A post graduate scholarship to promote gender diversity in Higher Education and society.

We’re launching the CTSG scholarship fundraising campaign.

Here is the link: https://spsr.me/dgWY

Transforming sexuality and gender research, supporting the next generation researchers

At the University of Brighton’s Centre for Transforming Sexuality and Gender (CTSG) we believe not just in actively involving participants from marginalised communities in research, we also think it is really important to build research capacity within those communities. The CTSG scholarship aims to build researcher capacity within and around the trans community, by offering a full tuition  fee scholarship to a student on the Social Research Methods Post Graduate programme – a stand-alone Master of Science degree offering ideal training for a student who wishes to go on to do a PhD – combined with individual mentoring by CTSG staff and a dedicated CTSG PhD student mentor.

The scholarship is awarded to a candidate who is committed to making a difference to the wider Trans community, especially its most marginalised members, for example disabled Trans people, and Trans people of colour.

About the scholarship

Launched in 2020, the Transforming Sexuality and Gender scholarship is the only of its kind in the UK. The scholarship has been developed to help promote gender diversity in HE and society, to contribute to social research related to Trans experiences and rights, and to challenge institutional genderism in wider debates. UK research by the NUS reported that over half (51%) of Trans-identifying respondents had seriously considered discontinuing their course (NUS, 2014), which demonstrates that universities must do more to support and promote a Trans-inclusive environment and research.

Who is the scholarship for?

The CTSG Scholarship is open to postgraduate applicants who situate their research topic within the CTSG research themes and can demonstrate a commitment to social change, Trans rights and vision for the future of transforming sexualities and gender inclusion and diversity in HE and society.

Caleb’s story

Caleb Hayes is the current Transforming Sexuality and Gender scholarship student. He did a degree in Criminology before applying to the Social Research Methods programme to pursue his research interest in is the experiences of transgender individuals with domestic violence or abuse.

The course is demanding but Caleb has taken part in Centre activities aimed at the post graduate community as well as contributed as a research assistant on a CTSG research project on the need for LGBTQ+ digital youth work during the pandemic.

Caleb said: “I hope for my academic work to contribute towards polices or initiatives aiming to support trans people. For example, working with domestic violence support services or LGBT charities in the future to create domestic violence support specifically for transgender people.”

As part of the scholarship Caleb has access to mentoring via the Centre. Being mentored by CTSG PhD students has helped making valuable contacts with other early career scholars working in the area of gender and sexualities research whilst a staff mentor is helping with the development of his PhD proposal.

Caleb: “The CTSG community has been incredibly welcoming and supportive. Everyone I have spoken to has been happy to provide me with guidance, resources, or just an ear, to reflect on ideas with.  Having the CTSG scholarship connection has been so beneficial with the demanding aspect of the course,  both support wise and in terms of resources. I’ve used a lot of resources found through the CTSG to develop ideas for essays, my dissertation, and my PhD proposal.” 

Where will the money go?

Our vision is to be able to award the Transforming Sexuality and Gender scholarship every year. By supporting this project you will help a student realise their dream of training as a researcher and enable young people from different backgrounds to pursue an academic career, working on topics that they are making real differences to marginalised communities.

If we reach our minimum target we can fund a student for the 2021-22 academic year. Thanks to your donation we will be able to recruit the most brilliant candidate and their student fee will be covered by the scholarship.

If we reach our full funding target we can secure the scholarship for the future. We will continue to work to raise funds to sustain the scholarship for future years and contribute toward making academic research more gender inclusive and diverse, by supporting one CTSG scholarship student every year.

Help us succeed!

You don’t just need to give money to help us succeed! Please share this project with anyone you think would support us – on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, by email, or on your blog. In fact, share it with everyone you know as we think it’s a great idea, and the more people who know about it, the more likely we are to make this work out brilliantly. Please support us and help make this project happen.

Thank you!