School of Physics and Astronomy recognises student outreach

The School of Physics and Astronomy has once again recognised the outstanding outreach and engagement activity undertaken by its undergraduate and postgraduate students at a prize-giving ceremony at the annual Chaos Student Ball.

Students were nominated by staff members across the School and voted for by the School’s outreach committee.

Tilly Evans and Amber Hornsby, were awarded the 2018 undergraduate and postgraduate prizes for outstanding outreach contribution.

Amber Hornsby has been involved with many aspects of Physics and astronomy outreach, both during her time here as an undergraduate physics students, and now as a postgraduate. She has spoken to students and the public at workshops and other events, and has co-ordinated the physics contributions to Cardiff Pint of Science 2018, held in May. In her role within the astronomy instrumentation group Amber works really hard preparing the Detector Lab for visits by external visitors - effort that often goes unnoticed, but is nonetheless greatly appreciated. She also writes about a wide range of astronomy topics research at a public level, for the Astrobites website and for the Society for Popular Astronomy magazine. For these reasons the 2018 Josephson Prize for outstanding contribution to outreach by a postgraduate student is awarded to Amber Hornsby.

Tilly Evans has donated more of her time to undergraduate recruitment activities than any other student. She is extremely enthusiastic when speaking with applicants and their parents, clearly demonstrating her passion for physics. In other activities, Tilly has worked closely with school students on a range of activities, and made sure they find Cardiff a friendly and welcoming place to visit. For these reasons, the 2018 Marconi Prize for outstanding contribution to outreach by an undergraduate student is awarded to Tilly Evans.

The hard work and achievements of many of our undergraduate and postgraduate students who have contributed vital support to our outreach, open days and for general ambassador work within the School, has also been recognized.

The Georges Lemaitre Award for Contribution to Community Engagement went to:

Daniel Cross, Eleanor Edbrooke, Eleanor Hamilton, Sarah Jaffa, Lydia Jarvis, Luke Jones, Jess Mabin, Mihaela Raischi, Taylor Short, Jess Werrell, Nikki Zabel.

The following students received the Vera Rubin award for Consistent Contribution to Community Engagement:

Adam Ali, Ryan Beckerleg, Kieran Billingham, Lille Borresen, Holly Davies, Calum Dear, Ben Flatman, Ellen Hall, Thomas Hyett, Matt Jordan, Alex Kirby, Alistair Muir, Amanda Seedhouse, Suzanne Thomas, Tom Williams.

The C.V. Raman Award for Significant Contribution to Community Engagement went to:

Kamran Bogue, Joycelyn Longdon, Cameron Manning, Sam Small, Connor Smith, Niki Tsvetanov, Joseph Ward.

The Marie Curie Award for Outstanding Contribution to Community Engagement went to:

Robert Daley, Polly Gill, Sebastian Gould-Williams, Nerys Griffith, Julian Herbst, Benedict Hofmann, Nick Koukoufilippas, Phoebe Lloyd-Evans, Alex Loader, Jeni Millard, Cameron Mills, Eve North, Chris Rees-Jacobs, Jaspa Stritt, Barbara Wawrzynek, Noor Zaidi.

Ogden Science Lecturer and Public Engagement Fellow, Dr Chris North, commented: “We really value the role that our students play as ambassadors for the School, the University, and physics in general, and we are delighted to recognise the effort that they put in.”

In addition to the Outreach awards, the students voted for three awards which were made to staff. Professor Mike Edmunds received the Best Lecturer award, Dr Annabel Cartwright the Best Tutor award, and Mr David Brown received the award for the Best Student Support Staff member.