1. Research Student Development Programme
Dr Richy Hetherington
My name is Richy Hetherington, I organise the research student development programme. In 2002 UK Government and British Research Councils recognised that research students weren’t meeting their full potential, they weren’t fully confident in the full range of skills they are developing. So measures were introduced by the Universities to help researchers build skills, boost confidence and recognition of those skills and increase employability of their research students.
Of such measure was more formalised training for research students and the Mres provides an excellent research training to make sure students wishing the enter a career in research have a well guided experience.
Two other ways were to introduce the ePortfolio system to help research students record and reflect on their skills and to formalise a development programme so research students could get an organised series of opportunities to develop a range of skills. The Development Programme is there to support PhD students and some sessions such as Managing Your PhD is specifically for PhD, MD or Mphil students, some of the sessions duplicate parts of the Mres programme such as Bioethics. However the majority of the Programme is independent and different from the Mres. You are welcome to book onto any of the sessions and if you are going to do a PhD afterwards the more skills you develop now the more prepared you will be before starting your PhD.

2. Inside the booklet Welcome to attend any event Duplicate events
No events are compulsory
Apart from Safety Sessions
Your Masters course work MUST take priority
Inside you will find a list of events starting on the inside cover of the front page, with a page reference next to each session. There is information about opportunities in and around the university. Then there is more detailed information about each of the sessions there is a description for each session. You are welcome to book and attend any of the events, none of them are compulsory for you and you must attend your Mres course as first preference. We don’t indicate which sessions are also part of the Mres in case that is confusing for PhD students so if in doubt you can ask by ing

3. 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.

4. 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

5. Click here or here to take you to the booking system

6. Booking system Access to Postgrad Training across the University
Keeps a log of the sessions you have booked
Updates your attendance to you ePortfolio
The workshop booking system has links for postgraduate training and development throughout thee faculties in the university along with some central held materials. 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.
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.

7. By clicking on one of the programmes you will see the full list of sessions in that programme

8. MRes specific and directed Sessions
When you log in you will recognised and you will be directed to the medical sciences programme.
There is a tab at the top that will show you sessions of particular interest to MRes students

9. MRes specific and directed Sessions
Some sessions such as endnote are open to all but have been highlighted as being important for MRes students.
Others are specifically for the MRes such as writing examination essays

10. Online Materials
If you can’t attend session there are a couple of options to access materials online there is a tab in the booking system to online materials, by accessing them this way you will be sent an with links to the materials and an evaluation form, completing the evaluation will trigger an update of your ePortfolio to include this session.

11. Statistics, Modelling & Bioinformatics
Statistical Considerations
IT Support & Package Overview
Basic Stats
Beginners SPSS
Advanced SPSS
Scientific Computation (Python)
One to One Statistics Support
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.
Matlab
Getting started with SAS

12. Online Resources
The materials can also be accessed directly through the website by using the electronic workshops tab on the right

13. Interactive Online Training & Guidance
Library Information sessions
(Endnote, Library Databases, Further Research Resources,)
and
IT sessions (Managing Your Essay, Data & Spreadsheets, Presentations using PowerPoint etc.
Interactive materials accessed as ONLINE workshops
The online materials vary a bit, in quite a lot of cases it is just powerpoint slides or a recap of the lecture but other sessions such as Document Management or data handling and spreadsheets have interactive training materials.
There are also a set of students guidelines attached to various sections that provide very user friendly advice on starting out in research.

14. Safety Sessions Biological & Genetic Modification (GM) Chemical
Attendance recorded in your ePorfolio & training record for supervisors to check
The only part of the development programme that is mandatory for you are the safety sessions. It is a university requirement that you have attended the appropriate training before working independently in the lab (your project). Your project supervisor will know which of these sessions you will need to have attended before you can start on your project so you might not need to attend them all. I would suggest it is worth going as if something comes up that means you will need that training it will be easier if you have already had it.
Attending sessions will mean a record will be made in your ePortfolio and your project supervisor will be able to see that record. This will allow your supervisor to check whether you have had the appropriate training, they are could do this before the last sessions in February and ask you to go then if you haven’t already. Please go before the February sessions if you can because if they become oversubscribed you may not have the appropriate training you need to start in the lab.

15. ePortfolio
All sessions you attend will update into the courses section of the CV on your ePortfolio.

16. Varied Development opportunities
Research Seminars
Other graduate schools (SAgE and HaSS) development programmes
Library, NUIT, Maths Aid, Writing Centre
Bright Club
Biotechnology YES
Three Minute Thesis
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

18. Free registration Visit www.ne-pg.co.uk

19. Ridley Atrium

20. Graduate Training Suite

21. Summary Development Programme Attend what you want to
Only safety is compulsory
Your MRes coursework MUST take priority
Please Book to attend Sessions
Care with booking some sessions are duplicate some are PhD/MD/MPhil specific
Look out for other opportunities
e.g. conference etc
Plan, Record and reflect using ePortfolio

22. Wishing you every success
Finally I’d like to wish you every success with your MRes but also with your professional development more broadly
The picture is of Ellie, Valeria, Beccie , Hannah all PhD students at Newcastle Ellie and Beccie having completed the MRes here first. They had won a regional Biotech YES young entreprenurs scheme competition and this is them at a very nice hotel in Knightsbridge London about to pitch in the finals of the competition.
Thanks and any questions?