Student support and training
Supervision
Students are allocated an ‘advisory panel’ consisting of a principal supervisor and, in some cases, a secondary supervisor (for example from an industrial partner), and two other members of academic staff from SBCS, at least one with experience of supervising students to the point of submission of a thesis and who acts as chair of the advisory panel.
Reporting
Students are required to submit written reports at various stages of their PhD, following which the advisory panel meets with the student to discuss progress and any problems that may have arisen. The chair of the panel summarises the proceedings of the meeting in a report to the director of graduate studies.
Techniques
Training in specific research techniques is provided in the laboratory of the supervisor. More generic aspects of practical and technical research training such as Health and Safety and use of analytical research techniques (radioisotopes, chromatographic separation techniques, mass spectrometry, etc) is provided by an experimental officer in SBCS. More specialised training is available from Officers that run our NMR, Crystallography, Imaging and Genome Centres.
The School (together with School of Medicine and Dentistry) also runs a programme of seminars on research techniques, intended specifically for research students. Students are expected to attend the parts of the programme that are relevant to them.
Basic mathematical, computational and data handling skills are taught in a course run by staff in SBCS entitled Statistical Methods in Biology.
Generic and transferable skills
To assist students to develop their skills in areas such as time management, independent working, teamwork, preparing and presenting scientific data, etc., they are required to participate in several events in SBCS (research project talks in the 1st year, poster presentation in 2nd year, and postgraduate symposium in the 3rd year), and to attend courses organised by the Learning Institute such as presentation and writing skills, managing research projects, poster presentation, writing for publication in refereed journals. Students are also encouraged to attend and participate in UK and International conferences and workshops.
Central student services
Queen Mary offers a range of support for students via the Student Service, including advice and counseling, disability and dyslexia, student health service, and careers advice. Further information will be available to students once they have enrolled at QMUL.