| | | Higher education news The 'York Accord' The University of York hosted a Workshop on 17 July, in collaboration with Brookings Doha Center and the Institute of International Education (IIE), to agree a series of recommendations to protect and support higher education in times of armed conflict. CARA's Executive Director, Stephen Wordsworth, was among the Workshop participants. The meeting agreed the 'York Accord', which calls, inter alia, for: • stronger national and international legal standards to prohibit the military use and abuse of higher education; state and non-state actors should review national policies and laws, in close co-operation with their higher education institutions and staff and with due respect for the values essential to quality higher education, especially institutional autonomy, academic freedom and social responsibility, to ensure that higher education communities are physically secure, and free from intimidation and improper external influence; • a global architecture to monitor and report systematically on the impact of conflict on affected institutions and higher education communities; • the investigation of attacks on higher education, with perpetrators being held to account; • practical steps towards offering safe haven to scholars and academics affected by conflict; • a Rapid Response Mechanism for Higher Education in emergencies, as an integral part of the overall humanitarian response, to mitigate the effects of conflict and ensure that students can return to university as quickly as possible; • The rebuilding of institutions of higher education as an inherent part of any national or regional post-conflict reconstruction strategy. The final text of the Accord has been sent to Gordon Brown, in his capacity as United Nations Special Envoy for Global Education. For more information on the York Accord, click here. [The Times] Home Secretary proposes tougher rules for student visas In a leaked document written by Theresa May, she argues that universities should develop ''sustainable funding models that are not so dependent on international students''. Students will also be required to demonstrate a higher degree of financial backing as a condition for receipt of a higher education visa than is currently required. She also expressed concern about the quality of the increasing number of London satellite campuses for universities based elsewhere in the United Kingdom. Universities are worried that they lack strong enough allies within Whitehall to make sure that immigration laws do not restrict their work, with the government planning to reduce net immigration to 100,000 per year. For more information, click here. [BBC] Students condemn the scrapping of maintenance grants During his summer budget, Chancellor George Osborne announced that maintenance grants will be replaced by a new loans system. The changes will only affect students starting university in September 2016 and will not work retrospectively. The available loan amount will be set at £8,200; higher than the current grant amount, with students expected to repay it once they are earning over a £21,000 a year. Additionally, tuition fees will rise with the rate of inflation. The higher debt that students from poorer backgrounds may incur could put them off seeking higher education. For more information, click here. [The Guardian] Chancellor George Osborne plans to freeze threshold for student loan repayment at £21,000 for 5 years Plans put forward by Chancellor George Osborne in the latest budget will mean that the cost of going to university will rise by £6,000 for middle earners, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS). The current loan repayment threshold of £21,000 will be frozen, allowing Osborne to collect an extra £1.4 billion a year from graduates as wages rise with inflation. An average student will expect to pay back an additional £3,800 over the course of his/her lifetime. For more information, click here [The Independent] and here. [The Institute for Fiscal Studies] | |
Events | 
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Islamic events in the United Kingdom UKIslamicEvents.net has one objective: to have a SINGLE website for all UK Muslims to go to find out what Islamic talks, classes, courses, trips, exhibitions etc. are happening in their area and across the UK. It has over 2,000 subscribers and has been running since 2005. Click here to visit their website and find an Islamic event near you. Edinburgh Festival Fringe Where: Various locations around Edinburgh When: 7th-31st August 2015 The Edinburgh Festival Fringe is the largest arts festival in the world and takes place every August for three weeks in Scotland's capital city. Every year thousands of performers from all over the world take to hundreds of stages all over Edinburgh to present shows for every taste. Events that you may find interesting include: • Edinburgh Arab Festival (28th-29th August 2015) – Edinburgh University: A two day festival exploring the beauty, diversity and richness of the Arab world through music, fashion, poetry, film, photography, calligraphy, exhibitions, traditional cuisines and more. Click here to visit its website. • Incognito: The Art of Disguise (7th-31st August) - The Nomad's Tent, Edinburgh: A remarkable exhibition of performance, tribal and ceremonial masks from Africa and Asia. Click here for more information. • Flamenco Escocia (8th, 9th and 18th August) – Chambers Street, Edinburgh: A performance combining Flamenco music with a Scottish rhythm. An award-winning performance, rated 5 out of 5 stars by the Guardian newspaper. Click here for more information. For the full programme of events, click here. To find out more about Edinburgh Festival Fringe, click here. Notting Hill Carnival Where: Notting Hill Gate and surrounding areas, London When: 29th - 31st August 2015 The Notting Hill Carnival is Europe's largest street festival, with over 1 million people attending each year. Delicious food stalls and a diverse range of music underpin the Caribbean-based theme of the carnival. Events include parades, concerts, family workshops, poetry, storytelling, comedy and costume competitions. For more information, click here. Manchester Jazz Festival Where: Thwaites Festival Square, Manchester When: 31st July - 9th August 2015 The Manchester Jazz Festival, now in its 20th year, is Manchester's longest-running music festival with something for every age and taste. This year's 10 music-filled days will feature 78 gigs, many of them free, from 400 artists across 10 venues. For more information, click here to visit the Festival's official website. | |
CARA: A voice for silenced academics | 
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As our current and previous Fellows will already know, Cara is a charitable organisation that provides support to at-risk academics so that they may continue their scholarly work free of oppression and discrimination. We currently support 90 fellows at various higher education institutions in the UK, and in 2014 were responsible for securing over £1million in fee waivers and in-kind support from many universities. However, our work extends beyond the direct support that we provide to Fellows. With increasing numbers of attacks being carried out on higher education institutions worldwide, our advocacy and awareness-raising work has become ever more important. On July 17th 2015, an assembly of leading academics, scholarship funding bodies, university leaders and scholar rescue organisations attended a meeting at the University of York to discuss the growing threat to higher education during and after conflict, and how best to protect it. Cara's input was instrumental in the implementation of specific guidelines set out in the resulting document, the 'York Accord'. The final version of this document can be found here. As a testament to our success, key recommendations from the accord have now been passed on to former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown in his capacity as the United Nations Special Envoy for Global Education. Cara also holds a deputy chair position at the Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack (GCPEA), serving as an active member of its steering committee and Higher Education Working Group where we campaign to stop all forms of attack on higher education. Our work includes lobbying states to protect and uphold the right to free academic debate and encouraging non-state organisations to protect the rights of individual academics. In addition to our work with the GPCEA, we raise awareness of at-risk researchers among the 108 members institutions of our UK University Network by giving regular talks and by approaching them to host our Fellows. These activities underpin our success in securing fee waivers and in convincing more and more universities to take an active role in protecting the sanctity of higher education. We are also active in encouraging our beneficiaries to tell their stories in an attempt to challenge current popular media perceptions surrounding refugees and migrant workers. Considering the increasingly hostile environment, we will continue relentlessly to advocate and campaign on behalf of academics and higher education. Adhering to the words of Albert Einstein, we will continue to "resist the powers which threaten to suppress intellectual and individual freedom". Hussam El-Kurd Cara Fellowship Programme Intern | |
Funding Opportunities 
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Westminster Full Fee Scholarships for UK and International Students Where: University of Westminster, United Kingdom Amount: Full tuition fee award only on any Master's program Deadline: 16th October 2015 Westminster University offers a number of full tuition fee scholarships if you are an exceptionally well-qualified student from either inside the UK/EU or an international country. Eligible candidates will have a First Class Honours degree or equivalent and exhibit financial need. For the official scholarship website, click here. PhD Studentship in Policy and Governance in Europe Where: University of Nottingham, United Kingdom Amount: £13,863 to cover PhD fees Deadline: 15th August 2015 This is an exciting opportunity to join LUCAS, to contribute to the research programme supported by the prestigious Leverhulme Research Programme Grant "Sustaining Urban Habitats: An Interdisciplinary Approach". The ambitious aim of this programme is to transform our understanding of how sustainable cities, and by extension our species, can be. Our objectives in achievement of this aim are to: • Understand the complex interrelated and competing factors influencing urban sustainability. • Holistically define, measure and model urban sustainability. • Identify pathways to transition developed cities and accommodate growth in developing cities in minimally unsustainable ways. • Define policy and governance structures to implement these pathways in practice. In response to global, continental and national pressures, governmental and non-governmental actors are formulating, implementing and evaluating strategies to promote the sustainability of cities. Sustainability has significant implications for the governance structures and policy processes of cities. The "policy and governance" of this research programme involves examining: the role of a diverse range of actors in developing sustainability policy; understanding how and why sustainability policy is changing; influencing the formulation and implementation of city-specific policy and governance for the improvement of sustainability. For more information on this funding opportunity, click here. PhD Studentship in the cost-effectiveness of personalised medicine in cancer treatment (Oct 2015-Sept 2018) Where: Queen's University Belfast Amount: £13,863 to cover PhD fees Deadline: 14th August 2015 A PhD Studentship in Health Economics at Queen's University Management School (QUMS) in collaboration with the Queen's University School of Medicine, Dentistry and Biomedical Sciences (SMDB) is available to pursue a research project that will determine the value and cost-effectiveness of gene-based stratification approaches in cancer. This personalised medicine strategy has the potential to significantly improve cancer survival rates, but the challenge is to do so in a cost-effective manner. This exciting joint initiative that straddles both economics and health will expose the student to a range of econometric methods. Simulation modelling will be performed to estimate the effect of personalised medicine on health outcomes, costs and value. Mixed-method health services research and economic analysis, particularly the economic analysis of health systems will be employed to allow the value of this innovation to be measured. The value of personalised medicine interventions will be determined in a number of relevant clinical settings. The successful candidate should have a social science or biological science degree with quantitative research methods training. Candidates with experience in health economics or health policy will be preferred. For more information, click here. 3 Clinical Veterinary PhD Studentships Where: University of Bristol Amount: £20,000 Stipend Deadline: 22nd August 2015
These fully-funded studentships commence in October 2015 or January 2016 and are available in a range of clinical veterinary specialisms. The studentships provide funding for fees and a stipend. About the Langford Trust PhD scheme The University of Bristol and the Langford Trust are offering up to three, 3 year PhD studentships, to study a clinical problem of relevance to a veterinary species. Studies will take place in the School of Veterinary Science, Langford campus and/or in laboratories on the main campus in Bristol.
Please apply via the University postgraduate application portal for one of the projects below:- • Pathogenesis of the bacterium Fusobacterium necrophorum in ruminant foot diseases • Developing hydrogels for cell implantation in canine spinal cord injury • Training adaptations of equine respiratory muscles • Steps towards prompt diagnosis and prevention of haemoplasmosis • Understanding Post-prescription Medicines Use in Cattle - Addressing the Knowledge Gap For more information, click here. 3-Year PhD Studentship – Molecular Mechanism Controlling Epidermal Keratinocyte Differentiation Where: Plymouth University Amount: £14,057 Deadline: 24th August 2015 The Plymouth University Peninsula Schools of Medicine & Dentistry are seeking to attract PhD candidates of outstanding ability to join their exciting and rapidly expanding programme of internationally-rated research. The Plymouth University Peninsula Schools of Medicine & Dentistry are committed to research excellence. Applications are invited from suitably qualified graduates, 2:1 or above, and preferably a relevant MSc or MRes qualification. Candidate with cancer research background is welcome but is not obligatory. International students must also have an IELTS score of 7.0 or above (or equivalent qualification). This PhD project focuses on the transcriptional regulation of keratinocyte differentiation pathways and is essentially part of a BBSRC funded research project. The student will work closely with a research fellow using in vitro and in vivo models to illustrate the mechanism of cell differentiation and cancer initiation. The student will receive profound trainings on histology, cellular and molecular biology, transgenic animal models as well as translational studies using state-of-the-art facilities provided by Dr Bing Hu's group and the institute. The student will also receive opportunities to participate and present in the key international stem cells and cancer conferences For more information, click here. | |
Employment Opportunities | 
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Research Assistant -University College London - Department of Political Science/School of Public Policy Location: London Salary: £29,193 to £30,738 per annum, inclusive of London Allowance Hours: Part Time Contract Type: Permanent Deadline: 14th August 2015 The Research Assistant will work with Dr Nils Metternich at The School of Public Policy, UCL on a project on forecasting and contagion of conflict funded by the ESRC. This is a part time Research Assistant contract. This part time appointment is available from 1st October 2015 and is funded from a research initiative with limited funding which currently runs until 30th September 2017 in the first instance. A Master's degree in political science or a related field and a good understanding of and experience with quantitative statistics. Experience with Data Management. For more information, click here. Research Associate – University of Glasgow - College of Social Sciences, School of Interdisciplinary Studies, Dumfries Campus Location: Glasgow Salary: £33,242 - £37,394 per annum Hours: Full Time Contract Type: Temporary Contract Deadline: 16th August 2015 To increase the research capacity of the Crichton Institute and its capacity, you will undertake research and Knowledge Exchange that will inform Business Intelligence and Policy Development in support of the economic regeneration of the South of Scotland and Dumfries and Galloway in particular. Specifically, you will be required to take a leading role in identifying and carrying out a series of studies to determine the relationship between a new, major public sector capital investment (new hospital) and the communities of interest that cluster around it and contribute to the formulation and submission of research publications and research proposals. For more information, click here. Senior Research Associate – University of Portsmouth – Civil Engineering Location: Portsmouth Salary: £28,695 to £32,277 per annum Hours: Full- Time Contract Type: 18 Months Temporary Deadline: 5th August 2015 The University of Portsmouth is seeking a Senior Research Associate to help establish a European Coastal City Network (CCN) designed to investigate opportunities to merge engineering approaches to coastal defence and risk management with the latest thinking on comprehensive urban design for long-term adaptation, development and regeneration. By initiating the CCN, UoP is intending to lead a pan European group of academics, policy makers and practitioners, and drive the agenda on the adaptation of coastal cities. For more information, click here. Research Officer – University of Essex – Institute for Social and Economic Research Location: Colchester Salary: £28,695 to £31,342 pro rata for part time Hours: Full Time / Part Time Contract Type: Contract Temporary Deadline: 2nd September 2015 The Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER) has a worldwide reputation as a multidisciplinary centre of quantitative social science research and as a producer of household panel data of the highest quality. We wish to appoint a quantitative social scientist to the post of Research Assistant to work in the ESRC-funded Research Centre on Micro-Social Change (MiSoC). The successful candidate will provide research assistance and support to several senior members of the MiSoC team in order to contribute to several aspects of the MiSoC research programme. This research assistance will likely include preparation of data-sets, basic data analysis, and advanced statistical or econometric analysis, all using advanced statistical software, such as Stata. You will take part in other research activities, such as contributing to the writing of research papers. For more information, click here. Research Assistant – Ethnic Parties and National Unity Project Location: Bristol Salary: £31,342 to £35,256 per annum Hours: Part Time Contract Type: Contract / Temporary Deadline: 16th August 2015 Applications are invited for a position as Research Assistant in the School of Sociology, Politics and International Studies. The RA will work in close collaboration with and under the supervision of Dr Anaïd Flesken (the Principal Investigator) on the ESRC-funded project 'The Effects of Ethnic Parties on National Unity: Polarisation vs Inclusion'. The project examines the impact of ethnic group-specific party campaigning on ethnic relations and social cohesion. The Research Assistant will have responsibilities related to research and project administration, including data collection and analysis as well as dissemination of results. Applicants should have at least a Master's degree and ideally a PhD in Sociology, Politics, or an adjacent discipline and experience both qualitative and quantitative research. For more information, click here. | |
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