Generation Research is an organisation that aims to inspire the next generation researchers by providing paid summer research placements to undergraduate students. Positions are across disciplines in a range of technical and research projects.
PhD students act as supervisors to these undergraduate students. They propose, write and submit a summer research project. If this is selected they help recruit their undergraduate student and then supervise them to carry out the project, gaining a great deal of skills and supervisory experience in the process. Flexible funding helped support the research project carried out by the placement students.
You can find out more about the programme here.
DiMeN will be promoting the GenRes programme and encouraging applications from our students when the next round begins in December 2024 - so look out for communications via email, Discord and the blog soon.
Arnas Tamasauskas, Liverpool
The Generation Research project has been very helpful for me in multiple ways. It was great experience taking charge of a smaller project within my thesis and act as the principal investigator while taking on a supervisor role with the undergraduate student.
First, I was able to better understand my subject. As I work in a neuroimaging lab, I got used to everyone knowing what Tract Based Spatial Statistics or Fractional Anisotropy is, and having to explain that to a an undergraduate student from scratch made me do some additional research to refresh myself on these concepts so that I could explain it in lay language. It was also useful to try and co-write code with the student in a way that is understandable for both of us.
Second, it was immensely useful to have someone help me collect data. My MRI scans require a lot of set up and recruitment eats up a lot of time, so having someone help with that side of things has been great. My student quickly picked up on my methods in the set up and she quickly got in the rhythm of contacting patients. This added time also helped me work on a different dataset that I did not have time for previously and that will result in an additional publication within my thesis.
Madeleine Gilbert, Leeds
It was a good development opportunity for me to supervise an undergraduate summer project. I also gained a lot from taking part in the selection process. Alex, the academic from York supporting the process, ranked the applications with notes. I could then see each application with the rank and notes which was really helpful for shortlisting. Alex was also on the interview panel with me which was really helpful and useful once again - I learnt how to conduct interviews, and his feedback on the candidates after the interviews was really helpful in deciding who to pick. As someone who’s never been on the other end of an interview/selection process, it was a great development opportunity.
Comments