Applications are now open for both summer placements and 1-year industrial placements at DSTL (Defence Science and Technology Laboratory). To find out more about the opportunities at DSTL, we interviewed Nic Ingram who has just returned from a year in industry with DSTL to complete his final year at Newcastle University.
Who did you do your placement with? And what does the company do?
I did my placement with DSTL. They sustain and grow science and technology capabilities that must remain in government, and help develop capabilities that are managed elsewhere, for example, in industry and academia.
Job Title: Augmented Reality Laboratories Location: Newcastle University, on campus – Herschel Annexe Pay Rate: £16.21 per hour including holiday pay Advertising Dates: 20 October – 29 October Role Overview/Background: This internship is being offered as a casual work opportunity by the School of Mathematics, Statistics and Physics at Newcastle University and is being facilitated by the JobsOC team in the Careers Service. This internship is expected to be for a total of 100 hours, working approximately 20 hours per week between November and December. The internship is open to all Newcastle University students; however, Physics, Engineering or Computing students would be particularly suited to the role. Laboratory skills courses are crucial in helping students gain hands-on experience of doing experiments, better understand the theory behind them, see practical applications of their knowledge and skills, and provide a basis for future employment. In cases of lockdown, shielding, inability to take up residence in Newcastle, limited facilities, space, personnel, University hours, to address the issue of equality of opportunity that students face, online experiments are needed. To increase users’ perception and interaction with the real experiments, a sensation that an activity is handled as if students would be physically on-site, the School of Mathematics, Statistics and Physics will introduce augmented reality (AR) techniques in the laboratory.
The intern will participate in the design and development of AR physics experiments. Planned activities include thinking, creating, programming and enjoying.
Key duties/tasks: Mechanical design and building of experimental setups to suit their remote operation Building electronic circuits using Arduino’s to connect mechanical parts of setups to computers Researching, developing, evaluating, implementing and testing AR online labs Working in a small interdisciplinary team Discussing progress on a regular basis Participating in project planning
Person Requirements Essential Skills/Attributes: Enthusiasm and desire to develop AR online labs Ability to work collaboratively Creativity to find solutions for AR online labs Teamwork Initiative Time Management Organisation and Planning Attention to detail Problem Solving Desired Skills/Attributes: Familiarity with AR development Experience programming in LabView
Degree discipline To be eligible to apply you must be a Newcastle University undergraduate/postgraduate student registered on a programme of study throughout the 2022-23 academic year. For full details of eligibility see the Working on Campus website. Students from all degree disciplines are welcome to apply; however, the role would be particularly suited to Physics, Engineering or Computing students. Newcastle University is committed to being a fully inclusive Global University which actively recruits, supports and retains staff from all sectors of society. We value diversity as well as celebrate, support and thrive on the contributions of all our employees and the community they represent. We are proud to be an equal opportunities employer and encourage applications from everybody, regardless of race, sex, ethnicity, religion, nationality, sexual orientation, age, disability, gender identity, marital status/civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, as well as being open to flexible working practices.
How to Apply Apply online via the following link: https://forms.office.com/r/sukqvUPyv9 For further information about the role contact Aleksey Kozikov, Lecturer in Physics, aleksey.kozikov@newcastle.ac.uk
Returning from a year in industry to complete their final year at Newcastle University, we interviewed Zach Smith about their time with Newcastle Strategic Solutions Limited. This is what they had to say:
Who did you do your industrial placement with?
Newcastle Strategic Solutions Limited
What was your role?
Software QA Tester
Why did you do a placement?
I did a placement in order to gain some concrete work experience in the software development industry, this is so I could hopefully gain an advantage over my competition when applying for jobs upon graduation
When did you start applying and how many places did you apply for?
I started applying around February/March time and applied for at most 20 people
How was the application experience?
Relatively straightforward, mostly just making sure my CV was up to date. I wrote a cover letter for each company I applied for and tweaked my CV in scenarios where different experiences might’ve been more useful
What, if any, help did you get from the university when applying?
The help I received from the university was mostly to do with their careers site, where companies could post placement opportunities. It was a huge help and ultimately lead me to get this placement
What work did you do over the course of your placement year?
I got the opportunity to do a range of things:
Programming automated tests for builds of NSSLs websites which introduced new features.
Testing on live servers of clients to ensure that everything was working as expected before deploying for the public to see and use.
I also had the opportunity to manually test features on the website to ensure that they met the accessibility criteria required.
I was working alongside teammates in a scrum team and would test whatever the developers would work on before giving it the seal of approval.
How was the overall experience of doing a placement?
Fantastic, I was treated really well during my time at NSSL, except for the odd stressful moment, I enjoyed it. One key value that I really appreciated working there was that my input was important and was truly taken into consideration when working on different projects even when it wasn’t about testing. I made a lot of new friends there during the early talent program that they ran too.
My experience here helped dictate what portion of computer science I would like to specialize in for my final year. Thanks to my time testing the accessibility of the website and new software developed, it has made me want to work in accessibility and hopefully work to improve how accessible software is to the general public.
Would you like to go back to that company after your final year?
Based on my experience? Yes.
With my current circumstances? No, I only say this because following graduation I’d prefer to be employed somewhere where I can live with my family whilst working for a while before I go settle in somewhere like Newcastle. To be honest though, if I was offered a high enough wage to cover the expenses of living alone easily then I probably would take something from NSSL.
