RECOVER: Support for postgraduate researchers

At the Academy, we recognise that almost all academic and clinical researchers will have experienced significant disruption to their projects and their careers as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

 

Post-graduate researchers (PGRs), including Masters students, PhD students and early-stage post-doctoral researchers, make up a substantial proportion of the UK research workforce. However reports suggest they feel they have experienced a lack of support during the pandemic as they fall into a gap between undergraduate students and independent researchers (PIs). Below we have collated a series of resources to help support both PGRs and their supervisors.

 

[Page last updated 09 June 2021] 

 

Emma Taylor is a PhD student in veterinary epidemiology at the University of Surrey. In this video, she shares how she initially struggled to engage with support from her university during the stress and anxiety of the COVID-19 pandemic, but then how she navigated her way out of the COVID-19 fog with help from her supervisor and continued her research. Watch here for some advice to supervisors to support their students – be patient, keep reaching out, provide a safe space to have open conversations.

Conor Scott is a second year PhD student at the University of York. In this video he shares his tips on how he manages his time and work-life balance during the COVID-19 pandemic, from planning ahead to objective-based goals, in order to avoid the trap of saying: "Okay, I’ll just work for longer.”

Jessica Dobson is a final year PhD student at the University of York. Here, she shares her strategies for resilience and managing her research during the COVID-19 pandemic. Jessica tackles issues like lack of access to laboratories due to social distancing requirements, and how this has forced her to slow down and spend a lot more time considering the results of each experiment - "a blessing in disguise". 

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