Author: Nikita Rathod

Adriana Lobosco, Laboratory Technician Apprentice, Department of Bioengineering

“I have always had great admiration for women in STEM careers and now I am in that position myself”

My first dream job was to be a vet – this was quickly vetoed after my sister told me where my hands would end up! After I finished my A-Levels, I spent some time working in retail as a visual merchandiser and then working in the food industry helping to develop new food-to-go products. After realising that I wasn’t enjoying my job, I left in search of a science-based role.  

Apprenticeships have always appealed to me because I like the hybrid approach of learning and working. Before I came across this apprenticeship, I didn’t think it was possible for me to access a role like this without a degree.  

As an apprentice bioengineering technician, my role is varied, and every day is different. I am constantly learning new things and putting them into practice. 

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Dr Stephanie Wright, Lecturer in Environmental Toxicology, School of Public Health 

“Being able to work in the lab on important environmental health issues, surrounded by amazing brains who are genuinely nice people, is a privilege.”

I wouldn’t say my career journey was entirely conventional. Academic, yes, but I skipped an MSc and went straight from PhD to my first fellowship. These were considerable achievements, but establishing both my independence and my own research niche so early on was challenging. I also weaved through disciplines, from marine biology to ecotoxicology to physical and analytical chemistry, to exposure and air pollution science and back to toxicology. These have given me a solid, holistic understanding of the research I do. Now I’m a lecturer and lead a research team and I can’t wait to watch them flourish and make discoveries in the emerging field of microplastics and health.  

Over the last few months, I’ve presented remotely to a group of European consortia, and to College students on the other side of the world. The students were on a programme at the University of Akron, and as part of one of their modules, I was invited to give a lecture.

I also presented in-person to science enthusiasts at the New Scientist Festival in Manchester, and to toxicologists in San Diego at the Society of Toxicology annual meeting, my first international conference off UK soil in two years.   (more…)

Azellia A. Shafira Taught Postgraduate, Business School 

Part of Shifting the Lens: A celebration of cultural diversity at Imperial 

“I feel self-assured and confident because I wear the hijab”

Since I started at Imperial, people have asked me a lot about the hijab and why I wear it. I love to share this part of my story.  

There are no rules in my country about how you should dress, but there are rules in some families. My father’s extended family is more conservative – there’s an unspoken agreement that when girls hit puberty, they have to start wearing the hijab. My mum’s side is more free, there’s no pressure. Growing up, neither of my parents wanted to force me the way that some parents do. 

I had the liberty to choose, and the time to learn more about it. I didn’t choose to be Muslim – I was Muslim from when I was born – but deciding whether to wear the hijab was an opportunity to explore my faith.  

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Harbhajan Singh Brar, Director of Human Resources 

Part of Shifting the Lens: A celebration of cultural diversity at Imperial 

“My parents really instilled a lot of pride in me growing up as a Sikh.”

When I was growing up, the racist murder of Gurdip Chagga and the killing of Blair Peach during the Southall riots in 1979 had a huge impact on me. This led me to become quite politicised and influenced me to study politics and international relations at university. I then also went on to do a postgraduate diploma in ethnic relations as I wanted to understand what more I could do to make things better for ethnic minority communities.  

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Jerusa Brignardello Guerra, Research Postgraduate, Department of Metabolism, Digestion and Reproduction and Research Assistant, Department of Surgery and Cancer

Part of Shifting the Lens: A celebration of cultural diversity at Imperial 

“When you are Chilean, you feel proud because you come from a country that has overcome a lot of difficulties. We are extremely resilient.”

When you are Chilean, you feel proud because you come from a country that has overcome a lot of difficulties. We are extremely resilient. We have many natural disasters like earthquakes and volcanoes, so we are used to rebuilding everything. Bad things happen often, but we learn to carry on. 

There is so much about Chile that people are not aware of. Chile is a really wealthy country in terms of literature – we have incredible writers such as Nicanor Parra, Roberto Bolaños and Pablo de Rokha. We have wonderful celebrations, such as for 18 de September, where the country stops for a week to mark the first meeting that started the process of independence from Spain. Everyone gets together to eat traditional Chilean food like empanadas and asados and drink terremotos, piscolas or an awesome Chilean wine. 

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Faridah Abdulrazaq, Taught postgraduate, MSc Climate Change, Management & Finance, Imperial College Business School 

Part of Shifting the Lens: A celebration of cultural diversity at Imperial 

“I love my course at the Business School. It teaches me about the world, showing me new things as well as confirming some things I thought to be true.”

I was born in London but moved to Nigeria at four or five years old. I grew up in Lagos. I would come back to the UK all the time as a child, it was where we came on holidays because my parents had a property here. It was great to visit, but it wasn’t like a proper holiday – it’s not as if they had a place in the Maldives! 

I properly came back to the UK when I was sixteen – I moved to Kent and did my A-Levels. From there I did a chemical engineering undergraduate degree in Sheffield, and now here I am back in London for my Master’s. 

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Ata Rahman, Digital Marketing Officer, Academic Services

 “So many people still think you can’t be brown and gay”

Part of Shifting the Lens: A celebration of cultural diversity at Imperial 

I’m gay and one of the hardest things for me growing up was that I was stuck in a world where both sides of my identity, the Pakistani and the gay sides, don’t tend to like each other. When I came out, I expected backlash from the South Asian community, particularly from the religious Muslim community. What was disappointing and really shocking to me was the amount of racism within the LGBT+ community. 

When I first came out and started going out in Soho in London, I was turned away from many places. This happened for about seven or eight years after I came out when I was 18. I was shocked by the number of people who would come up to me and tell me that I didn’t belong there or who would basically assume that I was there to blow up the club. I would say that there is still a significant amount of prejudice towards people of colour within the LGBT+ community – it’s a serious problem. I know that more and more steps are being taken to tackle it, but I think we still have a long way to go. 

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Ayşe Zeynep Kamış, Undergraduate, Department of Bioengineering 

“I’ve been empowered to be proud of my sexual identity because of Imperial.”

Part of Shifting the Lens: A celebration of cultural diversity at Imperial 

As well as my Turkish culture, being bisexual is also an important part of my identity. I came out after I moved to London to study at Imperial. I’ve been empowered to be proud of my sexual identity because of Imperial. In Turkey, it was always assumed that I was heterosexual. It was never an option to be anything else. You are an outlier if you’re openly gay in Turkey unless you are in a safe community.  

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Dr Diana Varaden, Research Associate, Environmental Research Group, School of Public Health

“I strive to identify how best we can communicate air pollution as a health risk to the public”

After I completed my MSc in environmental technology at Imperial, I started a job as an air quality consultant, working on projects involving monitoring and modelling air quality. Through my educational background and work experience, I was able to recognise the sources and magnitude of the air pollution problem in our city and its impact on human health.  

However, I couldn’t help but wonder how the public could understand the importance of tackling the air pollution problem if they could not see it! The opening sentence of my personal statement when applying for my PhD studentship eight years ago was – ‘Air pollution, the invisible killer, needs to be unmasked! How can we do it?’ Finding the answer to this question was and still is the focus of my research.  

My research largely involves working with members of the public, enabling them to be an active part of the research process, and helping them to design, implement and interpret their own air quality monitoring projects. I am interested in interdisciplinary work bridging natural science, social and health disciplines and in identifying the benefits of involving lay individuals in the research process.  (more…)

Fatima Sheriff, Taught Postgraduate, Centre for Languages, Culture and Communication 

“My advice to women in quiz is to not be intimidated by the male-dominated space, just learn what you love, do what you do best, and you’ll fit right in.”

Having studied Biomedical Sciences at the University of Sheffield, I did work experience at the Wellcome Trust and The Royal Society before getting onto the Science Communication Master’s course at Imperial.  

My course is what it says on the tin: a humanities course exploring all the ways science can be communicated to the public. We start with a foundation of ethics and media studies, then look into its applications. The highlights for me have been a placement at the British Science Festival and doing academic modules in museums and documentaries. For the latter, I got to write about one of my favourite filmmakers, Agnès Varda, which was a joyous essay experience (not a combination you hear very often).  

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