ESRC NINE Postdoctoral Fellowships 2020: Preliminary applications due by 16:00 on 17 January 2020

In 2018 and 2019, QUB Law candidates, Dr Clare Patton and Dr Elizabeth Agnew, respectively, won an ESRC NINE postdoctoral fellowship. Clare and Elizabeth were the only Law & Society winners across the consortium, and we were the only department at QUB to have an award-winner two years in a row.

We’re now looking for a talented individual to follow in their footsteps. Could it be you? Could you become a 2020 ESRC NINE fellow hosted by QUB Law?

If this appeals, and you are eligible for the competition, the first step is to submit a preliminary application to the School of Law by 16:00 on 17 January 2020. We have introduced this preliminary stage because ESRC NINE has indicated that only two candidates can be nominated by each School or Department.

Preliminary applications should be sent via email to Heather Kinning (h.kinning@qub.ac.uk). Please put ‘ESRC NINE PDF preliminary application’ in the subject header of your message.

A preliminary application requires:

1. A CV (max 2 sides of A4; minimum of font size 11)
2. A proposal (max 2 sides of A4; minimum of font size 11), including details of your proposed mentor (from whom you should have secured agreement in advance)

The CV needs to provide: (i) the date you passed your PhD viva voce, or the date for which it has been scheduled; (ii) brief details of your education to date, including overall percentage achieved in each degree; (iii) any awards received for work or training; (iv) previous employment history; and (v) any conference papers or publications.

In terms of proposal content, focus on the details provided under ‘Case for Support’: https://www.ninedtp.ac.uk/postdoctoral-fellowship-scheme/

In preparing your preliminary application, please recall that the Law pathway within ESRC NINE is ‘Law & Society’. Focus, too, on the particular characteristics of this fellowship opportunity –including (i) the fact that PhD supervisors should not be nominated as mentors, bar in exceptional circumstances, and (ii) the emphasis on how the fellowship would support you in consolidating your PhD, and preparing you for the next stage of your research career – either in academia or for a research career outside academia (e.g., as a researcher in a public, private or civil society organisation).

In advance of preparing a preliminary application, ensure you meet the eligibility requirements: see ‘ESRC Eligibility Requirements’ at the following link: https://www.ninedtp.ac.uk/postdoctoral-fellowship-scheme/

All preliminary applications received by the deadline will be reviewed by a small team of academic staff from QUBLaw and a selection made. We aim to complete this exercise by 24 January 2020 in order to provide successful applicants with any feedback we think they should incorporate before going forward to the internal Queen’s University Belfast competition (deadline 3 February 2020), which will determine who goes forward to the final stage as a QUB nominee.