The Aegis Professor Undergraduate Competition stemmed from a conversation between a science undergraduate student and our cohort of honorary professors of industry, ‘Aegis Professors’ and the Science Partnership Office in the spring of 2022. It was clear that there was a need to design an innovative scheme which would provide a unique opportunity for all science undergraduates to experience how scientific research ideas can be commercialised and developed beyond theory. Currently, this type of training is only available to those enrolled on joint degrees with innovation or bespoke course units. This year we are excited to also bring this opportunity to engineering students!
The Aegis Professors bring expertise from outside of academia and represent a diverse range of organisations from small start-ups, government, to international industries. Now in its second year, the competition, led by the Science Partnership Office, works in close partnership with these professors, the science and engineering student societies, the Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, science and engineering academics and is recognised by The Bristol PLUS Award.
The competition encourages the students to work on and develop ideas outside their traditional academic sphere, putting their academic skills into practice. We want to ensure student agency, so the competition is co-created with student representatives to develop and refine the approach each year to ensure it meets their needs and adds value to their student experience. Students provide feedback on what works and where improvements can be made.
How does the competition work?
- Students sign up and select their favourite scientific/engineering challenges – these are proposed by academics and the Aegis Professors. This year students tackled big challenges such as how to 3D print on any surface, provide clean drinking water for all, and reducing an organisation’s environmental footprint.
- We assign students to multidisciplinary teams who then work in their own time on the project over the summer.
- They present their work to the Aegis Professors at a Celebration Day in September
All participating students benefit from a training workshop in innovation, ideas generation and team working as well as online training on producing effective presentations and connection with past student competitors. The challenge proposers provide mentoring sessions where the students can work through their ideas.
This year eleven teams showcased their work at the day of celebration – nearly double the previous year! Working over the summer months can be challenging due to time zone differences, maintaining motivation, time management around schedules, remote working and collaborating with people you haven’t met previously. Despite this, the quality of the presentations and posters was highly commended by the judging panel of Aegis Professors!
What do the students think?
In the two years the competition has been running, we have received fantastic positive feedback where the students “appreciated the chance to network with [the Aegis] professors” and other professionals and “gain skills and experience for their CV”. For some, they were exposed to new ways of working: “The innovation workshop in June was inspiring – I hadn’t considered working in innovation before.” Others highlighted how it gave them the opportunity to “Work with new people and developing an idea as far as they could” and allowed them to “have a task which was outside of the normal academic sphere and being able to work open-ended on something they were deeply passionate about”. For others it provided an opportunity to gain experience in presentation and poster sessions which is limited in their degree course. Importantly, “It really felt like the work the students had done was being valued and rewarded!” Indeed, the 2023 winners have taken their idea forward setting up a company centred on sustainable fashion, Weaving Change. They have already secured over £50k in funding so watch this space!
We are looking forward to 2025 where we anticipate the competition to grow and develop further through joint working with our student society representatives, the Aegis Professors and academics across the Faculty of Science and Engineering with the possibility of incorporating other Faculties.
For more information, please contact us at scif-apuc@bristol.ac.uk
