shocks in plasmas with application in fusion energy. Will helps with a variety outreach projects at the University of York including the creation of a fusion podcast called: A glass of seawater.
(Credit: W Trickey)
The 2019 call for applications to the Engagement Early-Career Researcher Forum will open on the 1st April and close at 16:00 on Monday 3 June 2019.
(Credit: University of Birmingham)
The STFC community has a long tradition of undertaking public engagement across the length and breadth of the UK: engagement that we know has a profound effect on our audiences. A significant proportion of STFC’s engagement is designed and delivered by scientists and engineers near the start of their career, who are working hard to balance the demands of establishing their careers alongside their passion for leading high quality public engagement and outreach.
We know that this is a real challenge: people can feel left without support, can struggle to keep abreast of current good practice, find themselves unable to make the time to plan new engagement and outreach to their satisfaction, or have no-one in their immediate peer group that shares their belief in the importance of engagement. It’s important to us that we help to change that situation. For further insight into the prevailing attitudes towards engagement in the STFC community, please see our 2016 report, Public Engagement: Attitudes, Culture and Ethos.
The STFC Public Engagement Early-Career Researcher Forum (the ‘PEER Forum’) will support talented scientists and engineers in the early stages of their career to develop their public engagement and outreach goals, to ensure the next generation of STFC scientists and engineers continue to deliver the highest quality of purposeful, audience-driven public engagement.
Participants in the PEER Forum will meet face-to-face at least twice per year to share learning and to participate in session that will strengthen the depth and breadth of their understanding of public engagement and outreach.
It is STFC’s intent that the Forum evolves to shape its own agenda and activities over time, becoming driven by the needs of the Forum members as much as it is driven by STFC. Forum members will be encouraged to identify items of discussion, peer learning and training, and invited speakers to form the content of Forum meetings. Forum members will also have the opportunity to provide relevant insight and feedback to STFC from their local departments and/or engagement communities.
The PEER Forum is for practising early-career scientists and engineers who have an ambition to carry out excellent public engagement alongside, and complimentary to, their career in science or engineering. We are seeking Forum members from across the breadth of STFC’s pure and applied science and technology remit.
The specific personal requirements of PEER Forum membership are that members:
STFC is committed to a policy of equal opportunities, and appointments to the PEER Forum will be made on merit. We are keen to see diversity in the membership of the PEER Forum, reflected in the gender, race, and other protected characteristics of the Forum members. Gender diversity is particularly important at this point in time, and STFC has set a target for a minimum of 30% female representation on our boards, committees and networks: the PEER Forum has adopted this target. We will use diversity of membership as part of our selection criteria.
Appointments to the PEER Forum will be for an initial period of two years, beginning in September 2019. STFC may consider extension of membership for one additional year by mutual agreement, on a case by-case basis.
Forum members must be willing to actively participate, and contribute to, the Forum’s activities on a regular basis. It is expected that this participation will amount to 4-6 days of activity per year.
STFC will reimburse travel and subsistence expenses associated with attendance at Forum meetings in line with our normal policies and procedures.
Application to the PEER Forum is a single-stage process. An applicant must submit a total of three short documents as follows:
Applications that do not conform to the specified page limits, or do not contain all three required documents, will not be considered for Forum membership.
All applications must be sent by email to STFCPublicEngagement@stfc.ac.uk by no later than 16:00 on Monday 3 June 2019. Applications should be clearly marked in the email title as, ‘Application for STFC PEER Forum: [Applicant Name]’.
All applications will be assessed by an independent peer review panel, who will make recommendations on membership to STFC. The panel will use the following assessment criteria to arrive at their recommendations:
From applicants demonstrated to meet the criteria listed above, STFC aim to ensure Forum membership diversity across protected characteristics, institutions, and research disciplines. Particular attention will be paid to the gender diversity of Forum membership.
The decision of STFC in making invitations to join the PEER Forum is final.
| w/c 1 April 2019 | Call for PEER Forum membership opens |
| 3 June 2019 | Deadline for applications |
| w/c 1 July 2019 | Assessment panel meeting |
| w/c 29 July 2019 | Applicants informed of STFC decisions |
| mid-September 2019 | First meeting of the PEER Forum attended by new members |
All enquiries about the STFC Public Engagement Early-Career Researcher Forum should be directed initially to STFCPublicEngagement@stfc.ac.uk
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Last updated: 21 March 2019
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