The summer of 2011 seems to be shaping up nicely in the researcher development world despite the upheaval in terms of reorganisation that generally pervades right now. I am currently working with colleagues to put on a few events through May and June to give research students at UWE the opportunity to share their interests.

We are aiming to provide some institution-wide development events to complement the round of departmental seminars and conferences that are already planned. The theme of these overarching events is connections; gettting ones research out to where it matters.

To help with this I am putting together a workshop on the topic of “Preparing Research Posters”, an exploration of how to communicate your research in a visual way on one sheet of paper, not easy to do effectively. 

I’m also hoping to firm up arrangements for a friend and colleague, Dr Tristram Hooley from the University of Derby, to come to UWE and facilitate a workshop on how to use social media tools to augment your research efforts. Just knowing that he is coming has given me impetus to set up this very blog! He has his own blog right here. Preparing for and advertising this event will force me to widen my use of social media tools although I’m a prolific (and proficient?) user of both Twitter and facebook.

The final event that we are trying to organise (if we can get some rooms booked whilst the summer school season kicks into top gear!) will aim to showcase the research posters (and offer a prize for the posters judged to be the most effective at communicating the message).

So this is my inaugural post on a blog. Time now to get organising and make some connections happen!