During 2012 I supervised my first cohort of final year BSc Chemistry students in their projects. The students had to each design and develop an experiment or demonstration that was related to research conducted by the ATMOS group (my old research group – atmospheric chemistry). They had to present their final activities as an exhibition stand at an event in a school and an event at the Abbey Pumping Station, Leicester.
I mentored the guys by first taking them to the National Space Centre, where they looked around the galleries picking up ideas for their poster presentations. They then assisted in a chemistry and an environmental masterclass – giving GCSE and A Level students the chance to find out what it is really like doing a Chemistry undergrad degree.
I thought the guys worked brilliantly. They were extremely creative and came up with designs to make their own t-shirts. I was very proud of them on the day, they were all naturally talented communicators – their awesome marks were a testament to how hard they worked throughout their projects. Two of the students went on to do PGCEs.
