Would you be interested in participating in a research project that is being undertaken by the Universities of Nottingham, Sheffield Hallam and Reading? This would involve completing a survey that is looking at food graduate careers (primarily the UK), to assess what competencies are desirable in food science students for the initial roles they undertake after graduation. This will expand upon previous work led by the University of Nottingham a few years ago to build ‘Competencies for Food Graduate Careers’ found on IFST website- https://www.ifst.org/resources/competencies-food-graduate-careers. The existing resource has been valuable to UK university students in planning their career and skills development (and hopefully targeted job applications) and we hope the refreshed framework will reflect any changes in employer requirements since its launch in 2017.
We are looking at gaining viewpoints from a variety of food sector businesses e.g. large and small enterprises, own label, branded, chilled and ambient manufacturing, retailers, as well as recent alumni, research study (PhD) supervisors, technical services, academics and recruitment consultants. This is to capture a range of nuances of these requirements for graduates.
We would much appreciate your time to help in this research project to identify the skills requirements for new food scientists. Therefore if you are interested in taking the online survey please click on the following link. The survey will take approximately 15 minutes to complete
https://reading.onlinesurveys.ac.uk/competencies-for-food-graduate-careers-industry-survey-2022
We are looking to gather as many responses as possible, so if you have any colleagues who are employers of food science graduates, recruitment consultants or recent food science graduates (in job up to 4 years perhaps) who might also be willing to complete the survey then please pass this email onto them.
If you would like further information about the study, then please contact emma.weston@nottingham.ac.uk
Best regards
Emma
Dr Emma WestonAssociate Professor of Food Science (MIFST, PFHEA)Division of Food, Nutrition and Dietetics School of BiosciencesUniversity of NottinghamSutton Bonington CampusLoughboroughLE12 5RDUKFind out more about graduate careers in food sciences here