Category: Education

Last week we travelled down to the University of Sheffield to chat with chemical engineering students from all over the UK, at the Frank Morton Careers Fair.

The event provides us with a great opportunity to engage with students and host some friendly competition of our own. This year the IChemE stand was transformed into a Harry Potter theme, with photo props, our own IChemE every-flavour-beans, and Quidditch Beaker Pong.

Students took it in turn to play, and with five ping-pong balls each had to get the highest score they could. The balls had to travel through a gold Quidditch hoop, bounce once, and land in one of the chemistry beakers to get points. Serena, part of our Member Communities team, was on-hand to spot any cheaters!

In the end, Assekan Bali from University of Wolverhampton got the high score with 45 points. She wins an Amazon voucher and coveted ‘Yer a Chemical Engineer, Harry’ T-Shirt.

We also had chance to visit some of the employer sponsors who were on-hand to provide practical advice and information about graduate placements to the 2,000 students who filled Sheffield’s Octagon Centre. They included 3M, AstraZeneca, Bechtel, GSK, Johnson Matthey, Phillips 66, Total, Unilever and Wood.

The Careers Fair precedes the Frank Morton Sports Day, an annual event for chemical engineering students where they compete against each other to be crowned champions of undergraduate chemical engineering. Competitions range from the more traditional, such as football and netball, to the more alternative, with this year including an Escape Room challenge.

The University of Newcastle came in third, winning the Netball and doing well at the Escape Room and Dodgeball. Sheffield, determined not to be embarrassed on their home turf, took home second prize after coming top in the Tug of War, Fun Run, Men’s Rowing.

But the University of Birmingham triumphed yet again and took home the coveted Frank Morton Trophy for the fifth time in a row. They had a number of successes on the day, winning in Ultimate Frisbee, Darts, Dodgeball and Pool.

Every year at Frank Morton students put their creative skills to the test and design special t-shirts for their teams. The University of Manchester won the T-Shirt Competition this year, with their clever chemical engineering take on Ariana Grande’s smash-hit single, ‘Thank U, Next’.

The evening then continued late into the night, with entertainment to suit all tastes.

Committee President, David Miller commented:

“Frank Morton returned to Sheffield for the first time since 2003 as a smashing success. The great variety of evening entertainments were of particular note with everything from cinema, jazz, gaming and mocktails through to a bar crawl, Scott Mills, Karaoke and our very own DJ Soc. On behalf of the committee I’d like to give a big thank you to everyone involved in ironing out the hiccups of the day, especially to our amazing Student Union.”

Of course, the special thing about Frank Morton is that it is organised by chemical engineering students, for chemical engineering students. It is a significant undertaking to balance around studying, but can be advantageous in the future in terms of boosting your CV. The students on the Sheffield Frank Morton Committee shined this year, putting on a great event for everyone to enjoy. Well done to them all:

David Miller – Committee President
Joel Kirk – ChemEngSoc Liaison
Alex Castling – Secretary
Dimitris Koutris – Treasurer
Zak Nicholls and Sophia Van Mourik – Sports Coordinators
Eve Rosser – Entertainment and Catering Coordinator
Yashodh Karunanayake – Sponsorship Coordinator
Greg Ouseley – External University Liaison
Ellie Langshaw – Transport and Logistics Coordinator
Usman Anwar – Ceremonies Coordinator:

…not forgetting the University of Sheffield Student’s Union which helped to ensure it all ran like clockwork.

Sheffield will soon be accepting bids from Universities looking to host the event in 2019. We’ll keep you posted on the result.

View the Frank Morton 2019 photo gallery here. Some of these photos were taken by Adam Harris, follow him on Instagram here.