I am a second-year student at the University of Leeds. My research in the summer of 2022 focused on sustainability and equality in surfing culture, and how this relates to surfing's beginnings as a sport and religious practice for indigenous communities in Australia. In my free time I love to surf (shocker), play music and go climbing. 

Vaibhav Pramode Nair is a 2023 Laidlaw Scholar at the University of Leeds. He is the Lead Youth Representative of the Save Soil Movement, and in this capacity works to amplify youth voices for food systems transformation at major policy fora globally. Currently pursuing a Bachelors in Sustainability and Environmental Management at Leeds' School of Earth and Environment, he was the first undergraduate Youth Delegate from Leeds to the UN Climate Talks, representing at COP29 Baku, COP28 UAE and SB60 Bonn. Vaibhav leads efforts in diplomacy and climate at the Indian Youth Diplomacy Forum. He’s a LEED Green Associate, IEMA member, and an active participant in YOUNGO's Food and Agriculture Working Group, advocating for a shift in focus within the international climate policy discourse to the soil degradation crisis. Save Soil. Visit https://consciousplanet.org/ to learn more. Let's make it happen ! Try https://isha.sadhguru.org/us/en/inner-engineering . Changed my life. In is the only way Out.  If you study/work within the sustainability/climate space, please reach out. If not, definitely reach out. :)

I've been looking after Research Scholars in the Arts and Humanities since 2008, and have been involved with the Laidlaw Network since it was established.  I'm passionate about increasing diversity and making opportunities available to more. I'm a proud Loiner (someone from Leeds) and particularly love to work with students to engage with the city and the amazing cultural and creative industries that we have here. 

Research and Academic Administration

I am a 4th year medical student passionate about human centred clinical research. For my research I will be exploring the attitudes of potential therapy recipients towards novel therapeutics in Parkinson's Disease to improve cognition.  I have lived in 5 different countries across Asia and Europe so far - your quintessential third culture kid:)) I enjoy listening to Indian classical music, playing football and hiking. 

Hi! I am studying chemistry at The University of Leeds, I am an Undergraduate Scholar doing a research project titled 'The Upper Atmosphere of Mars'.

I am a fourth year student studying Geography and Sustainable Development at The University of St Andrews. I have a particular interest in reforestation, conservation and climate change mitigation. For the first summer of the Laidlaw Scholars Leadership and Research Programme I produced a research essay and poster titled 'Climate Change Mitigation: Investigating the impact of land use on soil organic matter (SOM)'. My research focuses on measuring and reporting soil organic matter content across different land use types such as cropland and woodland. I explore the climate change mitigation potential of soil and the potential of adding soil organic matter through woodland restoration. For the second summer of the Laidlaw Scholars Leadership and Research Programme I produced a Leadership-in-Action Video about my project on sustainable agricultural practices in Williamsburg, Virginia. My LiA project involved interviewing farmers in and around Williamsburg, academic researchers at the local university, The College of William and Mary and the manager of the Williamsburg Farmers Market. I also produced a reflective essay about my experience over the Laidlaw Scholarship titled 'Learning, Growing and Developing as a Leader'.

International Business student at the University of Leeds I currently work as a Student Ambassador, a maths tutor, and I have my own little crochet business on the side! My research project 'Imposter syndrome and Sense of belonging' delves into student perceptions of the condition, and the flaws surrounding the measures used to diagnose it.

Hi! I'm Maria and I am a current undergraduate scholar from the University of Leeds. I study Law and I aspire to be a corporate solicitor. 

I am an undergraduate student studying Sociology and International Relations at the University of Leeds.  My work experience is rather varied, having jumped from being an immigration solicitor's assistant, to utilities brokering, to retail, and then marketing. I like to believe I've picked up a few talents from each role! I'm art-obsessed; whether it is a gallery exhibition for photographs or paintings, to music and films. I also love a good book (they are a piece of art too)!  

Hi! I'm Izzy from North Wales (or a 'gog' - someone from the North - as we would say in Welsh). I am part of the 2022 scholars cohort and my research project is about Imposter Syndrome and sense of belonging. I study Psychology at the University of Leeds which I am thoroughly enjoying as I love people (and science/ evidence!). I chose this degree as I believe that understanding people's thoughts, motivations and behaviours is what is going to lead us to a more equal and just society. Working as a teaching assistant alongside children with special educational needs last year confirmed my intuition that I would like to go into social justice work after graduating. In my spare time I love to cycle, dance and swim outside.

I am Holly and I study German and English Literature at the University of Leeds. I will be working on the research project 'German at Leeds - Then and Now' as I am passionate about language teaching and language learning. I am specifically interested in developing strategies to decolonise language teaching through diversifying the curriculum of German Studies, which I hope to achieve through researching the history of German teaching at my university. I will look at how key moments of crisis in the twentieth century, such as WWI and WWII, in which Britain were in conflict with Germany, affected language teaching and the study of German at Leeds. I hope that this will help me identify how language teaching is affected by global events and political relations between countries in order to develop strategies to decolonise language teaching in the future.   I work as a German Ambassador for the Goethe Institute to help foster interest in the German language globally and nationally. As part of my role, I visit schools all over the country to encourage students to learn German and educate them on the career opportunities open to students with a foreign language in order to help them to navigate their futures.  I am committed to making a change to our community. Recently I took part in a decolonisation project in collaboration with the Goethe Institute and the Design Thinkers Academy in Amsterdam. I was the only student members of the team and I was working with teachers from all over the world and members of Goethe Institute Finland and Sweden. The target of the project was to develop resources to decolonise the curriculum to make German teaching more inclusive of queer people and people of colour. This required great ambition to come up with a solution to make German teaching more inclusive. I conducted interviews with fellow students, prioritising BAME students and members from the trans community to discover their experience of language learning.  I am committed to ethical leadership as I believe all people deserve to feel seen and valued in their education. As part of my commitment to diversifying our curriculum, A few years ago, I took part in a public speaking competition where I spoke about how we need to change our attitude to neurodiversity in young adults and children, encouraging a change in understanding and a re-education regarding mental health conditions and learning disabilities in young people. This approach required great courage and commitment as I had to question our current curriculum and seek to find new and improved strategies to better accommodate and understand neurodiversity, a topic which is often ignored especially in the early years of child education. This required great courage and extraordinary research as I was determined to develop an understanding of not only current issues in the understanding of neurodiversity in children and young adults but also foster new ideas to address these. Furthermore, I believe the best research is that which is challenging and seeks to find new and innovative strategies to overcome obstacles and improve society. I am dedicated to improving the lives of young people. In secondary school I worked as head of the Media Team. I helped to direct my team towards different strategies to encourage young people to develop an interest in journalism, visiting primary schools to educate younger students about career prospects in journalism. I saw how this leadership positively impacted the lives of young people, as throughout the several workshops we ran across primary schools in our local community, we saw how younger students were becoming enthusiastic about their futures, as they became aware of the fantastic opportunities available to them. This experience has really inspired me to apply for a Laidlaw Scholarship as I have seen how strong leadership can engage and inspire, transforming our community. I hope to foster my leadership skills throughout the scholarship, as throughout my education I have experienced how positive leadership can transform lives.

Hi I am max, I'm interested in development economics and international relations with low income countries . 

Hi I’m Lizzie! I’m studying French and Business at the University of Leeds. My Laidlaw project is about identifying North Africans in the French Resistance during WWII. 

Hey, I'm Jackson. I'm one of the 2022 scholars at University of Leeds. My course is Mechatronics and Robotics; in particular I'm interested in the ways that technology interacts with social and political issues that are important to me, such as environmentalism, the digital divide and the racial and gender biases in algorithms. My research focusses on improving the robustness of energy storage devices, e.g. for electric vehicles and solar panels. You can read a quick summary below! The recent global shift towards electrification is raising questions concerning the robustness of current energy storage devices. Electrical vehicles require many battery cells connected together in order to provide a sufficient amount of energy to power the car and solar panels contain many generating cells connected. However, the assumptions made when designing and developing these storage devices, can become invalid due to the uncontrolled environmental conditions or unpredictable faults with individual cells in the arrangement. In order to prevent failure and premature end-of-life, a unique collection of equalisation circuits can be designed for a system. My research centers on widening the use cases for these equilisation circuits and investigating whether a single set of circuits can be designed in a way that allows it to be used for a variety of applications rather than just one.

Studying Sustainability and Environment Management (International) MEnv, BSc at University of Leeds after a couple of years as a reporter. Interested in ecology, completed research project last year on the effects of honey trade on UK bees, now planning a Leadership in Action project.