Will you present your research in the Houses of Parliament?

“Being able to represent UCL at this prestigious event was a great honour. I thoroughly enjoyed communicating my science to people of various positions, including MPs.”

Current undergraduate or recently graduated? You’re invited to take part by submitting an A1-sized PDF of your research poster to teaching.learning@ucl.ac.uk. If you learned a lot from conducting research, you’re going to take what you learned to the next level as you hone your communication and public engagement skills.
 
Get accepted, and you get to engage with your peers and the public at the Posters in Cloisters event on 30 January, 2019. Get shortlisted, and you’ll become one of the two undergraduates representing UCL at Posters in Parliament on 7 March, 2019.

Why should you take part, though? Just ask the winners of years’ past.
 

Take your research to the next level

No matter what you go on to do, your ability to speak confidently and fluently about your ideas will serve you for the rest of your life. Yet, being able to contextualise your research at a level that everyone understands is a skill in of itself, as Enya and Douglas share in their experience of Parliament:

“Presenting in our department was very technical, critical and focused. To come here and speak to a range of people from outside of UCL with different backgrounds and knowledge helped us develop the way we explain our research to a diverse audience to find an angle that they will understand.”

A key to effective presentation is more than just how to shape your research in advance, however: it’s about how you adapt it in the very moment of delivery. For Zane, that was the best part of presenting at Parliament. 
“Condensing scientifically detailed information into something that everyone can benefit from is not as easy as it might seem,” she recounts, “In fact, I feel that an ability to modify my presentation on the spot based on the particular listener is my most important takeaway from this great experience.”

Being featured in Posters in Cloisters or Posters in Parliament gives you that room to grow as a great communicator – yet, it can also provide whole new opportunities you might not even be thinking about right now.
 

Open doors: life beyond research, through research

“It was an almost surreal experience.”

When Amanda Campbell went to Parliament two years ago to share her research on a biodegradable tent for music festivals, she didn’t expect to win first prize in a national competition a year after graduating from UCL.

“There is a huge sense of achievement going over previous work and portraying it on a poster. It takes work out of just the academic sphere and into the real world, where arguably it is more inspiring and engaging. It also gives students an experience of where research can take them, demonstrating that all their hard work doesn’t have to end when their course does.”

You never know where the next opportunity is going to come from. Research opens doors, and while you’re at UCL, you’re in the perfect place to conduct and broadcast world-class research.
 

When are you going to submit your poster?

Email the PDF of your poster to teaching.learning@ucl.ac.uk. From now until 23 January, 2019, you have the opportunity to submit – and if you’re shortlisted, you’ll be invited to present at showcase evening in the Cloisters one week later.

Will you be presenting your poster in Parliament on 7 March, 2019? There’s only one way to find out.

Robert Vilkelis