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CERN Employment and Training Opportunities

Employment and Training Opportunities for UK Students and Graduates

CERN offers tremendous opportunities for the right students to develop their skills and understanding through some of the most exciting and cutting edge projects in engineering, computing and physics.

CERN also offers the opportunity to work on a truly international campus, and provides the opportunities to work in collaboration with scientists and engineers from all over the world, and particularly from Europe. This broadening of the students' cultural and professional development will be immensely useful in whatever career the students choose.

Understanding the detailed needs of the supervisors at CERN who select candidates will help to make applications more focused and relevant. In a recent case a UK candidate with an Electrical and Electronic Engineering background missed a place at CERN solely because he believed he should stress the Electrical side of his experience, and neglected to mention his extensive Electronics experience and programming knowledge. This paper has aimed to give initial information which advisers can use to guide students and recent graduates.

CERN recruits young students and graduates for well funded positions as follows:

A breakdown of the areas in which technical students are currently working shows that almost half are working in Computing, with another 20% working in Electronics, 7% in General Engineering/Science areas and 9% on Mechanics. Supervisors in Computing sections are therefore very actively seeking students in every recruitment round, and have very specific search methods and criteria which they use to select from the hundreds of applications they see. They use a keyword search facility to identify applicants with the right skills sets, and look for good references from a reliable source, favouring references from University tutors whom they know and have come to trust.

There are two application deadlines each year, which from 2014 will be in January and June. Successful applicants then normally start 3-6 months later. Applicants from the UK, particularly for Technical Studentships, typically aim to start in June, in which case they would apply in January. For a September start the June application deadline would work better.

For all of the above opportunities at CERN, applications need to show an understanding of what CERN offers and a clear focus on what the student/graduate wants to achieve. If the student has relevant practical experience, be it inside or outside of University, it is very important to mention it. CERN is looking for evidence of a rigorous approach to life, study and work which will ensure the student provides genuine input to CERN in response to the high level training opportunity being offered.

The application process is so crucial that STFC has prepared a separate guidance document for students and their tutors, which can be accessed on the STFC website.

Any of the CERN departments would be pleased to engage in more depth with UK University departments and tutors, employers, trainers and careers advisers. Visits to CERN can be facilitated by STFC, and the first point of contact for this is Stephanie Hills

RCUK