Technician Commitment

7 March 2022

Technician Commitment academic lead

We are very grateful to Professor Stuart Mackenzie for his support of the technician community at Oxford and guiding us through the initial phases of the Technician Commitment accreditation. He has now stepped down as the University's institutional lead on the Technician Commitment, and we are in the process of recruiting a successor.

2 September 2020

Working on the Covid-19 Vaccine

Helen Sanders, a Clinical Trials Research Technician at the Jenner Institute, has been working on trials of the Oxford vaccine.

Find out how she has contributed to this vital research in this article on the Technicians Make It Happen website.

28 May 2019

Technician’s success at the University Apprenticeships Awards

Congratulations to Georgia Smith, who won the poster award at the recent University Apprenticeships Expo and Awards. Georgia’s poster presented her work as a research technician in the Department of Plant Sciences.

See the full news item on the Apprenticeships blog.

13 December 2018

Honorary degree for technician

Congratulations to Neville Baker, who has received an honorary MA degree from the University in recognition of 44 years of service in the Chemistry electronics workshop.

See the full news item on the Department of Chemistry website.

5 December 2018

In May 2017 the University became a signatory to the Technician Commitment, signalling its intention to address the key issues affecting the technical community in academia and research. We held a launch event in April 2018 attended by over 50 members of staff including technicians, technical managers and HR officers.

Professor Stuart Mackenzie, Head of the Physical and Theoretical Chemistry Laboratory, is the nominated institutional lead and chairs an inter-departmental forum who have produced our first two-year action plan covering the period to summer 2020. This has been submitted to the national steering group and we await feedback from peer reviewers by the end of January 2019.

The Technician Commitment is a sector-wide initiative led by the Science Council, in partnership with the Gatsby Foundation, and currently has over 60 signatories. Information on activities at national level can be found on the Technicians make it happen campaign website.

The commitment has five strands:

• Visibility
• Recognition
• Career Development
• Sustainability
• Evaluating Impact

The University has adopted a broad definition of a technician as any member of staff providing technical support for those whose role includes teaching and/or research, recognising that this covers staff with a variety of job titles and grades. Our activity will be focused primarily in the MPLS and Medical Sciences divisions, but any member of staff who identifies as a technician is encouraged to participate.

The University is developing opportunities for technical staff through its Work Learn Develop Apprenticeships programme which provides professional training and qualifications for existing staff.