SEFARI Gateway is delighted to provide support for a new Fellowship in collaboration with the Community Landownership Academic Network (CLAN). We are seeking an individual researcher or small team of researchers to help inform the development of practical guidance which can be used by researchers (and those who supervise them), community organisations and other stakeholders to promote and encourage improved robust research practice in this area.

Background

Modern community landownership has only emerged over the past thirty years in Scotland, with its ‘mainstreaming’ only taking place following the 2003 Land Reform (Scotland) Act. Despite numerous legislative mechanisms and substantial funding being made available to expand the number of community-owned estates, very little is known about the ongoing impacts and implications of this local development intervention. Research has been reactive and sporadic, focusing on specific case studies from a narrow range of academic disciplines. This has resulted in large gaps in knowledge, respondent fatigue and little robust evidence to inform future policy or improved practice.

The Community Landownership Academic Network (CLAN) was launched in 2021 in order to strategically coordinate the future of research in this field. CLAN is administered at the University of the Highlands and Islands (UHI) but is an open network which seeks to connect disparate researchers working in this emerging area with the communities and stakeholders who are ultimately the focus of their research. The network has now grown to over 200 individuals from academia, policy, practice and community organisations who meet regularly to present and discuss developments in this area. CLAN’s Advisory Group consists of both academic and non-academic stakeholders involved in research, funding, policy and practice.

From the outset, the network sought to integrate with community landowning organisations themselves, seeking to serve the sector through conducting relevant and necessary research in a sustainable and beneficial manner, the findings of which will be communicated in accessible ways. A recent study to inform CLAN’s Knowledge Exchange Strategy found some evidence of extractive and unethical research practices, respondent fatigue and increasing unwillingness to engage in research. Community representatives and sectoral stakeholders identified an urgent need for guidance and organisation of research activity. Subsequently, both primary and secondary research has been undertaken to investigate approaches to sustainable, mutually-beneficial research practices, and specifically considering the barriers to different stakeholders adopting these.

CLAN is currently undergoing an extensive expansion, including a rebranding exercise and the launch of a multifunctional website, following the recommendations made in the aforementioned study. These functions include: a comprehensive library of all research conducted on community landownership; a directory of all active researchers in this field; a database of all current and past research projects; and a ‘research matching service’ offering a direct means of collaboration between researchers, communities and other stakeholders. The website is due to be launched in January 2025.

Fellowship Aims

The starting point of this project is the assertion that the current ethical requirements of academic research should be viewed as the absolute minimum standard, and that research activity should seek to go well beyond these in order to not harm, and indeed benefit, individual and community respondents whilst retaining research integrity. Furthermore, community organisations should, in most cases, have the opportunity to be involved in the design and delivery of research, and have a realistic expectation that findings are fed back in a timely and accessible fashion. While such research can place more pressure on community bodies, it can also make the final result more useful to them. Consequently, the risk/reward of research will need to be assessed and any guidance would need to support a number of approaches and options.

The Fellow(s) will work collaboratively with community organisations in order to develop guidance that could potentially lead to a protocol which is practical, useful and theoretically informed, and can be used by community organisations to set expectations of how community research could be conducted. The guidance will hopefully be applicable to all disciplines and approaches to research. As may be expected, this work itself will require particular attention to ethical considerations in its undertaking.

It has already been suggested by funders and stakeholders, such as the Scottish Land Commission, that future research funding could promote such practices. Therefore, a further role of the Fellow will be to investigate the potential for further such uptake, identifying challenges/barriers and how we could encourage other institutions to promote or incentivise it as part of their functions.

Key Project Deliverables

Phase 1:

• Short review of practical approaches to community-focused research which goes beyond the minimum ethical standards. The focus will be on what can be gained and learned from how other countries and contexts have dealt with this issue and developed solutions. This will identify other similar endeavours and understand what may be applicable to the CLAN approach.
• Organisation and facilitation of collaborative online stakeholder workshops.

Phase 2:

• Inform the development of ethical research guidance in collaboration with CLAN Coordinator and relevant stakeholders (including researchers, community organisations and other research users).
• Presentation and dissemination of the guidance through range of mediums.

Timescale

Phase 1:

• Project to commence January 2025
• Short review January-February 2025
• Online workshops to take place no later than early March 2025
• Interim report end March 2025

Phase 2 (subject to Phase 1 completion):

• In-person workshop to take place no later than May 2025
• Final outputs to be completed by end of June 2025

Outputs

The informing of the CLAN Research Guidance will serve as the main deliverable of this project (via an interim report, final report and workshops). The Fellow(s) will also produce a Case Study for SEFARI Gateway and UHI’s Land & Communities Knowledge Exchange Sector Group.

An in-person workshop is considered essential for the culmination (phase 2) of this project. Following a series of online wider engagement workshops (phase 1), it is proposed phase 2 would bring together a group of approximately 15-20 representatives of landowning community organisations to contribute expertise and perspectives to the final development of any protocol. The workshop would be held in a location most convenient to the attendees.

Practicalities

The details of the final Fellowship work plan will be iterated and agreed with the successful Fellow(s).

The Fellow(s) should expect to spend the equivalent of up to 28 days (to a maximum total funding of £20,000 for time) on the total project (both phases), although the exact number of days, their timing, and their pattern through the working week will depend on personal circumstances.

The project and award will be split into 2 phases. 14 days (max £10,000 for staff time) for phase 1 (to end of March 2025) and 14 days (max £10,000 for staff time and an additional max £5,000 for an in-person workshop) for phase 2 (end June 2025). Phase 2 will be awarded depending on Phase 1 delivery and SEFARI Gateway Year 4 budget approval.

Please note that costs should be submitted net of VAT recovered by the applicant. Applicants should seek advice on appropriate VAT treatment of proposed funding.

Further Details

The Fellowship is open to applicants from staff:

• from any SEFARI Organisation
• ENRA Portfolio Centres of Expertise
• Staff within any UK Higher Education Institution (or Research Institute)
• Please note, you do not need to have been previously funded by Scottish Government via the Portfolio to qualify for SEFARI Gateway funding
• Applicants must have the support of their organisation. Sign-off should be at the level deemed appropriate for each organisation (please talk to your line manager), but Directors/Chief Executives of your Institute (or University school as appropriate) should be made aware.
• The taking of such an opportunity should not result in a candidate going beyond the end of any agreed contract they may have with their employer.
• It is recognised that individual circumstances are different and support levels will vary depending on salary, distance from the opportunity and so on – the support level will be kept under review to try and maintain a fair and equitable competition and process. The organisation of the successful fellow(s) should not expect to meet any costs beyond that paid for by SEFARI Gateway.
• The successful candidate(s) will be expected to contribute to relevant meetings or outputs for the project partners as the Fellowship progresses and to generate knowledge exchange related content for SEFARI Gateway (support will be offered on this).

Applications

Applications should be made to: info@sefari.scot and should include a cover letter (two pages of detail on your suitability or that of the team) and a two-page CV (or up to 6 pages for a team). Decisions on who to interview will be based solely on this letter and CV(s).

The cover letter should include:

• Why are you interested in this opportunity and what you would hope to get from it?
• What skills and experience would you bring to this role?
• How would you use your current work to underpin the project?
• What would you do to take the learning back into your organisation?

Team-based applications (max 3) should demonstrate how they propose to manage individual contributions to satisfy the degree of multi-disciplinary integration required and clearly identify a Fellowship Team Lead.

The deadline for applications is 5pm on Monday 16^th December 2024 we hope to hold interviews ahead of Christmas - possibly on Tuesday 17^th, Thursday 19^th or Friday 20^th December 2024.

If you have any questions on this, or any general aspect of the SEFARI Fellowship scheme, please contact Michelle Wilson Chalmers, Manager, SEFARI Gateway at: michelle.wilson@sefari.scot