Innovation Internships

Match-funding available for PhD Innovation InternshipsCould your business benefit from access to talented early career researchers at Scotland’s universities?

The Scottish Graduate School of Social Science (SGSSS) can provide match-funding of £2,750 for a 12 week, full time PhD Internship.

The social sciences have a great deal to offer private sector organisations – from informing policy and strategy, understanding the potential for new goods, services and business models, to providing future employees.

SGSSS Internships provide you with:

• access to highly skilled early career social scientists from our 16 member universities across Scotland;

• a motivated team member, increasing your capacity for work that you may not otherwise have the resource to do;

• access to specialist knowledge and research skills, including high level quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis;

• access to new ideas, insights and perspectives for your organisation;• opportunities for creating and developing networks with academia.

What is a SGSSS Internship?

PhD internships enable organisations to access the talent of an early career researcher for a three month period to deliver a specific piece of work. Placements provide tangible value to a host organisation whilst enhancing employability through the development transferable skills for our researchers. Internship partners are helping to prepare the next generation of capable and innovative social science leaders to work across boundaries for careers in and out of academia.

SGSSS works with you on developing your proposal and advertises internship projects extensively across our academic networks. We perform eligibility checks on applications and conduct a first sift to ensure the highest standard of applications reach you. We support you through the interview and selection process and handle all financial processes.

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Innovation Internships

Funding available for businesses

We have funding available to match-fund four internships with private sector business or industry partners. The total cost of a three month placement is £5,500, this covers a monthly stipend and expenses for the student. SGSSS will fund 50% of this, the remaining amount must be matched by you as the host organisation.

Key qualifying criteria

We are looking for opportunities that involve the testing of new ideas, methods or processes, or those which challenge existing norms. Projects must be of clear benefit to the host, helping to meet business objectives such as improving performance or productivity, enable it to take advantage of new opportunities or to grow as an organisation, and be achievable within the allotted time frame. In addition:

• Placements must be within business or industry partners (e.g. registered as a company, partnership, or corporation), this can include SMEs and Social Enterprises1.

• Groups of organisations may be considered, provided there is a lead business where the researcher will be based.

• The opportunity available to candidates must last for 12 weeks and must be full-time (minimum of 35 hours per week).

• The project must start before the end of December 2019 and be complete by the end of March 2020.

How to apply

Please complete the attached application form and return it to internships@socsciscotland.ac.uk by 5pm on 31 August 2018. If your project is accepted, we will work with you to develop your proposal further.

To find out more, please contact Anna Scott, Knowledge Exchange & Partnerships Manager, anna.scott@ed.ac.uk or 0131 650 3749.

1 Social Enterprises must be getting the majority of its revenue from trading rather than grants/donations

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Innovation Internships

Application formHost organisation details

Host organisation name:

Host organisation vision/mission:Industry type:Contact name:

Job title:Email:

Tel:Address:

Will this person act as the researcher’s

mentor?:

YES / NO

If no, please state name of mentor:

Job title of mentor:Email:

Tel:Address:

Will the researcher be based at this

address?:

YES / NO

If no, where will the researcher be

based?:Where did you hear

about this opportunity?:

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Innovation Internships

Project detailsProject title: Include a working title.

Project summary: Give a brief description of the project and any outputs or results you want the researcher to achieve.

Further details: Please give further details, e.g. strategic context, fit with business objectives, etc.

Skills required: Please list essential or desirable skills here.

Benefits to the researcher:

How will the intern benefit from the placement? What skills or insights will they gain?

Timing:

Start date (or must start by):

End date (or must end by):

Internships are normally full time three month positions. Certain projects may be shorter or worked part time, but the maximum amount of time a student will be with you is three months. If the timing is flexible, please put ‘flexible’ below.

Key relationships: What range of professionals, audiences, customers, clients will the researcher work with during this internship?

Consent: From time to time we may contact you about future internship calls, or to let you know about events, funding opportunities and other activities that we think are of interest to you. We will only use your information for the purposes stated and will never pass your details on to anyone else without your consent. If you consent to us saving your details to contact you in this way please let us know by ticking this box. ☐

Thank you for completing this form, please review the additional information below.

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Innovation Internships

Additional information

SGSSS Pathways

Pathways are crucial to the functioning of the SGSSS and are broadly analogous to academic disciplines, with some representing strategically important interdisciplinary research areas (e.g. Environment, Climate Change & Energy).

Social Science PhD students are doing research in the following areas:

Accounting, Finance, Business and Management (AFBM) Economic and Social History Economics Education Health, Families, Relationships and Demographic Change Human Geography, Environment and Urban Planning Language-based Area Studies and International Development Linguistics Politics and International Relations (PIR) Psychology Social Anthropology Social Work and Social Policy Socio-Legal Studies and Criminology Sociology Science, Technology and Innovation Studies and Information and

Communication Studies

What happens next?

Return this completed form to: internships@socsciscotland.ac.uk If your project is accepted, we will work with you to develop your proposal

further; Once a project has been agreed, the internship will be advertised to a

talented pool of high-calibre social science PhD researchers through SGSSS online and via academic networks. Applicants have approximately six weeks to apply;

Applications are sent directly to SGSSS so we can perform eligibility checks and do a first sift if required;

Hosts will review and shortlist applicants, and can either contact them directly to arrange interviews, or SGSSS can facilitate this;

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Innovation Internships

Once a suitable candidate (or candidates) is selected, SGSSS will invoice you for the total amount (50%) of funding. SGSSS will then make arrangements for financial support to the student over the three months and handle any related queries;

Before the internship begins, successful applicants and their university supervisor will be asked to sign an agreement document covering administrative details such as procedures for annual leave, etc;

At the end of the placement, we will ask you to complete a short feedback form to help us to develop our scheme in future.

Key dates (indicative timeline)

Deadline for

proposals

Internships advertised

Deadline for applications

Recruitment and selection

Internships start

31 August 2018

31 October 2018

12 December 2018

January 2019 February 2019

onwards

Thank you for your interest in the SGSSS Innovative Internships Programme.

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