Industrial Placement Student in the Synthetic Biochemistry Department Review

I thoroughly enjoyed my placement and throughout the year, I made the most of all the opportunities available both within and out-with work. Being able to carry out research in an industrial setting allowed me to be exposed to a corporate leader with less pressures as a student rather than a full-time member of staff.

My colleagues were extremely welcoming and made me feel fully integrated into the team. During work and out-with work (e.g. team-building, Christmas celebratory events), I had genuine conversations with all members of my team. Furthermore, I felt valued when I reached a level where other individuals would ask me for help in the lab.

My supervisor took complete responsibility for my mentoring and tutelage especially during the first few months of my placement. He trained me in the lab and out-with to give me necessary skills for me to confidently and independently work throughout my placement. In addition, he acted as my pastoral supervisor.

The work-load was variable. At times, I felt like I had too much to do with balancing experimental work; recording and analysing results; university report writing and general work activities building up. However, the moments with little to do (e.g. during a lab move I was involved in) made me realise it was much better to be busy than 'scratching the barrel'.

I worked on a project with most of the experimental work carried out by IP students. This felt like a large responsibility and thus, an increasingly amount of pressure to generate results. I was also treated like a full-time member of staff with the same responsibilities as others in my team such as reporting broken equipment in the lab etc.

I think the skills I have learnt this year will significantly impact my future. Not only will I benefit from the technical skills I have developed, I have improved my soft-skills such as building confidence; improving my professionalism, interpersonal and public-speaking. All of which will help me within my final year at university and future job prospects.

During my placement, I was moved into the brand new lab and office space within Stevenage (the High-Throughput Chemistry lab). This was a collaborative space for various departments to communicate. I felt the office had a friendly atmosphere- People regularly brought in snacks and treats and a good level of chit-chat occurred (but at a low enough level to keep the office as a professional working space).

Overall, my placement was organised with clear aims of the work that would have to be carried out over my placement. However on a day-day basis, my individual work activities were subject to change which made it difficult to time-manage with experiments/ work to carry out. Nevertheless, I was busy almost every day and always had something to do even at the end of my placement.

Personal development within site was encouraged by my team. However, when SRG stated 'the manager must consent with paying any fees' for development out-with site (e.g. visiting other sites and paying transport costs), my department was somewhat resistant and would not oversee costs to visit other sites. This made me less willing to ask to develop further outwith Stevenage (but any 'free' development opportunities were fully optimized by me).

Generally quite appealing. I have applied for the Future Leader Graduate Scheme in Commercial Management: Consumer Healthcare. After I organised a day at GSK House Headquarters, I took an interest in other business areas (i.e. marketing). Visiting brand management teams at GSK house exposed me to opportunities outwith science that I would really like to pursue.

Definitely at the start, students were keen to socialise amongst one another. As the year went on, social groups formed and there was less communication between the IP community as a whole. Saying this, IP Unite organised some great social events that were incredibly popular with IPs from all different sites including the Christmas Ball and Thames Boat Party.

Cost of living was around equal to university. Socialising was more expensive due to less student area compared to university.

As Stevenage is not near a university, nightlife was limited to the IPs that populated it.