PhD Social Policy, Social Work and Social Justice

Before the formal application process, prospective applicants are expected to have secured agreement in principle to supervise from a faculty member. This can be done in one of two ways:

1. Identifying a suitable potential supervisor from our staff profiles, contacting them about your project and gauging their interest, and capacity, to take on a new PhD student. Wherever possible, you should aim to send your prospective supervisor a full proposal. However, in some circumstances it may be more appropriate to send an outline proposal. Please see the guidance below, or if you have questions on this point, please contact the Director of Graduate Studies.

Please see below for more information on writing a PhD proposal.

This preliminary stage is crucial as an application cannot be progressed if we do not have suitable supervision available. Once supervision has been secured in principle, a proposal can be finalised, potentially in conjunction with the proposed supervisor (if the applicant has not already done so), in preparation for a formal application – details about the formal application process can be found HERE.

For our faculty to be able to make a decision on whether they are the appropriate person to supervise you, they need to have a strong sense of your proposed project, including whether it aligns with their current interests and methodological and/or subject expertise.

Being able to contact a potential supervisor, or the Director of Graduate Studies, with at least an outline proposal is therefore a crucial step in the application process. We are unable to progress applications or queries where the applicant does not have a good understanding of their own proposed research. It is also useful for you to give your prospective supervisor a sense of why you have contacted them specifically. For example, a recent publication, matching research interests, or the supervision of current or former PhD students on a similar topic. This is also useful for the prospective applicant; if you cannot clearly and succinctly explain to the prospective supervisor why you feel they are a good fit to supervise your project, they may not be the right supervisor for you.

We understand that it can be difficult to identify a suitable supervisor without guidance, and that there is a temptation to email multiple faculty members at once in hope of a positive reply. In our experience, this approach does not yield results. This is because a prerequisite for a successful and productive PhD experience is a good supervisor relationship, and a good fit between the supervisor’s and PhD student’s research interests. This relationship begins at the pre-application stage in many (but not all!) cases.

We recommend you follow these steps:

• First, consult the list of faculty members actively recruiting PhD students - https://www.ucd.ie/socialpolicyworkjustice/study/graduateprogrammes/phdsocialpolicysocialworkandsocialjustice/
• This list is subject to change. If you do not see a suitable supervisor on this list, please go to the next step, or contact the Director of Graduate Studies. 
• Take a look at our faculty profiles - https://www.ucd.ie/socialpolicyworkjustice/about/facultyprofiles/
• Here you can browse faculty, or search for faculty based on keywords that align strongly with your own proposal and/or research interests
• Take a look at the research carried out in the school, including research centres, themes, and current PhD students - https://www.ucd.ie/socialpolicyworkjustice/research/
• Make a shortlist of potential supervisors in order of relevance
• It may be that your preferred supervisor is not in a position to take on new students, in which case identifying more than one suitable supervisor can be helpful.
• Contact your preferred supervisor(s)
• Please only contact one potential supervisor at a time, to avoid duplication of communications, and to ensure clarity when it comes to supervisor allocation.
• Co-supervision is possible, and in some cases encouraged. This will be discussed with your prospective supervisor and the Director of Graduate Studies, once you have a principal supervisor for your project.

If after following these steps the proposed supervisor does not feel able to take on the project, you may opt to contact an another faculty member, or you may ask the proposed supervisor or the Director of Graduate Studies for recommendations of suitable faculty.

All formal applications to PhD programmes in the school require the submission of a full research proposal of between 4000-5000 words. 

Generally, a PhD research proposal should contain the following elements:

1. Working title and short description of the project
2. A description of the project (c. 1000 words): This should include
1. The research problem and/or research puzzle
2. Clearly formulated research questions that will allow you to address the research problem 
3. Aims and Objectives of the proposed research
4. The ‘value-added’ of the proposed research – i.e. what do you hope this research will tell us that we don’t already know? Or, what tools will this research give us to study a problem in a different way?
5. The scope of the research (i.e. what can and can’t it do?) and any potential limitations (N.B. Limitations are not admissions of weakness of a proposal, but rather an acknowledgement and understanding of what the research can realistically claim to do/achieve)
3. Description of the relationship of the project to existing research (c. 1500-2000 words): This section should consider
1. What does the current and foundational literature have to say on your proposed research problem?
2. What are the main themes in the literature(s)?
3. What is/are the gap(s) in these literature(s)
4. How will the proposed research contribute to addressing this/these gap(s)?
4. Methodology (c. 800-1000 words): This section should consider
1. Does the research draw upon existing theoretical or conceptual frameworks?
2. Which methods of data collection and data analysis do you propose to use and why (including why your chosen method(s) are the most appropriate for the study)? 
3. What data sources will you use (quantitative and/or qualitative)?
4. What ethical considerations might the research bring up? (n.b. this is especially important for qualitative research that proposes to collect data from human subjects, such as interview data, participant observation, ethnographic methods etc.)
5. Research Plan and timeline (c. 400 words): consider in this section
1. What tasks are required to undertake the research successfully (e.g. field work/data collection, data analysis, research design, writing up, editing, presenting at conferences, publishing peer-reviewed articles, etc.)?
2. How long each task is expected to take
6. Bibliography: Your proposal should be adequately referenced, including citations to relevant and ideally up-to-date literature(s), and to relevant methodological and theoretical sources. As such, you should expect your bibliography to run to 1-2 pages.

We understand that a research proposal is subject to change. In fact, during the first year of your PhD it is highly likely that the parameters of your research project, and even your research questions and focus, will change in some way. This is completely normal, and your supervisor(s) will help guide you through this process. 

Faculty will view your proposal not as a concrete track from which you cannot stray, but as a preliminary outline of your research ambitions. Nevertheless, it is important to be as precise as you can, as this demonstrates to your potential supervisor that you understand your proposed area of research well, as well as what PhD research involves. Your prospective supervisor, and the Director of Graduate Studies, will be happy to give you advice where appropriate.

Contact and outline proposal form

If you are passionate about your proposed area of research, but are not yet able to produce a full proposal, you may contact a prospective supervisor or the Director of Graduate Studies ((opens in a new window)matthew.donoghue@ucd.ie) with an outline proposal template – please click here to download