MOJ Evidence Fellowship ESRC Policy Fellowship
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Birmingham
Department Name: Social Policy, Sociology and Criminology
Abstract
Each fellowship will last up to 18 months to cover a three-month inception phase for set up activity, followed by a 6-12-month placement with the host organisation, and concluding with an impact phase lasting up to three months.
Fellows will co-design projects and activities with their host and produce analysis to inform government decision-making across a range of policy priorities. Fellows will also engage across the host organisation, building effective working relationships and supporting wider knowledge exchange with researchers. This will be supported through their embedded role within the host organisation, including line management support.
Fellows will co-design projects and activities with their host and produce analysis to inform government decision-making across a range of policy priorities. Fellows will also engage across the host organisation, building effective working relationships and supporting wider knowledge exchange with researchers. This will be supported through their embedded role within the host organisation, including line management support.
| Description | I am unable to share these at the moment as we are negotiating a data sharing agreement to publish/analyse the dataset I produced as part of this fellowship. Until the data is peer-reviewed, findings cannot be shared. |
| Exploitation Route | NA |
| Sectors | Government Democracy and Justice |
| Description | The impact is only just emerging as the Fellowship is ongoing. I will only report on concrete outcomes to date. 1. Have held, to date, 2 'drops ins' for Ministry of Justice colleagues and the second MoJ Fellow, to discuss their research projects and advise on any research queries (eg methodology) they may have. This has lead to the development of their individual projects and their ways of thinking about them. Some feedback from these (anonymised except for my name): - The session itself was laid out in a really helpful way, as you have said the only thing I could think to ask is for more time, but appreciate that this might not always be doable. Depending on the project/the asks being presented to the academics, there may be scope for update sessions for them to come back and see how their advice was used? This might help all parties understand the results and limitations of the studies used and would (hopefully) be of benefit to the academics as well! - It was massively useful. We got everything we needed plus more. It's always helpful to get feedback from an academic with expert knowledge - Anna is passionate and very knowledgeable. We are now in a much better position in terms of organising our priorities, shaping our questions, knowing the limitations, and backing up our arguments with up-to-date references. - I thought it was good actually. Anna and [second fellow] made some helpful suggestions and also, I think it's good to know that there isn't something glaring out there that we're completely missing... 2. Contributing regularly to the NRC (National Research Committee) as a reviewer, reviewing research project applications received for research in prisons/probation. This helped lightened the workload of the team. 3. Am contributing to a group bringing together prison stakeholders to discuss evidence gaps and provided insight into existing research, helped find research where teams working across a range of prison policy felt there were gaps. Contributed to moving towards a more holistic way of thinking about prison policy. There are several outputs in the pipeline which will be reportable next cycle as they have not yet materialised/taken place: Engagement activities - representative of host has been in touch recently to engage further with myself and colleagues at my academic institution for some further networking, with the aim of building academic-civil service partnerships more broadly. There will be an event in April to network and share host organisation's ideas/plans/Fellowships etc. Other outputs - I have worked with my employer's VC for Impact to produce a short video about the benefits of Fellowships such as the one I am report on here. This will be used as a resource for other academics considering/planning to apply for Fellowships/secondments. Plan to attend a government event on digital technology in prisons with the host's collaborators, and contribute to a discussion on the use of technology (as this related to the work I did during the Fellowship). Contributed to a piece of evaluation on these ESRC Fellowships as a research participant. |
| First Year Of Impact | 2024 |
| Sector | Government, Democracy and Justice |
| Impact Types | Policy & public services |
| Title | Survey - electronic - of men and women in prison |
| Description | Electronic survey of men and women in prison across a number of prisons. Further details to be reported at a later stage once the dataset is processed (currently this is being done). |
| Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
| Year Produced | 2023 |
| Provided To Others? | No |
| Impact | Not yet applicable - dataset has just been generated. |
| Description | Internal Ministry of Justice research seminar on my previous research |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | 60 Ministry of Justice colleagues working across a wide range of prison policy and analysis fields attended an online seminar at the start of my Fellowship; I presented my earlier research and explained my expertise, which helped not only disseminate my previous research findings internally but also helped me build relationships with colleagues going forward. A few participants asked for me to share reports and other externally published outputs. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |