Author Archives: Andrew

Postdoc Coffee Mornings: Returning in August

After a successful run of rotating postdoc coffee mornings hosted by 4 schools in UCD College of Science, the School of Physics are pleased to host a one-off summer coffee morning for postdocs in August.

The event promises to be an excellent opportunity for postdocs throughout UCD College of Science to reconnect at the end of the summer, and share plans for the upcoming academic year. Refreshments will be kindly provided by the School of Physics.

We look forward to welcoming you to the event, and please share widely with all of your postdoc colleagues and friends in UCD College of Science.

UCD College of Science Pride Event

On Friday 14 June, just over 100 members of the UCD College of Science community got together to celebrate LGBTQ+ Pride month with a celebration event in UCD O’Brien Centre for Science. Organised by the College of Science Equality Diversity and Inclusion committee, the event highlighted the College’s continued support of its LGBTQ+ staff and students, continuing its commitment to ensuring that our campus and academic communities are safe, welcoming and LGBT+ inclusive.

The event included a trio of rousing speeches from speakers reflecting on how far we have come in valuing and supporting the contributions of LGBT+ people within the College, and how much we can still do to advance LGBT+ equalities in the university, in Ireland, and in our academic communities. College principle Professor Jeremy Simpson opened the event with a few words reiterating his own personal support and commitment to upholding the values of dignity and respect in the College.

Jed Dowling, festival director of Dublin LGBTQ Pride and Postgraduate student in the College, spoke about the history of Pride events in Dublin, the importance of being visible and proud as LGBT+ people, and the power of showing up and publicly providing allyship to the LGBT+ community. Dr Saule Akhmetkaliyeva, Postdoctoral Research Staff Representative on the College of Science EDI committee, closed the speeches by speaking about the value of inclusion in science and increasing visibility within STEM subjects, reflecting on her involvement in pride events within the polar research community.

The EDI committee went all out with the decorations. The space was filled with flags and bunting including the progress pride flag (which includes stripes for intersex people and queer people of colour) as well as flags for lesbian, bisexual, transgender, asexual and pansexual identities. A colourful balloon arch also provided an excellent opportunity for attendees to take a selfie with their handheld rainbow flags! Those in attendance were treated to catering by Pi, and enjoyed delicious rainbow cupcakes and a giant ‘Pride’ cake. UCD’s Purl Jam society ran a craft table where people could knit their own rainbow friendship bracelets. For those who couldn’t knit, everyone also had the opportunity to pick up some pride goodies for themselves, including pride wristbands and UCD pride lanyards.

This is the third year that a celebration event has taken place to mark Pride month in the College. The event also follows a LGBT+ coffee morning held for rainbow week back in February. LGBT+ students and staff, and allies, are invited to march alongside the UCD staff and student LGBTQIA+ societies in the Dublin Pride parade later in the month, on Saturday 29 June. The UCD College of Science EDI committee will be organising more LGBTQIA+ initiatives in the next academic year.

A thank you to Dr Gary Brennan (School of Biomolecular and Biomedical Science EDI representative), Bairbre Fox (School of Physics EDI representative), and Dr Andrew McCartan (EDI representative) for organising the event. Acknowledgements also go to Associate Professor Catherine Mooney (Vice Principal for Equality, Diversity and Inclusion, UCD College of Science), Maeve O’Connell (College of Science Administration Office), Dr Niamh Nestor, (co-Chair of UCD’s LGBTQIA+ Staff Network and EDI LGBTQIA+ Subgroup), and Professor Jeremy Simpson (College Principal & Dean, UCD College of Science). Special thanks to Dr. Joe Branson (School of Physics) and Ross Murray (School of Physics).

Pride Celebration Event 2024

UCD College of Science will be celebrating LGBT+ Pride month with a Pride celebration event on Friday 14 June at 11am in the 4th floor atrium of UCD O’Brien Centre for Science.

The event promises to be an enjoyable morning where you can pick up rainbow flags and other goodies to celebrate LGBT+ visibility and inclusion in the college. We will have lots of treats to share with you, including a Pride cake, cupcakes, teas and coffees, and there will be a Purl Jam craft table to make your own rainbow creations.

The event is being organised by the College of Science EDI committee and will be opened by College Principal Professor Jeremy Simpson. The morning will include short speeches from staff and students in the college reflecting on the importance of Pride and LGBT+ inclusion in science.

Please put the event in your diary if you can join us, and invite your colleagues. We look forward to seeing you there to celebrate our LGBT+ peers!

Final Postdoc Coffee of the Spring Trimester

The culturally responsive mentoring programme would like to thank UCD School of Biomolecular and Biomedical Sciences for hosting today’s rotating coffee morning for postdocs in the College of Science. Over the course of the 2 hours, around 25 postdocs dropped by to enjoy some light refreshments while networking with each other across the 7 schools in the college. This was the third and final coffee morning of the Spring Trimester, and it proved to be another great opportunity for making new connections and taking a well earned break.

We would also like to thank all of the postdocs who have attended these events, for showing up and helping to build a strong community of postdocs in the college. It is hoped that there will be more coffee mornings over the summer and into the next academic year, so keep an eye out on further announcements via your UCD email account – or subscribe to our events calendar to make sure you don’t miss out!

[Postponed] Empowerment Workshop with Dr Karen Kelsky from The Professor Is In

UPDATE: Unfortunately this event is being postponed to a later date due to illness. Please keep an eye on our website for the announcement of a new date soon.

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The Culturally Responsive Mentoring Initiative is delighted to invite Assistant Professors in the College of Science to a ‘once-off’ ‘Empowerment Workshop’ with Karen Kelsky, PhD – The Professor Is In.

Karen will be delivering her 2-hour workshop for College of Science Assistant Professors on Friday, 3rd May from 1:30 to 3:30 pm (in-person only). The ‘empowerment’ workshop will cover such areas as managing power dynamics and building confidence to address difficult topics – i.e. identifying sexual harassment (and its structural embeddedness within academia) and dealing with it both at individual and institutional scales, but also wider issues of women’s challenges in academia, and role-playing of methods of setting firm boundaries, recognising the wide range of disempowering situations, and learning to trust one’s own instincts.

We encourage those who identify as under-represented or minoritised in the College of Science to attend. Registration is required by completing the registration form. As spaces are limited, we will allocate them to those who identify as underrepresented or minoritised first.

A sandwich lunch will be offered from 12:30 – 1:15 pm before the workshop starts and I hope you will be able to join your colleagues there beforehand.

Postdoc Coffee for May

Are you a postdoc in the College of Science looking for to network and connect with other postdocs? Our next coffee morning for postdocs in the college will be taking place next week, so if you could do with some socializing with you peers over coffee then make sure to put this in your calendar!

The School of Biomolecular and Biomedical Science are excited to host the May coffee morning, and will be looking forward to welcoming you to the Conway Institute from 10am until 12pm on Thursday 9 May. This is a great opportunity to meet postdocs from other schools, to chat about shared interests and potential collaborations.

No registration necessary! Just pop-by (with your keep-cup if you have one!) and enjoy this moment of the relief with colleagues as the end of the trimester draws closer!

School of Chemistry’s Postdoc Coffee

In March around 15 postdocs from across UCD College of Science made time in their morning to connect together over coffee and pastries for the third in our College of Science Postdoc Coffee morning 2023-24 rotating coffee series. The School of Chemistry did an excellent job at hosting the event, with refreshments provided by the Culturally Responsive Mentoring team.

The event gave postdocs an opportunity to meet over the UCD break period to celebrate St Patrick’s day and reflect on the successes of the spring trimester so far.

The next postdoc coffee morning will be hosted by the School of Biomolecular and Biomedical Science later in the trimester, so stay tuned for details to be confirmed soon.

UCD Women in Science Mentoring Awards

We are thrilled to report on the success of the first UCD College of Science Women in Science Mentoring Awards that took place on March 8th, International Women’s Day 2024. The initiative was organised by UCD College of Science’s Culturally Responsive Mentoring team, spearheaded by Vice President for Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion in the College of Science, Associate Professor Catherine Mooney, along with Dr Andrew McCartan from UCD School of Computer Science and Maeve O’Connell, Senior Project Officer in the College of Science.

The Women in Science Mentoring awards acknowledge mentors in the college whose efforts have fostered encouragement and support for women, girls, and other underrepresented individuals within the UCD College of Science community. A nominations process earlier in the year invited staff and students to nominate colleagues, mentors, teachers, and staff who had shown excellence in mentoring. In total, 21 certificates were awarded to the following winners:

The awards were presented to recipients during a special ceremony held on International Women’s Day in the O’Brien Centre for Science, which was beautifully decorated with purple and white balloons and bunting for the occasion. Associate Dean of Science and Associate Professor of Pharmacology & Toxicology, Tara McMorrow opened the ceremony with a rousing speech advocating for the inclusion and encouragement for success of women and girls in science, before handing out the certificates.

Students and staff from throughout the college gathered to celebrate the success of those receiving the awards. International Women’s day cakes and cupcakes were shared, along with tea and coffee. Finally, all award recipients were entered into a prize draw for a 50 euro one4all gift voucher.

March Postdoc Coffee Morning

Over the course of the trimester the College of Science EDI committee and Culturally Responsive Mentoring initiative are facilitating a rotating coffee morning for postdocs and research staff in the college, to take place roughly once a month.

The School of Chemistry is delighted to host next coffee morning for postdocs.

This will take place on Thursday 21st March from 10.30am-11.30am in the 2nd Floor Foyer of Science South.

Please come along and bring along other postdocs from your school. Looking forward to seeing many of you there.

Celebrating Rainbow Week in the College of Science

As part of UCD’s Rainbow Week 2024, UCD College of Science EDI and Culturally Responsive Mentoring collaborated with UCD EDI and the UCD EDI LGBTI Subgroup to host a celebratory coffee morning to show support and acceptance of LGBTI staff and students in the college.
We were delighted to be joined by Dr Niamh Nestor, co-chair of the UCD EDI LGBTI subgroup, and Prof Jeremy Simpson, College Principle, who both gave rousing speeches that spoke to the welcoming and inclusive culture UCD College of Science aims to foster in support of its LGBTI staff and students. Around 30 members of the college community were in attendance, and enjoyed delicious treats and goodies provided by the UCD EDI group. This included a delicious UCD Pride chocolate cake, and highly sought after UCD rainbow lanyards, and Pride pins!
Feedback from the event was extremely positive, and everyone agreed over the importance of such events to formally promote an accepting and supporting culture around sexuality and gender on campus. The event was one of several Rainbow Week events being organized across the UCD colleges, which you can find out more about on the UCD EDI webpage. The event also follows our own Pride celebration event that took place in the College of Science last summer. We will be holding another Pride celebration event this June in the college, so stay tuned for more information.
In the meantime, Culturally Responsive Mentoring in UCD College of Science will be hosting a coffee morning for International Women’s Day on Friday March 8th in Zone 9  (Top floor atrium, Science East) at 12noon-2pm. The event includes the launch of the UCD College of Science Women in Science Mentoring Awards, so if you have experienced or observed good mentoring of women in science please send us your nominations, and then join us on the 8th for more cake and celebrations.