This week the UK Data Service Impact Team opened applications for the 2023 Cohort of Data Impact Fellows. Find out who can apply, how you apply and why you should consider doing so below!
Funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), the Data Impact Fellows programme aims to provide career development opportunities for researchers and analysts at a relatively early stage in their career in the academic or charity sectors.
Who can apply?
The scheme is open to early career researchers in the academic or VCSE sector. The aim is to develop your ideas for creating impact from data-enhanced work and includes a £2000 award to help fund your development.
This year we’re focussing the scheme on projects and researchers who are using data from the UK Data Service collection and working on the broad themes of:
- poverty, deprivation and the cost of living crisis
- housing and/or homelessness?
If this is you then we invite you to apply for the next round of our Data Impact Fellows scheme. You can apply to the scheme on our Data Impact Fellows page.
If your questions aren’t answered below or on the Data Impact Fellows page feel free to get in touch with us, email our Impact Manager James at james.lockwood@jisc.ac.uk.
Please feel free to share this post and the application page with anyone you know who might be interested.
What does the scheme offer?
- financial support to help you develop your idea of data impact
- an opportunity to meet and network with other Fellows to share and develop ideas
- sharing your work and ideas, and opening up discussion on our Data Impact blog
- showcasing your work and its impact through co-creating a case study
- contribute to our 2023 Data Impact event
Why should I apply?
We asked some of our previous fellows why you should apply:
“I think a significant reason to apply for the fellowship is to meet likeminded people who share a common interest in translating UK data into impact. I used the fellowship money to analyse a number of census releases to help a charity, supporting eastern European migrants, conduct a needs bases assessment. It’s also a good funding pot to attend conferences and workshops to help develop your skills further.” Will Shankley
“My top reason for becoming a UKDS Data Impact Fellow is the ability to connect with other researchers who are keen to spread awareness about existing data sets and best practices for storing, managing, and sharing data.” Esmeralda Bon
“I think it gives you an impulse to explore aspects of data that might not always immediately fit a research article, but are worth keeping in mind, while at the same time training your own ‘voice’ in communicating outside of the narrow scientific community. This could be through a critical analysis of a certain concept, measure or statistic in a blog post, or by setting up an impact event with the help of the UK data service.” Bram Vanhoutte
“Being an impact fellow allowed me to have a platform to easily share my research and thoughts related to research within a safe space with plenty of support. It also enabled me to attend courses that I wouldn’t have entertained (due to funding). I felt very honoured to be named a fellow and have researchers within different fields that I wouldn’t have met otherwise. Also have the continued support of UK Data service team is something that I know I can count on and am proud of. The learnings from this experience and being part of this network have helped build my confidence as a researcher and this is something I will always be thankful for.” Anne Alarilla
“I found it a great way to open doors and do things I wouldn’t have been able to do otherwise. If not for the UKDS, I’d have never had an outlet to run an essay competition, and I certainly wouldn’t have had the great support that I had from the UKDS team. It’s also a chance to talk to other researchers outside of your field and get a different perspective, but in a very informal way.” Ben Brindle
You can find out more about the previous cohorts at the links below, including what they were doing during their time as fellows and what they’re doing now.
You can find more about the UK Data Service training and events on our website.