As we come to the end of our academic year and prepare to welcome our new cohort of MScR Global Environmental Challenges students in September, we wanted to take a moment to celebrate the incredible achievements and contributions of our postgraduate (PGR) community.
This year has been filled with impressive milestones – publications, successful Vivas, community engagement and countless hours of dedication.
We’ve also seen our PGRs supporting one another through peer-led initiatives, writing retreats, wellbeing meetups and vibrant discussion groups. Alongside this, our bespoke training sessions – covering project management, academic writing, presentation and networking workshops – have helped to further equip our students with essential skills.
Many of our students have had the opportunity to present their research at conferences in the UK and around the world. Some examples include:
Lucas Fadden travelled to Yokohama, Japan, to present his research into the gap between user expectations and technology performance of heat pumps at the ACM (Association for Computing Machinery) CHI conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, the premier international conference of Human-Computer Interaction.
Katie Weir travelled to Vienna to present her research looking into whether nitrous oxide emissions from grasslands can be reduced by inoculating them with rhizobia at the European Geosciences Union (EGU) General Assembly.
Claudia Moorhouse presented her research exploring staff and student ideals for engineering education at the Twelfth International Conference on Engineering Education for Sustainable Development (EESD2025) and at the UK and Ireland Engineering Education Research Network Annual Symposium.
Later this year, Sri Megawati will present her research on the impact of seawater desalination brine discharge on harmful algal blooms (HABs) and public health in Indonesian coastal areas at the IDRA Reykjavik Summit on Water and Climate Change 2025.
We also have students completing fieldwork this summer in the arctic and Indonesia and attending the EuroSciPy 2025 hybrid workshop-conference and the Tarfala Research Station 80 year Anniversary Conference.
Felix Brocklehurst joined the programme in January this year and is completing his research project in partnership with Pledgeball, looking into the potential of women’s football as a lever for climate change action. There are further opportunities for students to propose projects working in partnership with Pledgeball, researching topics related to sustainability and football, details of which can be found on our website.
Several of our students this year have gone on to secure PhDs at the University of Bristol and other UK universities. We know that their Master’s by Research degree will have been fantastic preparation for further research and study.
We are excited to hear from our Climate Change and Health PhD students as they present their research in our Climate Change and Health seminar series over the summer and autumn term.
The strength of our PGR community lies not only in individual excellence but also in the collaborative spirit that makes this environment so unique. A special thank you to all our supervisors, the Cabot team and the wider academic community who continue to champion and guide our students through every stage of their journey.
If you are interested in finding out more about the MScR in Global Environmental Challenges or applying for the programme, please visit our website or contact cabot-pgr@bristol.ac.uk.