April 2, 2015

Latest Funding Opportunities

BU research, Funding opportunities Alice Brown

The following funding opportunities have been announced. Please follow the links for more information:

Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council

Training & Skills Hubs

Quantum technologies are those that enable the creation, control and manipulation of sensitive and fragile quantum effects within single systems. Training and Skills Hubs will act as nodes within the national network of Quantum Technology Hubs, whose aim is to harness and exploit the research and training strengths that exist across the UK academic landscape, facilitate partnering with industry, and tackle the key technological challenges that need to be overcome to realise the promise of quantum technologies.

Award amount max: £15 million to support 3 – 5 Hubs for 5 years
Closing date: 2/06/2015

Royal Society

International Scientific Seminars

This scheme is for Royal Society Research Fellows who want to organise a small two-day scientific seminar at the Royal Society at Chicheley Hall.

Award amount max: £5000 for travel plus costs for up to 20 delegates
Closing date: 4/06/2015

Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council

Quantum Technologies Strategic Capital Investment Call

Funding is available for individual or consortia of institutions that demonstrate how their proposal will augment existing capabilities in the UK and that bring together a suitable support package that enhances this capital funding and enables delivery of new capabilities for the national network.

Proposals should clearly articulate the industrial contribution and leverage supporting this investment and how the investment would strengthen industrial engagement

Award amount max: Up to £25 million in total
Closing date: 2/06/2015

Innovate UK

Spearheading future electric vehicle battery production

Innovate UK and the Office for low emission Vehicles (OleV) are to invest up to £10 million in a single consortium to develop a pilot line to understand how to produce high-voltage electric vehicle batteries at a rate that can later be scaled up for commercial production.

Award amount max: Up to £10 million
Closing date: 3/06/2015

Biotechnology & Biological Sciences Research Council

Future Leader Fellowship

The Future Leader Fellowship (FLF) will provide support for researchers wishing to undertake independent research and gain leadership skills. The FLF will support the transition of early stage researchers to fully independent research leaders. As such FLFs represent part of our commitment to the supply of highly skilled professional scientists to the UK.

Award amount max: Unspecified
Closing date: 4/06/2015

Economic & Social Research Council

Training Bursaries

The ESRC wishes to improve the standards of research methods and to stimulate the uptake of high quality training courses in research methods across the UK social science community.

Each year there are bursaries for up to £1,000 each to enable staff in the UK social science community engaged in research, teaching research methods or supervising research to update their research skills. Contract researchers working in HEIs are also eligible for the bursaries.

Award amount max: £1000
Closing date: 15/4/2015

Innovate UK

Game-changing technologies for aerospace – collaborative R&D

Innovate UK is to invest up to £10 million in collaborative research and development and feasibility studies to accelerate the commercialisation of highly innovative technologies for civil aerospace

Award amount max: Up to £10 million
Closing date: 9/09/2015

Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council

Living with Environmental Change Challenge Fellowships

EPSRC’s Living With Environmental Change theme is keen to support the next generation of leaders in adapting to and mitigating climate change. This is a strategic activity focusing on a key challenge within the EPSRC LWEC theme and on bringing new thinking into the area.

The research required to answer this challenge requires a broad based, problem-directed and multidisciplinary approach. Applicants can come from any discipline area but we will not fund fellowships across councils therefore the balance of the research described in the application should be within the remit of EPSRC.

Award amount max: Unspecified
Closing date: 10/06/2015

Please note that some funders specify a time for submission as well as a date. Please confirm this with your RKEO Funding Development Officer

You can set up your own personalised alerts on Research Professional. If you need help setting these up, just ask your School’s/Faculty’s Funding Development Officer in RKEO or view the recent blog post here.

If thinking of applying, why not add notification of your interest on Research Professional’s record of the bid so that BU colleagues can see your intention to bid and contact you to collaborate.

April 2, 2015

Publishing an academic book in a low-income country

Featured academics, Global engagement, Publishing, Uncategorized Edwin van Teijlingen

Earlier this year our book ‘The Dynamics of Health in Nepal’ was published by Himal Books for Social Science Baha in Kathmandu.¹It is an edited collection covering a range of current health topics in Nepal, including issues such as maternal health, HIV/AIDS, sexual health, road traffic accidents, non-communicable diseases and the role of the media and migration.

One of us had published several books, with for example international publishers such as Elsevier, Routledge (part of Taylor Francis) and Oxford University Press.^2-4All editors authors are UK PhD graduates from the universities of Aberdeen (van Teijlingen), Southampton (Simkhada) and Sheffield (Wasti) respectively. All three of us were based in the UK at the time of conception of the book. Padam Simkhada was Senior Lecturer in International Health at the University of Sheffield, Edwin van Teijlingen still is professor at Bournemouth University and Sharada Prasad Wasti was a PhD student at ScHARR (University of Sheffield). So it made sense to talk to publishers in the UK, which is what we did. However, it rapidly became clear that we could get a deal for an expensive hardback book, a book which would sell way above what the average academic in Nepal could afford. After some soul searching we decided to look into getting the book published in Nepal.

One of the advantages of publishing Nepal is the same most outsourcing to low income-countries, namely it keeps the production costs down. Rather than increasing our profit margins by keeping the low production costs, as it the typical case in the global market, we used this to keep the retail price low. The book retails for 800NR (about £5.50) in Nepal which means it is affordable to academics and postgraduate students in Nepal. Similar books from international publishers sell for at least £20!

We had some trepidation about the potentially quality of the book before we signed the contract with Social Science Baha. These low expectations were based on the quality of printed text books we had seen for sale on small stalls outside the Kittipur Campus of Tribhuvan University. One of these shoddy looking books was based on lecturers given by our Nepalese colleague Prof. Dr. Bhimsen Devkota. When we passed one of these stalls many years ago he pointed at a particular book and said: “See that book, a student who had attended my lectures two years in a row, copied all I said, and the materials I handed out, all of it word for word. That student then got it published as a book.”

However, our expectations were wrong. From the outset the publishing process was impressive. Social Science Baha employed a very professional proof-reader/copy-editor who picked up a lot of minor style and language issues even after we had most of the chapters professionally proof-read in the UK. The classic example of the thoroughness of his checking was the name of one for the chapter contributors ‘Sally Woodes Rogers’, he came back to us and said, “But her name on the web pages of the University of Aberdeen is ‘Sarah’ not ‘Sally’, are you sure?” At which point we had to assure him that ‘Sarah’ was her correct birth name but that she wanted herself to be known as ‘Sally’.

The final version of our book looks very good. The cover is beautifully printed; the font, chapter lay-out and overall style are of a very high quality. Our book has the feel of a typical academic book published in Europe or North America. There is really nothing about it that says this book is published in a low-income country.

The book has been well received at its launch in Kathmandu in January 2015. The first published book review was also very complementary.⁵ Last but not least, having produced a great looking book, for us the final feel-good factor is that we agreed to donate all profits from the sale of the book to the charity Green Tara Nepal.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

Prof. Padam Simkhada

Dr. Sharada P. Wasti

References:

Wasti, S.P., Simkhada, P.P., van Teijlingen, E.(eds.) (2015)The Dynamics of Health in Nepal,Kathmandu, Nepal: Social Science Baha&Himal Books
DeVries, R., Benoit, C., Teijlingen van, E., Wrede, S. (eds.) (2001) Birth by Design: Pregnancy, Midwifery Care and Midwifery in North America and Europe,New York: Routledge.
Taylor R., Smith, B.,Teijlingen van, E. (eds.) (2003) Health & Illness in the Community: an Oxford Core Text, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Alder, B. Abraham, C., van Teijlingen, E., Porter, M. (eds.) (2009) Psychology & Sociology Applied to Medicine: An Illustrated Colour Text (third edn), Edinburgh: Elsevier Science.
Pradhan S. (2015) Book review The Dynamics of Health in Nepal, Public Health Perspective 5(2) on line journal: http://www.phpnepal.org/index.php?listId=943

March 30, 2015

BUDI Orchestra March Performance

BU research, Public engagement, Uncategorized lreynolds

On Friday 27^th March, the BUDI Orchestra gave a lively performance in the Atrium, Talbot Campus, performing well-known songs and pieces for our enjoyment. We were pleased to see so many staff and students stop to appreciate the Orchestra’s talents, some even singing and dancing along with the musicians.

The performance gave the BUDI Orchestra the opportunity to demonstrate all they have achieved in the last eight weeks as part of a wider project funded by Dorset County Council’s Inspired by 2012 Health and Wellbeing Legacy Fund. We were fortunate that a representative from the Fund could join us for the performance, allowing him to see first-hand what the support of the Dorset Legacy Fund has meant to this inspiring group of individuals, their families and even to the BUDI team.

On a personal note, as a Research Assistant who has worked closely on this project since October (and previous versions since February 2014), I have been struggling to put what I felt during their performance into words… something more than pride, more than happiness for their achievements, and more than the bittersweet knowledge that this may be their last performance due to lack of continuous funding. These are people that have come together and formed their own social community, not through the project per se, but through the bonds they have made with other people in a similar situation to their own, sharing their experiences as they learn to make music together. They, like us, have passion for their work and for the people they have met along the way, as anyone lucky enough to watch the performance would have witnessed. It has been an incredible privilege to be part of that.

Thank you to everyone that took the time to attend and celebrate this extraordinary group of people.

March 26, 2015

Is this a 3 star Shed?

BU research, Public engagement, REF Subjects afeigenbaum

Understanding REF

On Thursday March 26th, a dozen colleagues from around BU participated in a seminar on REF and Impact Monitoring in the Social Sciences. The Impact session organised by Professor Ann Brooks from HSC was led by Sociology Professor John Scott, an active academic citizen and prolific writer, often at the cutting edge of his field. Professor Scott has served on the Sociology RAE/REF panel for the past 15 years of exercises, as well as overseeing a submission for Plymouth University.

Professor Scott started the seminar with a brief history of the development of research assessment, setting the exercise in the context of our ‘audit culture’ of regulation in academia. As the REF changed once more for the 2014 cycle, the big question we now face is: how will the ‘impact agenda’ influence and shape research practice?

Speaking of the challenges of creating REF input plans, Scott discussed the personal cost that comes with making strategic decision of who should be included in what subject area. People doing very strong research can end up excluded from a submission because they are not a good fit with the university’s strategy for putting units together. Taking seriously the effects of this interpersonal dimension of REF planning should be incorporated throughout the process.

Scott summarised the profiling system used in REF 2014 that is likely to run again for REF 2020. Panels judge Outputs (65%), Environment (15%) and Impact (20%). He explained that the process works similar to exam second marking. After rating a sample of submissions from across these profile elements, panel members met to look for patterns and reach consensus on the reasoning behind allocating 3* and 4* marks. This was done across subject areas, for example, trying to compare an architect’s built shed and a medical researcher’s new diagnostic system.

Scott reinforced that citation indexes were not the driving factor in rankings. While citation indexes might be discussed as evidence, there is a clear understanding now with HEFCE that high citations can be because a paper is great—or terrible.

Impact in REF 2014

With the new impact component for REF 2014, universities submitted one case study for every 8 academics, with a minimum of 2 case studies needed for any submission unit. Alongside the Case Study comes an Impact Statement on strategy and approach to impact, which is equally assessed. Tracing some of the history of the rise of the impact agenda, Scott noted the role government expectations played and the fuzziness of the definition of impact.

As this was people’s first go at writing impact statements, universities took very different approaches. The retrospective collection of evidence often led to an ‘impact as add-on’ and the top-down approach to grouping together impact case studies. With more planning time for REF 2020, it is important to take a more systematic and dynamic approach to grouping case studies.

Scott emphasised that economic impact is only one aspect of impact. Cultural and Societal value does not need to be measured in financial terms. Panels in the Social Sciences and Humanities understand that impact has different definitions and overlaps between spheres. He highlighted that impact can be on the local, regional, national or international level.

For REF 2014, people tended to play it safe, going for the most obvious and easy to measure kinds of impact. It was difficult to find a balance between offering guidance and keeping things open so people did not feel constrained. Offering the example of a case study on conversation analysis, Scott discussed how researchers’ documented the ways their work was taken up by people working with pension claimants to improve relationships and workplace effectiveness.

Scott described how impact is assessed in terms of reach and significance. ‘Reach’ is not a reference to geographical scope, but how many people in a given area of impact you reach. For significance the assessment is for ‘how much’ something changed—a policy, a practice, a mode of delivery — but this is still a qualitative judgement.

Demonstrating Impact

In the second half of the seminar we moved to discuss methods of collecting and demonstrating impact in our research. Scott opened the conversation with another exam metaphor—panel members can only assess what is on the page.

Unlike outputs that you can carry across institutions, impact case studies must be for research undertaken in your submitting institution. While this can be hard for researchers changing home universities, for universities it means that, in principle, impact for former, retired or deceased colleagues can be counted. This was a big issue in REF 2014 and may arise in the consultations for REF 2020.

For REF 2020 it is likely that Jan 1st 2000 will be the start date of the research period, with impact demonstration assessed from January 1st 2014. This means that for the next REF esearch we have already conducted may be evaluated for impact, though there is room to include ‘emerging impact’ for later research.

Scott emphasised the need to have mechanisms in place for collecting evidence of impact. For REF 2014, researchers largely collected this on their own, but for REF 2020, it is important that institutions support this process, in addition to it being built into the research project.

In assessing impact, REF panels are looking for three key aspects:

Quality underpinning research: the 2* threshold
Significance and reach of impact: the evidence
Compelling narrative linking research

The different time frames for outputs and impact means that the (1) underpinning research being evaluated is often not the same as your research outputs. In relation to what ‘counts’ as underpinning research we discussed nontraditional research from both ends of the spectrum—research done under commercial or government secrecy agreements, and research done in entirely open access and digital forums. For REF 2014 these cases were dealt with on an ad-hoc problem-solving basis. For REF 2020, if people become more adventurous in their submissions, more dynamic modes of assessing impact will be needed.

For all submissions, Scott noted the importance of disentangling research processes from research impact. For researchers engaged in participatory and action research methods, this means explicitly linking the background academic context and theoretical basis of your research, separately from the purely applied aspects. It becomes very important to demonstrate both how your new academic research is innovative and how you evaluated its impact (i.e. carrying out an impact assessment within your own project).

In relation to (2) Scott discussed the ways you can use either qualitative or quantitative forms of evidencing impact—anything from press reports and media coverage, to a survey carried out independently, to letters of support from policymakers or industry. You can also track feedback and comments you have gotten from readers, as well as hits on your website. These are a starting place for evidencing impact and the kinds of things that institutional support will be helpful for.

This is also where (3) narrative is so important. With impact, you are telling a story that goes from the academic context of your research through to the demonstrable effects your research has had beyond academia.

Key Questions the REF 2014 panels asked about impact were:

What was the research activity: a person, a project, or a programme?
Was research actually carried out at the university?
Was the research carried out within the time period allowed?
Did the impact occur within the time period allied?
Did the research actually contribute to the impact?
Is there supporting evidence for the impact?

While research outputs in the Social Sciences and Humanities are often ‘owned’ by an individual or small groups of co-authors, impact can be linked to broader programmes and groups. Your impact narrative should connect your contribution to a larger project or programme’s impact.

For REF 2014, impact strategies were sometimes weak or poorly demonstrated. There were also challenges tying impact statements to institutional support mechanisms. The panel was looking for narratives—stories that demonstrated how support mechanisms supported impact, and how those mechanisms could be built upon in the future.

REF 2020 – Going Forward

For the next REF, HEFCE is looking into refining impact assessment. This includes their analysis of measurement tools, expansion of impact criteria, and reflection on how to best operationalise these.
As universities devise institutional support mechanisms for collecting evidence of impact, here are some practical things you can do:

Look for reviews that make reference to your research
Track website visits, press appearances, public forms of citations
Keep a folder of emails you receive from outside academia mentioning how your work is being taken up
Make sure to devise mechanisms for tracking impact into your research projects from the start (surveys, feedback)

Returning to strategy to finish off the session, Professor Scott reminded us that not everyone has to be putting out 4* outputs and 4* impact case studies! When organising for REF 2020 it will be important to embrace and support the diversity of our colleagues’ strengths.

FOR MORE ON REF REFLECTIONS & HEFCE READ: http://blogs.bournemouth.ac.uk/research/2015/03/26/ref-update-hefces-reflections-event-25-march-2015/

March 25, 2015

PR History conference abstracts online

BU research, Global engagement, Research news, Uncategorized Tom Watson

The 46 abstracts of papers chosen for presentation at the International History of Public Relations Conference 2015 are now available online at: https://microsites.bournemouth.ac.uk/historyofpr/files/2010/11/IHPRC-2105-Abstracts.pdf

This is the largest selection of papers chosen for IHPRC since it started in 2010 and, says IHPRC Chair Professor Tom Watson, “it is indicative of the increasing quality of research and scholarship from around the world in the field of public relations history.”

Authors come from 21 countries and include first-time contributions from Mauritius, Norway, Portugal and Switzerland. The largest group of papers is from the U.S. (10), followed by UK (8), Germany (4) and Turkey (4).

The conference will be held in the EBC on 8-9 July this year. Registration is at: https://microsites.bournemouth.ac.uk/historyofpr/registration/

March 25, 2015

14:Live with Professor Matthew Bennett

BU research, Public engagement ssquelch

Hello!

Thank you to everyone who attended 14:Live on the 24th March, it was an extremely fascinating half an hour with Professor Matthew Bennett.

Matthew Bennett, Professor Of Environmental And Geographical Sciences, gave us all a very interesting insight into some of his and his teams work into there travels pursuing footprints in the landscape throughout Africa, Europe and Central America. In this talk he shared some of his field experiences from the discovery of the Ileret footprints in 2009, to his work in Namibia on tiny children’s tracks.

For those of you who turned up to this talk and those interested in Aprils run, the date of the next 14:Live is still to be confirmed. So look out on the Research Blog and the student portal events page for updates on the talk, we look forward to seeing you all in April were there will again be 30 x tokens for a FREE Papa Johns pizza!

Would being a speaker at 14:Live interest you? or do you just want to find out more about student engagement with research events, if so, please feel free to contact ssquelch@bournemouth.ac.uk

March 19, 2015

Policy brief on Obesity

Knowledge Transfer, Public engagement, Publishing, Research news, Uncategorized Edwin van Teijlingen

Today my colleagues at the University of Aberdeen’s Health Economics Research Unit (HERU) published their latest HERU Policy Brief on ‘Gaining pounds by losing pounds: research finds financial incentives could help reduce obesity’. The policy brief is now available on line. These policy briefs are concise summaries of the findings of research projects, presented with a focus on policy implications. Linking research findings to possible policy improvements increase the chance that our research has an impact on the wider society. Furthermore, that our research has an impact in REF terms.

This latest policy brief ‘Gaining pounds by losing pounds: research finds financial incentives could help reduce obesity’ is part of a larger project called PROGRESS (Prevent Obesity GRowing Economic Synthesis Study), funded by the National Preventative Research Initiative (NPRI) and the Universities of Aberdeen and Melbourne. The project started when I was still at the University of Aberdeen, before I came down to Bournemouth more than five years ago now. Our research highlights that despite evidence that dietary interventions are the most effective way to lose weight, respondents preferred lifestyle interventions involving physical activity. Also that behaviour-change support improves effectiveness of interventions, but its value to participants was limited. A general preference to maintain current lifestyles, together with the sensitivity of take-up to financial costs, suggests financial incentives could be used to help maximise up-take of healthy lifestyle interventions. Finally, men required more compensation to take up healthier lifestyles.

Full details on methods and results are available in the health economics paper due to be published later this year, currently ‘published ahead of print’ (Ryan et al. 2014).

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

Faculty of Health & Social Sciences

Reference:

Ryan, M., Yi, D., Avenell, A., Douglas, F., Aucott, L., van Teijlingen, E. & Vale, L. (2014) Gaining pounds by losing pounds: preferences for lifestyle interventions to reduce obesity, Health Economics, Policy & Law, [Epub ahead of print] doi: 10.1017/s1744133114000413.

March 18, 2015

MIDWIFERY: Top five most down-loaded articles for 2014

BU research, Publishing, Research news, Uncategorized Edwin van Teijlingen

Today academic publisher Elsevier sent round an email with the top five most downloaded articles from the international journal Midwifery.

We were pleased to see that the fifth paper on that list is a BU paper jointly written with Dr. Helen Bryers, Consultant Midwife in Scotland.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

March 17, 2015

Contingencies sound art exhibition

BU research, Public engagement tdavis

There is still a chance to experience a number of works as part of the

Contingencies Sound Art Exhibition

The current work (16 – 20 March) is by Antonio Della Marina

Della Marina’s music puts sound in pole position, even going as far as to claim that it is more important than the artist himself. With an extremely reduced set of initial parameters, he realises intense sets, quietly spectacular landscapes of sweet hummings, changing in frequency, sequence, pitch and colour, forming little melodies as well as emotive harmonic clusters.

Further details here

Contingencies is an exhibition, talk and concert series featuring sound art, music and technology. It is a collaboration between the Emerge Research Group, Creative Technology Research Group and the Co-Lab.

Curated by Tom Davis, Ambrose Seddon and Bill Thompson

March 11, 2015

What do Wikileaks, MPs’ Expenses Scandals and Drone Strikes in Afghanistan have in common?

Fusion, Knowledge Exchange, Research news afeigenbaum

Data.

Big data, small data, everyday data. New technologies have reshaped what we know and how we find out about world events, conflicts and scandals. The collection, the aggregation, and later the manipulation and visualisation of open and shared datasets are now essential across many fields of research and public communication.

Next week at Bournemouth University we are hosting the first of three Fusion funded co-creation Datalabs. Datalabs are participatory workshops designed to enhance and share skills around working with data for civic and humanitarian research and public engagement. Datalabs involve students and staff from across BU’s faculties, as well as participating NGOs, journalists and digital designers.

Our first Datalab on Scraping and Cleaning combines a Masterclass and workshop to introduce participants to tools and techniques for scraping data from the web. We will go over how you format and organise data in spreadsheets. Discussing basic methods for data storytelling, the workshop will provide training in how to find data stories within datasets. We will also introduce geo-coding, making data ready for mapping.

To register to attend March 16th and March 17th Datalbs, email afeigenbaum@bournemouth.ac.uk

For more information on the project and future sessions see: http://www.civicmedia.io/datalabs/

To get the most out of the day we ask that you arrive promptly for the slotted programme sessions.

March 11, 2015

14:Live with Professor Matthew Bennett

BU research, Public engagement ssquelch

Hello!

14:Live will be returning on Tuesday 24^th March 14:00-14:45 at the same location, Poole House Refectory, next to papa johns. This is open to all staff and students and I am pleased to welcome Professor Matthew Bennett, Professor Of Environmental And Geographical Sciences.

Title of talk,

Walking the Landscape: Footprints, Human Evolution and Forensic Science

Matthew has spent several years pursuing footprints in the landscape throughout Africa, Europe and Central America. In this talk he shares some of his field experiences from the discovery of the Ileret footprints in 2009, to his work in Namibia on tiny children’s tracks. He will show how this work has been transformed by digital technology and is being translated into practical tools applicable in forensic science. In time, he hopes that these tools will be adopted by law enforcement agencies both in the UK and overseas leading to improved criminal intelligence gathering.

Matthew will also talk about the launch of a new BU Institute – Institute for Studies in Landscape and Human Evolution (ISLHE) –, it’s research agenda and how staff and students can get involved. The evolution of our own species in parts of East Africa occurred with a backdrop of profound climate change. The prevailing idea is that our family tree with its many false branches and extinctions was determined at least in part by these climatic changes. But East Africa is a landscape of tectonics and volcanism; a dynamic landscape of change which may filter the impact of climate. Matthew and his colleagues in ISLHE, particularly Dr Sally Reynolds who joined BU last summer, are re-framing questions about our evolution and placing them a landscape-orientated rather than climate perspective. Come and join him for this informal presentation to find out more about his own research journey and that of ISLHE.

It would be great to see you all there to listen to what’s going to be a very interesting talk about Professor Matthew Bennetts study, and just to give you that little bit more incentive to come along, there will be 30 x tokens for the first 30 audience members to be exchanged for a FREE individual Papa Johns Pizza at the end of the talk, plus lots of free tea & coffee, water & juices, dont miss out!

If you have any questions about this event or would like to hear about any other upcoming student engagement with research events, contact me on ssquelch@bournemouth.ac.uk

I look forward to seeing you there!

March 6, 2015

Two new CMMPH publications this week!

BU research, Publishing, Research news, Uncategorized Edwin van Teijlingen

BU Senior Lecturer in Midwifery Dr. Jenny Hall published her interesting piece on Nursing Times.net under the title ‘Time-wasters in A&E: time to shake the label’. Jenny uses quite a sociological argument highlighting that “However, labels such as time waster are unhelpful and inappropriate. Instead we have a duty to provide a service that is caring, compassionate and welcoming – no matter the pressures. “

The second CMMPH paper this week is by Professor Emeritus Paul Lewis and BU Visiting Faculty Jillian Ireland in collaboration with Poole Hospital NHS Foundation Trust midwife Danielle Freemantle. Their paper ‘The loss of midwifery supervision: to mourn or rejoice?’ in the March edition of The Practising Midwife reflects on and discusses some of the possible consequences of the NMC’s decision to end statutory supervision of midwives in the UK.

Congratulations to all!

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH)

Faculty of Health & Social Sciences

March 2, 2015

Student-midwife-run postnatal clinic: FUSION example

BU research, Fusion, PG research, Publishing, Uncategorized Edwin van Teijlingen

FHSS staff and students published their latest article ‘Would a student midwife run postnatal clinic make a valuable addition to midwifery education in the UK? — A systematic review’ now out on line in Nurse Education Today 35 : 480-486. The paper is written by Wendy Marsh, Dana M. Colbourne, Susan Way & Vanora Hundley.

We are pleased to inform you that the final version of your article with full bibliographic details is now available online. The publishers are providing the following personal article link, which will provide free access to this article, and is valid for 50 days, until April 17, 2015: http://authors.elsevier.com/a/1QcG5xHa50bEa

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

March 2, 2015

BU Undergraduate Research featured in Houses of Parliament

BU research, Featured academics, Fusion, Public engagement, student research mgouthro

BU was well represented at BCUR’s Posters in Parliament Event in February. Karolina Tamauskaite of the Faculty of Management and Susan Girvan of the Faculty of Science and Technology presented their undergraduate research.

Sponsored by the University of Central Lancashire (UCLan), the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) and the Higher Education Academy (HEA), undergraduate students from 24 universities visited Westminster to unveil research findings from a wide range of fascinating subject areas. Among them uni’s included: London School of Economics, London Metropolitan University, Universities of: Aberdeen, Nottingham, Leeds, Reading, Sussex and Exeter. Research topics ranged from cyber-bullying, medicinal properties in wheatgrass juice, climate models, and deprivation in mixed communities, etc.

Susan Girvan is studying a BSc (Hons) in Biological Sciences said “… it was great to meet other undergraduate students from from universities across the country about their research and to see such a wide range of subject matter being represented. Everyone at the event was really approachable and friendly and feedback on my own research was always encouragingly positive”. Susan’s dissertation supervisor Kevin McGhee, Senior Lecturer in Health Sciences was also on hand. Kevin notes that Susan was quizzed by 3 of the Posters in Parliament eminent judges, chaired by Sir Anthony Cleaver, on her research that is funded in part by the BU alumni fund, working with NUI Galway and within a larger international Fusion Project. Her poster on one specific gene, showed the methods employed by geneticists to identify how genes work together to make someone susceptible to schizophrenia.

Susan Girvan and Dr Kevin McGhee take questions from judging panel

Presenting these results at Parliament definitely has an impact nationally, as many MPs also attended the event.

For final year International Hospitality Management student Karolina Tarnauskaite from the Faculty of Management, “Posters in Parliament was a perfect external platform and opportunity for me to present my research, to the public. It was a great and very successful event as I had an opportunity not only to present the hospitality sector issues that I have interest in, but I had an opportunity to have an informed discussion with people from a variety of different backgrounds and disciplines”.

Karolina Tarnauskaite from the Faculty of Management presents her research on the adoption of tapas concept in other cuisines in the hospitality sector

The judging panel was led by UCLan Honorary Fellow Sir Anthony Cleaver, Chairman of the Natural Environment Research Council, and Professor Mick Healey, a leading expert of undergraduate research, and Professor Philippa Levy, Deputy CEO of the Higher Education Academy.

Deputy Vice Chancellor, Tim McIntyre-Bhatty was equally pleased to have BU’s presence in Parliament “It’s great for the students and staff involved, and for BU. Excellent to see all involved in such a high profile event and in good company”.

The event gives BU and other UK universities a stage to present high quality work being produced by undergraduates and also demonstrated how research-informed teaching can enhance the overall student experience. It also is a platform to promote student and staff collaboration on research outputs and publications, with links to BU Fusion.

BU’s presence is precursor to its involvement in the national BCUR (British Conference in Undergraduate Research) taking place at the University of Winchester in April, but also for BU’s inaugural SURE (Showcasing Undergraduate Research) conference being held on March 4^th. SURE is the product of a successful fusion bid and first showcase of its kind at BU where undergrad research and coursework is profiled and promoted to internal and external audiences.

BCUR has made a significant contribution to the success of undergraduate research and continues its work to promote it in all disciplines by providing students with an opportunity to share their research through poster presentations, spoken papers, or through creative outputs such as performances and film.

UCLan’s Professor Stuart Hampton-Reeves, Chair of the BCUR Steering Group, said: “This is our third Posters in Parliament and the event is clearly going from strength to strength demonstrating the vitality and quality of undergraduate research. MPs and other policy-makers have today had the opportunity to see the next generation of academics performing at a level that is already of an international standard.

Posters in Parliament in Jubilee Room - February 2015

“It shows that UK higher education is in good health. ‎We need to continue to protect and nurture our undergraduate research base. By providing more opportunities for our young researchers to develop through inquiry, ‎we can help them grow as academics to confront some challenging topics. The range of issues discussed here today shows that this generation of students is already making a real and valuable contribution to understanding the world around us.”

February 28, 2015

Two BU authored chapters in new book on childbirth

BU research, Featured academics, Publishing, student research, Uncategorized Edwin van Teijlingen

BU Ph.D. student and Consultant Midwife Kathryn Gutteridge and Hannah Dahlen Associate Professor of Midwifery at the University of Western Sydney contributed a chapter to the book ‘The Roar behind the Silence: Why kindness, compassion and respect matter in maternity care’. Kathryn Gutteridge and Hannah Dahlen wrote under the title ‘Stop the fear and embrace birth’. BU’s Dr. Jenny Hall also wrote a chapter called ‘Spirituality, compassion and maternity care’.

The volume edited by Sheena Byrom and Soo Downe was published this week by Pinter & Martin (London). I received my copy of the book yesterday, but didn’t have a chance to look at it until today. The Roar Behind the Silence is both a practical and inspirational book, which likely to be of interest to people working in maternity care (midwives, doctors, managers), local and regional maternity-care policy-makers as well as politicians and funders and, of course, to many pregnant women and maternity-care pressure groups. The book highlights examples of good practice, and offers practical tools for making change happen, advice on how to use evidence and real-life stories.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

February 26, 2015

Latest Major Funding Opportunities

BU research, Funding opportunities, Research news Alice Brown

Latest Major Funding Opportunities

The following funding opportunities have been announced. Please follow the links for more information:

BBSRC Enterprise Fellowships – Royal Society of Edinburgh, UK

The Enterprise Fellowships are designed to enable an individual to advance the commercialisation of existing research results or technological developments and are tenable for a period of one year. The Fellowships enable the holder to concentrate on developing the commercial potential of their research, whilst also receiving formal training in relevant business skills.

Award max: Unspecified
Closing date: 27/04/2015

Industry Fellowships – Royal Society, UK

This scheme is for academic scientists who want to work on a collaborative project with industry and for scientists in industry who want to work on a collaborative project with an academic organisation.

The scheme provides a basic salary for the researcher and a contribution towards research costs.

Award max: Basic salary & research expenses up to £2000/year
Closing Date: 26/03/2015

Biotechnology Young Entrepreneurs Scheme – BBSRC

Participants enter as teams and develop a business plan for a company based on a hypothetical but plausible idea based on real markets over the course of a three day residential workshop. The workshop encompasses presentations and mentoring sessions from leading figures in industry and culminates in the presentation of the business plans to a panel of ‘equity investors’ drawn from industry and academia. Up to three teams for each workshop are selected to progress to the final in London.

Award max: Prize fund of £5000, including first prize of £2,500, trip to USA, invite to BIA Gala Dinner
Closing Date: 29/05/2015

Brian Mercer Award for Innovation – Royal Society

This scheme is for scientists who wish to develop an already proven concept or prototype into a near-market product ready for commercial exploitation. The scheme covers natural sciences, excluding medical devices.

Award max: £250,000
Closing date: 23/04/2015

Please note that some funding bodies specify a time for submission as well as a date. Please confirm this with your RKEO Funding Development Officer

You can set up your own personalised alerts on Research Professional. If you need help setting these up, just ask your School’s/Faculty’s Funding Development Officer in RKEO or view the recent blog post here.

If thinking of applying, why not add notification of your interest on Research Professional’s record of the bid so that BU colleagues can see your intention to bid and contact you to collaborate.

February 25, 2015

Working towards research impact in Nepal

BU research, Featured academics, Knowledge Transfer, Research assessment, Research news Edwin van Teijlingen

BU’s Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health has a long history of working Nepal. Last month (January 7^th) BU’s partner Green Tara Nepal led the dissemination of the findings of our evaluation of key health promotion initiatives in Nepal. The evaluation was conducted in collaboration with the Government of Nepal, Green Tara Trust, a UK-based charity, several national and international non-governmental organisations and three UK universities, namely Liverpool John Moores University, Bournemouth University and the University of Sheffield. The evaluation identified key government, bilateral, UN agencies national and international non-governmental organisations working in health promotion in Nepal. Their health promotion activities and approaches were documented and gaps were identified.

As a follow up to both the evaluation and dissemination event we were asked by the journal Public Health Perspectives to write an editorial on our work.¹ Our editorial ‘Health Promotion: A review of policies and practices in Nepal’ highlights the research we conducted and the state of health promotion we uncovered. We also used our editorial to explain the UK notion of impact as formalised in the 2014 Research Excellence Framework (REF). To explain to our non-academic readers the REF is a nation-wide system to assess the quality academic research in all academic disciplines.^2-4 One key part of the REF is measuring the ‘impact’ that a UK university has on society and/or the economy. This REF requires UK universities to write and submit a number of case studies that show societal impact.⁵ The dissemination of the health promotion research in Nepal is the beginning of a REF impact case study for Bournemouth University and our UK partner Liverpool John Moores University. The editorial is a further stepping stone in the dissemination especially since it was co-authored between UK academics, health promotion practitioners as well as a member of the Constitutional Assembly (the Nepali equivalent of Parliament). Working with policy-makers at an early stage increases the chances of our research being incorporated in national policy-making in Nepal.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

References:

Sharma, A, Tuladhar, G., Dhungel, A., Padmadharini, van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P. (2015) Health Promotion: A review of policies and practices in Nepal, Public Health Perpective 5(2): http://phpnepal.org/index.php?listId=941#.VO4Qvn9tXkd
Parker, J., van Teijlingen, E. (2012) The Research Excellence Framework (REF): Assessing the impact of Social Work research on society, Practice: Social Work in Action 24(1): 41-52. http://eprints.bournemouth.ac.uk/20511/2/REF%20paper%20JPEvT.pdf
van Teijlingen, E., Ryan, K., Alexander, J., Marchant, S. (2011) The Research Excellence Framework (REF): new developments to assess research in higher education institutions and its impact on society. MIDIRS 21 (3): 298-301.
Hartwell, H., van Teijlingen, E., Parker, J. (2013) Nutrition; Effects of the Research Excellence Framework (REF) Nutrition & Food Science 43 (1): 74-77.
Research Councils UK (2015) RCUK Review of Pathways to Impact: Summary http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/RCUK-prod/assets/documents/documents/PtoIExecSummary.pdf

February 23, 2015

14:Live Today!

BU research, Public engagement ssquelch

Today will see 14:Live returning for its second run from 14:00-14:45 at the same location, Poole House Refectory, next to Papa Johns. It is open to all staff and students and 14:Live is pleased to welcome Dr Samuel Nyman, senior lecturer in Psychology.

Enhancing care services for people with dementia

The Bournemouth University Dementia Institute (BUDI) was established in May 2012 with a mission to make a positive influence on the lives of people with dementia. BUDI is made up of a multidisciplinary team that provides education, consultancy and evaluation, and research on a range of topics. One theme of BUDI is concerned with enhancing services that provide health and social care for people with dementia and their carers. This talk will present the findings of two studies under this theme.

The first study explored the social care needs of people with dementia who also have a visual impairment. Interviews with people in their own homes illuminated areas where services could be improved. The second study evaluated a service that supports people with dementia and their carers who are living at home. Interviews with staff and service users from the urban and rural areas identified important differences in how these two social care services operated, and the implications on care provision.

The talk will end by briefly mentioning current work under this theme and this year’s new Masterclasses and Master’s degree in dementia.

It would be great to see you all today to listen to what’s going to be a very interesting talk about BUDI’s research. Just to give you that little bit more incentive to come along, there will be tokens for the first 30 audience members to be exchanged for a FREE individual Papa Johns Pizza at the end of the talk, plus lots of free tea & coffee, water & juices – don’t miss out!

If you have any questions about this event or would like to hear about any other upcoming student engagement with research events contact me at ssquelch@bournemouth.ac.uk

I look forward to seeing you there!

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BU Undergraduate Research featured in Houses of Parliament

Two BU authored chapters in new book on childbirth

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