Richard Griffiths - Postgraduate Overview

I think the major strengths within the school of Anthropology and Conservation, lie in the diversity of the programmes that we run, and the fact that we embrace both social sciences and natural sciences within those programmes.

Our programmes embrace environmental anthropology, ethno-botany, visual anthropology, social anthropology, but also quite lot on the wildlife conservation side. One of the things I think that's absolutely unique within the school is the fact that we're addressing environmental problems from both the human side and the wildlife conservation side.

I think the other thing that's unusual about our school is the large number of post graduate students that we have. We currently we have a total around about 150 post graduate students. 80 or 90 of those are PhD students. We regard ourselves very much as a research led school. We are a school that really has a disproportionally large number of post graduate students compared to our undergraduate numbers. Post graduate study is a major thing that we do within the school.

We moved into this building about 10 years ago. This particular building is particularly good because as a school that embraces both sciences and social sciences. We have laboratories. This laboratory where we are now is an ecology lab.

We have a molecular genetics lab. We have a very good human osteology facility, an ethno-botany laboratory, and a dedicated teaching laboratory, and a computer suite as well.

I think certainly on the conservation side, we aim to equip students with the skills that they'll go out and become practitioners rather than academics. I think we do regard themselves as a very vocational school that's equipping students with the skills that they need to take jobs out there in the real world.