Skills Development Scotland and the SGSSS will support approximately three new PhD studentships from the 2022/23 academic year. Their research will provide new knowledge and insights to help advance the understanding of key skills issues from a Scottish perspective.

The purpose of the SDS-SGSSS PhD scheme is to engage with the academic community to support the production of new, high-quality research focused on the Scottish labour market. The scheme is led by supervisors, and designed to:

• Contribute to the development of a cadre of high-quality academic researchers with a deep knowledge of the Scottish skills landscape
• Provide SDS with access to high-quality academic research around topics of longer-term interest
• Increase the range and scope of SDS engagement with academic experts in support of skills policy

The lead supervisor must be a member of a HEI in Scotland that is accredited to hold studentships within their disciplinary pathway, and must have undergone supervisor training within their institution within the last 5 years.

Second supervisors may work within any of the SGSSS 16 partner HEIs. We encourage applicants to consider co-supervision with different universities across our network. You can find full information about the SGSSS partner universities online here.

Each year SDS invite proposals based on specific research topics. The 2021/22 topics will be provided by the official launch date of 31 August 2021.

Please read the competition guidance* carefully, paying particular attention to the role of SDS in the recruitment process and project support.

We will ask for applications to be submitted via our new application system** once we officially launch on 31 August 2021.

*The competition guidance for 2021/22 will be updated for the official launch on 31 August 2021.

**From the 2021/22 competition, we will be moving to a new application system. The guidance for this new system will be provided by the official launch on 31 August 2021.