The student volunteering team at the University of Bath's Students' Union has run an annual session for research students to present their research at the Age UK BANES Culture Club for four years. I signed up as soon as I saw this opportunity to share my research with this local group.
About the Session
The session is called Research Objects. There were four presenters this year, including myself, all in their first year of their PhD or research project.
We each had to choose an object that sums up our research, which we were to use as a 'hook' for our presentation. I decided to take the HoloLens because it motivates the discussion around virtual and augmented reality. Also, it's really cool and most people will not have seen it before.
Last week, we had a practice session in which the organisers gave us some feedback on our presentations. This was useful for making sure the content was right for our audience, so afterwards I felt quite comfortable going into the session.
On the Day
Here we all are:
Had a great time at V Team’s Research Objects for Age UK B&NES Culture Club. Thank you to all the PGRs who presented and to St John’s for providing such a fab venue @stjohns1174 @AgeUKBANES @thesubath @subathpostgrad pic.twitter.com/qdl8RonTFF
— V Team (@VTeamBath) January 31, 2019
My presentation is down below if you want to flick through the slides.
The other topics of the day included breast cancer research, reducing plastic waste in the oceans, and Antarctica. There was a broad selection of research areas and departments, and it was a pleasure presenting alongside the other enthusiastic students.
There was time for Q&A after each presentation, and the Culture Club members didn't hold back! What was interesting for me, though, was that the same sorts of questions that I have had before came up after my presentation, including how will people living with dementia interact with augmented reality and how will they move between activities? In future presentations, I will include these as relevant aspects to consider later on, after determining if augmented reality is suitable for people living with dementia.
There was a lovely buzz after the presentations were over, and the Culture Club members were grateful for us going along to share our work with them. I think I speak for all of the presenters when I say that we were just as grateful for them having us along to talk about our work.
My Presentation
I have included my presentation below, although it was better 'live' because the photos in the presentation are used to illustrate what I wanted to say, which I expanded on verbally. Watch the WorkLink video and the example application I developed by clicking the links.
You may notice it has similar content to previous presentations I have given, though new and improved as I get better at talking about my work! As noted above, I will improve further by highlighting key factors to consider later in the project.
Respond