It was a pleasure to once again host the VUW 3 Minute Thesis Final yesterday, taking place in the beautiful Hunter Council Chambers. It's always a joy to see such a range of research expertise condensed into an easily-digestible chunk of time - those who have given it a go know it's not as easy as our finalists made it look!

The big winner of the day was John Kerr, PhD student in the School of Psychology, who the judging panel ranked in first place. John wins $3000 and a place in the Asia-Pacific 3MT Final at the University of Queensland in October. He was also awarded the People's Choice and Research and Sustainability prizes.

Full results were as follows:

• John Kerr (PhD, Psychology): First place, Research and Sustainability prize, People’s Choice

• Georgina Bird (PhD, Biological Sciences): Second place, top female competitor (Graduate Women Wellington prize)

• Nikita Melashchenko (PhD, Law): Third place

• Déanna Ayupova (Phd, Chemical and Physical Sciences): Victoria International prize

• Tho Vo (Phd, Education): Faculty of Education prize (Graduate Women Wellington)

Additionally, we will be sending Shannon Couper (School of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies) to the New Zealand 3MT Master's Final at the University of Otago next month, as our highest placed Master's competitor.

Many congratulations to all eleven of our 3MT finalists, and everyone else who competed in the VUW competition. And good luck to John and Shannon in the next stage!