Westminster holds Graduate School Festival

The Graduate School at Westminster was initially launched in 2012 as part of a high-quality research degree framework which provides support, training, and development opportunities for doctoral researchers. They are given the opportunity to work within an exciting inter-disciplinary research environment, attend tailor-made workshops, and benefit from personal development planning guidance designed to help them gain the necessary experience and skills to enhance their research. 

This year’s Graduate School Festival included an ambitious programme of both on-campus and online events showing the work of the University’s doctoral researchers. It was also open to undergraduates and postgraduates at the University, as well as Westminster colleagues and the external community. 

The theme of this year’s festival was ‘Look Up and Look Beyond’, which encourages all of those involved to reach out beyond their own disciplines and comfort zones to experience something new. This year’s festival included keynotes from several professors, as well as a Doctoral Researcher Film Screening in Regent Street Cinema.  

It also featured ‘In Conversation with...’, an event designed to learn about the research happening across the Graduate School, and the ‘Graduate School Show Off’ which gave each researcher nine minutes to talk about their research in their chosen format. 
The five-day festival concluded with a panel discussion targeted towards those considering a PhD in the future, which aimed to demystify the PhD process. 

Professor Leigh Wilson, Director of the Graduate School, commented on the festival: “It was so brilliant to have Fyvie Hall for the week, and to see it transformed into the place where staff, doctoral students and others came together to talk, listen, ask questions and laugh! We are so proud to have been part of the festival. We are proud of the work our colleagues did, in particular, the work of Elle Larsson, Festival Lead, of Richard McCormack, Chair of the Festival Steering Group, and of all those on the Steering Group and in the Graduate School Registry to make it happen - and we are proud of our Westminster community of doctoral researchers.” 

Find out more about Westminster’s Graduate School.