Course: SPA6543 - Group Project for Physicists - 2019/20

General

Module announcements Forum

General

This module places students in groups of 3 to 6 allocated to a project proposed by either an external collaborator (e.g. industrial company, local authority, NHS) or by one of the research groups within the School of Physics and Astronomy. The students are initially briefed by the ‘client’, who proposed the project, and then self-organise to tackle the problem. The group will meet with one or several academic supervisors and (more importantly) with each other. Formal minutes (including action lists) of each group meeting will be kept and presented in the appendices of the group’s technical report. The project work is carried out using the School's laboratory and computing facilities as well as external facilities where appropriate. Each group will produce a formal, technical written report as well as presenting its findings orally to the ‘client’ and supervisors at the end of the project. The projects are assessed by academic supervisors with input from the external collaborator.

Aims and Objectives

This module aims to give insight into research-based on real problems encountered by the collaborator organisations. It is designed to expose students to a wide range of employment opportunities for physicists as well as giving them insight into the needs of employers. In particular, students gain invaluable experience in project management and teamwork, as well as improving their written and oral communication skills.

The learning outcomes from this module are:

Students will be able to complete a short group project by applying basic physical principles.
Students will be able to collectively organise themselves and delegate tasks appropriately to members of the group.
Students will chair, minute and attend regular group meetings throughout the duration of the project.
Students will compose a joint written Group Technical Report as well as a short Individual Student Report.
Students will compose and present orally a Group Oral Presentation.

Deadlines and report submission

The deadline for submission of the Group Technical Report is 23 April 2020 17:00.

The deadline for submission of the Group Oral Presentation and Individual Student Reports is 8 May 2019 17:00.

Assessment and Marking Scheme

There are three items of assessment for this module:

Group Technical Report (one per group): 30% overall contribution to the overall mark. This report will include technical descriptions of the project’s aims, methodology, and outcomes. It will include appendices containing meeting minutes, data, listings, etc. It will be no longer than 50 pages.

Group Oral Presentation (one per group): 20% overall contribution to the overall mark. The group will give a technical presentation of the aims, methodology, and outcomes of the project. The oral examination itself, which will be held in the Examination Period, will be structured as follows: 15 minutes for the group to present plus a further 15 minutes of questioning from the examiners. You will be informed of the venue and precise time of your oral examination by email.

Individual Student Report (one per student): 50% overall contribution to the overall mark. This report is to be prepared by each individual member of the group, it should detail your contribution to the work, self-reflections, and future work suggestions. It will be no longer than 5 pages.

The link at the bottom of this page gives further detail of the marking schemes for each item of assessment, this can serve as a guide to the structure/content for the items of assessment.

Group Technical Report, Individual Student Report and Group Oral Presentation should submitted in pdf format. The report will be checked using the Turnitin plagiarism detection service.