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Education (PhD)

2024-25 (also available for 2025-26)

How to apply Order a prospectusPostgraduate Open Days
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This course is eligible for Doctoral loan funding. Find out more.

Start date

16 September 2024

6 January 2025

21 April 2025

21 July 2025

Duration

The maximum duration for a PhD is 3 years (36 months) full-time or 6 years (72 months) part-time with an optional submission pending (writing-up) period of 12 months.

Sometimes it may be possible to mix periods of both full-time and part-time study.

If studying on a part-time basis, you must establish close links with the University and spend normally not less than an average of 10 working days per year in the university, excluding participation in activities associated with enrolment, re-registration and progression monitoring. You are also expected to dedicate 17.5 hours per week to the research.

Application deadlines

For September 2024

07 June 2024 for International and Scholarship Students

28 June 2024 for Home Students

For October 2024

07 June 2024 for International and Scholarship Students

28 June 2024 for Home Students

For January 2025

18 October 2024 for International and Scholarship Students

15 November 2024 for Home Students

For April 2025

24 January 2025 for International and Scholarship Students

21 February 2025 for Home Students

About the research degree

Reasons to study

  1. Develop a high level of transferrable skills which will be invaluable in your future career.
  2. The Graduate School offers the training and resources required to become a successful researcher.
  3. Access tools and skills to improve employability through the Researcher Skills Development Programme.

A PhD is the highest academic award for which a student can be registered. A PhD thesis makes an original contribution to knowledge. You will identify a research project and your thesis will be a substantial and unique piece of work. Your programme of work will include participating in conferences and seminars. You will attend relevant aspects of postgraduate courses and may engage in guided reading or a combination of study methods.

You will be supervised by a team of up to 3 members including a main supervisor who will advise and support you throughout your project. At the end of a 3-year full-time or six year part-time period of research and writing, you will submit a thesis which will be up to 80,000 words long. You will have developed a range of personal and professional transferrable skills which will be invaluable in your future career.

Completing a PhD can give you a great sense of personal achievement and help you develop a high level of transferable skills which will be useful in your subsequent career, as well as contributing to the development of knowledge in your chosen field.

Entry requirements

The normal level of attainment required for entry is:

  • Master's degree or an Honours degree (2:1 or above) or an equivalent professional qualification, normally with a classification of merit or distinction, in a discipline appropriate to the proposed programme to be followed, or
  • appropriate research or professional experience at postgraduate level, which has resulted in published work, written reports or other appropriate evidence of accomplishment.

As a PhD applicant you will need to submit an online application direct to the University and this should contain a provisional research proposal of between 1500-2000 words (plus bibliography). This should include key criteria that will enable the selector to evaluate the scope and importance of your project and to assist with identifying academic supervision with the necessary expertise and knowledge to supervise you and guide you through your research degree.

If your first language is not English, you will need to meet the minimum requirements of an English Language qualification. The minimum for IELTS is 6.5 overall with no element lower than 6.0, or equivalent. Read more about the University’s entry requirements for students outside of the UK on our Where are you from information pages.

What can I research?

There are several research topics available for this degree. See below examples of research areas including an outline of the topics, the supervisor, funding information and eligibility criteria:

Outline

Research topics could focus on any age group or community including the impact of government policies such as ‘Prevent’, the extent to which the political and organisational policies and frameworks facilitate / inhibit the translation of values into practice; marginalisation; faith, culture and pedagogies; policy work around cohesion, community perceptions of community cohesion, education and extremism.

Funding

Please see our Scholarships page to find out about funding or studentship options available.

Deadline

Supervisors

How to apply

Outline

Research topics could focus on a wide range of topics related to Career Development and Employability, including Policy, strategy and organisations, e.g. Higher Education institutions' responses to the employability policy agenda, the changing role and position of Careers Services; Transitions and ideas of success, e.g. School/FE to HE transitions in a careers education and guidance context, social mobility and equality; 'Getting in and getting on'- the relationship between access, experience and graduate success, data and metrics for career development and employability; Internationalisation, e.g. student mobility and international students; Professional practice, e.g. employer engagement and employer perspectives on graduate attraction and recruitment.

Funding

There are currently no scholarships or School fee waivers available

Deadline

Supervisors

How to apply

Outline

Research topics could focus on children and young people’s perspectives on and experiences of formal schooling; developing ethical practice in early years settings; young adults and the ‘gig economy’; young people, youth, unemployment, work, poverty, crime, class, inequality and the significance of place, children’s physical development; educational and labour market experiences of marginalised youth, and experiences of teachers, support workers and other practitioners working with young people.

Funding

Please see our Scholarships page to find out about funding or studentship options available.

Deadline

Supervisors

How to apply

Outline

Research topics could focus on the management of change; Education for the knowledge economy; internationalisation, Leadership in early childhood education and care, professionalisation of the Early Years workforce, teacher development.

Funding

Please see our Scholarships page to find out about funding or studentship options available.

Deadline

Supervisors

How to apply

Outline

Research topics could focus on youth and community work (its history and practices), adult literacy and numeracy, the provision of accessible routes into education; youth work education in HE settings,the impact of class, gender, ethnicity, disability, sexuality on outcomes.

Funding

Please see our Scholarships page to find out about funding or studentship options available.

Deadline

Supervisors

How to apply

Outline

Research topics could focus on narrative and feminist approaches to research; participatory, creative and visual methods, research ethics; quantitative research methods in educational research; ethnographic approaches.

Funding

Please see our Scholarships page to find out about funding or studentship options available.

Deadline

Supervisors

How to apply

Outline

Research topics could focus on any aspect of work undertaken in further and /or higher education colleges, the re-engineering of education, the political economy of education, lived experience; workplace learning, cognitive capitalism and emancipatory practice; IELTS and English language teaching / learning.

Funding

Please see our Scholarships page to find out about funding or studentship options available.

Deadline

Supervisors

How to apply

Outline

Research topics might focus on relationships between educational practitioners and students / participants / clients; education, politics and questions of social justice; Professional identity, agency and autonomy; education and popular culture; the translation of professional values into practice, the way in which practitioners draw on their professional value-base to inform their work with young people and the wider community, employability and ‘care’, learner autonomy.

Funding

Please see our Scholarships page to find out about funding or studentship options available.

Deadline

Supervisors

How to apply

Outline

Research topics could focus on young people’s experiences of alternative education provisions; home education; interventions aimed at retaining and improving the outcomes for students at risk of leaving education or of underachieving.

Funding

Please see our Scholarships page to find out about funding or studentship options available.

Deadline

Supervisors

How to apply

Outline

Research topics could focus on education for sustainability in particular countries or contexts, curriculum design.

Funding

Please see our Scholarships page to find out about funding or studentship options available.

Deadline

Supervisors

How to apply

Outline

Research topics could focus on blended learning; critical understanding of technology within higher education teaching and learning; critical understanding of learner analytical dashboards in higher education, social networking and social media in education, multimedia pedagogy, e-tutoring.

Funding

Please see our Scholarships page to find out about funding or studentship options available.

Deadline

Supervisors

How to apply

Outline

Research topics could focus on confidence and teacher educators; work-based learning – developing reflective practice; effective work place mentoring; the links between education and national development, vocational pedagogy, research about FE-based teacher educators, trainee teachers and FE-based teacher education.

Funding

Please see our Scholarships page to find out about funding or studentship options available.

Deadline

Supervisors

How to apply

There are different ways to find the right research topic for you:

  1. Find a supervisor and design your own research project – explore the Huddersfield Research Portal or the Huddersfield Centre for Research in Education and Society (HudCRES) to find research and researcher expertise to find the area you’re interested in.

  2. Browse our listed funded opportunities.

Places are always subject to eligibility, a review of your proposal and supervisory capacity.

Student support

At the University of Huddersfield, you'll find support networks and services to help you get ahead in your studies and social life. Whether you study at undergraduate or postgraduate level, you'll soon discover that you're never far away from our dedicated staff and resources to help you to navigate through your personal student journey. Find out more about all our support services.

Researcher Environment

Our postgraduate researchers contribute to our thriving research [culture] community at Huddersfield, in return, we provide an experience that enhances your potential and inspires you to think big and become a globally competitive researcher.

Join our community of like-minded people who are passionate about research and gain access to world-leading facilities, advanced research skills training, and expert career advice.

Reduced inequalities

  • We recently ranked 6 out of 796 global institutions for reduced inequalities in the Times Higher Impact ratings – this recognises our research on social inequalities, policies on discrimination and commitment to recruitment staff and students from underrepresented groups.**

World-leading

  • We are in the top 50 UK universities for research power, and nearly two-thirds of our research environment is classified as world-leading and internationally excellent.***

As a researcher, you’ll gain access to our Researcher Skills Development Programme through The Graduate School, to help broaden your knowledge and access tools and skills to improve your employability. The programme is mapped against Vitae’s Researcher Development Framework (RDF), you’ll benefit from Vitae’s career support as well as our own programme. We also have a team dedicated to improving the academic English needed for research by our international PGRs.

Our training is delivered in a variety of ways to take advantage of online platforms as well as face-to-face workshops and courses. You can access a range of bespoke training opportunities and in-person events that are tailored to each stage of your journey;

  • Sessions on PhD thesis writing, publications and journals, post-doctoral opportunities, poster and conference presentations, networking, and international travel opportunities

  • opportunity to work and study abroad via the Turing Scheme through The Graduate School

  • Externally accredited training programme with Advance HE (HEA) and CMI

  • Online research training support accessed through a dedicated researcher module in Brightspace, the University’s Virtual Learning Environment

  • We also hold a series of PGR focussed events such as 3 Minute Thesis PGR led research conference informal events throughout the year.

**THE Impact Rankings 2022

*** REF2021

Important information

We will always try to deliver your course as described on this web page. However, sometimes we may have to make changes as set out below.

When you are offered a place on a research degree, your offer will include confirmation of your supervisory team, and the topic you will be researching and will be governed by our terms & Conditions, student handbook and relevant policies. You will find a guide to the key terms here, along with the Student Protection Plan.

Whilst the University will use reasonable efforts to ensure your supervisory team remains the same, sometimes it may be necessary to make changes to your team for reasons outside the University’s control, for example if your supervisor leaves the University, or suffers from long term illness. Where this is the case, we will discuss these difficulties with you and seek to either put in place a new supervisory team, or help you to transfer to another research facility, in accordance with our Student Protection Plan.

Changes may also be necessary because of circumstances outside our reasonable control, for example the University being unable to access it’s buildings due to fire, flood or pandemic, or the University no longer being able to provide specialist equipment. Where this is the case, we will discuss these issues with you and agree any necessary changes.

Your research project is likely to evolve as you work on it and these minor changes are a natural and expected part of your study. However, we may need to make more significant changes to your topic of research during the course of your studies, either because your area of interest has changed, or because we can no longer support your research for reasons outside the University’s control. If this is the case, we will discuss any changes in topic with you and agree these in writing. If you are an international student, changing topics may affect your visa or ATAS clearance and if this is the case we will discuss this with you before any changes are made.

The Office for Students (OfS) is the principal regulator for the University.