Doctoral Focal Awards in the Arts and Humanities - 'A Golden Thread: Crafting the Creative Economy from Scotland's Highlands, Lowlands and Islands'

‘A Golden Thread: Crafting the Creative Economy from Scotland’s Highlands, Lowlands and Islands’ embeds a world-class programme of doctoral training and enterprise development within Scotland’s rural and island communities. Located at the extremes of the national footprint, these communities can face isolation, disconnect and multiple layers of marginalisation. Craft is a focal theme for the programme, building on its deep heritage in rural and island traditions. Envisaged as a ‘golden thread’ between local and global, pasts and futures and across sectors, disciplines and geographies, the programme framework supports interdisciplinary exploration of craft practice and its application to and in future-focussed sectors such as space, aquaculture and bio-design. Embracing craft as innovation, and in support of craft’s sector profile as a majority of women-led micro-enterprises, the cohort training offers transferable enterprise and employability skills, and networks practice-led doctoral students within the enterprise and innovation landscape. The interdisciplinary and cross-sector delivery consortium connects arts, community and placemaking organisations embedded within Moray and the Highlands, the South of Scotland and the Scottish islands, including Moray Arts Development and Engagement (M:ADE), Shetland Arts, SkyeSkyns and Fyne Futures, to consortium lead The Glasgow School of Art (GSA) and co-leads The Open University and Scotland’s Rural College (SRUC), and to partners working across the Creative Economy, including The Bernat Klein Foundation, The Crichton Trust, Highlands and Islands Enterprise and South of Scotland Enterprise. The consortium and its programme embed and embody a demonstrable commitment to diversity, equity and excellence. Its impact-led aims and objectives are to: Deliver a world-class doctoral training programme and cohort experience. Embed enterprise and innovation in programme design, delivery and governance. Create new and enhanced pathways to and through doctoral and supervisory training, with a focus on increased access, diversity and skills, mental health and wellbeing, positive experiences, completions and post-doctoral careers. Strengthen Scotland’s Craft sector, Creative Industries and the wider Creative Economy, addressing key skills gaps and diversifying workforce, audience and outputs. Generate and catalyse a range of wider economic and social impacts, across multiple layers of marginalisation and connected to national policy and global agendas. Design and pilot a bespoke evaluation and learning framework to capture, demonstrate and enhance impacts. The programme prioritises recruitment for doctoral studentships from within partner rural and island communities, utilising best-practice approaches, including ringfenced awards. Informed by cross-sector expertise and lived experience of current and former doctoral students, the programme incorporates foundational pre-training support and a range of flexible study options including online, distance and part-time study. Enhanced provision includes Collaborative Doctoral Awards and specialist skills-based secondments co-hosted with place and industry partners. Cohort training combines person-centred development and industry-focussed enterprise and employability skills. The cohort offer includes a pre-accelerator enterprise programme, taster sessions and industry placements, skills development masterclasses and workshops, expert coaching and mentoring, and an online peer support network. The cohort will be further strengthened through a challenge-based collaborative research project. Training incorporates specific support for supervisors, with the potential to extend provision to students and colleagues across the UK SSI research community. Responsive programme delivery is supported and enhanced by a novel and dynamic programming and evaluation tool. The tool facilitates student-led configuration of interdisciplinary and individualised study themes and topics, and will support ‘in motion’, iterative performance measurement, impact evaluation and learning, through the lifetime of the programme and beyond.