A pilot scheme for groups of ECRs, led by a mentor, to meet regularly to support each other on key areas in their careers.
As part of our Early Career Researcher (ECR) Programme, this scheme builds on the success of a similar group mentoring programme led by Professor Katie Featherstone with support from the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR).
Three groups of six to ten ECRs will work flexibly and collaboratively to identify their own needs and goals, and to develop the unique skills and strategies needed to navigate and build a scientific career.
We aim to support researchers from a range of backgrounds and experiences, and we hope to receive applications from groups of researchers underrepresented at senior academic levels, including women and those from minority ethnic backgrounds.
Our mentors
Prof Michael Coleman
Prof Michael Coleman graduated from Oxford with a first in Biochemistry and did his PhD in London on neurofilament biochemistry. He returned to Oxford for two postdocs, the first on the molecular genetics of human eye diseases and the second identifying the slow Wallerian degeneration gene (WldS) in mice, working with Hugh Perry, Laura Conforti and colleagues.
Much of the group’s subsequent research at the University of Cologne, Babraham Institute and now at the University of Cambridge, has focussed on this axon degeneration mechanism, branching into related areas of axon and synapse degeneration, including in Alzheimer’s disease, ALS and peripheral neuropathies. Since 2016, Michael has been Academic Lead of the John van Geest Centre for Brain Repair in Cambridge.
What are your hopes of being in mentor of the career development group?
Mentoring ECRs will be a great opportunity for me to pass on a lot of what I’ve learned, but also, to coach them to support one another to come up with their own solutions, because from their perspective as ECRs and different family and research backgrounds, they may be different from those that I came up with a lot during my career.
What single piece of advice would you give to an early career researcher?
Never interpret a rejection (for a paper, grant or job) as an indication that you can’t do great science. Not even if there are many – I once had eight paper and grant rejections in a single week. It felt awful, but you need (or need to develop) a crucial mix of confidence and humility to get through it. Rejections are part of research, just as rejections from publishers are part of being a literary author, rejections from investors are part of running a business and rejections for jobs happen in every career. If you are confident enough that you are right, you adapt your plans for any valid criticisms you hear, and keep going. Not having the money or the job you wanted is bad, but it’s nowhere near as bad as wrongly thinking you cannot do good science.
Prof Roxana Carare
Prof Roxana Carare qualified in Medicine in Bucharest in 1994. During her basic clinical training, she became fascinated by anatomy and completed her PhD in experimental neuropathology in 2006, in the University of Southampton, UK. She was appointed lecturer in 2001, associate professor in 2014 and full professor of clinical neuroanatomy in 2016.
The main international recognition for Roxana has come from the interdisciplinary research she leads, relevant to drug delivery to the brain and to the causes and new treatments for Alzheimer's disease, with over 110 peer reviewed publications in the field. Roxana is a member of the UK Medical Research Council Dementia Platform UK Vascular Experimental Medicine committee and the UK government advisory committee for the effects of pollution on the brain, has served as the only European member of the American NIH strategy committee for funding in dementia. Roxana has won prestigious awards, including a Dementia Research Leader award from the Alzheimer’s Society. Roxana has served as Co-Chair for The International Alliance of Women Alzheimer's Researchers in Alzheimer’s Association, Vice-Chair of the Vascular Professional Interest Area of Alzheimer’s Association, is a member of the Scientific Committee for Alzheimer’s Association, Secretary of the British Neuropathological Society, Rainwater Foundation, serves as an expert for several international research funding boards.
What are your hopes of being in mentor of the career development group?
I hope to be able to share and discuss experiences, both positive and negative and identify together the compass for a fulfilling career journey. Mentoring has shaped my career and my life, I would like to be able to share and impart the same skills and attitudes. There is no recipe for success, but there are values that are important to remember and not always visible in formal career advice settings.
What single piece of advice would you give to an early career researcher?
A successful career is not about working hard, but it is very much about working smart!
Prof Katie Featherstone
Prof Katie Featherstone is Professor of Sociology and Medicine and Director of the Geller Institute of Ageing and Memory, University of West London. Katie’s current NIHR HS&DR funded study Understanding the everyday use of restrictive practices in the care of people living with dementia during a hospital admission is part of her wider programme of research examining institutional cultures of care, drawing on traditions in ethnography and medical sociology.
The goal of her research is to improve the quality and humanity of care people living with dementia receive during a hospital admission. This work informs public policy, training, and improvement strategies within NHS hospitals. This strategic programme builds on her track record of ethnographic research across a range of clinical settings.
Katie has a track record of supporting early and mid career academics working in the field of dementia. She designed and led a highly evaluated mentoring programme funded by the NIHR Portfolio Development group and supported by the Office for the National Director for Dementia Research. This work is currently informing ECR strategy across a range of national funding bodies.
Her recent monograph Wandering the Wards - An Ethnography of Hospital Care and its Consequences for People Living with Dementia (with Andy Northcott), received favourable reviews and was shortlisted for the Foundation for the Sociology of Health and Illness (FSHI) Book Prize 2021.
What are you hopes of being in mentor of the career development group?
I hope to bring my experiences of navigating academia and the research funding landscape. The codes of academia (and of obtaining research funding) are often hidden and undiscussed and my hope is that together we can unpack these codes, share some of the common challenges, and discuss strategies we can use to navigate a route towards independence. Academia can be an isolating experience and a key goal is to develop a supportive and sustained collaborative network of trusted colleagues outside of our institutions we can call on for mutual support.
What single piece of advice would you give to an early career researcher?
Reach out and ask for support - academia can be very isolating and competitive, but it doesn’t have to be that way. The key step-change I experienced in my career was once I started to reach out, talk truthfully and openly about my experiences, values, and goals, and asked for support.
