innovative ways of working with researchers

Innovative ways of working with researchers

Fiona Christie and Tahira Majothi: Careers ConsultantsVictoria Sheppard: Research Skills Coordinator

Vitae Conference, 6 - 7 September 2010

f.christie@salford.ac.uk t.majothi@salford.ac.uk v.m.sheppard@salford.ac.uk

PGR community at Salford

Science & Technology (Built Env; Computing Science & Engineering)

Arts & Social Science

Health & Social Care

RC-Funded

Split-site &

Distance

Learners

Professional Doctorates

PhD by Published

worksPractice-based PhDs

Researcher Development

Careers & Employability

Research Skills

Research Technologies

Teaching & learning

Online Technologies

Stayin

g Connecte

d

Raising awareness

‘post-event’ presence

Training Delivery

Visibility of research & researchers

Community

Active engagement

Careers BlogSkills & Technologies blog

Online newsletter

Reflective practice

Researcher blogs

Online profiles

A closer look at some examples….

• “The GTA Corner” – an early attempt to create an online community

• 2009-10: PhD Student perspectivehttp://vimeo.com/14637849

• Careers blog

Careers blog• Practical solution

• Inspired by good practice elsewhere

• Finding a voice and building an audience

• Transparency of professional staff

• Part of a blog family

• Is it worth it?

Careers blog – some stats

Enablers• Credibility of social media as research

within University

• Buy-in from senior staff

• Experimentation: trial and error

• Research technologist

• Collaboration

Limitations/challenges

• Recognition that still resource-intensive

• IT Infrastructure and support

• Overload of options!

• Measuring impact

Next Steps• ‘Virtual Doctoral School’ as space that

brings everything together

• Getting researchers more actively involved….

• …and their supervisors!

LinksSalford PGR website: http://www.pg.salford.ac.uk

PGR Blogs: careers http://www.careers.salford.ac.uk/students/phd/blog/

Skills Training & research technologies: http://www.pg.salford.ac.uk/blog/

Twitter: http://twitter.com/SalfordPGRs

Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/salfordpgrs/

Diigo social bookmarking: http://groups.diigo.com/group/skills-training-and-research-technologies

Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/salfordpgrs

Online conference proceedings: http://tinyurl.com/sparc09proceedings

Vimeo: http://vimeo.com/salfordpgrs