SusSed

Written By Muhammad Zainudin

The Sustainability Skills and Education (SusSed) Series

SusSEd is an initiative project by the Green Impact Team in the University of Sheffield. What exactly is Green Impact? Their website describes it as, ‘Green Impact is a simple, rewarding and fun sustainability accreditation scheme’. The definition outlines the clear aims of the University of Sheffield to make a huge impact on the environment whilst maintaining its integrity and values. Nicholas Nuttgens, mentioned during one of the SusSEd’s talks that apparently people talk about climate change for less than 5 minutes, when it is in fact one of the biggest issues facing humankind. Even the United Nations addressed climate change as one of the problems to be tackled in their 17 Sustainability Goals.

SusSEd includes 11 inspiring motivational talks by renowned professors and experts in their own respective fields. They are trying to attract as many people as they can by hosting the talks during lunchbreaks, 12:10pm to 1:00pm every Tuesday and Thursday. University students can attend talks for free and register their name for each session to get HEAR Recognition.

Every session was amazing; a few talks really touched my heart and passionately inspired me. The first one was from Nicholas Nuttgens, his topic was ‘Talking About Climate Change: Developing Our Skills’. He began the talk, by telling us how the world perceived Climate Change in one word, based on his life-long survey. The words were SLOW, HUGE, COMPLEX, INVISIBLE, INTERGENERATIONAL, INTERNATIONAL and CHALLENGING. I think all these words perfectly describe climate change because it is reacting slowly and is rarely seen by the naked eye.  Perhaps, it will not be us who will experience the hellish effects of climate change but it may be endured by future generations. To help tackle climate change, we can change small actions from our normal and comfortable everyday routines like switching on the AC, using less air travel for holidays and encouraging more car sharing to make a difference. However, the sad truth is, probably, only a few people will do it. Nicholas split everyone into groups of five to dicuss various scenarios. The discussion had a huge impact on me as I reflected on all the petty decisions I had made during my life, risking the lovely Earth. It made me more aware of changes I could make, such as shopping online rather than driving a carbon-releasing car to an air-conditioned mall to buy one shirt.  

The Sustainability Skills and Education (SusSed) Series

SusSEd is an initiative project by the Green Impact Team in the University of Sheffield. What exactly is Green Impact? Their website describes it as, ‘Green Impact is a simple, rewarding and fun sustainability accreditation scheme’. The definition outlines the clear aims of the University of Sheffield to make a huge impact on the environment whilst maintaining its integrity and values. Nicholas Nuttgens, mentioned during one of the SusSEd’s talks that apparently people talk about climate change for less than 5 minutes, when it is in fact one of the biggest issues facing humankind. Even the United Nations addressed climate change as one of the problems to be tackled in their 17 Sustainability Goals.

SusSEd includes 11 inspiring motivational talks by renowned professors and experts in their own respective fields. They are trying to attract as many people as they can by hosting the talks during lunchbreaks, 12:10pm to 1:00pm every Tuesday and Thursday. University students can attend talks for free and register their name for each session to get HEAR Recognition.

Every session was amazing; a few talks really touched my heart and passionately inspired me. The first one was from Nicholas Nuttgens, his topic was ‘Talking About Climate Change: Developing Our Skills’. He began the talk, by telling us how the world perceived Climate Change in one word, based on his life-long survey. The words were SLOW, HUGE, COMPLEX, INVISIBLE, INTERGENERATIONAL, INTERNATIONAL and CHALLENGING. I think all these words perfectly describe climate change because it is reacting slowly and is rarely seen by the naked eye.  Perhaps, it will not be us who will experience the hellish effects of climate change but it may be endured by future generations. To help tackle climate change, we can change small actions from our normal and comfortable everyday routines like switching on the AC, using less air travel for holidays and encouraging more car sharing to make a difference. However, the sad truth is, probably, only a few people will do it. Nicholas split everyone into groups of five to dicuss various scenarios. The discussion had a huge impact on me as I reflected on all the petty decisions I had made during my life, risking the lovely Earth. It made me more aware of changes I could make, such as shopping online rather than driving a carbon-releasing car to an air-conditioned mall to buy one shirt.  

The second talk that inspired me was by Christopher Jones who discussed public perception towards carbon dioxide. Jones is actively involved in making the public face of Carbon Dioxide Utilisation (CDU) a forethought. During his talk, he quoted Apt & Fischhoff (2006), “without public acceptance, it may be impossible for electric sector innovations such as CDU to gain regulatory approval, find sites or secure funding”. Based on his research, using focus groups he found that CDU awareness was very low. The discussion covered three areas: Conceptual (should we do this?), Technical (can we do this?) and Societal (what will happen?). As a result, conceptually, he found that CDU is valued as part of mitigation effort and is accepted generally with significant caveats and technically, CDU may be possible.

In conclusion, I found all the talks very motivating and they helped the attendees realise that an environmental crisis is very real and needs to be tackled imminently. Furthermore, SusSEd staff are dedicated to keeping the events running smoothly for the presenters and audiences. I hope that Green Impact will continue this noble initiative to educate young peoples’ attitudes towards improving the environment.
The second talk that inspired me was by Christopher Jones who discussed public perception towards carbon dioxide. Jones is actively involved in making the public face of Carbon Dioxide Utilisation (CDU) a forethought. During his talk, he quoted Apt & Fischhoff (2006), “without public acceptance, it may be impossible for electric sector innovations such as CDU to gain regulatory approval, find sites or secure funding”. Based on his research, using focus groups he found that CDU awareness was very low. The discussion covered three areas: Conceptual (should we do this?), Technical (can we do this?) and Societal (what will happen?). As a result, conceptually, he found that CDU is valued as part of mitigation effort and is accepted generally with significant caveats and technically, CDU may be possible.
In conclusion, I found all the talks very motivating and they helped the attendees realise that an environmental crisis is very real and needs to be tackled imminently. Furthermore, SusSEd staff are dedicated to keeping the events running smoothly for the presenters and audiences. I hope that Green Impact will continue this noble initiative to educate young peoples’ attitudes towards improving the environment.

Places To Eat At In Sheffield

By Oluchi Emenike 

Do you plan on having an event in Sheffield – a birthday, reunion, graduation party, get together, a date, just want to destress and all or you basically just want to eat out in Sheffield? Well, here is the article for you!

First of all, as a student in Sheffield, in fact as a student in the UK, you need UNiDAYS; click on the link to join for amazing student discounts https://www.myunidays.com/. This is important for every student especially when you are on a budget; why be a student if you can’t enjoy the perks of being one?? You could also get coupons and the likes from wowcher or groupon (for other activities including paintballing and spa days etc.) Then you can also sign up to restaurants because most of them send offers to their customers particularly on your birthday.

As an organized person, I would always tell you to plan ahead – this includes booking a table and planning to be there on time specifically during the festive seasons.

So now on places to eat at in Sheffield,  I’ll start with my favourite - the Italian restaurants – well I’ve only been to 3 of them a total of 12 times (don’t judge me please). There’s Piccolino – the fanciest one, request to seat on the terrace if you happen to go there on a date; then Zizzi, they have the loveliest garlic bread I have ever had and there is Ask Italian which is always quiet when I am there even though there are other people dining there.

Then there are the Asian restaurants – a lot of them around; you will definitely have to eat at Cosmo at least once during your stay as a student at Sheffield – it is a buffet. Ubuffet is another one – I do not really like this one but then it is different strokes for different folks. There is also Baan Thai, Thai Thai Ka, Hui Wei, Wagamama and WasabiSabi; they all have lovely food and these are just the ones I have tried so explore and well, google is your friend.

Sheffield also has some Latin American restaurants; we have Las Iguanas, Revolucion de Cuba which also serves great cocktails and on Thursday evenings there’s a lot of salsa going on, and Chiquito (this is the one I am visiting next). Tropeiro is another wonderful restaurant where you get to try different types of meat until you are tired but unfortunately the one in Sheffield has been closed for a while and I have no idea if they plan on reopening anytime soon.

TGI Fridays is amazing, you should have their stack of ribs with Jack Daniel’s sauce and SMOKE barbecue is another amazing place to eat at. Lucky Fox is perfect for when you feel like having pancakes and the likes. In all these, let us not forget Nando’s with their extra hot wings.

You can also try Yates’s, Wetherspoon, Browns, Handmade burger, Harvester, Five Guys and many more. Just know that Sheffield has a variety of restaurants so there will always be some place to try. However, I have not come across African restaurants in Sheffield, so if you really want to try some Nigerian goodness like the real Jollof rice, small chops etc. send me an email!

Project Phoenix – Yes, we can!

“Yes we can” is a slogan used by United States President Barack Obama in the 2008 Presidential Campaign which best describes Project Phoenix - a student led project at The University of Sheffield aiming to construct a full size 1920's single engine two seater Pietenpol Air Camper aircraft.

Hello,

My name is Andrei Roibu, I am an IEA and for the past 10 months (from February until December 2016) I worked as the Project Manager of this ground-breaking student endeavour. Today, I want to to tell you a bit about the project itself and its journey to date.

Figure 1 - Pietenpol Air Camper [Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3b/Pietenpol.air.camper.g-buco.arp.jpg]

Project Phoenix was first proposed to me by Dr. Simon Hayes at the end of 2015, when he came up with the idea of a student project aiming at constructing a full-size kit aircraft in order to showcase the abilities of our students, here at the University of Sheffield, and the technical and manufacturing capabilities of the workshops in the Diamond building. At that time, I was President of Simurq Aeronautics, a student-lead society aiming at constructing drones and RC planes and taking them to competitions. Honestly, when I first heard the idea I did not believe that it could be done, as it seemed too complex and too costly for students to reproduce. I held on to my doubts for months, all through Christmas and the 2015-16 winter exam season, however, Dr. Hayes kept pitching the idea to me and insisting that we can do it. Honestly, I don’t know what made me accept his project proposal, as I was still doubtful about the project's chances of success. To some extent, I was probably curious to see how far we could go with this seemingly insane idea until we reached that point where it would have become obvious it was too much to handle. Hence, Project Phoenix was born.

From February until April, the project team consisted of Dr. Simon Hayes, Mr. Richard Stockley (one of the Diamond technicians), Dr. Stephen Mason and I, worked mainly into looking at different kit airplanes and trying to find the required funding for the project. Our first major breakthrough came when we managed to receive a sponsorship for £11,000 from the University of Sheffield Alumni Fund, which came as a surprise to all of us considering that little to no student projects ever received such a large sponsorship. This was probably the moment where we started realizing the scale and magnitude of what we were planning on doing. At this point we were looking at building a Zenith STOL CH750 aircraft and we were estimating the entire project to run for 3 years, requiring a budget of around £60,000. This might seem as a big number, however we were quite confident that we could obtain the sum from further university grants and private company sponsorships, as we were already getting a lot of attention from the various engineering departments.

As April was coming to an end, so was my term at the helm of Simurq Aeronautics. The project, at that time named ‘The Alumni Aircraft Project’ – I know, not a very catchy name – was intended to be done in collaboration with Simurq, which made me assume that as my term ended so would my involvement with the project. It was at this point when Dr. Hayes asked me if I wanted to be the overall leader of the project, which took me by surprise. This put me in very delicate position, as beside the project I was managing two part-time jobs at the Sheffield Students’ Union while also studying towards my degree in Aerospace Engineering. The solution that I found was that of a joint student leadership, having myself as the Project Manager, in charge of all the non-technical aspects of the project and the overall management, and bringing a second person on board as the Technical Manager. My first choice for the role was a Mechanical Engineering student, which initially accepted and came on-board from April until May, however as the spring exam season kicked in, she decided that she needed to prioritize her studies. The second choice for the role was an avionics stream Aerospace Engineering student, which at that point was keen on getting relevant technical and managerial experience and had all the attributes for the position. At the moment of this blog’s writing, after my departure from the project, he has assumed full Project Manager status.

The next milestone in the history of Project Phoenix was the worldwide famous Brexit. In the weeks following the UK’s decision to leave the EU, the entire team met regularly in order to assess how this impacts us, realizing that the initial budget estimate was now overly ambitious in the looming future economic climate. This was the moment when we decided that we should adopt a simpler design, for which most if not all of the materials and tools could be bought on the already available funds, with any subsequent sponsorship or grant being used for further improvements and modifications. After an extensive market research, we decided on the Pietenpol Air Camper.

Over the summer, planning was done for the workshop, team structure, branding and a future sponsorship campaign. All the while, the project kept growing and growing, gaining more and more attention from the different departments within the University and from across faculties. At the start of the academic year, we ran a recruitment campaign and selected the team, thus kick starting the work on the project itself.

At this point in time, Project Phoenix is the flagship project of Aerospace Engineering in Sheffield and the largest undergraduate project ever undertook at the University of Sheffield. The projects is seeing the participation of over 30 students from across all the departments of the Faculty of Engineering and also from other faculties, such as Social Sciences. All levels of study are represented within the project, from first year students to postgraduates and PhDs, with the project members gaining substantial engineering and managerial experience.

Project Phoenix is registered with the Light Aircraft Association, which allows the construction of the aircraft using the original blueprints. The Pietenpol Air Camper is an empiric design, as such, it has never been modelled, and its design never analysed. Alongside construction, a dedicated research team within Project Phoenix is looking into potential ways of improving upon the design, analysing its structural dynamics and the airflow around the plane, utilising this data to implement our own flight simulator and publish research papers in engineering academic journals. Rigorous manufacturing standards are implemented throughout the construction process, insuring that the students participating in the technical teams obtain relevant manufacturing knowledge and the final aircraft receives its flight accreditation. Moreover, the project benefits from a dedicated management team, where a group of students are gaining valuable experience in managing the bureaucracy and regulations entailed by a project of this magnitude, while also helping insure a friendly climate for their peers working on the project. In addition to this, the project aims at promoting most if not all of the participating students, with the help of the University Marketing Department, through social and classical media, both on a local and nationwide level.

In the past 10 months, I have seen this project grow from a seemingly impossible idea to the largest undergraduate project ever undertaken at The University of Sheffield. I look back with pride on what we have achieved in such a short time while also looking to the future with great hope and great expectations. I have left Project Phoenix at the beginning of this month, due to academic and health reasons, however I am proud to be one of its’ founding fathers. Coming back to where we started, if I would be asked now if undergraduate students can build a full-size aircraft from scratch, I would proudly tell them:

“At the University of Sheffield, yes, we can!”

Enactus Sheffield

Enactus is an international non-profit organization that works with leaders in business and
higher education to mobilize university students to make a difference in their communities
while developing the skills to become socially responsible business leaders. Participating
students form teams on their university campuses and apply business concepts to develop
outreach projects that improve the quality of life and standard of living for people in need. An
annual series of regional and national competitions provides a forum for teams to present the
results of their projects, and to be evaluated by business leaders serving as judges. National
champion teams advance to the ENACTUS World Cup.

At The University of Sheffield, Enactus is one of the most active societies. Housed in the
University of Sheffield’s Enterprise Department, Enactus Sheffield has regular meetings every
week for different ongoing projects. In my first year at university, I thought it was a good idea
to join Enactus and I submitted my application for it. Shortly thereafter, I was called upon and
recruited in the Local Youth Project as an engineer. The project aimed to support the extensive
Somali community present in Sheffield by providing transferrable skills. We aimed at creating a woolen product, for which we designed a storm drain that incorporates woolen insulation to capture water pollutants before heading down to streams and rivers. Regular meetings were held every week in order to get updated on the project and provide key updates to the team regarding the work which was deputed to each member. This storm drain was taken to the Sheffield City Council in order to see if it could be implemented under the current infrastructure. However, our project was not successful as the council did not approve it due to some technical problems.

Nonetheless, Enactus proved to be a very rewarding experience, and one that looked very good on the CV too! It provided an opportunity to speak about the sort of work done in the project at interviews and assessment centres with prospective employers. Several big companies such as GSK ask whether you have been involved with Enactus at any point in your life, therefore it is really good to get involved with Enactus as it provides you with an edge over other applicants.