On Wednesday 25^th January 2023, Cohort 3 had the honour of receiving their MSc Robotics and Autonomous Systems degrees as part of the University of Lincoln post graduate graduation ceremony, held at the wonderful Lincoln Cathedral and Castle.

[If you have not had the chance to see several of the CDT students graduate then here is a link to graduation video – starts at time stamp 1:17:02.]

The MSc RAS is a mandatory component of the first year of the four year CDT and provides a background and grounding across the robotics domain. The first year of the CDT takes place at the University of Lincoln with the remaining 3 years taking place at their respective research institution.

As many Cohort 3 students had now left the city to pursue their PhD research, this was a great time to get together and see how everyone was doing. It was also a time for celebration with all the other graduates completing the course. The ceremony started at 10:00 AM so it was an early start for several students to make it for seating time of 09:00.

Upon arrival at the castle grounds, the first part of the day was to collect your tickets from the graduates tent This also meant collecting tickets for your respective gowns and hats. Although it was early the Castle grounds had already begun to get very busy with students collecting their tickets.

Even the weather was itself was slightly overcast, the atmosphere was great with lots of excitement students and guest. The gowns hats were collected from the County Assembly Rooms on the Bailgate where a final fitting and dressing took place. This is only a few hundred meters form the castle but meant that there was lots of people mingling across castle square which was great to see. This was available from 08:00 so the area was already full of students and their guests.

Once the gowns were on and the hats were secured it was time to make your way towards the Cathedral entrance were the procession into the cathedral would begin. This area was jam packed.

To separate the students and guests, students made their way through the south transept, and the guests made their way through the main visitor entrance directly into the cathedral nave.

Once in the transept, the students were guided across the seating area known as the ‘crossing’. This area had a full stage where students would receive their applause and be formally recognised and acknowledged as graduates by the University of Lincoln and principle and vice principal staff.

Once the students had crossed into the nave area then the next order of business was to find your seat. These were all very easily laid out and all the MSc RAS students were sitting together.

This was a nice moment as it allowed everyone to get togther and see each other all dressed up. The next time we would see this is upon receiving our PhDs!

After a short pause to close the doors and get guests seated, the ceremony then commenced. The ceremony was all captured live on YouTube and can be found here. The ceremony in total lasted under two hours but the chilly breeze made it feel much longer! As the MSc RAS awards were near the very end of the ceremony everyone was very happy to get up and moving again.

Once the ceremony had concluded then the graduates proceeded towards the castle for a drinks reception and mingling with friends and family to celebrate their awards.

To mark a close to the occasion, some of us went for a meal with family, others had pre-arranged tours of the cathedral and castle arranged. Others had to catch connections to travel back to their home. But, we still found time to take a few photos of the event with as many of the Cohort 3 MSc RAS graduates we could find. Thanks to everyone involved for the memories of the day and the journey through the year!

Do you want to get involved in the CDT?

If you are interested in learning more about what we do and if you share a passion for agriculture and technology then go to our AgriFoRwArdS CDT website to see more about our research, how you can be involved, and how to apply to be a student in the program.