Postgraduates represent roughly 30% of our student body at Southampton and are vital to the University of Southampton.
Your PGR Representatives exist to represent you to the Student's Union and the University, to hold regular social events so you can meet and mingle with fellow postgraduates, and finally to make you feel part of a community here at Southampton.
We are pleased to announce the new SUSU PGR Representatives are:
Nick Hillier - Engineering and Physical Sciences Richard Curtis - Environment and Life Sciences Samuel Redgrave – Social Science
Nick Hillier from the Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences
Rep Spotlight
This month, we would like to introduce you to Nick Hillier from the Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences.
Hello, my name is Nicholas Hillier and I am a PhD student in the Energy Storage and its Applications Centre of Doctoral Training over in Mechanical Engineering. I have very recently been elected as your Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences (FEPS) PGR Representative. For those of you who have no idea what this is (or why you should care) let me explain.
I will be representing the interests of the PGR community (all 1200 of you) at the Faculty Executive board meetings. I will also sit on Staff Student Liaison Committees and the Postgraduate Committee within SUSU. I am primarily focused on the academic needs and wants of the PGR community, from training to mental health during your research. I will be working with the departmental representatives to make these 3-4 years the best of your academic career.
In short, I will be channelling problems and (hopefully) solutions to the people who make the decisions and holding them to account to make sure things happen.
The PGR Representative position has arisen from the restructuring of the faculties and I see it as a great opportunity for the PGR voice to be heard. The PGRs in FEPS are fundamental to the success of the faculty, from demonstrating in labs to delivering the scientific output the university depends upon. We are vital, but are not always considered. The undergraduates are widely represented throughout their time at university but PGRs have unique concerns and needs and I feel there has been a disconnect between the university and us. This is why I stood for the role and hope I can do it justice.
If you have anything you would like to raise with me please do email me on feps-pgr@soton.ac.uk or pop along to my office 23/1051.
