Research Training

NERC DTP student training:

Panorama will offer outstanding training opportunities to excellent NERC DTP students from all backgrounds to address real-life environmental questions. As a result, PhD graduates will be prepared for careers leading the environmental industry, government, academia and beyond. Our DTP is supported by Collaborative Awards in Science and Engineering (CASE) partnerships with more than 40 companies (e.g. Yorkshire Water, Arup, Mott MacDonald, Syngenta, Ørsted), charities (e.g. Natural History Museum, FrogLife, Friends of the Earth), research institutions (e.g. CEH, NCAS) and government agencies (e.g. Natural England, DEFRA, Environment Agency).

Our cohort-based training is divided into specific development themes and will address Cohort Building, Personal Effectiveness, Careers and Leadership, Communication & Policy and Data & Analytics. This is delivered through a multidisciplinary programme, providing research, personal effectiveness, professional, career and transferable skills. Subject-specific training is delivered through bespoke training, industrial partners, departmental/university training and individualised training tailored to the student’s skill set.

The key principles of our NERC DTP student training programme are to:

• Equip DTP students with the skills and knowledge for leadership in a 21st century workforce.
• Provide optimum career prospects to all students through training provision, expertise, leadership, entrepreneurship and innovation.
• Embed industrial and end-user partners within the training programmes to inform and provide relevance.
• Develop a cohort of motivated and independent early career researchers who will become the next generation of environmental scientists working in relevant research areas and supporting the UK industrial strategy, NERC delivery plan 2016-2020, Conservation 21, and the 25-year Environment Plan.

Career planning is embedded throughout the whole programme, starting from the induction that includes a career event with alumni, existing students and selected industry partners. Our representative training programme (see table below) combines cohort-wide development events (core events) and individualized training that will be informed through a training needs analysis (TNA). From the results of the TNA, the individual student’s training needs will be agreed in discussion with the details with the supervisory team and will be revisited at annual meetings at the beginning of the academic year. The training is by DTP academic staff, university training staff, industry and external providers.

Representative training programme:

*The Programme Residential Induction will be structured as a 5-day residential session at the beginning of the programme at a UK field-based research station that allows PhD students to experience scientific approaches outside of their core discipline. This event will include classroom-based sessions about the DTP training programme, the structure of a PhD, basic project management and academic integrity. The residential will also include a practical component on fieldwork skills and planning and basic modelling skills from different disciplines (e.g. Biology, Atmospheric Sciences, Earth Sciences). This will allow PhD students with field-based or theoretical project to develop skills in communicating across multi-disciplinary teams.

The development programme will consist of 38 days (year 1: 17, year 2: 10.5, year 3: 10.5) of cohort-based events. Individualized transferable skills development, as defined through the TNA, is expected to add 5 days of training per year. Subject specific skills development will vary individually.