1. Research Student Development Programme
Dr Richy Hetherington
The University and the UK research councils recognise the importance of providing researchers appropriate training in a broad range of skills and providing the mechanism for skills to be recorded and reflected upon. So the Research Councils require that all of their research students be involved in the equivalent of 10 working days of training and development each year and this is a policy the Faculty would uphold for all of its research students. The development programme is there to provide some of those opportunities and help point you in the direction of the others.

2. National Changes Number of research students has increased
HEI full time
Academic staff
99/00 113,790
14/15 132,865
% Doctoral Graduates work in HE research 6 months after graduation,19% after 3.5 years
An international policy of investing in Education and research meant a large increase in the number of research students. So the employment market has become much more competitive. Almost tripling of Doctoral Graduates in the last 17 years.
There has not been the same relative increase in the number of academic positions so more research students would be taking up other employment roles. Thus the role of the supervisor and student has become less of the master and apprentice and more, the supervisor providing a framework for the student to develop their skills as a researcher.
Data from & Vitae
Number of research students has increased
Full time academic positions have not

3. The data aligns to findings that you are likely to be shown several times. While some are rather horrified or smug at this I think growing number of doctoral graduates and the large numbers who enter careers outside of academia as a good sign. It is a clear indication the PhD is being valued for the higher level skills it the doctoral graduates can show in a range of areas.
The Royal Society Scientific Century: securing our future prosperity 2010

4. A changing employer environment
Competency Frameworks
Appraisal and feedback
Performance Management
Self Assessment
These changes in relative numbers of applicants with research degrees came at the same time as a change in the expectations of employers. The employers look now to their human capital more that their physical assets.

5. Programme Booklet Mostly accurate but is subject to change Changes
Basic Statistics – 15th Nov to 22nd
Brilliant Club – 12th Oct (was 31st Oct)
One of the things handed out today is a development programme booklet, your supervisors should also have received this. The booklet contains the majority but not all of the development programme sessions. The ability to take courses is nothing new and the faculty has always encouraged research students to find taught course programmes that would be of use to them. In most cases this is still done by contacting the module leader or the degree programme directly. A full list of taught course modules can be found at this web address.
However the Programme is provided mainly to support researchers development in not research specific skills but transferable skills, the programme is continually evolving to help meet the needs of research students and their professional development.

6. Inside the booklet Events with identical names are duplicate events
A few sessions are mandatory –
Managing your PhD
Appropriate Safety sessions
Academic Integrity
Research Ethics
Inside you will find a chronological list of events, with a page reference next to each, with links to a description for each session. As you can see some sessions are highlighted as mandatory you only need to attend any session once, preferably at your earliest convenience. Though there is an element of discretion within that if you are a member of staff and have been working on a project for a while and have already had the appropriate saftey training you to do the work you won’t need to attend similarly if your project is entirely desk based you won’t need to attend a chemical safety session. We don’t police this as we hope that your assessors will notice any training gaps during annual assessment. So sometimes people do manage not to attend these session we find that when if we do get instances of things such as plagiarism it is with students who have not attended sessions such as Academic Integrity and Plagiarism. We can also link attendance of sessions such as Managing your Research Degree to the timely completion of annual assessment and the thesis.

7. Session Details
In information about each session there is a brief description of what the session is about with who is presenting or facilitating the session. There is a list of skills we hope the session will help you with, the skills are charted against a national framework the Joint Skills statement skills headings which you can find in the back pages of the booklet and some feedback on the session from researchers who have attended previously including ratings and comments. Then the date and the room the session takes place, there is a map of the rooms in the back page of the booklet.

8. Graduate School Website
ncl.ac.uk/fms
The booklet however is only a guide, the graduate school website is the place to find all the information. The front page will contain any major news items. Links on the left hand menu will take you to other items of interest. It is easy to get to the site from the Newcastle university home page and it is /FMS

9. Statistics, Modelling & Bioinformatics
Statistical Considerations
IT Support & Package Overview
Basic Stats
Beginners SPSS
Advanced SPSS
One to One Statistics Support
Applied Stats (ICM)
Scientific Computation (Python)
Getting started with SAS
The Statistical Considerations in Experimental Research takes place at the beginning of each academic year with and is an expanded version of this slide. We try to help students be aware of potential issues that arise in collecting data for quantitative analysis and the sort of training and advice that is available to help. Don’t worry if you have missed this or any of these sessions we do try to make as much of this available online as we can and we are generally keen to provide support.
It is important to consider which software is the easiest and most appropriate for the type of analysis you will use there is a training session in November that will provide advice on which software is supported and which is the most likely to work for you.
We don’t aim to provide training in all statistical tests, there are two many but we do want you to understand the basics before you start. There is a Basic Stats session that quickly works up from the most basic terms and covers the most common analysis methods.
To help put the most straight forward tests into practice there is an SPSS course in November February and May , those who find that useful and would like further advice for more complex use of SPSS and could do with some directed advice there is an advanced user session that takes place in May
The Applied Statistic session is intended principally for students in Institute of cellular medicine but some places may be available to research students across the faculty. This set of four short workshops provides a way to understand the more basic statistical methods from the bioscientists perspective, using real data for analysis.
There are a number of sessions and courses that can support students who require computation or modelling there are introductory session for Python, SAS and Matlab. There are more complete programmes for Bioconductor software, R programming and Sysmic these are all training programmes that need to be paid for but are delivered at cost price to Newcastle research students. This training is not currently linked through the research students development programme but is available, discuss the requirements with your supervisors and I can point you too how to book up for it.
When you have a good a clear understanding of the experiments you are trying to set up there are one to one statistics support sessions. These sessions are intended for students who have a clear goal in mind for their experiments, quite possibly have some preliminary data to base a larger scale study on. Dr Pearce can provide very insightful help but is not a magician so can’t transform a useless set of data into a significant result. It is advised that students might wish to take advantage of the one to one support sessions at key points in their design and the analysis of data to confirm their approach is the best possible. During the one hour session there it is not possible to define experiments or analysis from scratch, coming with a plan and a clearly defined question makes the most use of this resource.
Bioconductor
bioconductor.org
R Programming
SYSmic

10. Booking system Access to Postgrad Training across the University
Keeps a log of the sessions you have booked
Updates your attendance to you ePortfolio
Taking the left hand link for skills development will take you to a list of workshops that should include all of those in the booklet, but throughout the year there may be additions to this list. It is important that all items are booked through this site. This allows us to make appropriate staffing arrangements, monitoring the uptake so we know whether to put more courses on or to cancel them. It also allows us to send out evaluations so we can see how to improve items. We may need to change rooms or times and those who have booked can be informed.
You will be automatically sent an electronic evaluation after attending, please do take the time to complete this, we need this information to make improvements where they are needed but also as evidence that what we are doing is useful and appreciated. When you do attend a record of your attendance will be made in your ePortfolio, this will be important for those of you continuing on to a PhD as these records might be looked at.
Your address is the unique identifier for bookings so it is essential you use your Newcastle university address for a record to be made.
There is also an option to register your interest if you can’t attend or if a session is fully booked, we will endeavour to get back to everyone registering their interest in a session to see if there is a way they can get advice in this area.

11. Medical Sciences Booking

12. Online Resources
Where possible we have tried to make the materials delivered available online, we are trying to develop a system for login to access of these materials so we can updates peoples records but that is an ongoing process. The majority of the materials are presented open to access without any login.

13. IT training Library Information sessions
(Endnote, Library Databases, Further Research Resources,)
and
IT sessions (Managing Your Essay, Data & Spreadsheets, Presentations using PowerPoint etc.
Interactive materials accessed Online

14. Interactive Guide

15. Linked to ePortfolio https://portfolio.ncl.ac.uk/
All of the sessions you book up for and attend will be automatically updated into your CV, courses and conferences attended section. Allowing you to reflect on what you have gained from these sessions. More detail will be given in the ePortfolio & PDP session but essentially the skills attached to each of the sessions in the development programme will relate to skills in your Personal Development Plan and these are all linked to the Joint Skills Statement, Skills Headings.
This will give you the opportunity to record and reflect on the skills you require and how you can develop them
Automatic ePortfolio updates

16. Ridley Atrium

17. Graduate Training Suite

18. Faculty Travel Grant

19. More development opportunities
Research Seminars
Other graduate schools (SAgE and HaSS) development programmes
Library, IT, Academic Writing Centre
FameLab
Brilliant Club
Three Minute Thesis (3MT)
Biotechnology YES
Vitae (UK Grad)
Postgraduate Conference
We are keen to promote the range of external development opportunities and relate them to the development programme sessions where possible.
Remember to record the things you do in your ePortfolio

20. Please register at www.ne-pg.co.uk
UK’s Largest FREE postgraduate conference covering Medical, Bioscience Health Sciences
Student talks & posters: Neuroscience, Immunology, Public Health and Epidemiology, Genetics, Mitochondria, Nutrition, Microbiology, Cancer, Cell and molecular biology , Ageing
Please register at

22. Your Involvement Evaluations PRES Development Programme Review Group
Institute Reps
Graduate School Committee
It has been a steep learning curve to becoming an independent researcher, and sometimes it can feel like you are thrown in the deep end. However, in the long run, I now feel confident that I can work independently.

23. Student Rep Roles School Rep Two per Institute
Represent the student view at Faculty meetings
Meets with key staff
Feeds back to Institute’s students
School rep:
Usually two per School - one taught, one research
Represent the student view at Faculty meetings
Meets with key staff
Feeds back to Course Reps what has been decided at both University and Faculty meetings
Education officer:
Attends University wide meetings
Represents the whole student view
Feeds back to the School Reps what has changed

24. The Good News

25. The Good News
The good news is across the sector it seems to be working

26. I wish you every success in your research and your career
Finally I’d like to wish you every success with your research but beyond that too, with your career and making name for yourself in research and beyond here are a few of our researchers who have done this in recently, here are some great examples just last month Rhys Anderson winning the people’s choice vote in the Vitae national three minute thesis competition, a couple of years ago Pete Chater presenting a poster of his research at the House of Commons, and Graciela Rocha and I after Graciela had won a prize for her public engagement poster at a national event hosted at Leeds university.
Thanks and any questions?