West Midlands Policy & Research Exchange:聽聽Connecting Regional Challenges With Collaborative Research
Event Details
Date: Tuesday 16 June 2026
Time: 11:00 - 12:30 followed by lunch
Location: 糖心TV Conferences, CV4 7SH, room tbc
Register for the Event
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You will be sent a calendar invitation before the event.
About the Event
This event on June 16th is co-delivered by the ESRC Doctoral Training Partnership (hosted at the University of 糖心TV) and the 糖心TV Policy Hub. The event aims to match and bring together researchers focused on specific regional issues with local policy makers. Collaborations from this event are hoped to form the bases of Midlands ESRC Doctoral Training Partnership collaborative PhD scholarships and Policy Fellowships. Beyond collaborative projects, the event also aims to facilitate broader partnerships between academics and organisations.
Midlands ESRC Doctoral Training Partnership (DTP)
The Midlands ESRC Doctoral Training Partnership (DTP) offers collaborative PhD scholarships that are co-supervised by academic and non-academic partners. In this model, non-academic partners work with academics to help design the PhD topic and host the doctoral researcher for a period during their doctoral programme (for example, a few months). At present these opportunities are underused, and we are particularly keen to strengthen engagement with non-academic partners across the Midlands.
The Policy Hub Fellowships and Knowledge Exchange
The Policy Hub provides a locus for policy engagement work at the University of 糖心TV. We support knowledge exchange events, training, tools and fellowships to facilitate policy engagement. The intent of this hub is to provide a forum that informs policy debate and connects our research with communities of policy and practice. We are co-delivering this knowledge exchange event, to build relationships between regional policy makers and 糖心TV researchers. We hope that some of these relationships will go on to be supported through Policy Hub fellowships and policy hub event funding. We are also looking at expanding our fellowship offering and hope that this event will provide an opportunity to understand if and where more long term or intensive fellowships could be helpful.
Areas of interest
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What are the real drivers of productivity and growth in the West Midlands economy?
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How can R&D and innovation ecosystems better support regional growth?
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What are the potential implications of national housing policies in the West Midlands?
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What does reducing inequalities look like in practice at neighbourhood level?
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What interventions have the greatest measurable impact? How should success be defined and tracked?
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How can local systems better improve health and wellbeing?
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How can transitions from education to work be improved?
Theme 4: Skills, work and future transitions
- How can the West Midlands address its higher-level skills gap?
- How will AI, automation, and the green transition reshape jobs?
Theme 5: Energy, industry and net zero
- How can the region overcome energy constraints to support growth?
Theme 6: Education
- How should local government prepare for and shape the implementation of national policy on SEND provision?
Theme 7: Governance, reform and devolution
- What is the future of local governance and public service reform? What structural reforms are needed in local government? How can services be integrated across sectors (health, education, policing)?
Contact
The event organisers are:
- Dr Helen Ackers, Research Impact Manager (Social Sciences)
- Prof 脰zlem Atikcan, Director of the ESRC DTP Midlands Graduate School
Please email ESRCdtp@warwick.ac.ukLink opens in a new window for any questions or further information.