White Rose Doctoral Training Partnership opportunities at the Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research

Are you interested in conducting PhD research with a social and civic purpose?

The Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research (CRESR), at Sheffield Hallam University welcomes applications for PhD scholarships to be funded by the White Rose Doctoral Training Partnership (WRDTP). Scholarships would be tenable from October 2025. Applicants are advised to submit their own project ideas on any topic aligned with our research themes as well as one of the WRDTP pathways.  We are also inviting applications for the Advanced Quantitative Methods award. Scholarships are available for both full-time and part-time PhD study. Please refer to our doctoral applications page and the WRDTP website pages for detailed information about the awards, eligibility and materials to support putting together an application. 

About The Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research

The CRESR is one of the UK’s leading policy research centres.  Our work is concerned with understanding the impact of social and economic disadvantage on places, on people and on the environment.  Having a beneficial social impact is at the heart of what we do in CRESR, and we seek to drive forward social and environmental justice within disadvantaged communities.  We grapple with pressing societal challenges, ranging from the personal traumas of homelessness to the complexities of repurposing industry for a net-zero economy.  For nearly 40 years this research has informed policy and practice on a regional, national and international level.

The CRESR’s post-graduate research community

The CRESR is also a leading centre for doctoral research. Our postgraduate research school currently has around 30 students working on PhD projects across the breadth of our areas of research expertise.  Several of these projects are conducted in collaboration with our research partners in the charity and government sectors.  As a doctoral student at CRESR you will be co-located with academic staff and join a lively research community offering excellent support and training.  White Rose funded students also benefit from the training programme and extended networking opportunities offered by the WRDTP.

WRDTP Pathway Awards

We offer multi-disciplinary research expertise covering a wide range of qualitative and quantitative methods organised into five research themes.  

We also welcome applications that do not sit within these themes provided we have relevant supervisor expertise in the centre.  

Housing and Place

Our work on housing and place develops and builds on CRESR’s outstanding record of housing-based research and evaluation by furthering an understanding of the operation of housing markets, individuals’ experiences of housing precarity and homelessness, and the interface between housing and other domains - including welfare, health, and social care.  It aims to provide evidence and analysis to support and influence effective policy and practice that promotes social justice and fairness.

Theme lead: Dr Jonahan Webb

Inclusive Economy

Understanding how social and spatial inequalities are shaped through economic life is critical to addressing the defining challenges of our time, such as the rise of in-work poverty and how to address regional disparities in prosperity. CRESR’s Inclusive Economy theme develops this research agenda by asking: What are the processes contributing to labour market vulnerability and economic insecurity? And how we might create more inclusive economies that provide greater economic social wellbeing?

Theme lead: Dr Richard Crisp

Sustainable Futures

CRESR’s Sustainable Futures research theme explores the implications and experiences of the transition to a low carbon society from social, economic, socio-technical and policy perspectives and from the standpoints of citizens and stakeholders. We are particularly concerned with how transitions play out in the energy and transport sectors within urban environments, undertaking robust research which focuses on hard-to-reach groups across these domains.

Theme lead: Prof. Aimee Ambrose

Voluntary and Community Sector

In the UK alone the VCS accounts for nearly 1% of total GDP and generates more than £50 billion in income each year. But the value of the VCS cannot be captured solely using this economic approach. The VSC research theme centres attention on what voluntary action contributes to our public discourse, civil society, and our collective wellbeing, and asks whether the VCS should be given even greater responsibility for delivering welfare services.

Theme lead: Cathy Harris and Dr Rob Macmillan

Policy Research and Evaluation

Applied policy research with impact lies at the core of all that CRESR does. The Policy Research and Evaluation theme considers the interface between academic research and real-world practice.  It has a twin focus: to explore and improve our methods of research and the underlying concepts that inform them; and increasing the impact of our research.

Theme lead: Dr Julian Dobson

Advanced Quantitative Methods (AQM) Awards

CRESR has significant methodological expertise as well as access to quantitative datasets to support applications for AQM awards. Applications are welcomed from students who wish to apply advanced, cutting-edge quantitative research methods to either primary or secondary quantitative data to facilitate impactful research that answers research questions aligned to one or more of our research clusters. 

We particularly welcome proposals in the following areas:

• the societal impacts of policies and programmes designed to encourage more sustainable transport
• how place and/or place-based policy effects the lives and outcomes of residents
• the development and nature of new housing supply and/or whether it addresses need
• the outcomes and effects of new housing supply for residents and on neighbourhoods

AQM award lead: Prof Ian Wilson

Next Steps

If you would like to apply for a White Rose funded PhD scholarship, please access information about the application process via the research degrees White Rose DTP scholarships page and the White Rose DTP website.

Before you apply, we recommend that you discuss your proposed research topic with a potential supervisor. We have academic staff working across each of the research clusters who are interested in supervising new PhD students and you can read more about their areas of research interest on the Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research staff webpage.

Shortlisted candidates will be invited for an interview w/c 3rd February 2025.  If successful at this recruitment stage, you will be offered a PhD in principle and nominated for the DTP competition.  You will work closely with the proposed supervisor to develop your research proposal further in preparation for the DTP application deadline of 26 February 2025.

Please contact CRESR’s Post-Graduate Research Tutor Dr Sadie Parr if you have questions. Sadie will also be able put you in contact with a potential supervisor to support you in putting together your application.