Personal and Academic Development

Description

10 Credits

You will meet your Personal Tutor for your PAT tutorial. To continue with group work, you will work within your Tutor Group to produce a press release for an academic paper, reflecting on how your ability to work in a group has developed since semester one (18.2). As part of this process you will discuss the portrayal of science in the media, which will lead into discussions on appropriate scientific sources. 
Using appropriate sources will be vital for your second semester assessed essay (18.1), where you will be asked to reflect on your first semester essay and address at least three key areas.

You will write a CV and use this as a basis for discussion on what skills you can develop at university (18.3) and you will be encouraged to engage with Careers Services and schemes such as PSA (Personal Skills Award). You will be encouraged to engage with social media (e.g. LinkedIn) in a scientific capacity and will discuss the negatives and positives of this.
To prepare you for presentations in later years, you will give a five minute presentation within you tutor groups, reflecting on how you can improve your presentation skills in the future (18.4). To help with speaking in a larger group as well as give you the opportunity to develop leadership roles by co-running these sessions, you will take part in an ethics debate on a relevant aspect of Biosciences.

Ahead of second year, you will undertake basic training in R-studio. Further, there will be an underlying thread of inclusivity and diversity; completing on-line diversity training followed by a reflection.

By the end of the module students should be able to:

• Write a scientific essay, correctly formatted (i.e. figure legends and citations), with a working knowledge of academic integrity and using appropriate scientific sources.
• Work in a group to produce a press release for an academic paper, consider how the media explains science and reflect on the experience of group work.
• Reflect on how your university experience can benefit your career pathway and as part of this process create a CV. Further students will reflect themes of inclusivity and diversity.
• Give an oral presentation and reflect on how you can improve your presenting skills for the future.
• Carry out basic coding in R-studio.