Summer Student Review

Very enjoyable and got a good overview of the work that goes on at DSTL. The work was interesting and very rewarding.

My 'buddy' who I was working under was grateful for the work that I did, and I never got the feeling that I was wasting team member's time when asking them to help me with something.

My line manager and buddy were always available by email or phone to help with anything, and anyone else on the team was happy to help.

The work increased more and more as the placement went on, however for about the first 4 weeks there was literally nothing for me to do but read a few documents on what the team does, which after the first week made me bored to tears. This was because I was waiting to be given access to the secure IT, which is understandable given the nature of the work but I felt there could have been other jobs for me to do whilst waiting.

Left alone to my own devices in the lab and trusted with fairly important data work in the office. Was also asked to escort some equipment to an RAF base with another team member. I was also allowed to drive the team owned vehicle around site which was a great surprise.

My generic transferable skills such as teamwork, presentation and communication skills definitely improved over the 10 weeks whilst collaborating with team members about work. However 3 main skills gained specifically from the role I was in was analysing data, programming, and also becoming much more confident in hardware and taking things apart to see what was happening.

I was sat with another team due to security clearance, Whilst the majority of people I was introduced to were friendly when speaking to them, the office was generally dull. Everyone was intent on their work and never asked how I was getting on or making the effort to tell me about what they did, ask where abouts I was studying etc. It was unfortunate that I couldn't sit with my team as they seemed a lot more friendly, and we would have been discussing the work etc.

Quite badly I have to say. The worst thing was the organisation regarding accommodation. I put my name down to be put in contact with other students looking for accommodation, but never heard anything back. After emailing for the third time I was finally told they had all been put in contact with each other. Luckily they hadn't already found a house without me. There was no help in finding accommodation in the local area and we weren't given the details of any estate agents. Eventually we all managed to find separate lodging in local houses, only to find that there are actually houses on site specifically for people doing short term contracts and placements. I have no idea why we weren't told about them. The other big negative was the very long wait to get fully enrolled on the secure IT that I needed to do my work. There seemed to be a 'training' session every 3 or 4 weeks for this, but when doing a 10 week placement (some people even did 8 weeks) you are wasting so much time. Even then the training was just telling us how to log in, and would have been much easier to be given on the first day and shown by my buddy how to do it.

No specific courses, however the whole placement was putting time and resources into giving me an insight into the company, whilst they get a relatively small amount of work in return.

Was told my application would be looked upon preferably if I applied for a graduate job.

Would have been much better if we were able to rent a house together. However a few of us still went to lunch together, and there was another summer student on my team which made it a lot better.

I traveled home on weekends and didn't venture into nearby Salisbury in the evenings.

I traveled home on weekends and didn't venture into nearby Salisbury in the evenings. I got the impression there wasn't many clubs in Salisbury.

I saw a few groups advertising tennis, skiing trips, rugby and other activities.