Research scientist Review

I thoroughly enjoyed my placement, the only drawback was that it was not directly related to my degree area but nevertheless I feel that I have learnt many useful skills and am extremely glad I chose this placement.

I was immediately made to feel part of the group and not any different to permanent members of staff. I was trusted to do things for everyone in the group and also present findings at department meetings.

I was given good support at all times, I never felt like a question was too silly to ask but at the same time I was encouraged to think for myself and I think this was important to help me learn about the science we were doing and meant I always understood the work we were doing.

It depended on how my project was going, the experiments we performed took many days of full-time work to complete however there were quite long periods of waiting for results and during this time I could only help other people with what they were doing, which was not always needed.

I was given a good balance of responsibility - I was able to make my own decisions and design experiments myself, however I was never left to do something I was unsure about and was always trained very well in all areas.

My job was not exactly in my degree area so the theory I have learnt this year will not be very useful in the final year of my degree but the practical skills I have learnt in the lab will be really useful for my dissertation. I feel so much more confident in the lab environment purely from the variety of protocols and techniques I have learnt.

It was a fairly small office, but very loud! We all got on very well and this was especially useful for me as I felt I would be able to ask anyone in the group for help if I needed it.

I was introduced at a good level, they sort of assumed I knew very little which was useful as although some things I had already done before, it meant that I was taught exactly how they wanted things done, therefore after that I was very rarely picked up on my technique. Luckily in my department there were areas to progress to which meant that half way through my placement I was still learning something new and so never got bored.

I was taught to do every aspect of the group's work and in some cases was trained on new things that other members of staff hadn't.

Graduate scheme available but not much advantage for students who have done a placement already.

There were a lot of students on the site and we were encouraged at the beginning of the placement to meet each other. This made socialising very easy throughout the year.

Not as cheap as up north but not bad considering we were near London.

There was not a lot of places to go out but a lot of restaurants and a few bars.

There was not a lot to do in the area, but being close to London meant you could do plenty of things if you made the effort.