Summer Opportunities Fund
Each year the long vac has traditionally provided Churchill students with a vital opportunity to generate hands on work experience and inform their future career path through participating in summer work placements
From joining a lab to working with primary sources in a specialist archive, for many students these types of summer projects have been hugely formative in helping them understand what type of job they want to go into, whether or not they want to pursue further education or whether or not a career in that sector or area of science is one that is appealing to them.
Many students are desperate for those experiences and, as explained by Rita Monson, Senior Tutor at Churchill, an added concern is that funding for these types of experiences is often really limited and is not sufficient to actually even cover an individual’s living expenses;
Despite the fact that there shouldn’t be unpaid internships, most research groups don’t have the kind of money that would be required to fund these sorts of experiences and it’s really important that the research group isn’t out of pocket because ultimately you are agreeing to take someone who is relatively inexperienced. There are costs associated with experimental work which most groups will pay from their own expenses but I’m talking about the actual living expenses so that no student is out of pocket if they take up one of these placements and at the moment that’s not necessarily happening.
In response, the College, led by the Senior Tutor, has devised a Summer Opportunities Bursary scheme which aims to offer a limited number of bursaries to students on a competitive basis at £2,500 each, to enable summer work placements.
In order to be considered, students will have to write a proposal demonstrating they had thought about what they were going to get out of the experience and what types of scientific or cultural exploration the bursary would allow them to do.
You may also be interested in:

Legacies need not be large to make a difference.

Supporting our students today, and for the future.

Keeping alumni connected with each other and the College.