Phase III Research Specification
For the full Phase
III Research Specification
For the formal Call for Proposals and the "Guidelines and advice
for applicants" on the ESRC website - http://www.esrc.ac.uk/fundingopps.htm
Research in Phase III will focus on post-compulsory education,
work-based learning and lifelong / adult learning. The remit also
covers people moving between learning in different sectors, including
transitions from school, and teacher / trainer education.
Approximately £9 million is available to support research projects
under this Call for Proposals. Applications are invited for projects
led by researchers based at Higher Education Institutions and independent
research institutes recognised by the ESRC in England, Scotland,
Wales and Northern Ireland.
As with earlier phases of the Programme the core objective will
be to support research which focuses on improving outcomes for learners.
This will be pursued through partnerships between practitioners
and policy makers with researchers in all stages of developing research
projects, so these generate processes and outcomes which address
the needs of policy and practice. Building research capacity will
also feature strongly.
The Programme envisages supporting a number of major research projects
(up to £1.25 m each) plus a range of complementary smaller projects
(over £100,000 but below £500,000) which include a significant element
of research capacity development in under-researched areas. Projects
are expected to start from mid-2003 onwards and to run for up to
five years until the current scheduled end-date of the Programme
in December 2008.
B. Timetable
Those interested in bidding for Phase III funding will need to
submit Outline Proposals by 15 April 2002. The timetable for Phase
III is expected to be as follows:
| 15 April 2002 |
Deadline for submission of Outline Applications |
| early June 2002 |
Shortlisting decisions announced |
| mid October 2002 |
Closing date for Full Applications |
| January 2003 |
Applicants respond to peer review comments |
| April-May 2003 |
Final funding decisions announced |
Summer 2003
|
Phase III projects commence |
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C. Workshops
Four Workshops for intending applicants were arranged for January
2002.
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| York |
15 January |
| Cardiff |
22 January |
| London |
24 January |
| Edinburgh |
30 January |
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These Workshops were designed to brief those considering leading
bids for Phase III funding. They were invitation-based events as
numbers at each venue are limited, so only one member of each team
should normally have participated.
The new Programme Directors will also be happy to discuss research
proposals / ideas with individual potential applicants, without
prejudice to the Steering Committee's final decisions:
Professor Andrew Pollard
01223 369631, ajp67@cam.ac.uk
D. Consultation reports
An extensive process of consultation throughout 2001 informed the
development of the Research Specification for Phase III. All these
are available for downloading as Word documents:
Six Consultation Seminars were held (click for reports from Edinburgh,
York, Belfast,
Birmingham, London
and Cardiff) A Questionnaire
was sent to a wide range of interested organisations, groups and
individuals (a Summary of Questionnaire responses will be available
here) 13 Focus groups were held with groups of hard-to-reach learners
(a Report on the Focus Group Discussions, including detailed appendices
of anonymised quotations from group members will be available here).
A Summary of these responses was published in our October 2001 Newsletter.
Two Capacity Building Seminars were also held (Report)
E. Review of pedagogic research
As a part of the development process the Programme has also commissioned
a "Review of Current Pedagogic Research and Practice in the Fields
of Post-Compulsory Education and Lifelong Learning". This is being
undertaken by a team from the Tavistock Institute led by Dr Elliot
Stern (020 7417 0407, e.stern@tavinstitute.org).
Click here for
the Tavistock report.
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