Maximising Your PhD Experience: My Comprehensive Guide to Life at the University of Manchester

Author: Priya Srivastava // Editor: Erin Pallott Featured photo by Priya Srivastava. Embarking on a PhD journey at the University of Manchester is a thrilling experience, but it comes with its own set of challenges. Beyond the academic rigours, there's a wealth of resources and opportunities that can significantly enhance your time as a postgraduate …

Building Your Researcher Profile and Utilising Social Media – Annet Nakkazi and Rural Great Minds

Author: Annet Nakkazi // Editor: Erin Pallott Teaming up with the Doctoral Academy and the Researcher Development team, I organised a podcast episode about how postgraduate researchers can start building their online presence and researcher profiles. I talked about our blog, Research Hive, and how blogging is a great way to start getting your name …

Getting Much Done and Gaining Confidence as a PhD student

Author: Ayobami Esther Olanrewaju // Editor: Erin Pallott Photo by Prateek Katyal on Unsplash Reading Time: 4 minutes Does it look like your research is not taking shape or you have been reading for too long and still have nothing to write about? Do you think it only happens to you? You couldn’t be more …

Making the most of it: 10 money-saving tips

Author: Olivia M // Editor: Erin Pallott Feeling the pinch during this cost-of-living crisis? You’re not alone. Many of us are trying to keep our heads above water with raging inflation and skyrocketing energy costs, but hope is not lost. Luckily, the powers-that-be recognise the financial hardships, offered support in the form of an energy …

Taking the leap: Returning to full-time study

By Phoebe Harding-Walker There is a tremendous amount of advice available to anyone starting a PhD, so much so that it’s difficult to know what to filter out and what to pay attention to. If you Google ‘advice for new PhD students’, as soon as you press that enter key, a whopping 206 million results …

Being a “Stingy” Student – with @mrdealsmanchester

Author: Erin Pallott The media is full of advice on how to save money. Some of it is useful (Opening Lifetime ISAs, guides to investing) and some of it is not so useful (stay at home, stop eating avocado toast, buy a house). The 2021 Student Money Survey highlights how little money many students have …

Is your mind playing tricks on you? 10 common unhelpful thinking styles which can affect your mood

By Mia Bennion Typically, we don’t tend to question our brain or our thinking – if you think it, it must be right…right? Not necessarily! Thoughts are opinions, not facts! Our brain can be our best friend, helping to alert us to any danger, problem solve and granting us with creativity and imagination. Unfortunately, sometimes …

Teaching on Zoom: The new norm

By Tarnjit Sidhu For PhD students, teaching is a brilliant way of getting hands on experience of working with students and building your CV, especially if you’re wanting to progress within academia. There are many ways of getting involved with teaching opportunities at UoM, for example The Brilliant Club, Manchester Access Programme (MAP), and general …

When your research is so good someone else does it first

Mashed Potatoes in a Bowl By Nadine Mirza During one of my regular perusals of updated literature in my area, I came across a paper published only a little while back. A well crafted study that was an enjoyable read and incredibly relevant to my own work. One might say too relevant. In fact, it …

Celebrating International Women’s Day in the Division of Population Health

Melissa Surgey Staff and students from across the Division of Population Health, Health Services Research and Primary Care (and wider) came together in March to celebrate International Women’s Day (IWD) and Women’s History Month. I’ve written previously for Research Hive about why it’s important to mark these events, both as a way to celebrate the …