Doctoral Research College Officer (022019-44)

Category: Admin/Clerical | Faculty/Division: Research, Innovation and Enterprise | School: Doctoral Research | Department: Doctoral Research Team | Location: City Centre Campus | Post Type: Full Time | Closing Date: 19 Feb 2019 | Birmingham City University is implementing an ambitious growth strategy across the continuum of Research, Innovation and Enterprise activities.  Delivery of our strategy ensures that new knowledge underpins our curriculum offerings to all students; powers innovative collaborations and partnerships with organisations of all types and delivers economic, cultural and societal impact regionally, nationally and globally. The research ambitions of the University can be summarised by the phrase “Better; Bigger; Broader and Bolder”, signaling our intention to further improve research quality; grow the numbers of research-engaged staff and post-graduate research students; ensure excellent research underpins our entire academic portfolio and to do more research in collaboration with end-users to drive innovation; address real-world problems and deliver tangible impacts. Post-graduate research students (PGRs) are an essential part of our research ambitions, adding new capacity to our research engine and contributing to our research ambitions, whilst studying for a research doctorate supervised by teams of faculty-based research-engaged academic staff. An integral part of our strategy has been the establishment of a cross-university Doctoral Research College (DRC) to support the development journeys of our doctoral student population from application to award. Working in partnership with Faculty-based PGR coordinators and academic staff, the DRC will coordinate and harmonise all aspects of doctoral student provision, to ensure our PGRs receive a high-quality experience and are equipped with a range of transferrable skills for their subsequent professional lives. We have ambitions to grow significantly our doctoral student population and to manage actively and accelerate progress of PGRs to achieve award within 4 years of full-time study. The Doctoral Research College team is led by the DRC Manager and comprises a distributed team of cross-faculty and faculty-embedded Doctoral Research College Officers and Programme Administrators (DRC) who work in partnership with academic staff to support all aspects of PGR life and administer the systems and processes that underpin doctoral studies. The Doctoral Research College Officer is a primary point of contact for the administration of all aspects of the PGR life-cycle from admission to award and undertake a broad range of support activities including: Work in partnership with Faculty-based academic and research staff to maximise the quality of service to, and the student experience of, PGRs studying for the doctoral qualification, as well as to support the research development activities for PGRs/researchers. Provide PGRs with a friendly, knowledgeable and helpful primary point of contact for all administrative matters relating to their doctoral studies. Ensure that operations and activities relating to PGR students comply with University academic regulations, policies and procedures and relevant external regulations and best-practice. Provide professional and effective secretarial support for the Faculty Research Degrees and Environment Committee and ensure all committee records are maintained accurately and up-to-date. Implement and maintain effective systems and processes, including the use of SITS, to collate and report on all data relating to doctoral student studies, progression and awards. You should be educated to first degree level (or equivalent combination of professional qualifications, skills and experience) and have experience of student administration in the UK higher education sector, ideally with PGRs, and be comfortable working in a matrix management structure.  If you are committed to delivering a high quality service to support PGR students from application to award and feel you could contribute to the development of a high quality Doctoral Research College, we would like to hear from you. Please apply with a CV and covering letter through the BCU Jobs website, explaining clearly how your skills and experience match the requirements of the role and how you could contribute personally to the success of the Doctoral Research College and the wider success of the Research, Innovation and Enterprise Team. We look forward to hearing from you. Birmingham City University offers excellent benefits which include up to 32 days annual holiday.