Ignite Sheffield #5 Applications

Applications are now open for Ignite Sheffield #5 -> http://tinyurl.com/clm7ctx

Ignite is a speaking event with a difference.  Each speaker has 5 minutes to talk about something they care about.  During the talk the speaker must use 20 slides which auto-advance every 15 seconds.  It's not as easy as it sounds!

The next Ignite Sheffield event is on the topic of Cultures and Communities.  If you would like to give it a go, fill out the web form (http://tinyurl.com/clm7ctx).

We hope to see you either as a speaker or as part of the audience on the 14th May 2014, at Coffee Revolution in the Sheffield University Student's Union.

Ignite Sheffield #4

The 4th Ignite Event is on the 19th March.  At Coffee Revolution in the Sheffield University Student's Union.  If you haven't come across the concept of Ignite before check out this website to see what we're all about.

We have some excellent speakers. Come along and learn something new!

Schedule

From 6.45 Welcome and chance to get your coffee 

7.00 Introduction - Kay Guccione

7.05-7.35 Session 1

1. Homes Under The Hammer: Putting Silk To The Test - Chris Holland

2. Everyday Urban Living for International Students - Lakshmi Rajendran

3. Build Your City Out of Poetry - Joanne Mateer

4. Deconstructing the Home Ideal - Daniel Kerr

5. The Hamster: An Unexpected Journey Into Drug Manufacturing - Darren Geoghegan

Coffee break and chat (15min)

7.50-8.30 Session 2

6. Have a Safe Journey - Emma Carter

7. Service Design Jams: 48 hours to change the world - Clare Foyle

8. The Future Can be Composted - Jess Ghost

9. Design for Accessibility - Hannah Harvey

10. The Skeleton in Obesity: Strong bones don't prevent fracture - Amy Evans

11. End of the Road: Breaking the Mould - Anthony Prince

Coffee break and chat (10min)

8.40-9.10 Session 3

12. Stains TM: Leak Chic - Chella Quint

13. Home Sweet Home: Housing designed to match lifestyle - Aiman Rashid

14. Idea to Inspiration: Skills to shape your life - Hasan Siddiqui

15. Stem cells: Overcoming multiple challenges for survival - Veronica Biga

16. Creativity for the soul: How design makes you feel - Chris Webb

9.10 Details of next event

9.15 Close – retire to Interval for discussion - All Invited

Inundated with speakers

The last two Ignite Sheffield events that we've held have been hard work for me.  Getting speakers has mostly involved using my own networks to find people who are interested in talking.  It's been difficult, often the people who you know have something interesting to say and are happy to talk lots in an informal situation balk at the thought of public speaking.  Even to a fairly small crowd.

Ignite Sheffield #3 is different though.  We decided to use the University of Sheffield (because we have contacts, nothing against Hallam) and advertise through them to all of their postdocs and phd students.

And WOW!

In less than a day we filled up all the slots, decided to have more talks at the event, filled up those slots and started to book people in for Ignite Sheffield #4 which we'll hold sometime in July.

So now we just need an awesome audience and don't forget it's FREE.  There's a facebook event here we're you can sign up to come and watch (and make sure it's in your diary).  https://www.facebook.com/events/558667547496796/

The final titles and running order should be coming in April.

We hope to see you there.

Ignite Sheffield #2 Applications

Hello Everyone,

We're going to open applications for giving a talk at Ignite Sheffield #2 today.  Hopefully we can set the program quite early and give us lots of time to advertise!

The plan is to have 9 talks in total, preference will be given to those who apply early and then to those who haven't spoken before.

The date hasn't been finalised yet, but it will be a Wednesday in February, if there is a specific date that you can't do, email me (postdocbeth@gmail.com) after you fill out the application form and we'll try and set the date for one of the other options.

The application form for speaking can be found here:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?pli=1&formkey=dDhydXp2aVduYzdneU9wMXJUX0xuWUE6MQ#gid=0

Please point anyone else that you think might be interested to the form as well.

Hope to hear from you soon!

Ignite Sheffield

Ignite Sheffield #1 roundup

Hi All,

So Ignite Sheffield #1 was last night.  As the dust settles this morning I wanted to write down a few of my thoughts to help make next time even better.

To start with I'd like to say that I think it was a great success.  For our first event I was going to be happy if we got more than 20 people in the audience.  The count was 29, so that's great.

All the talks were really great, there was a slight issue with some of the slides not advancing correctly, which I will have to check more carefully next time.  It was a shame that we didn't have a few reserve talks to give us one to slot in for the speaker we lost due to illness.  We had a great idea suggested to us to vote on a video from another Ignite event to watch instead.  Unfortunately I forgot to bring any speakers so that went out the window!!

I think blocks of 4 speakers was definitely long enough.  If we'd had some more speakers I would have been happy to go down to block of 3 with more breaks.

The venue was excellent, and I would definitely encourage people to use Coffee Revolution as venue.  They were very helpful and really friendly.

Singsoc gave a great performance, we knew it wouldn't be polished, but it was highly successful. A different group who were sitting around the corner even joined in the applause!

We've already got some volunteers for the next session, which I think will probably be Jan/Feb 2013.  Watch this space for more details.

In the meantime, we have a twitter account @IgniteSheffield, and a facebook page https://www.facebook.com/IgniteSheffield, so come and see us there.

A few days to go!

Hi all,

We're down to only a few days until Ignite Sheffield #1 (17/10/2012 - 7.30pm).  I'm very excited and more than a little bit nervous!  Really hoping it goes well.  We've got some fantastic speakers and a great venue so it should be great.

However it would be really good if anyone reading this blog would go and tell a couple of other people about the event, even if you can't come yourself.  It'd be fantastic to have a big audience to give some love to all our excellent speakers.

Here's the facebook event page:

https://www.facebook.com/events/191055761028848/

And the current speaker list is:

Kate Montague : Spinal Injuries
Cat Taylor : The top 10 ways to help your child succeed at school
Charlotte French : China and Chairman Mao
Beth Hellen : Seeing the world through different eyes (mainly those of bees)
Chris Ward : The Innate Immune System
Kate Hellen : The quilts of Gee's Bend 
Peter Hellen : Satellite navigation systems
Tash Reynolds: TBC (probably archaeological)

Ignite poster

I'm rather a fan of intriguing your audience rather than spoon feeding them.  So here's the poster for Ignite Sheffield...