Long read: Second cohort joins expanded Broadening Horizons programme at taster event

More than 130 chemical scientists joined the second year of our Broadening Horizons in the Chemical Sciences programme as leaders seek to tackle long-standing issues of racism and inequality within the sector.

Eleven partner businesses also came together at the launch event in Manchester in June to give Black and ethnic minority students invaluable industry insights with the intent of helping the chemical sciences to retain more top talent.

Now in the second year of a three-year pilot, Broadening Horizons aims to break down the systemic barriers that are entrenching diversity issues within the field. The new 131-strong cohort represents a huge increase in the size of the programme when compared to the inaugural group. Compounding the cohort’s expansion was the addition of pharmaceutical business Charles River, which joined the 10 original partners for the first time.

The scheme was launched on the back of our eye-opening report, Missing Elements, which shone a spotlight on the lack of representation in the field of chemistry. Our research shows that talented Black chemists are more likely to leave the profession at every stage of their career path after undergraduate studies than their peers.

A three-day taster event gave the new cohort an opportunity to meet their peers and predecessors and representatives from both ourselves and the industry partners. As well as this, the collection of students and graduates will benefit from access to other events and insights as part of the scheme with a view to helping them kickstart their careers.

The new cohort and industry representatives at the Manchester Deansgate Hilton Picture: RSC

A second set of first impressions

Introductory messages from Royal Society of Chemistry President Professor Gill Reid and Race and Ethnicity Unit lead Dr Joanna Jasiewicz kicked off the launch event, which started with a cohort-only day.

After an icebreaker to get the dozens of attendees acquainted with each other, the rest of the first day was focused on developing career skills. Career and professional development adviser Laura Woodward laid on a triple-header of sessions focused on networking, identifying skills, and CV and cover letter writing.

The Missing Elements report identified that a shocking 0% of chemistry professors in UK universities are Black. Professor Robert Mokaya, who works at the University of Nottingham and is an RSC Trustee, believes he may be the only Black chemistry professor in the UK - a number which gets rounded down to zero in the statistics.

Introduced by Professor Reid, Professor Mokaya shared his experiences of a lifetime spent in the chemical sciences as someone from an underrepresented background in a keynote speech to round out the first day's events.

Perhaps more important than any of the individual activities for the cohort, however, were the feelings they experienced on meeting so many of their contemporaries.

“Once those elevator doors opened after I checked in, I walked out and I just saw this amazing spectrum of colour,” said Aamna Khan (right), a master’s student at the University of East Anglia. “This reassuring sense of belonging was an absolute wave, and it made me realise, ‘Wow, I belong. I belong in chemistry’.

"This is a space for chemists and people in the chemical sciences because it's a programme for people of colour in the chemical sciences and it was just overwhelmingly awesome.”

Reflections from year one

Some familiar faces started off day two’s activities. Six members of the inaugural cohort – Carla Aldington, Zakariyya Dar, Johanna Fish, Cyrille Kiaku, Michelle Andrea Salins, and Seán Adeoti Thompson – reunited on stage for a panel discussion, chaired by Dr Laura Reyes, programme manager in our Race and Ethnicity Unit.

A Q&A followed as the new generation peppered their predecessors with questions, eager to extract as much knowledge as possible. Everything from their site visits and mentoring to the inclusion landscape came up, with the new group making an instant impression.

For one of the original cohort who is now a walking ambassador of the scheme's progress, the chance to meet with some of her successors was a special moment.

L-R: Dr Laura Reyes, Zakariyya Dar, Carla Aldington, Seán Adeoti Thompson, Johanna Fish, Cyrille Kiaku and Michelle Andrea Salins Picture: RSC

Johanna, a PhD student at the University of Southampton, said: "I can't wait to support them through this because they just need to be elevated. They are the future, and they are going to be amazing."

She added: "Just seeing more people being here is amazing and it shows that actually we are committed to doing better and we are trying to do better. My heart is just so full and I can't wait to support everyone through it."

Ahead of the first meeting between the companies and the group, there was a period of facilitated networking practice. The six members of the first cohort were on hand to dispense advice and help out as the new students and graduates got in some last-minute training to maximise their opportunities with company representatives.

Students visit the RSSL stand Picture: RSC

Students speak with representatives from Oxford Nanopore Picture: RSC

Cohorts and companies come together

The graduates and students first met with the industry representatives over lunch, putting their networking training into practice as they went on fact-finding missions.

Stalls surrounded the edge of a conference room in the Manchester Deansgate Hilton, with fervorous discussions taking place until the next session kicked off an hour later.

Our CEO Dr Helen Pain officially welcomed the partner companies with a short speech before handing over to Strategic Partnerships Lead Ian Knibbs (right), who introduced each of the 11 companies for the next session.

Representatives from each of our Broadening Horizons partners each gave a five-minute flash presentation showcasing their businesses. Each was as unique as it was insightful, giving a different perspective of what to expect from life at the partner companies.

A joint Q&A followed at the end, with the cohort posing a variety of challenging questions, including asking about 'diversity hires', visa issues, and even why they should pick each company.

"Today the energy and the enthusiasm and the opportunity in the room is just incredible," said Dr Pain after the session. "A huge, big shout out for all the participants who really are putting their kind of confidence right and centre and forward in terms of working with our partners. Huge shout out to the partners who make this possible."

Representatives from each of the 11 partner companies on stage after the flash presentations Picture: RSC

Shared experiences

Six industry representatives took to the stage for the day's final formal session. During the panel session, they shared details of their careers and experiences as Black and minority ethnic people in the chemical sciences.

After another series of varied and intriguing questions from the audience, the day's formal activities were over. For those on the stage, it was an eye-opening experience seeing how the cohort responded.

"Having shared my story, I was surprised by how much resonated with quite a few people. The fact that they then came to me later and spoke to me about it was really interesting," said Dr Alan Stephen, a catalyst scientist at Johnson Matthey who took part in both of the afternoon's sessions.

"It did feel validating to be in a space where everyone had similar experiences, but also very different ones at the same time and felt like a community where we could share them and actually talk and laugh about them in some ways."

Farzana Patel, a tolling production manager at Syngenta, added: "Coming out of university I maybe wasn’t aware of the presence of any bias in industry in this day and age but a role I had early in my career was my first experience of this. It resulted in me questioning my competence and took a hit to my confidence. Now working in a very different environment and culture to this, I have felt the difference this can make and have thrived as a result.

"I think if there was something like this for me when I was a student, I would have probably been better prepared to say ‘actually, I belong in what I'm doing. I have confidence in that.'"

Above: Dr Alan Stephen, of Johnson Matthey. Below, Farzana Patel, of Syngenta. Picture: RSC

Day two highlights

As the day wound down with a networking session and dinner, the cohort had a chance to gather their thoughts, with everyone seeming to take something different from proceedings.

For UCL master's student Ratu Mayangsari-Sumampow, the opportunity to build proper connections with industry representatives was invaluable.

"For me, the best part of the programme so far was being able to meet all of those leaders and key decision-makers," she said. "I've met these companies at past careers events but I've only met people in entry positions so getting opinions and advice from people higher up the ladder is so meaningful to me because I realised I know now what they really want in future candidates that they will hire."

Dilhan Manawadu, who recently finished a DPhil at Oxford and whose wife was part of the original cohort, was particularly taken by a 'very enjoyable' panel discussion with the 2022 cohort.

"We knew from their experience what to expect from the programme and then we sort of could act accordingly during the rest of the programme and interact with the other companies in a better way," he explained.

University of Sheffield PhD student Fourat Keskin was also inspired by what he saw in the morning session and was encouraged to see the commitment of the partner companies.

"it was really useful to see how they used Broadening Horizons to benefit their career path and their professional progression," he said. "That was really good to see and really good to meet them as well because they were so enthusiastic and energetic, it was almost contagious. You couldn't help but be so enthused about this programme when they were too."

He added: "The presentations by the companies let us know that there is space in these big corporate, industrial and smaller chemical industry companies for us. They are open to people of our background and also that they are working to be better."

Top to bottom: Ratu Mayangsari Sumampow, Dilhan Manawadu and Fourat Keskin Picture: RSC

One-to-one insights and closing remarks

An abbreviated final day was no less busy for the cohort, with the morning dominated by one-to-one networking opportunities. The 10-minute sessions enabled the students and graduates to get the insights they need to inform the next steps of their career journeys.

Each member of the cohort had the chance to book a dedicated 10-minute session with the company of their choice, with some getting more than one. There was also the chance to hold an informal chat with the Afro Caribbean Commercial Science Network and Science Solutions Recruitment during the two-hour window.

Video messages from Dr Pain and Professor Reid were shown at midday as the taster event drew to a close, followed by a 10-minute montage of the previous cohort's site visits.

Dr Jasiewicz and Dr Rehana Sidat, vice-president of risk management at GSK, rounded a busy three days with short speeches to the cohort. The former noted the site visit opportunities coming up in the next few months, while Dr Sidat stressed the need for the participants to continue engaging and build on what they learned at the taster event. Site visits have commenced since the end of the taster events, marking the next step on the cohort's journey.

Dr Rehana Sidat, of GSK Picture: RSC

Reflecting on the launch as a whole, Dr Sidat said: "It's great that our companies have come together to go for a common purpose, which is to make sure that we've got an equitable, diverse workforce and really create that future pipeline of talent. Consistent with the first cohort of students, we've seen really energised engagement."

She added: "I was delighted to see the participants from the first cohort come back to us and talk to us about their experiences and actually be the face for this programme going forward. The insights and the experiences that they shared with us will last forever with me, for sure."

Dr Joanna Jasiewicz gives a speech on the final day Picture: RSC

The taster event built on the positive feedback we received from year one, while also providing graduates and students a window into what industry life is like.

Now with a larger group of students and graduates and an expanded roster of companies, there is the potential for the programme to make an even greater impact this year.

“The cohort is bigger this year, which is great because it means that the word is out, people feel more confident about applying and I think the visibility of it is higher,” said Dr Pain.

"Of course, we're running as a three-year pilot, so we expect the numbers to increase year on year. It is only possible if we have the funding and what is amazing that we have the funding now from the partners to invest in this.

"But what really makes a difference is once you have a first cohort, they can be role models for the second cohort and then this cohort will be role models for the next cohort next year."

She added: "We need to make a difference. There's no point just talking about commitment and saying things need to be better. We need to be proactively enabling that to change and to happen so I've got real optimism for the future, but we must keep going."