12 Doctoral and 2 Post Doc positions – 6 European Universities | deadline for applications: 3 February 2013

 
The UNIKE project –Universities in the Knowledge Economy – is looking to fill in 12 doctoral positions and 2 post-doctoral positions at 6 European Universities (AU Aarhus University, UB University of Bristol, UK Graduate School of Education, RU Roehampton University, École Normale Supérieure de Lyon, LU Univerza V Ljubljani, and Universidade do Porto/FPCE) in an Initial Training Network (ITN).
Applications are welcome from anywhere in the world. The deadline for applications is 3 February 2013 at 17:00 CET.
Deadline: Sunday 3 February 2013
 
Aims of UNIKE project

What are the changing roles and scope of universities in emerging global knowledge economies and regions? The first aim of the UNIKE project is to train a networked group of critical researchers who will examine these issues and especially compare developments in Europe and the Asia-Pacific Rim. The second aim of the UNIKE project is to generate potential research leaders who are committed and able to develop doctoral education in their own institutions and internationally.
 
Doctoral projects (12 positions)

The deadline for applications is Sunday 3 February 2013 at 17:00 CET. Applications should be sent to UNIKE@au.dk
Any offer of a position will be conditional on the applicant providing evidence that they meet the language proficiency requirements of the university where they are enrolling.
 
Job description
1. Undertake an independent research project, with academic supervision, including a secondment and/or research visits to associated partners, as agreed in a detailed ‘Individual scientific, training and career plan’, which is to be written within 6 months of the commencement of the appointment.
2. Complete the host institution’s doctoral training requirements and submit a thesis within three years.
3. Attend and participate in UNIKE’s 3 workshops, 4 summer/winter schools and final conference, help organise one of these events, and give a presentation at a minimum of one of these events.
4. Contribute to the formation and activities of a work package team led by the post/doctoral researchers by participating in webinars, wikis etc (e.g. to discuss literature, interview associated partners with relevant knowledge, share research and fieldwork plans, comment on each others’ draft chapters and papers).
5. Give papers at two international conferences and submit two articles to international peer reviewed journals. Contribute to a chapter in an edited volume resulting from the UNIKE project.
6. Disseminate research to a wide academic and general public by writing in other genres, including one individually or jointly written blog, one newspaper feature article and a multimedia release; by knowledge transfer in a form suited to a secondment partner where relevant (e.g. presentation, report, press release); and by presenting research results as a Marie Curie Ambassador to another university or school or the Erasmus Mundus Students and Alumni Association.
7. Other duties as specified in the relevant project description.
 
Remuneration

Doctoral students will be employees of their university for the duration of their UNIKE doctorate and will be given a full-time contract for three years. The salary for a doctoral position is set in accordance within the regulations of the Marie Curie Initial Training Network within the European Commission’s 7th Framework Programme and the labour laws of the relevant country. In addition to the salary, funds have been allocated to cover the travel, accommodation and subsistence costs of attending all UNIKE workshops and summer schools, including a 2-week summer school in New Zealand; and towards the costs of secondments and research visits to Associated Partners, including in the Asia-Pacific Rim.
 
Starting date

The selected doctoral researchers must register at their university no later than the start of the academic year 2013.
 
Contacts

For enquiries about the overall UNIKE project, please contact UNIKE Administrator Astrid Cermak asce@dpu.dk or UNIKE Coordinator Professor Susan Wright suwr@dpu.dk.
For enquiries about individual positions, please see the contacts given in each individual doctoral project description.
 
Doctoral project 1: ASEM meetings and HE ‘policy travel’ from Europe to Asia
Part of Work Package 1: ‘Concepts and theories’
Location: Bristol University, United Kingdom Supervisor: Professor Roger Dale
Objective: To advance understanding of processes of trans-regional policy transfer by exploring ASEM meetings as a forum for discussing and extending the Bologna Process.
 
Doctoral project 2: Internationalisation of higher education in centres and peripheries
Part of Work Package 1: ‘Concepts and theories’
Location: Ljubljana University, Slovenia. Supervisor: Professor Pavel Zgaga
Objective: To analyse the dilemmas that ‘internationalisation’ of universities and higher education pose for academic life in small countries in Europe and Asia – as yet a neglected dimension of internationalisation.
 
Doctoral project 3: Conjunction of Chinese and Western educational traditions in the design and teaching of Sino-Danish Centre courses
Part of Work Package 1: ‘Concepts and theories’
Location: Copenhagen Campus, Aarhus University, Denmark. Supervisor: Professor Susan Wright
Objective: Internationalisation strategies of many European universities in Asia favour the development of joint degrees, but how do academics create joint pedagogies that meet the expectations of governments, society, universities, professors and students?
 
Doctoral project 4: Mapping the field of higher education industries, and choosing case studies
Part of Work Package 2: ‘Trends and developments’
Location: Bristol University, UK. Supervisor: Professor Susan Robertson
Objective: To map and create regional typologies of the new field of higher education industries, and generate cases that will contribute to the development of theoretical and methodological approaches that will help us understand transformations of higher education globally.
 
Doctoral project 5: Audit culture and the Industries of ranking
Part of Work Package 2: ‘Trends and developments’
Location: Copenhagen Campus, Aarhus University, Denmark. Supervisor: Professor Susan Wright
Objective: To map the rise and analyse the dynamics of university rankings on the university sector, its governance, institutional strategies and academics’ self-management.
 
Doctoral project 6: Governance through Autonomy – A context-rich comparative study.
Part of Work Package 3: ‘Policies and practices’ Location: University of Porto, Portugal. Supervisor: António M. Magalhães
Objective: The project examines the meanings and significance of ‘autonomy’ as a central concept in new forms of university governance. The aim is to grasp how it acts simultaneously in three ways: as an instrument of state regulation; as an incentive for making universities into coherent and strategic organisations; and as mechanism for interpellating academics as appropriately ‘self-managing’ subjects.
 
Doctoral project 7: Alternative forms of university ownership, finance and organisation
Part of Work Package 3: ‘Policies and practices’
Location: Roehampton University, UK. Supervisor: Professor Rebecca Boden
Objective: To model and evaluate alternative ownership, financial and organisational forms (for instance, trusts or co-operatives) which might be adapted and adopted as models for university governance and management.
 
Doctoral project 8: Management and gender
Part of Work Package 3: ‘Policies and practices’ Location: Roehampton University, United Kingdom. Supervisor: Rebecca Boden
Objective: To explore university leadership as a complex relationship between personal biographies, institutional arrangements and policy developments, with a particular emphasis on gender diversity.
 
Doctoral project 9: Academic values between globalisation and globalism
Part of Work Package 1: ‘Concepts and theories’
Location: Ljubljana University, Slovenia. Supervisor: Professor Pavel Zgaga
Objective: There are widespread academic complaints that ‘academic values’ have become endangered but there is not much insight into the issue from a comparative perspective. The project will analyse and compare the dynamism of academic values challenged by ‘globalizing’ knowledge economies and the impact of these challenges on universities in Europe and Asia Pacific Rim.
 
Doctoral project 10: Think Tanks and Academic Entrepreneurs in the Production of Knowledge
Part of Work Package 2: ‘Trends and developments’
Location: École Normale Supérieure de Lyon, France. Supervisors: Professor Jean-Louis Derouet and Reader Romuald Normand
Objective: To analyze the relationship between think tanks and academic knowledge, the kind of knowledge they prioritize and produce, and the consequences for scientific knowledge more generally.
 
Doctoral project 11: Impact of governance changes on the educational categories and internal life of universities
Part of Work Package 3: ‘Policies and practices’
Location: University of Porto, Portugal. Supervisor: Professor António M. Magalhães
Objective: The project examines the reconfiguration of educational categories resulting from the changes to governance in higher education – an overlooked aspect of current reforms. As the Bologna Process’ rationales of reform have been implemented beyond the European region, carrying on their shoulders the governance reforms, attention must be paid to their impacts on the reconfiguration of educational categories such as ‘professor’, ‘student’, ‘teaching’, ‘learning’, class and campus – the traditional time/space of education.
 
Doctoral project 12: Models of doctoral education
Part of Work Package 1: ‘Concepts and theories’
Location: Copenhagen Campus, Aarhus University, Denmark Supervisor: Professor Susan Wright
Objective: To compare the European and USA’s flagship doctoral programme models (that is, the EU’s ‘Initial Training Network’ (ITN) and, in the USA, the National Science Foundation’s interdisciplinary, theme-driven IGERT program) and review the latest changes in Chinese doctoral education.
 
 
Individual post-doctoral projects (2 positions)
The deadline for applications is Sunday 3 February 2013 at 17:00 CET. Applications should be sent to UNIKE@au.dk
 
EU requirements

Applicants for post-doctoral positions must have been awarded a PhD degree and, from the date when they obtained a degree which entitled them to embark on a doctorate, up to the time of their recruitment to this position, must have more than four years’ but less than five years’ full-time equivalent research experience.
 
Job description
1. Undertake an independent research project, with academic supervision, including a secondment and/or research visits to associated partners, as agreed in a detailed ‘Individual scientific, training and career plan’, which is to be written within 6 months of the commencement of the appointment .
2. Complete the research project in two years.
3. Gain management experience by undertaking a UNIKE-wide role as detailed in the relevant project description (averaging one day per week).
4. Attend and participate in all the UNIKE workshops, summer/winter schools and conferences that are held during your period of employment, help organise one of these events, and give a presentation at a minimum of one of these events.
5. Contribute to the formation and activities of a work package team led by the post/doctoral researchers by participating in webinars, wikis etc (e.g. to discuss literature, interview associated partners with relevant knowledge, share research and fieldwork plans, comment on each others’ draft chapters and papers).
6. Give a paper at one international conference and submit two articles to international peer reviewed journals. Contribute to a chapter in an edited volume resulting from the UNIKE project.
7. Disseminate research to a wide academic and general public by writing in other genres, including one individually or jointly written blog, one newspaper feature article and a multimedia release; by knowledge transfer in a form suited to a secondment partner where relevant (e.g. presentation, report, press release); and by presenting research results as a Marie Curie Ambassador to another university or school or the Erasmus Mundus Students and Alumni Association.
8. Other duties as specified in the relevant project description.
 
Remuneration

A post-doctoral researcher will be an employee of their university and will be given a full-time contract for two years.
The salary for a post-doctoral researcher is set in accordance within the regulations of the Marie Curie Initial Training Network within the European Commission’s 7th Framework Programme and the labour laws of the relevant country. In addition to the salary, funds have been allocated to cover the travel, accommodation and subsistence costs of attending UNIKE workshops and summer schools, including a 2-week summer school in New Zealand; and towards the costs of secondments and research visits to Associated Partners, including in the Asia-Pacific Rim.
 
Starting date

Start dates are negotiable but the selected post-doctoral researchers must begin their contract at their university no later than the start of the academic year 2013.
 
Contacts

For enquiries about the overall UNIKE project, please contact UNIKE Administrator Astrid Cermak asce@dpu.dk or UNIKE Coordinator Professor Susan Wright suwr@dpu.dk
For enquiries about individual positions, please see the contacts given in each individual post-doctoral project description.
 
 
Post-doctoral project 1: New landscapes of publishing and knowledge dissemination
Part of Work Package 2, ‘Trends and developments’
Location: Bristol University, UK
Supervisor: Professor Susan Robertson
Objectives: To generate an account of new forms of publishing and knowledge dissemination in higher education (actors, activities, histories, interests, effects) and to examine the consequences for dissemination and impact. To help facilitate knowledge exchange within the UNIKE training network.
 
Post-doctoral project 2: Academic entrepreneurialism, civil society and democracy
Part of Work Package 2, ‘Trends and developments’
Location: Copenhagen Campus, Aarhus University, Denmark
Supervisor: Professor Susan Wright
Objectives: To identify concepts and forms of universities’ relations with ‘surrounding society’ and especially their roles in relation to civil society and democracy in contrasting countries in Europe and the Asia Pacific Rim. To explore academics’ actual interactions with ‘surrounding society’ and whether new social forms of ‘academic entrepreneurialism’ are emerging.

The full information is also available on the UNIKE website at www.unike.au.dk