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Postdoctoral research and research projects between 2005 and 2009

I have been part of the Reinvention Centre for Undergraduate Research at the University of Warwick since its foundation in autumn 2005. As a researcher I was very involved in all of its projects throughout my time as a PhD student and later as a postdoctoral researcher. The themes I have been working on in the Reinvention Centre particularly encompass the relationship between teaching and research, sociologists' relationship to teaching and research, students' sociological identity, learning spaces in the university and how students and academics relate to each other therein, students' complex relationships to the world of work whilst studying at the university. My work within the Reinvention Centre has always been closely related to my doctoral and postdoctoral research and also informed it.

Most importantly, over the last four years I have had the chance to actively engage with creative ways of conveying research, other than the written word, the conference paper and the journal article. As such, I was part of a collaborative documentary film production between staff and students and I organised an interactive exhibition on teaching and learning together with Cath Lambert. My interest in other forms of expressing the social has been substantially nourished by my participation in the ESRC Workshop-series 'Live-Sociology' at Goldsmiths College, University of London.

 

Research projects

  • Postdoctoral Research Associate for 'The Graduate Pledge' (funded by the Higher Education Funding Council for England) at the Reinvention Centre for Undergraduate Research, University of Warwick, July - December 2009. Joint research project between Warwick University and King's College London. At the Reinvention Centre at Warwick, an interdisciplinary team of four undergraduate researchers, one postgraduate researcher and a postdoctoral researcher critically investigates the development of particular graduate capabilities in research intensive higher education institutions. By means of discourse analysis of departmental and university webpages at Warwick, the research first aims to establish a sound basis of understanding about the university's claims upon the capabilities undergraduates achieve by the time of their graduation before evaluating how these claims are put into practice.

  • Researcher for ‘Reinventing Spaces’; funded by the Reinvention Centre for Undergraduate Research, September 2008 – June 2009. Principal investigator: Cath Lambert, University of Warwick.
    Employing ethnography and qualitative interviews, this project investigates the relationships between space, curriculum and pedagogy. Exploring how different learning spaces affect learning experiences. The project explores how different learning spaces affect learning experiences and what common themes can be seen in the secondary and tertiary educational sector.

  • Research assistant for the evaluation of the ESRC-research programme ‘Science and Society’, September 2008 – February 2009. Principal investigator: Prof. Steve Fuller, University of Warwick; conducting and analysing qualitative phone interviews; quantitative survey analysis

  • ‘Sociologists Talking’ – qualitative research project on sociologists, their academic identities and their relationship to teaching and research; presented as audio pod casts and with visual material in a jointly organised interactive symposium on 'Teaching and Learning In and For a Complex World' with Cath Lambert (see Conferences), March and April 2008 and in June 2009 ('Festival of the Social Sciences, University of Warwick). An online-documentation of the exhibition is available here.

 Photos: With courtesy to Les Back

 exhibition, photo taken by Les Backexhibition canvasheadphones

 

  • Collaborative student staff production of a documentary film Students at Work - Learning to Labour in Higher Education' (2006-2009), Reinvention Centre for Undergraduate Research, University of Warwick. The film was researched and filmed by a team of undergraduate students, a MA student, a PhD student, an administrative member of staff and an academic. 'Students at Work' deals with the difficulties and challenges of current Higher Education and students carrying out work whilst studying in order to prepare themselves for the world of work but also being able to fund their studies. The film itself provides a critique of these conditions and is at the same time an example for how critique in the university, learning and preparation for the world of work can be seen in their togetherness. The film was launched in March 2009 and is available for free download at:http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/sociology/rsw/undergrad/cetl/filmspublications/studentsatwork/

  • Design and analysis of a survey amongst Warwick sociology finalists on the topic of their experience writing a dissertation (results implemented in departmental procedures), 2007

  • Design and analysis of surveys amongst Warwick sociology first year students on the topic of their sociological identity and expectations, 2005-2007.