Bioscience Sandwhich Student Review

The atmosphere in the department is friendly and quite relaxed, but the first few months were a struggle due to the sheer volume of things to understand in order to carry out my project well. However, it got increasingly more enjoyable as I got the hang of it, despite many frustrations as aspects of the science I was using didn't work as hoped. Other colleagues were always happy to provide suggestions too, which helped this.

I felt like one of the team and was never made to feel like 'just a sandwich student', and got along with everyone well. However, as the departments are so big and I worked with so many different people, it did take a while to settle in and properly get to know people. The department often arranged social events such as going out for lunch, which helped with this, and there was a cake desk too!

It was a steep learning curve for at least the first half of my placement and I had to do a lot by my myself, but I wouldn’t say that this was due to a lack of support or guidance, as help was always there if I asked for it I just wasn’t having my hand constantly held. I was encouraged to do a lot independently which has definitely paid off now I’m nearing the end of the year, as I feel far more competent than I think I would have, had I not had to figure things out by myself.

The workload can vary greatly from day to day, depending on the work you have to do in the lab. There were days that I had to stay very late to fit in steps on an assay, but there were also very quiet days where I spent most of the time reading papers. Most of the time it was about the right level, and the flexible working time is very useful as I could always leave earlier on the next day if I’d had to stay later the day before. I was also quite unlucky in my placement, in that I had quite a long stretch of time where I was waiting for an external delivery of protein to arrive, so couldn’t carry out any more lab work and was therefore less busy than I should have been, but this was completely out of the control of the placement.

I had almost complete responsibility of my project, planning and carrying out all of the experiments myself and in control of ordering reagents in time too. I would run them past my supervisor before carrying them out, but was never instructed on what to do next. I also met with representatives from an external company involved in the project, initially with my supervisor but by the end of the year I was organising meetings with these representatives and going to them alone.

I feel that this year has been invaluable to me, as I feel far more independent and able to work with people professionally in a way that will be useful for life. It has definitely improved my organisational skills and my initiative to put myself out of my comfort zone, to the point that many things I was nervous of at the start of the year such as presentations, barely worry me now.

The office is friendly and people have a good sense of humour, and there are usually a couple of conversations going on. As it’s open plan, you can find people quickly if you need to speak to them and it feels quite open. The desks themselves are large so plenty of working space and also a cake desk where people in the department frequently bring in cake!

The placement was well set up and a lot of organisation was evident. There was a good network between both placement students and other students/graduates on similar placements between the whole company, not just the lab-based departments. However, the initial paperwork was rather confusing and lacked some communication, but this was handled by an external recruitment company.

Initially we had training sessions over several weeks specific to the department, to allow us to use the range of equipment and software we would need. Additionally there were often lectures and meetings that we were welcome to attend on current technologies and research, often from external groups. All students had the option to arrange work shadowing with each other in different departments, and the change to attend several conferences throughout the year.

Personally I would be happy to return, and am considering the graduate scheme here after I complete my final year of university. As the company is relocating to a different site across the country, many employees will soon be leaving, meaning that employment opportunities here in the next few years could be quite good. However, the graduate scheme isn’t automatically lined up to a full-time position in the future.

There is a network of students set up by AstraZeneca which organises both social events outside of work and educational ones within work time, including full day seminars. Many of the students live together as we had the opportunity to meet before the placement began on an induction day, so could arrange to rent house shares together. Because of this there are quite often student nights out and parties too, informally organised.

Far cheaper than in my university city, by about £100/month less in rent. For a 3 bedroom house with fairly large rooms and an ensuite we paid £750/month. However many of the local accommodation is old so heating can be more expensive. Nights out are also cheap and most of us lived within walking distance of the town centre. All of the bars pubs and the one club are free to enter and drinks are fairly standard for a non-student area.

There isn’t that much local nightlife but Manchester is only a short train journey away, and a mini bus between 15 or so people only comes to about £10/person to get there. However there are several more relaxed pubs around with a good atmosphere and a few bars too. Also there are quite a few good restaurants which are quite reasonably priced and do very good food, as well as takeaways.

There are a handful of company wide hobby based clubs such as cycling, photography, but I wasn’t involved in any myself. However as a department we quite often did things outside work such as going for meals or nights out. The company Christmas party was a huge event and really impressive, and free to attend. As well the sports club organised a few events like a site run, fancy dress rounders and fancy dress ‘it’s a knockout’ which were all good fun.