By Nina Globerson
On 1 May, the School of Computer Science prepares to welcome visitors, staff, and students alike to its one-of-a-kind Doors Open day. As the only School to implement this initiative at St Andrews, co-founders Dr Ruth Hoffmann (Lecturer, Deputy Director of Postgraduate Research, and Head of the AI theme) and Dr Kirsty Ross (Industrial Liaison) are thrilled to welcome all to the third iteration of the event.
“Doors Open is an event where we’re trying to engage as many people as possible from the public, industry, and sectors that are not within the computer science department. The idea is to showcase what the School does and get people engaged, involved, or interested in computer science and see what we can foster from that.” Dr Ruth Hoffmann
The event emerged from conversations between Dr Ruth Hoffmann, Kenneth Boyd (Honorary Lecturer), and Dr Kirsty Ross on how they could better engage companies in the research within Computer Science. Inspired by art degree shows in Dundee and Glasgow:
“We started off with the idea to invite a bunch of industry people and give them various talks. However, we soon realised that we couldn’t simply talk at them. Therefore, we invited exhibits, and from there we decided to open the entire department up to the public because it needs to be everybody. There are many opportunities for industry people that perhaps they, staff, or the public are not aware of, especially on how we could integrate public engagement within the School for its teaching and research” Dr Ruth Hoffmann
Previous Doors Open events have led to productive and interdisciplinary projects such as the French Digital Library with Dr Pauline Souleau in the School of Modern Languages; involvement of Experian and Skyscanner in the third-year module CS3099: Software Engineering Team Project; Senior Honours projects with Wikimedia UK; as well ongoing projects with psychologists, marine biologists, and historians.
“The conversations are the real impact of Doors Open…Relationships don’t come out of nowhere. It sometimes takes time for these relationships to develop, and it might just be a random conversation at a Doors Open day that then turns into something else further down the line. It’s leaving space for serendipity, as well as creating a slightly more structured opportunity for all involved.” Dr Kirsty Ross
Besides forty projects being shown throughout the day, from climate action language models to generative machine learning for synthetic histopathology slides and video analytics for rugby skills training, this year’s Doors Open approach has evolved, with the addition of ‘Hot Tattie Talks’ to provoke meaningful conversations with the public. This includes fascinating topics such as the affordability of AI and Computing (Prof Simon Dobson), Co-designing Ethical Digital Futures (Dr Abd Alsattar Ardati), and a Brief History of Programming Languages (Dr Edwin Brady). There will also be closed sessions, similar to the collaborative nature of a sandpit event, that are driven by invited external partners who want to present a challenge and to consult with academics. This will not only spark fruitful discussions, but will also help create alliances between industry partners, academics, and the wider School.
The event is also about the students and enabling them to spotlight what they do. Dr Ruth Hoffmann commented that kudos should be given to the students as “they are extremely self-starting and they don’t need much help from us. However, I’m hoping that with these Open Days we can give them a little bit of a leg up to present their research and make new contacts.” This includes internship opportunities such as StARIS and the Vertically Integrated Projects, which often stem from conversations held between staff and various students at Doors Open. It also highlights the student societies within the School, such as St Andrews Computing Society (STACS) and Women in Computer Science (WICS) who showcase what they do, whilst accessing potential employers within a fun and interactive setting.
However, there is also something far more exciting taking place behind the scenes — the integration of external partners into academic modules, creating opportunities for students to gain industry experience. This is most notable in CS3099, where third year undergraduates work in groups to create a software product from start to finish. With the expertise provided by both academics and industry professionals, students have gone on to create Wikidata inspired web visualization, as well as creating novel social enterprise applications for specific audiences. Alongside the main theme of CS3099, accessibility has been built into the module in collaboration with Skyscanner.
“This means that every single graduate from 2024 and 2025 will have the experience of building accessibility into their software products, which is fantastic in creating a cohort of inclusive engineers coming out from the School.” Dr Kirsty Ross
It also means employers and potential employees are creating synergy to see if they are “a right fit for one another,” and having the opportunity to choose the best of the best adds Dr Ruth Hoffmann.
Doors Open is about representation, interdisciplinary collaboration, and connection. It is due to this that Dr Ruth Hoffmann has been able to reconnect with colleagues from other Schools that she doesn’t typically get to see, as well as reigniting conversations held with visitors from previous years: “I think my favorite part is the buzz of the day where you’ve got people presenting and talking to each other and getting excited on various different levels.” It also is about highlighting that “the doors remain open permanently to anyone who wants to work with the School of Computer Science” says Dr Kirsty Ross, and creating the space to talk to people:
“I love spotting a need, joining the dots between individuals, as well as watching the relationships grow from there, and this only scratches the surface of what Doors Open could be like in the future.” Dr Kirsty Ross
This also raises the question of what’s next for Doors Open, which both Dr Kirsty Ross and Dr Ruth Hoffmann have agreed involves maintaining the enthusiasm amongst students and staff to present their work to the public, as well as encouraging other Schools within St Andrews take up the model.
Furthermore, there are ongoing discussions about setting up a rapid software prototyping centre where external partners can provide a source of paid, subject specific employment for the students of the School of Computer Science. Given St. Andrews location within a “sweet spot” to support local businesses in, around, and outside of Fife, the impact of initiatives like this could be significant. Furthermore, if more Schools were to run their own Open Doors events, the nature of academic research and student opportunity could change immensely, promoting increased interdisciplinarity and collaboration on a much larger scale.
Check out all the fantastic talks, sessions, and exhibits on show for Doors Open 2025 at https://doorsopen.wp.st-andrews.ac.uk/our-show/ now, and see you on 1 May!