Graduate research students are not only the driving force underpinning much of the theoretical and experimental research that is undertaken in universities today - they are also tomorrow's research leaders of academia and industry.
The EPSRC Doctoral Training Partnership (DTP) scheme enables the University to offer studentships to approximately 86 new doctoral students (excluding any leverage), equivalent to 17% of our provision, each year. Oxford focuses these studentships in research groups that align strategically with the research themes and challenges of both EPSRC and the University, beyond those already on offer through our Centres for Doctoral Training. Doctoral students are members of both a research group and a department, as well as being a part of our broader researcher community embodied in our Graduate School. We anticipate that the number of new DTP studentships will be as follows (noting that number will vary slightly each year with research activity and priorities): Chemistry (7), Computer Science (8), Engineering (14), Materials Science (13), Physics (9), Mathematics and Statistics (14), the Networked Quantum Information Technologies hub (11, spanning five academic departments), Geography and the Environment (2-3), and research areas at the interface of physical and medical sciences (1-2). Although these estimates are expressed in terms of departments (with the exception of NQIT), this is largely an administrative mechanism, and many DTP students will often be supervised in research groups that work across more than one discipline and department. A further six studentships are held aside annually to award to the very best students, regardless of discipline.
The research themes of our departments are accessible through our admissions course pages, and interested applicants are advised to contact a potential supervisor before applying. Applicants for all funded places at Oxford, including places funded through the EPSRC DTP, must apply by the late January deadline (early January deadline for Computer Science). Departments will shortlist the best applicants for interview in February and award studentships to the best candidates by late February or early March.
All our doctoral students are trained and supervised in research groups, which produce world-leading research in outstanding research environments. Each student is allocated a supervisor and a co-supervisor who will support them through their course and guide their journey from research proposal to submitted thesis. Collaboratively the supervisor and student work out the most appropriate training programme for the research skills that the student will need. As many of the most dramatic scientific advances in the coming years will be made at the interface between traditional disciplines, our Graduate School enables students to access not only specialist training in their research field or department, but also a wealth of training offered across Oxford science departments.
Through the Graduate School, we also provide training to enable students to develop the knowledge and skills to manage themselves and their research with integrity, collaborate with others, communicate their research to their peers and to the public, and manage their career progression. We have also developed a suite of training programmes in enterprise and innovation to ensure our doctoral students are enterprise literate and have an understanding of the process of innovation.
We are able to provide opportunities for the most able and promising undergraduates to use their summer vacation productively by experiencing a real research environment. Oxford awards 15 vacation bursaries per year, with an average duration of ten weeks. To support promising early career researchers who have just completed their thesis, Oxford also makes approximately nine doctoral prize awards each year to enable them to realise fully the impact of their doctoral research.
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