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Do you have an interest in Digital Technology and its use in Business?

Research themes

The joint meeting between the Creative & Digital Economies Research Theme and the Entrepreneurship & Economic Growth Research Theme took place last week.  The small but focused group discussed strategies of moving forwards with the themes and ideas on how to bring people together.

The group decided that it need a central focus, and will use the recently signed Digital Manifesto as a way to bring people together for future meetings.  To read more about the Digital Manifesto please read Samantha Leahy-Harland’s post here (link).

For the next joint meeting brief presentations will be given to initiate a focussed action list.  So if you feel your area of research can benefit from speaking to other colleagues in areas such as social media and digital technology, and how businesses are using these emerging technologies come prepared to talk about possible collaboration projects and bids and your specific area of research.

Another link area is small local businesses, such as rural business or family run business.  Again if you feel you could benefit from shared knowledge and experience join us at our next meeting.  

It is hoped these actions can then be taken forward towards joint bids in areas such as Horizon 2020 (link), and to bring together like minded colleagues to share knowledge and experience.

If you would like to read a copy of the Digital Manifesto or want to discuss this further please get in touch via Nikki Gloyns ngloyns@bournemouth.ac.uk

The date of the next meeting is TBC likely to be in September.

Making a Contribution: REF and Buses

News from the PVC, REF Subjects

I suspect that this may win an award for the most contrived title!  Let us deal first with the issues of buses.  The reference is simply to the fact that I have not posted for a while and have more than one post to make this week!  Having dealt with the minor issue of the title we should perhaps turn to the main event, which has nothing to do with buses and everything to do with acknowledging contribution.

On Thursday of this week the REF Academic Steering Group (RASG) which I chair will meet in the presence of the Vice-Chancellor to recommend the final selection of outputs, and associated staff, across all the Units of Assessment in which we intend to make a return in REF2014.  Just to be clear our submission is made in November of this year but the results are due in December 2014 which seems a life time away just now and I can feel the wait dragging already!

The point I would like to make, however, is that the inclusion of outputs is only one way of contributing to our REF submission and all researchers at BU have, and will, help shape our submission.  Outputs account for only 65% of the overall research profile in any given Unit of Assessment (UOA), the other 35% is down to environment (15%) and impact (20%).  Unlike RAE2008, data collection for REF2014 is based on HESA codes rather than the returned FTE and, therefore, metrics which support environment – research income, doctoral completions and esteem – are based on the collective performance within a given HESA code.  To put it bluntly they are not tied to specific individuals who have outputs that are returned. This means that even if a member of staff does not have outputs selected for inclusion, they may have contributed strongly to the research environment through leadership, income generation or student supervision.  Similarly impact is based on a series of case studies, two for the first 14.99 FTE and an additional one for every subsequent 10 FTE.  Again there may be cases where some individuals have generated impact case studies but don’t have sufficient outputs at the required threshold to be returned.  In many ways these individuals have contributed more than anyone to our REF submission.

So the message is a simple one: even if your outputs are not selected for submission this week, all staff are making some form of contribution to our REF submission.  We should also not forget those that are making a contribution through their teaching enabling others to focus on research.  REF is a collective not an individual endeavor.  It is a game, and yes it is a game of high-stakes, that we must play and play well to ensure that the reputation of BU as a leading research institution is maintained, something which is a core part of our collective commitment to Fusion and BU2018.

An introvert’s perspective of the Festival of Learning

News from the PVC

When I was a postgraduate student at Edinburgh you had to do what was called colloquially as a ‘six month report’.  It was a rite of passage – a written report and a talk in front of the department – in order to be registered fully for your PhD; something like a transfer report in BU’s current system but earlier in your doctoral journey.  I had never spoken in public before apart from a few lines in various theatre productions as a kid (I was Sam as in Samneric in the Lord of the Flies once).  The rehearsal for the talk was an absolute disaster, a humiliation in front of my supervisor and friends.  My supervisor, who was Head of Department at the time and usually short on time and patience, helped me to sort a new structure and content for the talk probably to save his own embarrassment and this allowed me to ‘belt it out’ as he so eloquently put it.  So was born ‘Matthew the Performer’ something which I perfected rapidly through a series of external talks and in my early days as a lecturer.  I actually learnt to enjoy performing, could and still can, turn it on as required channelling my inner passion and enthusiasm for all things linked to research.  Presentations are now my bread and butter, but occasionally they still take their toll on a die-hard introvert, in a world of extroverts.

This was very true of my sandcastles presentation for the Festival of Learning recently; a success by most accounts, full of enthusiasm for the science of sedimentology and hopefully entertaining the audience of adults and children present.  My boys liked it so that is the feedback that matters to me most.  I passionately believe in the importance of public engagement and sandcastles provide me with an enduring vehicle to talk about geology and the amazing story of our planet!  The Festival was about public engagement and the public were engaged by all who contributed to it; amazing in fact and a testament to what we can do at BU.

The point I wish to make here however is that the cost of this piece of public theatre to me personally was huge; I didn’t quite spend the rest of the weekend in a darkened room but not far short!  I don’t mind admitting that my worst nightmare is a room full of strangers and a need to network and/or sell.  I can do it and well when needs must after years of practice, but the cost is often high.  I much prefer to talk to a few close colleagues and friends than a room of strangers.  I suspect that there are many people out there like me within BU, who crave for the solitude of the hills, a good book, a closed door and something creative to work on.  People are sometimes perplexed (and have often felt the need to comment) on the contrast between me in performance mode, or when observed talking to my close friends, and the version of me visible at other times as I walk for example across campus lost in moody thought oblivious (sorry!) to all that pass by.  So why bare my soul so publicly in this way?  Well I have just finished reading a fantastic book, which has won much praise and sold around the world entitled Quiet by Susan Cain.  It is simply fantastic and makes one proud to be an introvert in a world of extroverts!

Yawning Up-State Post-Visit Report Part 2 – Santander Travel Scholarship – Dr Simon Thompson

Awarded & submitted bids, Fusion, Post-award, REF Subjects, Research themes

Science Center, Bard College, Rhinebeck, New York State.

 

Bard College, Rhineback, New York State.

 

Circada.

 

L-R: Dr Andrew Gallup; Dr Simon Thompson.

 

Most people can relate to yawning as all of us have done this at some time, with some of us being prolific yawners. However, little is known about the reasons for us yawning or the mechanisms involved.

My work on the link between cortisol and yawning has been published and is gaining momentum in the scientific community with presentations at the First International Conference on Yawning in Paris in 2010 and a forthcoming symposium being planned by me at Bournemouth University.

My travel scholarship enabled me to visit key workers in the field in upstate New York and with affliations with Prinecton University and Bard College (see photos). This has been so successful that we envisgae research collaboration between BU and the USA. I was even able to meet with the assistant to the world famous Professor Oliver Sack’s to discuss my resaerch and to “put it on the map” in the neurological community!

A bonus of my trip was to encounter first hand an extremely rare circada that hatches in the region I visited only every 17 years! What a privilege!

I am most grateful to Santander for their generous support and I believe this trip will help me make significant steps forward in my clinical research i yanwing and multiple sclerosis at BU.

The ‘Clone Wars’: Episode 1 – The Rise of 3D Printing and the Implications for Intellectual Property

Training

Do you, or any of your colleagues / students want to find out more?

17 July 2013

Bournemouth University, Executive Business Centre, 89 Holdenhurst Road, Bournemouth BH8 8EB 

Arrival from 6pm for a 6:30pm start 

The Centre for Entrepreneurship together with the Centre for Intellectual Property Policy and Management (CIPPM) will present a series of workshops which will focus on 3D printing with particular focus on the Intellectual Property implications.  The workshops will be led by Dr. Dinusha Mendis, Co-Director of CIPPM.

This workshop will be based on Dr. Dinusha Mendis’s recently published paper on this topic and will provide an overview of the challenges to IP as a result of 3D printing. In looking to the future and in drawing parallels with the entertainment industry and the download culture, Dr. Mendis will consider whether any lessons can be learnt from the past and if so, how they can be applied to this new type of technology which will most certainly challenge IP laws.  The presentation will also suggest that rather than focusing on stringent IP laws the future lies in adopting new business models in adapting to this new technology.  In conclusion Dr. Mendis will present some thoughts for the future in taking this suggestion forward.

Workshop 2 and 3 will take place later in the year and will include a hands-on workshop with a 3D printer, and a round table discussion about the future of 3D printing. 

This is a free event for businesses, BU students, BU staff and BU Alumni. Refreshments will be provided.

To find out more or to book your place please visit http://bucfe.com/events/3d-printing-intellectual-property-law/

Research Professional

Funding opportunities

Every BU academic has a Research Professional account which delivers weekly emails detailing funding opportunities in their broad subject area. To really make the most of your Research Professional account, you should tailor it further by establishing additional alerts based on your specific area of expertise.

Research Professional have created several guides to help introduce users to ResearchProfessional. These can be downloaded here.

Quick Start Guide: Explains to users their first steps with the website, from creating an account to searching for content and setting up email alerts, all in the space of a single page.

User Guide: More detailed information covering all the key aspects of using ResearchProfessional.

Administrator Guide: A detailed description of the administrator functionality.

In addition to the above, there are a set of 2-3 minute videos online, designed to take a user through all the key features of ResearchProfessional.  To access the videos, please use the following link: http://www.youtube.com/researchprofessional

Research Professional are running a series of online training broadcasts aimed at introducing users to the basics of creating and configuring their accounts on ResearchProfessional.  They are holding monthly sessions, covering everything you need to get started with ResearchProfessional.  The broadcast sessions will run for no more than 60 minutes, with the opportunity to ask questions via text chat.  Each session will cover:

  • Self registration and logging in
  • Building searches
  • Setting personalised alerts
  • Saving and bookmarking items
  • Subscribing to news alerts
  • Configuring your personal profile

Each session will run between 10.00am and 11.00am (UK) on the fourth Tuesday of each month.  You can register here for your preferred date:

23rd July 2013: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/771246561

27th August 2013: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/398714217

24th September 2013: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/882372120

These are free and comprehensive training sessions and so this is a good opportunity to get to grips with how Research Professional can work for you.

Erasmus, Lifelong Learning Programme, Leonardo… – will they exist in Horizon 2020?

The short answer is ‘Yes’! BU holds a number of these awards and I am delighted they will be staying in Horizon 2020 with a huge budget of €19bn. To make things simpler, the EC has streamlined several programmes into one ‘Erasmus for All’ which contains three action strands.

1. Learning mobility of individuals: This is focused on Staff mobility (in particular teachers and trainers); mobility for higher education students; a Master degree scheme and volunteering and youth exchanges.  This is where Erasmus Mundus and Erasmus Staff Mobility as you know it will sit.

2. Cooperation for innovation and best practices: This focuses on strategic partnerships between youth organisations and other relevant actors; Large-scale partnerships between education and  training establishments  and business; IT-Platforms; and cooperation with third countries. Also included in here are the existing Sector Skills Alliances and Knowledge Alliances (the latter is a structured partnership between a  university and enterprise to promote an active 2 way knowledge exchange  with a focus in partnership, innovation and long term impact; an example is here).

3. Support for policy reform: This includes an open method of Coordination; valorisation and implementation of EU tools; and policy dialogue with stakeholders, third countries and international organisations.

More details on Erasmus for All will be posted as I get them and you may wish to read this leaflet produced by the EC in the meantime.

Tick tock! Tick tock! – Fusion Fund deadline today at 2pm

Funding opportunities, Fusion

A reminder that applications to the Fusion Investment Fund must be submitted via email to FusionFund@bournemouth.ac.uk  by the deadline which is 2pm TODAY! No exceptions will be made to this deadline.

Please ensure you use the correct application form when applying. They are different this year. 

This one for SMN standard, CCCP and SL: FIF Application Form 

This one for Erasmus: Erasmus Application form 

This one for Santander:  Santander application form

If you haven’t already accessed the documents you need please visit the FIF intranet pages.

The Fusion Investment Fund is managed by Samantha Leahy-Harland and is administered by Natalie Baines. Please direct all initial enquiries to Natalie Baines.

Now Available: Research Ethics e-module on myBU

Research Ethics

The research ethics e-module training course is officially launched TODAY.

Please login to myBU and click on ‘Research Ethics’ under the ‘My Communities’ tab to begin the e-module. Contact Julia Hastings Taylor with any comments/questions regarding the e-module. If ‘Research Ethics’ is not visible on your myBU homepage, contact Julia Hastings Taylor and she will add you to the participant list.

The University Research & Knowledge Exchange Committee (URKEC) recently approved the implementation plan of a mandatory research ethics e-module training course. The research ethics e-module is vital to ensure all academic staff and PGRs at BU are provided with training in research ethics. This will ensure all members of staff who conduct their own research and supervise students are proficient in basic research ethics principles.

In accordance with the recommendations from the BU Research Ethics Review, the University procured two research ethics courses (Ethics 1: Good Research Practice and Ethics 2: Working with Human Subjects). Both courses will be available on myBU.

The first course (Ethics 1: Good Research Practice) covers standard practice and recent changes in universities’ ethics policies related to research that investigates people and their data. This course will be mandatory for all academic staff and PGRs. Successful completion of the course requires a score of 8/10 on the end of course assessment.

  • All academic staff (including all BU employees who supervise students on dissertations, thesis, etc.) will be required to complete the course no later than three months after the release date (1 July 2013) and refresher training will be required every two years thereafter.
  • All new starters will be notified of the requirement to complete the course. They will also be given three months to complete the course.
  • PRGs will be required to complete the course within three months of the start of their first year. This will begin at the start of the 2013/14 academic year. For ease of access, both courses will be available on the Graduate School’s myBU page, which will be available in the coming months.

The second course (Ethics 2: Working with Human Subjects) covers the ethics of involving human participants – directly or indirectly – in research projects. This course is recommended for all academic staff and PGRs and is mandatory if the research project involves working with human participants. Successful completion of the course requires a score of 8/10 on the end of course assessment.

Several engagement initiatives with internal support opportunities will be undertaken to ensure maximum participation with the e-module. For example, Fusion Investment Fund (FIF) applicants will be required to successfully complete the e-module. Additionally, internal development schemes (Grants Academy, EU Academics Development Scheme, etc.) will require that all new members complete the e-module. Due to the potential risks if relevant staff and PGRs are not adequately trained in research ethics, several non-compliance measures will be implemented to ensure they have basic knowledge of research ethics principles and best practice. Please visit the Research Ethics page of the blog for more information on the e-module, to include detail on engagement initiatives and non-compliance measures.

Flying through Mexico – a reconnaissance tour

Fusion

 

I visited Mexico for 2 weeks earlier this month (6-20 June) to assess the potential for future research collaboration and to establish links between Bournemouth University (BU) and Mexican organisations. As I have the role of School of Applied Sciences (ApSci) Academic Lead for Students Placements, one of my objectives was to find potential hosts for our students and also opportunities for staff and student exchange. The talks I gave (5 in total!) allowed me to disseminate some of the work I do, the wider teaching and research at ApSci and to promote BU overall. After the talks there was always a good interaction with students and staff and I think there is a good chance that this was the start of long-lasting partnerships between BU and at least some of the organisations I visited:

  • Instituto de Investigaciones Oceanologicas, Universidad Autonoma de Baja California, Ensenada – researchers from other departments and also from CICESE (Center for Scientific Research and Higher Education) also attended the talk, what was very good. Many thanks to Dr Amaia Ruiz de Alegria Arzaburu for organising everything. It was great to catch up with you and hopefully we will be doing something together soon.
  • Instituto de Ingenieria, Universidad National Autonoma de Mexico, Mexico City -attendance to the talk was very good and there was also an interview and material will be added to their website, so quite good dissemination. Dr Rodolfo Silva Casarin is a star, brilliant head of a very interesting group, it was great to have met him after so many emails we have exchanged in the recent past. Many thanks!
  • CINVESTAV (Center for Research and Advanced Studies), National Polytechnic Institute, Merida – here I had a closer contact with research conducted by staff and PhD students and also with coordinators of relevant programme, including some clear demonstration of will for visiting BU and start collaboration. Thanks to Dr Ismael Marino Tapia for the invitation and for being such a great host. Very interesting research are being conducted in CINVESTAV.
  • Laboratorio de Ingeniería y Procesos Costeros, Universidad National Autonoma de Mexico, Sisal – this people are so lucky, they have brand new facilities right at the beach, beautiful settings and they are building new labs, which I’m sure will host great quality research. The talk was well attended and hopefully we will be able to keep in touch with colleagues that were very interested in staff and student exchange. Many thanks to Dr Ernesto Tonatiuh Mendoza Ponce and Dr Cecilia Enriquez for the opportunity to visit your facilities – I look forward to working with you.
  • Instituto EPOMEX (Instituto de Ecología, Pesquerías y Oceanografía del Golfo de México), Universidad Autonoma de Campeche – Thanks to Dr Gregorio Posada Vanegas for introducing the research conducted at EPOMEX and for facilitating the contact with students and other staff. The interactions  after the talk were very informative and hopefully we will continue our collaboration in the future.

This was my first time in Mexico and I had the opportunity to see a bit of very different parts of the country, talk to researchers and students and learn about their work, culture and life style. I call it a tour because in two weeks I visited Ensenada in Baja California, Mexico City and a number of locations in the Yucatan Peninsula, including Merida, Sisal, Campeche and also part of the coast of Quintana Roo. So every other day I was packing and unpacking, which was very tiring. But all worth it for the people I met and the things I learned.

Many thanks to BU’s EUADS (EU Academic Development Scheme) funds for allowing me to engage in this reconnaissance tour.

I will keep you posted of further developments from this initiative.

Fusion supports Euro PR History Network advance

Delegates to the EPRHN Planning Meeting

With financial support from the Fusion Investment Fund, the European Public Relations History Network (EPRHN) held its first planning meeting at BU on Wednesday June 26.

The network was founded virtually in 2012 by Prof Tom Watson of the Media School and drew interest from 33 academics and practitioners in 11 European countries. It was approved.as a project by EUPRERA (Europe’s PR education and research association) in autumn last year.

Its aims are to develop and produce information about the history and historiography of public relations in Europe through the identification and formation of archives, transnational research, joint research bids and the production of publications in print and online formats.

The meeting of EPRHN’s core group brought seven historical researchers from Germany, Romania, Spain, Scotland, Turkey and Bournemouth. Fusion assisted their attendance through travel bursaries.

Among the actions to be progressed are a bid to the EU’s COST (Cooperation in Science and Technology) scheme, which was facilitated on Wednesday by Paul Lynch of RKE; a second edition of its Archives Record publication; and a panel session on ‘developing the history of European public relations’ at EUPRERA’s annual conference in October.

Prof Watson, who was supported by Dr Tasos Theofilou in the organisation of the meeting, said it had been highly productive. “There’s a limit to what we can achieve by email and Skype. The EPRHN made a big forward step because FIF helped bring key members together”. It will also assist Prof Watson and Dr Theofilou to fully launch the group at the October conference.

“At present, 13 countries are represented in the network. We hope to widen that base and engage many more historical researchers in its activities”, said Prof Watson.

For more information about EPRHN and BU’s contribution to the burgeoning field of PR history, go to: http://historyofpr.com.

CEMP Conversations this week and next

PG research

An extract from this morning’s conversation is here: CEMP conversation Tom Stacey

Tom Stacey shared an article about second language acquisition and related this to his own PHD research into coding as language acquisition.

He also talked about the practice-based element of his research, of which this robot is an example.             

Next week – on Friday 5th July, at 11.30 – 12.30, in the CEMP office, our final CEMP conversation of the academic year will take place.

We’ll be discussing two related items:

(1) Marketa Zezulkova’s book chapter on a holistic approach to media literacy education:  Marketa Book Chapter

(2) Richard Wallis’s recently published article, co-authored with David Buckingham, on the construction of media literacy within the policy context of the Communications Act: European Journal of Communication-2013-Wallis-0267323113483605

It should be a cracker, and,as always, all colleagues are very welcome to join us, in the current CEMP office, for the last time!

Joint PhD studentships: an example of FUSION in practice.

Fusion, PG research

For many clinicians undertaking a PhD means choosing to either give up clinical practice for a period of time or studying on top of an already demanding full-time job. Now a partnership between the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) and Portsmouth Hospitals NHS Trust (PHT) is making it easier for midwives to undertake a doctorate while still maintaining their clinical skills. The team has developed a novel joint studentship that will allow midwives to combine clinical practice with a research role, working across BU and PHT. The studentships will run for four years and PhD students will spend two days per week working as a midwife in clinical practice and three days per week working on their thesis. This set up facilitates the co-creation of knowledge.

In addition to providing the individual midwives with excellent education, these studentships are designed to examine an area of clinical practice identified by PHT where the evidence is lacking and research is needed. As a consequence the research studies will be directly relevant to practice and will have a demonstrable impact in the future. Hence BU will be able to show that its research and education have a direct benefit to the wider society. Finally, the studentships benefit midwifery practice by building a critical mass of researchers, which will help translate research findings into practice and so create a culture of evidence-based practice.

The result is a studentship that truly fuses research, education and practice.

The CMMPH/PHT partnership has developed three matched-funded PhD studentships for midwives, which will begin in September 2013. These joint PhD studentships will be supervised by both BU academics (Sue Way, Catherine Angell, Carol Wilkins, Maggie Hutchings, Edwin van Teijlingen & Vanora Hundley) and supervisors from PHT based in practice.  We are excited about this novel approach to PhD studentships and hope that we will have many more studentships with other NHS Trusts in the future.

For further information please contact Prof. Vanora Hundley or Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen.

FIF Applicants – please use the correct form

Funding opportunities, Fusion

A quick reminder to applicants to the Fusion Investment Fund: Please can you ensure you use the correct application form when applying. They have been updated since previous rounds. 

Please use the following (as on the intranet pages):

This one for SMN standard, CCCP and SL: FIF Application Form 

This one for Erasmus: Erasmus Application form 

This one for Santander:  Santander application form

All other documents including policies and FAQs are available on the FIF intranet pages.

The Fusion Investment Fund is managed by Samantha Leahy-Harland and is administered by Natalie Baines. Please direct all initial enquiries to Natalie Baines.

Time is running out! – Deadline for applications is 2pm on Monday

Funding opportunities, Fusion

If you would like to apply to any strands of the FIF please make sure you submit your application by the deadline which is 2pm on Monday 1 July. No exceptions will be made to this deadline.

For all the updated strand policy documents, Fund FAQ’s and information about applying, please visit the FIF intranet pages.

 The Fusion Investment Fund is managed by Samantha Leahy-Harland and is administered by Natalie Baines. Please direct all initial enquiries to Natalie Baines.

Marie Curie 2014-2020: The new structure

I know many of you are preparing your Marie Curie applications for August and can’t bear to think about 2014! For those of you who are interested in making an application to the Marie Curie scheme in 2014 and beyond, an insight into how these will look will be helpful.

So far Britain has had the most success with the scheme so far receiving  almost €800m in funding covering almost 3, 000 successful applications in a range of subjects.  BU is amongst this number and we hold more than 10 Marie Curie grants.  We have seen the benefits of Marie Curie Fellowships, just as other successful award holders have; with a recent study finding that 95% of Marie Curie fellows stay in touch with their international hosts actively after 5+ years.  86% confirmed that participating in Marie Curie projects had strengthen existing collaborations with the international partner organisation, so this scheme really is a great one to be involved in.

The  good news is that the strands will pretty much exist as they are, although the overarching labels and title are changing slightly which may leave you confused! The Marie Curie Scheme will be called Marie Skłodowska- Curie Actions in 2014 and will fall under the ‘Excellent Science’ pillar of Horizon 2020; this represents a new increased focus on the excellence of the host and candidate in Marie Curie actions moving forward. The aims of the scheme will remain the same and the budget is a healthy €5.75b (2014-2020).

The COFUND and ITN schemes will remain unchanged and the other schemes will be condensed into two – Individual Fellowships and RISE.

  • The ITN scheme is dedicated to early-stage researchers and involves a wide partnership of institutions from academic and non-academic sectors. It addresses the triple ‘I’ dimension of mobility – international, innovative, interdisciplinary – and combines scientific excellence with an innovation orientated approach. It focuses on developing entrepreneurship and skills matching research and innovation labour market needs and aims to enhance the employability of researchers in their chosen career.
  • Individual Fellowships will provide opportunities’ for international and intersector mobility of researchers to facilitate career moves. It encompasses intra-European, incoming, outgoing mobility as well as re-intergration and under Horizon 2020 there will the opportunity to undertake inter-sector secondments.
  •  The Research and Innovation Staff Exchange (RISE) scheme is a new type of exchange action to stimulate knowledge transfer. The scheme will be flexible allowing European and international exchanges of highly skilled research and innovation staff based on a common research project.
  • COFUND has regional, national and international programmes designed to foster excellence by spreading best practices of Marie Curie actions in terms of international mobility, research training and career development. It will be extended to doctoral training and will build on the experience of FP7 COFUND.

When I receive more information on this scheme, I will share it but in the meantime if you have any questions on the Marie Curie scheme, do get in touch.

Papers from 19 countries at 4th PR history conference

Boston University (BU) speakers at IHPRC 2013

Aussie academics at IHPRC 2013

 

 

The fourth International History of Public Relations Conference, held at BU on June 24-25, attracted papers from 19 countries. Organised by the Institute for Media & Communication Research in The Media School, it covered topics as diverse as the Royal Family’s first PR adviser to PR in Kazakhstan, and publicity for the launch of Gone With The Wind in 1939.

Held at the Executive Business Centre, there were two strong themes: the historiography of public relations and historical aspects of the professionalisation of PR. They symbolised the conference’s development since 2010 from largely descriptive narratives to a more analytic, sometimes critical approach.

The conference welcomed the authors of five new or recent books and witnessed the launch of the first title in Routledge’s New Directions on Public Relations and Communication Research series which has been developed and edited by Dr Kevin Moloney of the Media School. The book, Public Relations and Nation Building: Influencing Israel, was written by Dr Margalit Toledano and Prof David McKie.

Prof Tom Watson gave the keynote presentation about the state of scholarship in public relations history. He called for historians to move away from “comfortable” topics to more critical investigation into the use and abuse of public relations.

The conference dinner was addressed by Bob (Robert S.) Leaf, a pioneers of international public relations in the 1960s to 1980s, when he was the international chairman of the leading public relations consultancy Burson-Marsteller. Mr Leaf recently published a memoir, The Art of Perception. Delegates also attended a “meet the editors” session which featured contributions on research and publishing by the editors of four major academic journals in the field.

Papers and presentations will be published on the conference website, http://historyofpr.com, in the late summer. Planning for the 2014 conference, which will be held at the EBC on July 2-3 next year, will start shortly.