Education / Lifelong Learning (PhD / MPhil) - 2012/2013 entry

An MPhil/PhD is an opportunity to undertake a major piece of research under the supervision of someone with academic expertise in your field. The Department of Social Policy and Education offers committed, enthusiastic and dynamic research-based teaching. Our approach is interdisciplinary and is designed to foster a creative environment for graduate research.

As a research student, you will be interested in your own development as a lifelong learner and will be seeking to engage in critical debate and key issues of education and lifelong learning. You will develop your skills as an independent and active learner, and apply your research skills with theoretical perspectives and understandings of lifelong learning. You will be immersed in an academically stimulating and challenging environment, with easy access to high-quality research resources.

There are several academic experts in education, and supervision is offered in a range of areas. These include: lifelong learning; higher education policy and practice; lifelong learning and widening participation policy and practice; post-compulsory education; adult and continuing education; gender and education; education in later life; education and the life course; education and social class; wider benefits of learning; community-based learning; citizenship; international service learning.

Students completing a PhD/MPhil will have developed advanced skills in research and scholarly writing, and will be able to use these to embark on, or further, a career in research. As many of our students study part-time, you have the opportunity to apply your developing research skills in your current career.

You will be able to attend relevant modules on the MSc Education, Power and Social Change, as well as other courses for research students.

The programme has close links with the Birkbeck Institute for Lifelong Learning (BILL). BILL acts as a hub for interdisciplinary and cross-disciplinary research into education across the lifecourse. Its research spans a variety of disciplines, connecting educational researchers in sociology, psychology, social policy, economics
and philosophy. BILL hosts seminars, events and meetings and aims to develop and sustain research into lifelong learning within the College, as well as at national and international levels, including through Birkbeck Institute for Social Research.

We have a range of links with other departments, both in Birkbeck and at other universities, and arrangements for joint supervision according to your interests are therefore possible. Before making an application you are advised to contact the relevant potential supervisor. 

• Please note: before making an application, you should contact the potential supervisor.

• Claire Callender, BSc, PhD: Higher education policy; funding and finances of higher education students, both in the UK and internationally; widening participation; part-time students.
• Ben Kotzee, MA, PhD: Educational philosophy and theory; professional education; theories of expertise and tacit knowledge.
• Professor Sue Jackson, BA, MA, PhD: Gender and education; feminist theory and research; lifelong learning and post-compulsory education for adult learners; pedagogies and practices of lifelong learning; learner identities, including gender, social class and age.
• Jonathan Smith, BA, AFBPsS: Adult learning and personal development; career values and teaching.
• Anita Walsh, BA, MSc, PhD: Work-based learning; epistemology of informal and work-based learning.

• You can start studying in September or January.
• Before making an application, you should contact the relevant potential supervisor.