Caitlin Feerick and Robyn Harries were awarded at Royal Holloway University of London ‘Young Physicists of the Year’ certificates. This is the first time we have had two female students win this award and we are very proud of them!

To provide an insight as to why they won awards read on…

Caitlin is a delight to teach as she is really enthusiastic towards learning new concepts. She is very thorough in her calculations and methods and enjoys asking questions even after she has got the correct answers. Whenever we study exam questions in class Caitlin wants to know about the wider implications of the concepts and the limitations of methods.  She is very systematic and relentless in her work. She brings any small gaps in her knowledge to our attention and Caitlin's enthusiasm is infectious and she is an asset to the class. She regularly mentors younger students too.

Robyn quickly grasps new concepts in physics but this is generally through concentrated effort to work through problems and to carefully document what she finds. This includes a lot of detail relating to what has happened using the language of science, including units of parameters being looked at so that it becomes a natural process when thinking through new topics to see how they “jigsaw in” with what is known already.  She is also really good at coaxing her peers through some of the more difficult topics by giving examples of how they work in practice and helping them through some of the maths associated with the physics.