10 Feb 2025 - How to start your dissertation

Welcome to your postgraduate student news summary of key things happening this week.

IT Services will be applying important updates to campus wifi on Wednesday (12 February) between 4 and 8am. Wifi will still be available during the upgrade, however there may be a brief interruption in some areas.

Celebrate the 60th anniversary of Roses this year and take on the Run To Roses challenge. We know that movement aids good mental health so join us in running, walking, and moving 60 km over 10 weeks in the lead up to Roses. You don’t need to be a pro - this challenge starts on Monday (17 February) and welcomes everyone!

As the temperature drops, here are a few simple tips for moving around campus safely.

Starting to write your dissertation can feel like an overwhelming step - but you don’t have to navigate it alone. Join the Academic Skills Community PGT Dissertation Writing: an introduction workshop tomorrow (11 February) to help break down dissertation essentials into manageable chunks. We’ll look at what a dissertation is, the opportunities writing a dissertation offers you and the academic skills that are needed to write one. Finally, it will briefly look at the different sections of a dissertation and what’s needed for each one.

Starting on Wednesday (12 February), the weekly Confidence to Speak and Listen workshops give you the chance to practise communicating and meet others from different disciplines. The sessions are open to all students, focusing on confidence from perspectives of both speaker and listener, and involve interactive activities involving your voice, your body and your ears! Come along to discover communication strategies to apply in different contexts. 

Would you like to teach English to speakers of other languages? Join our CertTESOL programme, a five-week course accredited by Trinity College London. The course will run over the summer and you’ll gain the skills and knowledge to begin your English language teaching journey.

Celebrate National Student Volunteering week by checking out UoY Volunteering on Instagram for stories about the amazing impact our student volunteers make in the wider community. 

You can also get involved! Check out our York Students in Schools (YSIS) Extracurricular Clubs, Reading Buddies and Summer Block Placements. We also have Community Projects where you could help capture local oral histories, produce charity videos, research and develop fundraising plans, explore York’s green spaces, or support young people to protect human rights in York or re-engage with their education. Application deadline: 19 February via Handshake.

Fancy leading York SU’s work next academic year? It’s time to nominate yourself to be a Sabbatical Officer (or Sabb). There are seven full-time paid roles up for grabs where you can focus on an area of student life that interests you. All positions are open to both undergraduates and postgraduates. If you’d like to work and campaign on behalf of students next year, read everything you need to know about the York SU Elections.

Log on to Handshake, our careers platform, for jobs and opportunities:

See all updates for students on our website:

Things to know this week is produced and distributed by the University's Internal Communications Team. Please email any feedback to 
university-internal-comms@york.ac.uk.

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