The North West Social Science Doctoral Training Partnership (NWSSDTP) brings together the Universities of Keele, Lancashire, Lancaster, Liverpool and Manchester. Our partnership involves a critical mass of world-leading researchers able to supervise PGRs across the full range of social sciences, providing advanced methodological training, professional development and early career mentoring. Our governance structure enables us to exploit institutional resources within the consortium and to engage in constructive dialogue with supervisors and PGRs, to ensure our work enhances PGR capabilities and achievements across the consortium.

The vision of the NWSSDTP is to play a central role in enabling successive, diverse cohorts of UK social science PGRs to achieve their potential as future research leaders, by equipping them with the skills and capabilities required to have a transformative impact in a range of challenge-led environments of national and international significance. Our strategy for developing future research leaders involves enhancing professional development, boosting employability initiatives, promoting access to bespoke careers support and making PGRs partners in shaping research, training and the environment. Establishing supportive structures for researcher development at all career stages is central to our core ambition of research excellence.

Regular engagement with senior University executives allows us to play a vital role in shaping and achieving institutional social science strategies. In line with UCLan’s Strategic Plan 2021-2028, Keele’s ‘Our Future; Strategic Vision, Lancaster’s Strategic Plan 2021-2026, Liverpool’s Strategy 31 and Manchester’s ‘Our future’ Strategic Plan, the mission of the NWSSDTP is to embed high quality PGR training as a vehicle for promoting research excellence, fostering interdisciplinarity and intensifying knowledge exchange opportunities.