Doing a placement year is an achievement in itself – in an increasingly competitive market, securing a placement that equips students with the right skills, confidence, and industry knowledge for their future is a commendable success. An important part of our work at the University of Sheffield involves ensuring that all eligible students have the opportunity to undertake a placement year and develop their employability, skills, and knowledge as much as they can while doing so.
The awards
The Placement Year Awards, organised and run by the University of Sheffield’s Careers and Employability Service with support from key faculty employability staff, recognise exceptional students who have made significant contributions to their workplace, their organisations’ sustainability, and have shown considerable resilience and growth during their placements. The awards also recognise and celebrate extraordinary placement providers who provided exceptional support and development opportunities that have made a significant positive impact on students during their placements.
Students were able to self-nominate or be nominated for the following awards:
- Celebrating Resilience Award: a student who has overcome challenges to pursue their placement year - these could be related to health, education, finance, caring responsibilities, or challenges within their workplace.
- Sustainability Award: a student who has made a considerable contribution to their placement provider’s social or environmental sustainability practices whilst on placement.
- Creativity and Innovation Award: a student who has made a significant impact on an organisation through new initiatives and creativity, or who has helped innovate through the use of technology/problem-solving. Students had to be nominated by their employers for this category.
- Placement Student of the Year Award: a student who has made considerable contributions to their host organisations while demonstrating significant personal and professional growth.
Students were also able to nominate employers for the Placement Provider of the Year Award, which recognises managers, mentors, or work colleagues, who have gone above and beyond to provide students with exceptional support and skill development opportunities.
The ceremony
The Placement Year Awards Ceremony featured two keynotes from Professor David Forrest, Deputy Vice-President for Education (Student Experience), and Helen Smith, Associate Director of Student & Academic Services (Careers & Employability), who spoke about the value and impact of undertaking a placement year and developing one’s skills and attributes through work-based learning opportunities and recognised the extraordinary contributions that our students make through their placement experiences.
We also welcomed Soumya Namdeo, University of Sheffield Management School alumna who had previously undertaken a placement year at Cummins, who spoke about her experience of stepping into a graduate role after completing a placement year and translating the insights and skills gained during her degree into her current career.
The winners
A university-wide panel of Careers and Employability Service staff and faculty employability staff selected the winners in each category from over 150 nominations.
Celebrating Resilience Award
Highly Commended: Katie Fitzgerald - Psychology]
Highly Commended: Romesa Khawaja - General Engineering
Winner: Daniel Holloway - Aerospace Engineering
We were inspired by this student’s reflection - that resilience isn’t about what happens to you, but about how you respond to it.
Sustainability Award
Highly Commended: Maria Jose Gordillo Chiriboga - Management & Economics
Highly Commended: Romesa Khawaja - General Engineering
Winner: Lily O’Shea - Zoology
This candidate’s sustainability activities were very impressive, wide-ranging, and we felt they were leaving the strongest legacy behind.
Creativity and Innovation Award
Highly Commended: Hateem Mohammed-Janjua - Mechatronic and Robotic Engineering
Highly Commended: Chloe Greenwood - Psychology
Winner: Emily Milburn - Biomedical Science
It was clear from this nomination that this student has shown outstanding talent in creating effective ideas and methods to improve business operations. The company was extremely impressed by Emily’s creative abilities which have played a major role in changing how their company is perceived. The value of this has been huge to them.
Placement Student of the Year Award (Faculties of Social Science and Arts & Humanities
Highly Commended: Momin Rizwan - Economics
Highly Commended: Ahmad Khan - Economics
Winner: Junyu Zhao - Accounting and Financial Management
This was a really competitive pool of applicants, several candidates could demonstrate the required criteria for this award. What particularly impressed us was the adaptability of this candidate, showing commitment to their team in meeting tight deadlines and taking on additional responsibilities at short notice.
Placement Student of the Year Award (Faculty of Engineering)
Highly Commended: Morgan Manly - Mechatronic and Robotic Engineering
Highly Commended: Aditya Mahendra - Computer Systems Engineering
Winner: Simone Jain - Computer Science
The candidate has demonstrated effective leadership and influence in the developer community, additionally the candidate led a team of interns to invent patentable creations as part of IBM’s patent group programme outside of their core role.
Placement Student of the Year Award (Faculty of Science)
Highly commended: Faith Eldred-Butler - Chemistry
Highly commended: Chloe Godfrey - Psychology
Winner: Samuel Verhulst - Biomedical Science
This student exceeded expectations, seizing an opportunity to automate a previously manual process for creating an immunocytochemistry assay; they taught themself how to use automation machinery to design an assay that reduced lab time from a week to a couple of hours.
Placement Provider of the Year Award (SMEs)
Highly Commended: Translink Corporate Finance team - Translink
Highly Commended: Sook Meng Muk - Matillion
Winner: Paul Ridgway - The Curve
It was clear from this nomination that the placement student in this organisation was provided with a comprehensive range of support, and a valuable range of knowledge transfer and personal development opportunities, including a live project of real value which stretched their skills and learning - exactly what most students are seeking from their placement host employers.
Placement Provider of the Year Award (Non-SMEs)
Highly Commended: Alex Edmunds - BMW Group
Highly Commended: Alex Staton - Microsoft Limited
Winner: Helen Liley - RCI/Mobilize Financial Services
Photographed: Momin Rizwan, placement student at Mobilize Financial Services, accepting the award on Helen’s behalf.
Helen Liley showed considerable investment in the student’s growth on both a personal and professional level, and created a safe and inclusive environment which empowered the student to work with the wider team and become a more confident and capable professional.
We are grateful to all those students and employers who have taken the time to submit their nominations and all those who attended the Placement Year Awards Ceremony to join us in celebrating our winners and nominees. We are also thankful for our employer partners for participating in the awards, and the incredible support from employability staff across the university in helping us select the winners from a high number of excellent nominations.