Ep46: Technicians Make It Happen

October 21, 2017 in Season 3

Photograph of experimental setup. — Technicians design and construct many experiments. Image credit: Stuart Higgins.

It’s not just academics who conduct experiments, analyse results and teach students - technicians do it too. What is the role of a technician in science?

I personally try and blur the line between technician and academic

In the first part of this episode I talk to Stephen Franey, a Multi-Disciplinary Manager in the Teaching Labs at King’s College London, and Thomas Pitcher, who works in the pharmacology labs at King’s College London. We talk about the role of a technician, and how perceptions have changed with time.

In the second part I talk to Michele Rea, Communications Manager at the Gatsby Charitable Foundation, about technical education reform and their current campaign to promote technical roles ‘Technicians Make It Happen’.

You can read the ‘Report of the Independent Panel on Technical Education’ here, and more of Gatsby’s reports into science education on their website.

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