Professional Development

Page Contents
    Research career
    Research ethics
    Administration & safety
    Science communication
    Scientific development

On this page, I keep a record of training I have undertaken to improve my skills in a variety of different areas.

Research career

2005-2006 (three modules totalling 10 days) “Leading in Science”: course on science, leadership, innovation and economics organised jointly by the Royal Society and the Tanaka Business School of Imperial College, London.
May 24 2006 Supervising international research students, Newcastle University Staff Development Unit.
Jun 19-20 2006 Royal Society new research fellows’ seminar and discussion day.
Sep-Dec 2006 “Science in a spin”: A new Business Development Programme for academics and researchers, Newcastle University. 7 1-hour sessions.
Nov 16 2006 Supervising research students, Newcastle University Staff Development Unit.
Jun 5-6 2007 Positive People Management, 2-day course run by Aware UK at Newcastle’s Staff Development Unit.
Sep 13 2007 Institute of Neuroscience research away day, Newcastle University.
May 1 2008 Supervising research students: Assessment and Examination, Faculty of Medical Sciences.
May 2 2008 Applying for MRC grants, Faculty of Medical Sciences
May 8 2008 Graduate student development and e-portfolio, Newcastle University Staff Development Unit.
Sep 15 2008 Institute of Neuroscience research away day, Newcastle University.
Feb-Jun 2009 “Bite-sized chunks” series of workshops on applying for research grants, Newcastle University.
Apr 30 2009 Seminar on submitting to Nature, with Lesley Anson, a Senior Editor of Nature
May 19 2009 Workshop on getting research published, with Irene Hames.
Sep 23 2009 Institute of Neuroscience research away day, Newcastle University.
Oct 1 2009 Moving into a management role in the research environment, with Robin Henderson, MY Consultants Ltd.
Mar 26 2010 PI development: support to survive, with Liz Kemp & Lesley Heseltine, Newcastle University Staff Development Unit
Apr 27 2010 PI development: the PI as manager, with Sue Nobb, Insp!rations
Jun 16 2010 PI development: Managing your Research Project, with Robin Henderson, MY Consultants Ltd.
Jul 12 2010 PI development: Looking to the future, with Robin Henderson, MY Consultants Ltd.
Sep 16 2010 Institute of Neuroscience research away day, Newcastle University.
Jan 14 2011 Institute of Neuroscience / Institute of Health & Society research day, Newcastle University.
Jan 17 2011 seminar on “Building relationships with corporate partners”, Faculty of Medical Sciences, Newcastle University.
Feb 4 2011 Briefing on BBSRC and MRC grants panels, Faculty of Medical Sciences, Newcastle University.
Sep 19 2011 Institute of Neuroscience research away day, Newcastle University.
Sep 17 2012 Institute of Neuroscience research away day, Newcastle University.
Nov 12-13 2012 Royal Society workshop on Understanding Grant Processes, Chicheley Hall.
Sep 16 2013 Institute of Neuroscience research away day, Newcastle University.
Oct 1 2013 Faculty of Medical Sciences Symposium on Consultancy, Newcastle University.
Jan 14 2014 Rapid Networking Event on security, sensing, surveillance and autonomous technologies, Newcastle University.
Feb 6 2014 Horizon 2020 Information and Networking Day on Work Programme 2014-2015 for Advanced digital gaming/gamification technologies, European Commission, Luxembourg
Mar 26 2015 Research Impact celebration event, Great North Museum, Newcastle
April 29 2016 Leadership in the role of professor, Newcastle University Staff Development Unit, led by Prof John Ramsden

Research ethics

Apr 27-28, May 22 2007 10-credit module on Research Ethics, run by Northumbria University.
Jun 12-13 2008 two-day course on Research Ethics in a Higher Education context, run by Keele University.
Jul 23 2008 Law, Ethics and Research: induction training for members of Faculty of Medical Sciences Ethics Committee, run by Newcastle University’s Policy, Ethics and Life Sciences Research Centre.
Dec 2 2009 Legal issues in clinical research, run by Newcastle Clinical Research Centre.
Mar 10 2010 Newcastle University Policy, Ethics and Life Sciences Research Centre seminar on the TGN1412 disaster, Prof Adam Hedgecoe, Cardiff University.
May 4 2010 Good Clinical Practice for research, run by Newcastle Clinical Research Centre with Tanya Symons.
Feb 1 2012 Good Clinical Practice Refresher Training, run by National Institute of Health Research Clinical Research Network with Paul Maher

Administration & safety

Jul 26 2006 RAE Overview and Progress so far, Newcastle University.
Aug 18 2006 pFACT (Project Financial Appraisal & Costing Tool) training course, Newcastle University.
Jul 15 2009 Risk assessment training course, Newcastle University.
Jun 9 2010 University IT systems, Newcastle University Staff Development Unit.
Mar 29 2012 Safety for Principal Investigators, University Safety Office.
Oct 4 2012 Emergency First Aid At Work (1 day course), North East Ambulance Service NHS Trust.
Jan 14-17 2013 First Aid At Work (3 day course), North East Ambulance Service NHS Trust.
Jan 18 2013 Chemical safety training course, Newcastle University.
Jan 22 2013 Biological safety training course, Newcastle University.
May 23 2013 Workshop on conducting effective Performance & Development Reviews, Newcastle University.
May 13 2014 Human Resources briefing for Principal Investigators, Newcastle University.

Science communication

December 7 2005 attended Royal Society Media Training Course, taught by Judith Hann and John Exelby
March 16 2006 attended Media Skills Workshop, Newcastle University Staff Development Unit.
April 30-May 1 2007 attended Royal Society Scientist workshop at the National Science Learning Centre, learning how to communicate science effectively to school children.
May 24-25 2010 attended 2-day Story Seminar given by Robert McKee
Feb 11 2011 seminar on “Proactive Media Relations”, Staff Development Unit, Newcastle University.
Jun 25 2013 “Everyone can be a film maker”, Robin Fearon
Jul 1 2013 “Using animation to engage”, Siobhan Fenton

Scientific development

Aug 28-Sep 5 2006 Spike Train Analysis Workshop, Newcastle University.
Aug 27-28 2008 Spike Train Analysis Workshop, Newcastle University.
Sep 18 2009 North East Epilepsy Research Meeting, Durham University (5 CPD credits).
Oct 21-24 2009 Statistical Parametric Mapping Course, University College London.
Nov 5 2009 Orbital and neuro-imaging for ophthalmology, Newcastle University.
May 26-27 2010 Thinking Digital, The Sage Centre, Gateshead,
Sep 23-24 2010 Statistical Parametric Mapping Course, run by University College London at Durham University.
Oct 20 2010 Cooperation and Conflict in Human and Animal Behaviour, symposium to mark the retirement of Dr John Lazarus, Newcastle University.
Jun 13 2011 9th BriSCEV (British Society for Clinical Electrophysiology of Vision) Course on unexplained visual loss and Conference, Baltic Centre, Gateshead
Jun 13-14 2011 9th BriSCEV (British Society for Clinical Electrophysiology of Vision) Conference, Baltic Centre, Gateshead
18-20 July 2011. Introduction to human brain anatomy, with dissection room practical sessions, University College London, course director Dr Paul Johns
15-16 March 2012. Epilepsy Research UK’s International Expert Workshop “Why do some brains seize? Molecular, cellular and network mechanisms”, St Anne’s College, Oxford
17 October 2012. Epilepsy awareness training at Epilepsy Action, Yeadon, Leeds
10 January 2013. Translational Research Day: Chronic disease – what’s the point and are we missing it? Newcastle University
11 January 2013. Newcastle University Centre for Behaviour and Evolution conference
20 June 2013. Postgraduate ophthalmology teaching session on strabismus, with Mr Anthony Vivian
26 Jan 2014. Paediatric Ophthalmology 2014, day 4: strabismus, University College London and Moorfields Eye Hospital
15-16 March 2016. UK Neuro-ophthalmology special interest group annual meeting, University College London Queen’s Square and Guy’s Hospital.
12-15 Sept 2016. Optical Foundations of Full-Parallax Imaging, Universitat de València.
19 Oct 2016. British Machine Vision Association technical meeting: Vision for Interaction: from humans to robots, London UK.
23-25 Oct 2016. 20th Machine Intelligence: Human-Like Computing, Cumberland Lodge, Windsor UK.

NB Scientific conferences where my own work was presented are listed separately, here.

DataCamp courses

  1. Jan 2018. Introduction to R.
  2. Jan 2018. Intermediate R.
  3. Jan 2018. Cleaning Data in R.
  4. Jan 2018. Working with the RStudio IDE (Part 1).
  5. Feb 2018. Data Visualization with ggplot2 (Part 1)
  6. Feb 2018. Data Visualization with ggplot2 (Part 2)
  7. Mar 2018. Deep Learning in Python.
  8. Apr 2018. Intro to Python for Data Science.
  9. May 2018. Intermediate Python for Data Science.

Coursera courses

  1. Nov 2016. Machine Learning, by Stanford University.
  2. Jan 2017. Neural Networks for Machine Learning, by Toronto University
  3. Apr 2018. Neural Networks and Deep Learning by deeplearning.ai
  4. Apr 2018. Structuring Machine Learning Projects by deeplearning.ai
  5. Apr 2018. Improving Deep Neural Networks: Hyperparameter tuning, Regularization and Optimization by deeplearning.ai
  6. May 2018. Convolutional Neural Networks by deeplearning.ai
  7. Feb 2020. Computational Neuroscience by University of Washington.
  8. Mar 2020. Google Cloud Product Fundamentals by Google Cloud.
  9. Apr 2020. Google Cloud Product Fundamentals: Core Infrastructure by Google Cloud.
  10. Apr 2020. How Google does Machine Learning by Google Cloud.
  11. May 2020. Getting Started With Application Development by Google Cloud.
  12. May 2020. Improving your statistical inferences by Eindhoven University of Technology.
  13. May 2020. Launching into Machine Learning by Google Cloud.
  14. May 2020. Introduction to TensorFlow by Google Cloud.
  15. Jan 2022. Introduction to Genomic Technologies by Johns Hopkins University.
  16. Feb 2022. Causal Inference by Columbia University.