Training and skills in the UK plant sciences community: Have your say

Categories: UKPSF
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Published on: September 4, 2014

The UK Plant Sciences Federation have set up working groups to follow up the recommendations made in their report, which was launched in January. The Training and Skills Working group is tackling school, university, post-graduate and early career issues in the plant science – definitely a broad scope. The Chair Simon Leather is trying out ‘crowd-sourcing’ with his working group, asking anyone who wants to contribute for their opinions and suggestions about the way forward.

In a post on his personal website, Simon Leather has given a lot of information about the current status of training and skills in the UK plant science community, the main problems highlighted in the report, comments from the first Working Group meeting and some ideas to help solve the problem.

Leather argues that action is imperative: Without a well-trained cadre of plant scientists that are able to recognise whole organisms and are able to interact with industry we will see more problems arising with invasive species, our crop production industry will be severely compromised and biodiversity loss will accelerate. 

Some of the ideas to improve training and skills in plant science discussed at the Working Group are:

  • Working with teachers to encourage children and young people to take an interest in plant science
  • Raising awareness in schools and universities of the opportunities provided by a background in plant sciences
  • Working with the Society of Biology degree accreditation scheme to make sure plant science is a part of accredited courses
  • Building stronger training links between academia and industry to ensure HE courses are fit for purpose

What do you think? Do you think these are the right areas to focus on? The Working Group has come up with reasonable actions to begin making progress. I strongly encourage you to read the whole article, and to have your say on the action plan and challenges by commenting on the article.

Along with the Working Groups on Funding, Regulation and Translation, the Training and Skills group will report at the UKPSF AGM on 20 November.

Go here to read the article and comment: http://simonleather.wordpress.com/2014/09/02/how-do-we-save-uk-plant-sciences/

In Photos: UK Plant Sciences Report Launch

Categories: UKPSF
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Published on: February 3, 2014

Thanks to Society of Biology Regional Coordinator David Urry for wielding the Society camera throughout the launch of the UKPSF report ‘UK Plant Science: Current Status and Future Challenges’, and letting me use some photos!

The GARNet website has a news piece on the launch, and tweets about the report are collected here

Not put off by the long, damp queue for the Faraday Lecture, the plant sciences community gathered in the Marble Hall at the Royal Society.

crowd 900

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Current Status and Future Challenges of UK Plant Science

Categories: GARNet, UKPSF
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Published on: January 28, 2014

status report cover

The UK Plant Sciences Federation released UK Plant Science: Current Status and Future Challenges today. It is the product of over a year’s work collecting data and viewpoints from across the UK plant science sector, from researchers like those in the GARNet community to industry scientists, managers in industry and academia, plant breeders and growers, policy-makers and educators.

The report contains the first ever assessment of activities across the UK’s plant science sector. It calls for a doubling of investment in plant science, which currently receives less than 4% of UK public research funding, and urges Government and industry to work together to achieve this.

Jim Beynon, GARNet representative to UKPSF and UKPSF Chair, says: “In addition to increased investment, we need a more concerted approach to ensuring progress in both fundamental scientific understanding and its application for all our benefit. This has not been the case for more than a decade and the adverse impact on skills supply, infrastructure and innovation is now becoming apparent.”

The whole GARNet team have contributed to the report, and we’re excited to be going to the official launch at the Royal Society – consider the above quote from Jim a preview of his speech this evening! We’ll post some photos here later in the week, but in the mean time you can follow the launch virtually on the #UKPSFReport Twitter stream.

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