INSPIRE

These are half day visits to a research provider’s lab or group to see and hear first-hand from clinical academics and other researchers about what they do and why. Research Taster Days are offered across a large range of topic areas in Exeter, Bristol, Cardiff and Plymouth Medical Schools. These are advertised in October/November, students apply for their chosen Taster Day and then visit the research groups usually on a Wednesday afternoon sometime between late November and the end of January. The costs of travel to other medical schools, or between Truro and Exeter, can be reimbursed on submission of receipts.

Examples of recent Taster Days held at the University of Exeter include:

• Primary care research in the Exeter Collaboration for Academic Primary Care
• Research in the Children and Young People’s Mental Health Research Collaboration
• Clinical research in diabetes and related long-term conditions in the Clinical Diabetes Research Group
• Research in Digital rehabilitation within the Interdisciplinary Translational Rehabilitation Research Centre (INTERSECT)
• Research in the School for Public Health Environments Research at Exeter (SPHERE)
• Clinical Mycology Research within the MRC Centre for Medical Mycology

Attending a Taster Day is a good way to make links with potential research supervisors that could support you in applying for a funded research studentship (see below) later in the year to gain further research experience.

INSPIRE summer research studentships are open to medical students from their first until penultimate year of study. These provide £1000 to work with Exeter-based research teams and £1250 to work with research teams elsewhere, with awards judged by a local panel including previous student award holders on the basis of an application form covering:

• a description of plans for the research studentship;
• details of student’s experience of research to date and how the studentship will support their career plans; and
• a statement from the research supervisor/host, outlining how the student will be involved and supervised, and confirming their agreement to host the student.

Further details on INSPIRE studentships for 2023-24 will follow here and will be circulated to students shortly, but in the meantime, for any further information please contact Dr Jane Smith (jane.smith@exeter.ac.uk).

Mentoring entails informal communication, usually face-to-face and during a sustained period of time, between a person who is perceived to have greater relevant knowledge, wisdom, or experience in relation to work, career or professional development (the mentor) and a person who is perceived to have less experience (the mentee). If you are interested in a career that incorporates research and would benefit from a mentor we may be able to help you identify a local clinical academic in a relevant field. Please email Jane Smith (jane.smith@exeter.ac.uk) providing some information on who you are, your stage of training, clinical area of interest, any research interests and experience and what you would hope to get out of mentorship.

The first in-person INSPIRE research conference since the pandemic, attended by nearly 130 students from across the GW4 universities and beyond, was held in Cardiff on 18th November 2023. Over 30 students from Exeter got on a coach at 7am on the Saturday morning to attend, many presented posters, and Courtney West won the Jo Tarr Memorial prize for the best oral presentation. A 12-strong team of Exeter students also narrowly defeated runners-up Plymouth to win the prize for their presentation addressing a Hackathon challenge (see below).

An INSPIRE big data Hackathon challenge addressing a One Health problem ran for the first time between October and November 2023. Teams from each of the four universities involved in the GW4 INSPIRE programme signed up to work on the challenge in the month leading up to the INSPIRE conference and, led by some of our previous and current intercalating medical students undertaking a MSc in Data Science, prepared a prize-winning presentation at the conference.

Learn 2 Innovate is a student healthcare innovation programme run by Cardiff University that aims to encourage students to participate in health innovation through a series of workshops, mentorship and a cross-university collaborative innovation task. The goal is to inspire and support students to become future innovators in healthcare. Further details are available here. 

The INSPIRE Journal is produced by a team of student editors from across the four GW4 universities and includes articles written and chosen by students, ranging from news articles and interviews to original student research reports. The current and previous issues of the journal are available here.

The journal is currently looking for three students from each of the GW4 institutions (in any year of study, 12 in total), to join the editorial team for the 2024 issues of the journal. The successful applicants will be involved in the whole publication process, from the handling of article submissions (e.g. arranging for peer review and revision of manuscripts) to post-acceptance processing (e.g. copy-editing and proofreading), helping with the development of several skills, including academic writing, peer review, team work and working to tight deadlines. Student editors will also have the opportunity to be involved in updating the website, co-ordinating social media promotion of the journal and creating podcasts. To apply, please complete this application form by Thursday 29 February.