Naomi Shiner is a Senior Lecturer at the University of Derby, teaching both undergraduate and post graduate courses.
She has had had a varied career since qualifying as a Radiographer in 2000. Naomi spent eight years working in a busy teaching hospital, the Queens Medical Centre, Nottingham, progressing to become a Senior Radiographer.
She decided to extend her radiography skills from acquiring images to interpreting them. Gaining a post graduate qualification, Naomi moved into advanced practice and became a Reporting Radiographer in 2003.
She says she loved the challenge of working with radiologists and making a real difference to the service. It was at this point through helping junior doctors and other healthcare professionals to improve their radiographic interpretation skills that she realised that she wanted to teach.
Naomi can now pass on her knowledge to other radiographers studying postgraduate programmes.
Radiography allows you to move around the country and world with ease, so in 2008 Naomi moved to Scotland to work in computerised tomography (CT) and Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) and she became the first autonomous reporting radiographer in the Highlands. Whilst developing and supporting this service, Naomi moved into the superintendent role of the conventional imaging department in 2010.
In 2013 it was time to take the plunge into academia. Naomi moved to Robert Gordon University in Aberdeen and she says it was ‘like a duck to water’.
She completed another post graduate course in higher education and became a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. Naomi loves the time spent with students. She says, “The career allows you to be innovative and inspirational. Using off-the-wall techniques, I love it when you see the students have ‘light bulb’ moments.”
Not all Naomi’s time is spent directly with students. There are networking opportunities, visiting placement sites, conferences and working across professions. This enables her to develop further and focus research to what interests her most.
There is a pastoral role within academia and, Naomi says, “You can make real bonds with your students. Watching them graduate is so rewarding and can bring a tear to the eye!”