Choosing the right university can often be harder than choosing your course itself. Which university has the best facilities? The best support? The friendliest environment? The most convenient travel routes? And most importantly – which university is closest to the best food spots?

The UCL Medical Physics & Biomedical Engineering (MPBE) Offer-Holder Day is back again this year – and it is here to answer all of your questions! The opportunity to learn more about the courses I was considering was certainly a valuable one – especially given how indecisive I am in general. The event included talks and presentations from faculty members and current students, which provided valuable insight into the curriculum, teaching style, and research opportunities available.

 Academia aside, the campus tour – led by current students – was the perfect chance to explore the facilities available and find out the best study spots, libraries and cafes available on campus. I was able to get a sense of the social life at UCL, the support services available to students, and the opportunities for extracurricular activities. Perhaps what stood out the most to me was how welcoming the students leading my tour were – and is ultimately what invited me back to study at UCL full-time.

Finally, attending the Offer-Holder Day gave me the opportunity to meet other prospective students and make new friends. University can be a daunting experience, especially if you’re moving to a new city or country. Meeting other students who were in the same position as me helped me to feel more connected to the university community and gave me a great sense of friendship and support.

If you were considering going to the UCL MPBE Offer-Holder Day, let me make that decision for you – do it! There is so much more to see than what is available on a website or prospectus. The Offer-Holder Day is such a great opportunity to have all of your questions answered by students as well as staff, to get an understanding of the campus vibe, and to make new friends – friends who you may just end up going to lectures with come October.

You can view more pictures from the May 2022 Offer Holder Day here >>>

This blog was written by Saarah, Medical Physics

The experience I had working with Young at Heart Ghana could be summarised in 3 words: amazing, inspiring, and eye-opening. Before the placement, I knew almost nothing about the Ed-tech industry but after having interesting conversations with the team at Young at Heart, I can confidently say with no doubt that I am familiar with the industry especially the accessibility of the use of educational technology in developing countries.

Young at Heart Ghana is an Ed-tech organization which aims to make STEM education more accessible to students in schools through customised digital platforms and software. Throughout the placement, I actively engaged with their operations, research, and engineering departments, all envisioning the same mission: to champion access to Ed-tech spaces. Knowing that you are involved in a community, where more and more young students are getting access to digital content and practical knowledge because of the projects being done at Young at Heart is incredible.

During the placement, I took part in the user-testing for Ananse Hub, a teaching platform. I created STEM teaching material on the Solar System using infographics for the platform. I also developed quizzes related to the content material. Using the discussion platform in the hub, I presented the information and recorded voice notes. The team then provided feedback and outlined the technical difficulties occurring with the platform. The task was very insightful, such that using infographics can help keep the audience’s attention, and further enhanced my presentation and storytelling skills.

Since the internship was combined with in-person and remote fellows, I collaborated with the other remote fellows in developing a survey as a follow-up of the report the in-person fellows did. As a team, we created surveys in relation to justice, well-being and access. In the development of the survey, I reviewed published papers on access to Ed-tech platforms and measured the variables specific to distributive justice. In distributive justice, I analysed different variables such as internet connectivity, data and cloud storage availability in school infrastructures, and schools in different regions in Ghana. I then created a survey for different stakeholders like parents, teachers and technicians, asking them about their student’s access to technology and its reliability of it. Gaining more insights into the intersection between justice and Ed-tech was enriching and broadening. One of the highlights was learning more about the Vegas & Winthrop model, which is an aspiration of education post-COVID. Where the school is in the centre of the community, it powers every single student’s learning and development using every single path possible, from technology to health and social protection agencies.

One of the products Young at Heart Ghana is Ananse the Teacher app. The app combines African folklore and provides a medium where stories and learning intersect. The lesson usually starts with an African folklore story, engaging students with the STE(A)M lesson, followed by practical experiments and hands-on activities. We were tasked to plan and create a lesson for Ananse the Teacher app following the science curriculum for primary schools in Ghana. I designed the lesson on the topic of Materials, where students get to learn and classify everyday materials and objects based on their properties. I started with an African folklore story “Why the Tortoise has a rough shell?”, describing the tortoise’s shell properties and the properties of other objects that appeared in the story, linking it to the lesson. I also categorized materials into different sections: Natural materials, Converted materials, and Synthesis. This ensures that students know the different types of materials and where they fit into the classification. Finally, I created hands-on activities and projects to end the lesson. It not only enhanced my design and creativity skills, but I also learned that it is important to relate it to the student’s culture and background. It makes it more relatable to students’ everyday life, hence leading it to be more interesting and engaging. One of the highlights was engaging in a conversation with the founding director at Young at Heart, Josephine Marie Godwyll. She told us how children in Ghana don’t know the difference between broccoli and cauliflower, but that is because they have never tried it before, as it was never a thing in Ghana. Therefore, it is crucial in familiarizing yourself with the culture of the country when developing teaching materials!

Throughout the placement, we had multiple extracurricular activities from the team at Young at Heart. We learnt about a variety of topics from business to pitch training to career journeys. It was very insightful as listening to others about their career journey is at the same time further educating yourself. They gave advice such as “Don’t be afraid to step outside your comfort zone as you never know if you don’t try.” If you try you may discover new opportunities that may peak your interest! We also had discussions and interactive conversations with the co-founder at Young at Heart, Martin Bruce. Martin gave us two videos to watch. Both videos are pitches at the Royal Academy of Engineering. We then stated the differences both good and bad, the takeaways and the key points. It was very interesting as judging from a different perspective, and we learnt so much more about elevating your pitch and starting with a purpose at the very beginning. Lastly, we had an engaging conversation about our career journeys with other remote fellows and Martin, what we envision doing in the future etc. Biggest takeaway: What you study doesn’t mean what you will do in the future as a career. Your interests may change from time to time and that is okay. University is for you to explore what you like and what you don’t like until you find what is your purpose. These quotes will be on my mind when I am having career troubles in the future.

I got to work and experience with a variety of different sectors: marketing, engineering, business and content creating. This placement not only helped me grow personally but professionally as well. By working with others and trying different sectors, I could see substantial development in my future career and real-world experience.

Working with the brilliant Young at Heart team on advancing access to high-quality education through Ed-tech solutions was very insightful and I would highly recommend this placement project to other students at UCL. Applications open in Dec/ Jan, for more information, please visit the following link: https://liveuclac.sharepoint.com/sites/UCLInternationalDevelopmentHub

This blog was written by Rachel, Biomedical Engineering

My first year at UCL has officially come to an end and I can’t believe how fast these a-little-less-than-ten-months went by!

In the span of a few months, I went from being a wide-eyed 18-year-old to a young adult full of ambition. I have learnt a lot, met so many inspiring people, both teaching staff and students, and grown so much as a person.

MOVING TO LONDON : Making a home away from home

It feels like only yesterday I was in a plane in the direction of London, looking through the porthole and feeling both nervous and excited about this new adventure that was just about to start.

Moving away from my family and the country I had always lived in, adapting to a new city, meeting new people, and having to make a home away from home was not easy at first. At that time, I found the prospect of moving to London by myself and starting this new chapter of my life daunting and overwhelming and I had far too many apprehensions. But this is all part of growing up and as unsettling as that was, things got easier with time.

After my first few weeks at UCL, I had joined a society I really liked, met new friends, discovered my favourite study spaces, made peace with the 9am lectures and started a life-long friendship (although unstable in times of strikes) with the tube!

All these small experiences and achievements familiarised me with this new chapter and made me excited for it.

MY COURSE : Biomedical Engineering

University is undoubtedly very different from high-school and one key point of my first year was obviously my course.

After spending one year studying it, I could not be more reassured that I made the right choice. What I really like about Biomedical Engineering is that it offers an interdisciplinary approach that allows me to apply the knowledge I have acquired in Engineering, Physics and Maths to the medical field or, in other terms, to innovate in the clinical domain. It really is an interesting and exciting course where I am perpetually learning, expanding my horizons, and growing, both as an engineer and as a person.

I think the highlight of this first year were the Scenario Weeks during which we had to work in teams on exciting, hands-on projects which included developing a wearable device and designing a healthcare app.

This makes me very excited about the coming years and I am looking forward to all the exciting projects I will be working on.

SOCIETIES/CLUBS : A door to new experiences, friendships and opportunities

Finally, when it comes to my first year, I think that one last essential part of it were the clubs and/or societies. At the start of the year, after attending an online social event which I really enjoyed, I decided to join the UCL Women’s Engineering Society, and it was probably one of the best decisions I made.

Indeed, by doing so, I got the chance to meet and befriend so many students who have the same interests as me, to attend amazing socials and to become one of UCLWES’s executives which allowed me to further enhance various skills.

Next year, I will be the treasurer of UCLWES and I am really looking forward to this new role and to the great socials and activities that we will be organising.

So my advice to any first year reading this post would be: go to the welcome fair, try out the taster sessions, attend the socials, you never know, you may discover THE society/club that is made for you and make life-long friends.

As this blog post is drawing to an end, so does my reflection on my first year. I know that I will forever be thankful for this first year, and this is why I am both, a little sad at the idea of letting it go and excited about what is coming next!

There will be periods of homesickness and stress, but there will also be periods of joy and excitement. Life, certainly, does not come with a map and these ups and downs are what make it so special and full of lessons! 🙂

This blog was written by Sirine, MEng Biomedical Engineering

Photo credits: All pictures supplied by Sirine

When I applied to university, I could picture myself doing the big things. Going to interesting lectures and doing exciting projects, exploring all that London has to offer during day and night; and making a lot of friends. But what I didn’t pause to think about, which I reckon is the case for most prospective students, is what my routine would look like. So, what would a normal day in the life of a 19-year-old Biomedical Engineering student look like?

Early mornings

Even if I don’t have class, waking up later than 8am is dangerous game for me since I get tempted to stay working in my bed the days I don’t have class. However, I try to still wake up in order to be on campus around 9am to ensure a somewhat productive day.

Morning Light Through my Window

Firing up my brain

I’ve found that waking up and leave immediately does not work for me, so I give myself half an hour to drink my coffee and be in my phone. That way, my brain is already fully awake by the time I sit in class or library.

Out the door

Since I don’t live within walking distance to campus (technically I do but I’m lazy in the mornings) I take the bus. However, my laziness makes my bank account scream since TFL is so expensive now. I normally get to campus 10 minutes early and go grab a coffee at the student centre cafe, since it’s nicer than Pret. Pro tip: if you hand them your reusable cup to use, you get your drink for cheaper!

View of St Pancras from the bus

Prime Focus Time

If I don’t have any classes that day, I’ll go settle into my study space in one of the libraries in campus (science library or student centre preferably), and follow my weekly schedule to keep up to date with content and assignments. This period of the day is crucial since I get the more done in the morning.

Lunch Break

Since the sun is coming out again and it’s getting warmer, I meet my friends for lunch in Gordon Square. Sometimes when you’re in campus it feels like you don’t get enough air since you’re always indoors, so I like to take a breather during lunch. Plus, every opportunity to tan must be seized.

UCL Wilkins Building

Terminating Daily Tasks and Me-Time

After finishing my tasks for the day an afternoon lectures, I head home at around 5pm. When I get home I go to the gym, or at least I try to a couple times a week. I found that working late in the evening does not work well for me, so I give myself a couple hours before watching the last lectures or finishing up anything that was not done on campus.

Sunset sky on my way back home

Finally, I aim to be in bed by 11:30 pm since getting anything less than 8 hours of sleep makes me a zombie the next day. We can’t forget to go out and have fun a couple times a week. At the end of the day, we need to enjoy time with friends to keep our lifestyle balanced and avoid burning out!

This blog was written by Ines, MEng Biomedical Engineering

Photo credit: All pictures supplied by Ines