All Postdoc Academy courses

An official welcome from the Office of Postdoctoral Affairs (OPdA), there will be a brief interactive presentations from the Careers Service and Personal and Professional Development (PPD) whose principal role is to support the University's research staff.

An official welcome from the Office of Postdoctoral Affairs (OPdA). This event consists of two sessions so as to give postdocs an opportunity of attending either a morning OR an afternoon session as best suits. Both sessions will include brief interactive presentations from the OPdA, Careers Service and Personal and Professional Development (PPD) whose principal role is to support the University's research staff.

Introductory forum on Impact, specifically user engagement, focused on enhancing awareness of media relations, public engagement and policy engagement.

The seminar will provide you with a roadmap of practical steps and issues to consider when submitting a research ethical application for review by a University research ethics committee. It will provide an overview of the research ethics structure at Cambridge and signpost the relevant guidelines and sources of support. It will take you through the application journey from who should apply for ethical review, how to prepare and submit an application to what factors research ethics committees consider during their review.

The instructor is Dr Rhys Morgan, Research Governance and Integrity Officer, or Dr Sinead Healy, Research Governance Facilitator, of the Research Strategy Office (RSO).

Good practice in research: authorship and publication ethics

Have you ever faced any issues related to authorship within your research group or making a submission to a journal? Using case studies and group discussion, this course will explore best practice in authorship and publication from deciding how authorship of a paper is decided to managing the challenges that can arise when working with publishers or editors. Discussions will include ‘grey areas’, common issues and navigating a fictional authorship dispute, and you will be given the opportunity to share your experiences and perspectives.

Have you ever faced any issues related to authorship within your research group or making a submission to a journal? - Who gets to be an author? - How do you start a conversation on authorship with your research team? - What approaches can be used to resolve an authorship problem? - How are mistakes handled in a published paper? - In what circumstances will a paper be retracted from a journal?

Publishing research, and getting fair credit for publishing, can lead to difficulties and pitfalls (especially if you’re unsure about how to best manage various aspects of the process).

Using case studies and group discussion, this course will explore best practice in authorship and publication from deciding how authorship of a paper is decided to managing the challenges that can arise when working with publishers or editors. Discussions will include ‘grey areas’, common issues and pitfalls, and you will be given the opportunity to share your experiences and perspectives.

The instructor is Dr Rhys Morgan, Research Governance and Integrity Officer, or Dr Sinead Healy of the Research Strategy Office (RSO).

Please note this is now a virtual session.

Have you ever faced any issues related to authorship within your research group or making a submission to a journal?

• Who gets to be an author?
• How do you start a conversation on authorship with your research team?
• What approaches can be used to resolve an authorship problem?
• How are mistakes handled in a published paper?
• In what circumstances will a paper be retracted from a journal?

Using case studies and group discussion, this course will explore best practice from how authorship of a paper is decided to managing the challenges that can arise when working with publishers or editors. Discussions will include ‘grey areas’, common issues and pitfalls, and you will be given the opportunity to share your experiences and perspectives.

This talk will take place on Friday 27th September at 13:00 in room AG03b Exams hall, Student Services Centre

Topics covered:

• Mission and values of the University
• Principles informing governance at Cambridge
• Overview of governance bodies
• Senior University offices and officers
• Key governance bodies: Regent House, Council, General Board, Board of Scrutiny
• Key governance resources: Statutes and Ordinances, Reporter, Governance hub

The Postdoc Academy has reopened its hot-desking space to postdocs for quiet working at Postdoc Centre, Eddington and we are now offering slots in the early morning and in the evening. Your patience and understanding is appreciated as we continue to reopen this facility in a safe manner.

Please read the below notes carefully before booking:

• Before booking a hot-desking space at Eddington, please complete the short online induction form here:

https://bit.ly/HotDeskingPdA

• Postdocs can book one of six hot-desks available, in 1hr 45 minute slots
• Your booking will be checked by a member of our team and upon approval your University card will be activated for access to the postdoc centre at the time of your booking(s).
• Please book your session at least one working day in advance in order for your card to be activated.
• If you do not have a University card, please note this in the 'special requirements' section of the booking form, and we will provide information on access when we confirm your booking.
• If you don't have a CRSid, please complete the following form to request your booking: https://www.postdocacademy.cam.ac.uk/forms/utbs-external-booking
• Time slots for the next week's sessions are released for booking on Wednesdays, at approximately 3pm
• The days on which hot-desking is available may vary week by week

If you have recently started peer reviewing, or are ready to get involved, the OSC invites you to this unmissable session, where you will pick up tips and best practices from PLOS, publishers of the world's largest multi-disciplinary peer-reviewed journal.

This session provides valuable career advice to science postdocs from the speaker's own experience, expressed with a good deal of humour.

Postdoctoral Researchers are typically employed on relatively short-term contracts, and are funded by so-called 'soft money' to carry out a specific project for a PI. This creates an immediate tension. The specific project will have research objectives and deliverables that must be met to satisfy whoever is funding the work, and the PI will be assessed on whether these goals have been met. However, a postdoctoral researcher will often have their own research interests and also career objectives. A really successful postdoctoral project is one in which everyone's goals are met. The talk will cover a little about Dr Flewitt's own experience of this process from the perspective of both sides and try and draw out some general thoughts for discussion.

With ever developing complexities in the UK’s immigration system, Graeme Ross, the University’s Head of Immigration for staff matters, conducts termly briefing sessions for non-UK postdocs holding UK visas. These commonly cover the ‘basic’ work visas, such as Skilled Worker and Global Talent, and how to switch into or extend these in order to remain in the UK. However additional guidance on applications for dependents and Indefinite Leave to Remain/Settlement is also covered. There will be an opportunity to ask questions about other immigration matters; not all of these may be answered on the day but would be followed up individually as needed.

Following the UK government’s announcement of a ‘new’ visa route, known as the Global Talent Visa, Graeme Ross, the University’s Head of Immigration for staff members, will conduct a presentation on what this means for postdocs and how to apply for this visa. There will also be a short presentation on other relevant visa routes, such as dependant visas and Indefinite Leave to Remain/Settlement, and an opportunity to ask questions about other immigration matters.

With ever developing complexities in the UK’s immigration system, join us for this briefing and Q&A with the University’s Head of Immigration.

The session will cover:

• the ‘basic’ work visas, such as Skilled Worker and Global Talent
• how to switch into or extend these in order to remain in the UK
• guidance on applications for dependents
• Indefinite Leave to Remain/settlement/citizenship applications.

There will also be plenty of time for you to ask questions about other immigration matters. If your question cannot be answered on the day, it will be followed up individually afterwards.

Please note: it is important that when you book this course, on the booking confirmation page, select Add to Calendar to start importing the appointment to your calendar.

GSK, the science-led global healthcare company, is running a forum for networking and sharing information about what unique skills postdocs have, by virtue of their roles, and how these are mutually beneficial.

Please note this session is now running as a virtual/online session. Joining instructions will be emailed closer to the time.

People love stories. They entertain, they help us to remember. This short interactive session is aimed at researchers looking to improve the effectiveness of their communication. It will introduce the importance of working out who your audience is and what they want to know. It will also explore how storytelling is as relevant to research communication as it is to fairy tales. We all have to communicate our research and ideas, why not do it through stories?

The session will be delivered by the Academic Director for STEM, Institute of Continuing Education.

Please note that if you are not eligible for a University of Cambridge Raven account you will need to book by linking here.

We’ll be looking at the what, why and how of public engagement and introducing researchers to some of the ways to plan an effective public engagement project.

Please note that if you are not eligible for a University of Cambridge Raven account you will need to book by linking here.

Once you have booked a provisional place on this course, you will need to email the organiser Dr Rahuman Sheriff, sheriff AT ebi.ac.uk with your CV and cover-letter explaining why you would like to participate, with “MOL-workshop” in the subject line by 18th September 2019.

Computer models are increasingly used by researchers as well as pharmaceutical industry to investigate molecular mechanisms disease initiation, progression and therapy. Systems modelling of biochemical pathways deregulated in disease condition offers mechanistic insights into the pathology; helps to elucidate mechanisms behind dug action and predict dose required for treatment and thereby greatly facilitates fundamental research and drug discovery. Such modelling requires background in both molecular biology and mathematics.

This workshop will train postdocs from life science and mathematics to communicate and work together to learn to build and analyse computational models using user-friendly open source software. Participant will explore selected computational models from a recent publication, freely available in BioModels repository (www.ebi.ac.uk/biomodels/).

Speakers:

Lourdes Cucurull-Sanchez PhD Director, Quantitative Clinical Pharmacology GSK Medicines Research Centre, Gunnels Wood Road, Stevenage, Hertfordshire, SG1 2NY, UK

Prof. Jasmin Fisher PhD, FRSB Professor of Computational Biology UCL Cancer Institute Faculty of Medical Sciences, Paul O’Gorman Building 72 Huntley Street, London WC1E 6DD

Alfonso Martinez Arias PhD Professor of Developmental Mechanick Department of Genetics University of Cambridge Cambridge CB2 3EH

Tutors:

Rahuman Sheriff PhD, Thawfeek Varusai PhD and Krishna Tiwari EMBL-EBI, Cambridge, UK

Learn how to sell your research to the media. You will pick up some tips on best media practice and how to spark interest in your specialism.

This event is for postdocs at the approximate mid-point (1-2 years) of a typical postdoctoral tenure in Cambridge (up to 5 years*). It has been designed specifically for this key career stage to help you position yourself for the next step in your career, in academia or otherwise.

This interactive online session will cover:

• What next - reflecting on your professional development and identifying what you would like to achieve during the rest of your contract.
• How could you get there - sharing ideas for how to achieve your development goals, focus on key professional development topics, and where to find information and support across the University.
• Action planning - gain tools to ensure you know when and how to take the next steps during your remaining time as a postdoc.
• Q&A - informal discussion with the facilitators and other participants.

This booking is provisional and will be approved once you have submitted the full registration form. The form has been designed to help you think about your experiences in Cambridge so far in advance of the session. The data you provide will help us to better understand the challenges, needs, and aspirations of postdocs at this stage of their careers.

The deadline for registration and booking is 12pm on 26 February.

*If you have been a postdoc for more than 5 years and this session is of interest, please get in touch: development.pda@admin.cam.ac.uk

This event is for postdocs near the mid-point of their current contract at Cambridge.

The session has been designed specifically for this key career stage to help you position yourself for the next step in your career (in academia or otherwise).

You will have the opportunity to reflect on your professional development activities so far and get guidance to support you in working towards your future goals.

This interactive online session will cover:

• What next - reflecting on your professional development and identifying what you would like to achieve during the rest of your contract.
• How could you get there - sharing ideas for how to achieve your development goals, focus on key professional development topics, and where to find information and support across the University.
• Action planning - gain tools to ensure you know when and how to take the next steps during your remaining time as a postdoc.
• Q&A - informal discussion with the facilitators and other participants.

Please also complete this form when you make a booking so that we can tailor the session to suit the needs of participants. Your booking will be approved upon our receipt of this form.

The booking deadline is 22 March 2023.

“At Cambridge, we recognise that world-leading research depends on the connections researchers make to share ideas, pose new questions, challenge assumptions and form collaborations.”

Cambridge has a range of networks to promote interdisciplinary working and connect researchers across the university. These networks provide a range of opportunities for postdocs, from meeting new people and establishing collaborations, to developing and funding their own interdisciplinary projects. We have created this event to give postdocs a chance to find out about the importance of interdisciplinary research at Cambridge and the lively network of cross-School initiatives at the University.

For further information please see the short video: What impact will your next connection have?

Speakers: This event will be chaired by the Postdoc Academy Researcher Development team. There will be a general presentation introducing all of the SRNs/IRCs followed by individual presentations from Stephanie Norwood (Synthetic Biology IRC), Maria Bargues Ribera (Cambridge Infectious Diseases), Margarida Dias Rodrigues (Centre for Physical Biology), Francesca Re Manning (Global Food Security IRC ), and Sara Serradas O’Holleran (Global Challenges SRI). We will also be joined by postdocs who will talk about their experiences with these groups. Presentations will last for around 40 mins total with an opportunity for Q&A for the final 20 mins.

This seminar, facilitated by the Head of Research Information at the Research Strategy Office, outlines online tools that can be used to enhance networking and online presence. The software overview includes Symplectic Elements (a publication retrieval tool and Research Information Management System), Altmetrics (a social media analysis tool) and Research Professional (a funding information database).

Join the Office of Postdoctoral Affairs [OPdA] at their flagship Postdoc Centre @ Eddington for lunch with the Head of OPdA, Karina Prasad, and Assistant Head, Liz Simmonds. Over lunch, Karina and Liz will give a brief overview of the OPdA and how it can support you in your role. This will include the OPdA’s current initiatives, work on the Concordat, and other areas with a connection to HR and support for postdocs. There will also be an opportunity to have your questions answered.