Students’ frequently asked questions

How do I register and log in?

You can only register if your school is taking part in the event. If so, you should get an log in card from your teacher. You need to enter the username and password from that card on the website homepage.

If your school is not taking part, nag your teacher to sign up for the next event! But don’t give your teacher too much of a hard time – spaces are limited, maybe they did try to get you in. Get them to apply for the next one. If you are a teacher you may want to talk to your Head of Department. Teachers can register your interest in the next event on the teacher sign up page.

I’ve forgotten my password, what do I do?

Don’t worry, there’s various things to try:

Click on the forgotten password link on the log in page and we can email it to you again. Your username is on the email we sent when you registered.

How secure is it?

Security is a top priority. Only students with log in cards can log in. We only send out these cards to registered teachers who’ve been allocated classes. We also strictly moderate all live chats and questions to make sure that student identity and information is protected.

How do I give feedback?

All feedback (good and bad) is greatly appreciated. We take everything you tell us on board and this helps us to improve our next events.

What’s all this about the live final?

You get to vote for your favourite researcher. In the Curiosity Carnival Zone five researchers with lots of votes go through to live final on the night of the Curiosity Carnival (29th September 2017) at Oxford University. You can go along on the night to meet them in person. In the final, the researchers will face questions from the audience and compete for votes to decide who’ll be crowned the winner of I’m a Researcher, Get me out of here! Find out more about I’m a Researcher – Live!

What is this site about?

I’m a Researcher is a free online event where school students meet and interact with researchers. It’s an X Factor-style competition between researchers, where students are the judges.

Students challenge the researchers over fast-paced online text-based live CHATs. They ASK the researchers anything they want, and VOTE for their favourite researchers.

It’s a great way to find out about all the different types of researcher, and get answers to the questions you really want to ask.

You can only talk on the site if you are one of the students, teachers or researchers who are taking part. And you can only vote if you are one of the students, but anyone can look around and read what is being said. Go on, have a look. From the main log in page, just pick a zone and browse around!

During the event young people use web technology they feel comfortable with, to ‘meet’ researchers. They ask questions and have live chats, and then vote for their favourite. Five researchers then go into a live final to decide who will be crowned the winner!

I’m a Researcher brings people together, gives young people a voice and teaches them about careers in research in a fun, memorable and engaging way.

I’m a Researcher, Get me out of here! is produced by Mangorolla CIC and Gallomanor, specialists in helping organisations engage their communities.

What can I do on the site?

Students can:

  • ‘Meet’ the researchers
  • ASK them questions
  • Let researchers know their opinions
  • Find out what real researchers are like and what they do all day
  • Engage in live discussion about real-life research done at universities and other places
  • CHAT live with researchers and ask them questions
  • Choose which researcher they think should get £500 by VOTING for the person they want to win
  • Enter a contest to win £20 in gift vouchers

Researchers can:

  • Engage with students
  • Contribute to education and careers advice
  • Hear what students and teachers have to say about research
  • Hear about the work other researchers are doing
  • Win prizes and take part in the live events if they impress the student’s enough

Teachers can:

  • Show their classes how research works in the real world
  • Download and use lesson plans and resources
  • Show students how the subjects they study at school relate to real life
  • Make lessons fun!

We hope everyone will find I’m a Researcher, Get me out of here! useful, engaging, and enjoyable. Explore the site, check out the researchers’ profiles, the live chats and all the questions that have been asked before, and… have fun!

Will all my questions get answered?

Nearly all questions will be answered.

If you ask a really rude question, moderators will take it out. Sometimes researchers get asked the same question many times: moderators will take out repeat questions and add your name to the first one.

Actually answering questions, of course, is up to the researchers.

Why hasn’t my question been answered yet?

Firstly check that it hasn’t been answered yet. Your answered questions should appear on your profile page. We will also email you to let you know if we have your email address, but sometimes our emails go into the spam folder.

Secondly, give it some time. The researchers are real people with jobs, they’re volunteering their own free time to answer questions. They will answer all the questions they can, as quickly as they can, but it might take until the next day.

If two students ask the same question then we’ll dupe one, adding the student’s name to the original question. So your name may be there but not your exact words. The researchers may also have answered your question in their profile.

Chat seems to be blocked, what can I do? (Cookies and iPads)

Lots of problems can be caused by cookies not working on your machine. Make sure your browser (Safari, Firefox etc.) has cookies turned on, so you are accepting them. This tends to be the main problem when using iPads.

With an iPad, go to Settings / Safari / Accept cookies – From visited (or Always)

Apple’s advice for using Safari on iPad

There are a few things that are most likely stopping the chat system from working. They are quite techy so you may want to refer your IT support technician to this page:

  1. The chat system uses Javascript. You need to have Javascript enabled and this is normal.
  1. Many schools use net filters based on keywords such as chat. Please ask your teacher to ask your computer people for *.imaresearcher.uk to be whitelisted.

I’m having problems with the website. What should I do?

Lots of problems can be caused by cookies not working on your machine. Make sure cookies are turned on.

You may occasionally not be able to see the latest pages or answers. Usually clicking refresh will sort it out. If not, try clearing the cache (Tools>options>clear cache or clear/delete private data, in most browsers).

Why are the researchers in the Gallery in that order?

The participants appear in the Gallery in reverse alphabetical order (we mean, people called Z first and people called A last). This is because research has shown that people whose names begin with letters near the start of the alphabet tend to be more successful in life (http://www.quirkology.com/UK/Experiment_surname.shtml). Maybe because they are always first in lists!

Here at I’m a Researcher we think life should be more fair, and we try to do our bit to make it fairer. So we are putting the people from the end of the alphabet first for once.

Latest Questions