Gap year
jobs
Any job you do in a gap
year is bound to help you
develop new skills, but if
you look around you may
be lucky enough to find a
science-related job. Here
is a couple of ideas to get
you started:
YINI (Year in Industry)
arrange paid placements
for gap year students in
UK science companies.
Check out their website
for more information:
http://bit.ly/P2u9XZ
School science
technician – for hands
on chemistry experience,
why not ask your school
if they have any
technician vacancies?
Top tips
Taking a gap year
Annette Hutchinson asks: ‘it is worth it?’
Is a gap year right for you?
Thirteen years of compulsory education is a long time, so
it is little wonder so many people choose to take a break
after school before going to university. From volunteering
or backpacking to paid employment, there are many ways
to fill a gap year, but how will it affect your prospects?
We’ve had a chat with some university admissions tutors,
recent graduates and chemistry employers so that you can
decide if a gap year is right for you.
What the universities say
Liam Cox, of the School of Chemistry at the University of
Birmingham, UK, says students who have taken a gap
year ‘often come back with a sense of maturity, better
organisation and time management skills, all of which lend
themselves to a subject like chemistry, where you do need
to be organised and plan your week ahead.’
Take a revision guide
with you if you go
travelling, and glance at it
every now and again.
A worry for some students is that they will forget
everything they learnt at school but Cox doesn’t see this as
a problem. ‘Different people take varying times to adjust
to things,’ he says. ‘So if you’ve forgotten your chemistry,
that might be your disadvantage, but somebody else is
struggling with getting out of bed for a nine o’clock lecture
when they’ve not got their mother to wake them up.’
Keep up-to-date by
reading magazines like
The Mole, Chemistry
World or New Scientist.
Deciding how to use your gap year is important. For
Bhakvik Patel from the University of Brighton, UK, it’s all
about variety. He’s encouraged by gap-year students who
break up their year with different ‘mini projects’. This gives
Keep up your chemistry
during a gap year
students a ‘more diverse
experience than someone
who’s going to just one
location for the year.’
Talking about gap-year plans in your UCAS personal
statement is a great way to sell yourself to admissions
tutors. The key thing is to relate your plans to the skills you
hope to develop. ‘Admissions tutors want to see what an
individual is going to gain from that experience and how
it’s going to contribute to their success in the future,’ says
David Read, director of undergraduate admissions at the
University of Southampton, UK.
What the graduates say
‘I changed completely. I was so much more confident,’
says recent graduate Amy Styring of her gap year. Before
studying archaeology and chemistry at university, Amy
worked for a few months to fund a trip to Brazil. She
had planned to do voluntary work at an archaeological
site there, but when this fell through at the last minute,
she ended up volunteering on a farm. Amy has used
this experience in job applications as an example of her
independence and initiative.
What the employers say
It may seem like a long time off, but before you know it,
you’ll be a applying for your first ‘proper’ job. So what do
your future bosses think of gap years?
‘As a recruiter, I look at how [a candidate’s] life
experiences contribute to their skill set and a gap year
may impact on that’ says Ian Bell, who works for Afton
Chemical Ltd. He says a gap year itself is neither positive
nor negative, ‘it’s what they’ve done with that luxury [of
having a gap year], that’s of interest.’
Jacquin Wilford-Brown, from International Paint Ltd,
says she often finds the qualities she’s looking for in
candidates who’ve taken a gap year: ‘If you’re talking to
someone who has taken a gap year, they often have more
experience that they can draw on and you can get a better
impression of who they are, and what they can do. If they
haven’t, they might still have the same qualities, but it
might just be harder to find out.’
istockphoto
So, whether you decide to take a gap year or not, you
won’t be disadvantaged when it comes to applying for
university or securing a job in chemistry. But if you do
decide to go for it, make sure you have a plan, so that you
can get the best possible experience from the year, and
develop skills that will help you in the future.
6 | The Mole | September 2012
www.rsc.org/TheMole