 Hi everyone and welcome to the SOA's Development Studies Department talk. It's great to see so many people here interested in our postgraduate programs and in development studies. So I'm just going to give a kind of presentation, who we are as a department, what makes us distinctive, talking about some of the things that you can expect to find if and when you come to us, and then there'll be time at the end for questions. It's entirely up to you if you want to kind of ask a question out loud, if you just put your kind of electronic hand up and then I'll call on you and then just unmute yourself and ask, or you can type it into the chat box and I've got both of my boxes open so hopefully I should be able to see you. Okay well let's get started. So I'm assuming that all of you will have looked at our programs online and the structure of the program online, which is one of the reasons you're here, because you're interested in the programs that we offer. So what I'm not going to do is I'm not going to cover the detail of the structure of the individual programs. Although if you want to ask a question about that afterwards, that's absolutely fine of course, but I strongly recommend if you haven't gone to look at the website, please do go and have a look. You can look at not only the outline of the programs, you can click through and you can find descriptions of exactly what each module looks at, what it covers and the topics that it looks at, and of course you can get in touch with anyone for any of the modules you're interested in, as well as the program conveners and the admissions tutors will come to me if you've got any questions and if I can't answer it, I can find someone who can. I'm guessing that most of you are thinking about our programs either because you want to work in global development or in a related area in some capacity, or perhaps you're already doing so and you want to do a master's program to perhaps take a step back from your day to day role and the work that you're doing and the challenges of operating in development or humanitarian environments and reflect perhaps on what it is that you're doing and how it ties in with broader thinking about global development. Some of you may well have studied global development as part of a first degree, others may have touched on it a little bit, some this may be entirely new for all of you and our students come from all of those backgrounds, so we have a wide range of students and I'll talk more about our students and who they are a bit later, excuse me I've got a bit of a cold at the moment, and of course I imagine that all of you are already interested if not active in some way in global development issues and campaigning and advocacy and so on, so I don't need to go into too much detail about why it's important as an issue, but just to give some context, you know so the the overall context in which our program sits is a story of great progress of course if we think about what's been achieved over the past half century or so, but nevertheless there are still huge gaps in addressing poverty, so although for example over the past couple of decades the mortality rate of children has fallen by around 50% and maternal deaths have also fallen quite considerably down by about 40% from the year 2000, but despite that we know that still 800 women and 15,000 children including 7,000 newborns will die every single day. Global poverty similarly has been falling over the past decade, but despite that a quarter of the world's population are living on less than $3.20 a day and around 700 million people, so you know around a tenth of the world's population are living in extreme poverty on less than $1.90 a day, and of course we also know that one of the impacts of the Covid epidemic is that it is already pushing people into extreme poverty or into poverty, so we know that the number of those living in extreme poverty is likely to rise by around 150 million by the end of this year and of course we don't know what's likely to happen in the year or years to come as a result of Covid and the impact of the climate emergency as well is going to be pushing additional numbers, very large numbers potentially into extreme poverty. Around 82 million people were forced from their homes last year, forced to flee either internally or to another country, and almost nine tenths of those are of course housed or living within developing poor countries rather than in developed countries. We've just seen in Afghanistan a new crisis that is likely to see a significant outflow of people adding to the pressure that is on systems, on organizations responding, on host governments in poor countries who are so under-resourced in coping with the financial as well as social needs of helping large numbers of people, and we can see regions like the European Union, countries like the UK and the United States who are not only doing very little to help but actively making it harder for those fleeing from persecution, violence and fear to reach safety. So together across the broad suite of our programs they're looking at some of the most urgent and pressing of global issues that we're facing today and we'll be facing over the next medium even long term. Our masters and our research students are engaged with understanding and thinking about these huge challenges and huge topics and what they tell us about the idea of development itself. So for those of you who are perhaps new to the subject of development studies or global development and are thinking what is it that we actually look at? Essentially development studies is the study of how individuals become poor and remain trapped in poverty. It looks at what it means to be poor when we say someone is living in poverty or in extreme poverty, what do we actually mean? What is the experience of that? What are the specific vulnerabilities? Babatunde, I can notice your microphones and if you could just unmute it that would be great because we're getting some feedback from your microphone. Thank you. It also looks at what international organizations and governments are doing about poverty both in the global south but of course also in the global north. What are donors trying to do to address poverty and are those policies actually working or perhaps are they having no effect or even making things worse? And this means the study of development is forcing us to ask some quite challenging and difficult questions. Firstly, what is development? What do we mean by that term development? How do societies change and how should societies actually change perhaps? Why have some countries or regions not developed and who defines whether they have or have not developed? What policies and programmes, what structures, what systems can help make good change happen and which actors perhaps are better at making good change occur and supporting communities than others? It also asks development a good thing. Now this may seem a really strange question to ask but actually development is a term that can be used in all kinds of ways and development policies can have all kinds of impacts intended but also unintended consequences and they may not always be good for particular groups of people. So development itself is a contested and challenging and challenged term and within the specialist programs, the violence conflict and development, migration, environment and so on, we apply those specific lenses to the same broad questions and understandings. Sorry. So development studies and the various programmes around that look at these arguments and the evidence for each and they help you make up your mind about what you think about development, global development or migration policy or environmental policy, about efforts to rebuild conflicted societies to engage in humanitarian action and so on and to think about how good change can be brought about. So it's an interdisciplinary, sorry I think I've just skipped a slide accidentally, there we go sorry. So it's an interdisciplinary degree which and what that means is that we bring together colleagues and approaches from a broad range of largely social science disciplines to examine and explore all of these questions. We have colleagues who work in politics, in anthropology, in sociology, economics, politics, history, all applying those different lenses to come up with different ways of looking at these problems to ensure that we get as full a picture as possible. It's also both global and local in focus. So development studies doesn't just look at the countries and regions of the global south, it also looks at what's going on in the global north about the levels of interconnectedness, about the ways that policies and practice within the global north can impact on poverty and vulnerability and instability and migration, population movements in the global south, and of course it looks at the ways that global south countries are talking and interconnected between themselves, so global sort of south-south cooperation, collaboration, learning experiences and so on. So for example if you think about a topic such as migration we could look at it if we were just taking a global south perspective from asking why it is that people move, why it is that people leave their homes and we might think about what their experiences are that have either led them to do that and once they've moved we could take a slightly broader perspective and think about the experiences of people as they cross different countries, as they cross different regions in search of a better life, but we also need to think about it from the perspective of the global north, not only what the experiences of those migrants who are seeking to get into and once they are into global north countries, but the way in which global north countries are perhaps driving some of the factors that are causing this instability in these processes to take place in the same and by doing so gain a much fuller question. It's only by looking at it from this total perspective that we can really understand what's going on and that of course is true for all of the issues that we're exploring through our programs. So what makes so as as a department or our development studies department distinctive, you will know if you've done your research there are a number of universities and institutions which also have long-standing development studies programs and although there is some overlap of course about the things that we're looking at the questions that we're asking, each of these departments has its own distinctive approach so one of the things you need to think about is where will I feel most comfortable, which approach to development and which character or what character of each department best fits my aspirations for where I want to take my learning journey and journey in gaining more knowledge and understanding around global development. So look we're a top five department for the discipline in the world, so our expertise is recognised. We're a very diverse department as you will know if you know anything about SARS. SARS is one of the most diverse places or diverse universities in the world in terms of its student body but its staff is also incredibly diverse and we have colleagues from around 10 different countries representing a wide range of disciplinary backgrounds working on a range of themes and a range of geographical areas. We all have experience in working outside of academia, working on and with international organisations or NGOs with governments, trade unions and social movements and we're all engaged in ongoing policy debates and action as well as our more academic focused research and all of this is brought into the teaching that we're doing at master's and postgraduate research level. So I think there are five things that mark out our department that make us different from the other departments. The first is that we take a very context specific perspective. Now what I mean by that is and I suppose this speaks to the broader mission of so has itself that we don't just look at thematic issues within global development. So international finance institutions, the role of NGOs, violence and conflict, agricultural change, we look at them through a very specific geographical lens. All of the staff work on either region countries and regions in Africa or in Asia actually quite few also work on issues in Latin America and that for us is really important because we feel that you can only understand the impact and the opportunities for development through a context specific lens just because something worked well in Bangladesh doesn't mean that you can simply transplant that project and expect it to work the same in Cameroon just because a group of people in one region responded well or responded badly to a particular intervention doesn't mean the same thing will happen with either the same group or certainly a different group of people elsewhere. So we understand that you need to think about the difference that place and group make in understanding global development and violence and migration and so on and we think this is actually one of the things that makes our students so distinctive as well and one of the things that is so appreciated and welcomed by employers because they know not only are you bringing a broad general understanding of global development but you understand the importance of place and geography you will have some kind of expertise in region as well as in the more general theory and themes of global development. The second thing that perhaps marks us out is our approach to the fundamental questions of what development is and what it should be. Now of course like any group of colleagues with a large number of colleagues there isn't total agreement we have as many disagreements between ourselves as we do agreements but generally speaking in different ways and across different topics we do take a broadly critical perspective on current development orthodoxies I suppose in particular but not only challenging neoliberal based policies and approaches from dominant global development actors most of which are based in the global north and most of and we all kind of share an agreement that one of the roles of our research and our work and one of the aspirations for our teaching and for the things that our students go on to do is to encourage and help promote and support stronger voices from the governments and citizens of the global south in the debates and policy setting that affect their day to day and lives and their long-term futures and as I've already talked about all of us are involved in research and development practice and again this means that you know our department's character is shaped by the research projects that we're doing now you can go and have a look all of us have kind of a staff profile and on that we all talk about the research that we're doing so you can get a really good sense of the breadth and range of research that is being done by my colleagues across the department I'm just going to throw in a few examples just to give you some ideas of the kind of things that we're doing so Laura Hammond for example you know a globally renowned expert on issues related to migration and also to migration politics development and instability in the Horn of Africa and she's leading a major global research project which is looking at migration and migration policy with a particular view or a particular focus rather on the drivers what is it that is making or forcing people to move how are they moving and what is their experience and what are the consequences of that and this is linked into efforts to try and influence and shape and impact upon migration policy in the EU. Jonathan Goodhand another of my colleagues is working on a major research project a really interesting project looking at the way that drugs and illicit drugs and other illegal economic activity are impacting upon conflict states on public health and livelihoods and this is focused on Afghanistan and Colombia and Myanmar and the aim here is to try and develop new approaches and policy reforms that can help in post-conflict reconstruction. We also have a group that's part of the department called positives negatives and this is a really interesting group you may actually have come across some of their work they produce comics and animations and podcasts about social and humanitarian issues with a particular focus on conflict on migration on refugees and on asylum issues and actually what makes them really interesting for us is not only are they kind of doing their own projects but they're also working with colleagues so for example they've worked with Jonathan Goodhand in trying to find really innovative and interesting ways of passing out passing on the findings from his research project to reach wider audiences and to try and engage with people who wouldn't read the normal kind of academic texts where research traditionally appears so it's a really innovative way of kind of spreading out to the world and to new groups the research that is being done. I've just been working on a major project looking at with an international team of researchers looking at a major NGO that has a child sponsorship model which is something that you will certainly have come across a feature of many NGOs fundraising activities and we were also looking at the role that religion plays in shaping what this NGO does how it does it and what the opportunities but also the challenges and problems might be. The other feature of thing that makes us distinctive I think is this is the decolonization agenda now this is something you will all have heard about and I suppose in recent years the term has become by some court as anyway one of abuse as much as it is an opportunity for others who are working in this to do something exciting and different and many institutions are talking about decolonization and the way that they're trying to adopt a decolonized model to their teaching but so has actually this being something tangible a lot of the work that is being done within the UK has been led by colleagues within and across so as as a whole and it does shape the curriculum it does shape the way we teach what we teach the kind of resources that we use when we're teaching of course this is tremendously important for all the things that we believe in it so as about ensuring that everybody's voice is heard that we pay respect to those ideas and those theories and those thinkers and those activists who may be ignored in more traditional environments but it also has some really important transferable skills because it links into this idea around cultural intelligence and cultural knowledge and employers can teach people how to do basic processes it's very easy doesn't take much time but what they find it much harder to teach is this kind of level of cultural intelligence cultural awareness the an understanding that just because you and many other people think in a particular way that doesn't necessarily mean that the majority of the world does and that's sought after by employers the idea of cultural intelligence is something that is becoming much much more important and that is one of the key important outcomes of a decolonized model it's not just about doing it for issues around social justice but that's what drives us but it also has these other benefits for our students and from our teaching and finally what makes the department distinctive is we are based in SOAS SOAS is an amazing place to study it has quite rightly a global reputation for the institution and what it does because there are there's nowhere else that does it there is nowhere else that says we are going to focus on Africa and Asia and we will apply the social science humanities and arts disciplines to an understanding of that so it's full of people who have shared the same interests the same aspirations the same desire for change and for engagement with the global community that you do a library is one of the best libraries in the world for resources on Africa and Asia it's the national UK library for such resources there are every day there are events happening there are talks many of which will be relevant to your studies others you'll go to just because you find them interesting it is truly an inspirational and amazing place to study and I know that because I did all of my postgraduate degrees at SOAS so I had that same SOAS experience I should also be said actually that the fact that we're based in London makes a difference if you think about the organizations around global development so many are either based in London or have people regularly coming through London that you know even outside of SOAS there are a huge number of events seminars meetings campaigns going on that you can get involved in and that's tremendously important I think to all of our students who make use of those resources and of course you know within less than a mile you have universities of LSE you have UCL for that anyone interested in global health you have the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and these are all resources and libraries that you can make use of they also hold public events that you can go and attend and so it creates a hugely dynamic intellectual as well as activist environment that our students can get so much from as well as of course staff as well so what is it that our programs give you so our programs give you firstly a very strong and interdisciplinary social science training so you may have come from a particular discipline like economics or politics and of course you know that will feature very strongly in your studies but what's also important is understanding the way that taking a slightly different disciplinary approach and focus can give you different answers or a different perspective on a problem and by combining them it gives you a really strong foundation for acquiring new skills and for taking with you it gives you key skills in how to ask questions how to challenge orthodoxies and powers in what they're doing to explore issues and to develop your own answers your own solutions your own ideas about what can be done to create good change and it gives you an understanding of the processes that lead to global and national and regional and local social change what kind of things might be more conducive what things perhaps less so what are the challenges what are the spaces of opportunity it gives you an understanding a deep understanding of the specific issues and topics within global development whether it's migration or conflict environmental change and its impact humanitarian action agrarian change industrial development and so on and it gives you an understanding of what form they take in different regions as well as a deep understanding of the way that our interconnected and globalised world works and functions and at times fails to function of course and it gives you an intellectual home and a social and professional network that our students carry with them through the rest of their careers and their lives so we don't tell you what to think what we're trying to do what we are doing is helping you develop as critical independent thinkers so you can contribute to debates and change as informed contributors and make your challenges and make your assertions based upon expert knowledge and an expert understanding of what the evidence is and how to use it and what it's telling us and together these provide a vast range of of key knowledge platforms for a career in global development but actually I think it goes much beyond that it's not just about careers although that may be your main focus but it's about creating globally informed globally active citizens and I think that's the skills and the foundation that our programs whichever one you take give you most of our students are planning to go on and work in the global development sector or are already working in the global development sector or related area and are using this program to help develop those skills and so our programs as I've just said are designed to help you become deep thinking deeply analytical and critical participants in development processes to help you understand what kinds of intervention may be most appropriate and why help you identify how do you know what impact you've had if you've been running an intervention both intended but also unintended what are the potential consequences of different approaches and what they might be for different groups and communities and above all to think self-reflexively about what you and the organization that you're working with are doing for whom and why and these are the reason that employers like our students not just because of the knowledge that they acquire although that's really important but because of those analytical and critical skills that they refine and sharpen during their studies so as development studies alumni are known for that critical thinking they can challenge orthodoxies and assumptions in ways that are helpful in ways that are evidence backed in ways that can kind of with pinpoint precision identify what the weaknesses and challenges of particular approaches are they know the right questions to ask they know the kinds of data they need in order to justify the claims they're making when something is to show whether something is working or not working and this means our students go on to a whole range of different career options after they've finished their program some will go back to the organizations they're working for those who are kind of starting new in the sector go on to work across a whole range of organizations one of our I've thrown up in this slide in the previous one just some examples of our former students and things they've said about that program one of our former students is now the Executive Director of Care International UK we have former students who are working with organizations like the Danish Refugee Council both in Denmark but also within individual countries like Djibouti and Ethiopia we've got former students in NGOs like Action Aid Octfam Save the Children and in human rights organizations like Amnesty International whereas others have gone on to work for formal donors like DFID or JICA in Japan or the South Korean Development Organization whereas others have gone on to work for large philanthropic organizations like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation some work in areas that are not necessarily often framed within global development but are clearly related so for example one of our former students on the violence conflict and development program went on to work in the London's mayor office designing programs to deal with knife and other violent crime drawing on the skills and expertise she had developed as part of that program and others have gone on to become journalists to do PhDs to work in private sector work for private banks and so on all making use of these kind of core skills the point is that we don't have a typical destination for our alums they work in the sectors and in the places where they feel comfortable where they can make the difference they want to and one of the purposes one of the aims of our programs are to help you find that place to help you understand where you can make the difference and help you get there if anyone is thinking and here to think about doing a research degree you're coming in for an MFIL or a PhD we have a very large PhD program we have about 60 students in the department in total are undertaking a huge range of projects across a wide range of topics and a wide range of geographical regions all of the permanent staff supervise PhD students and as PhD students are a really important part of the research life of the department so just some maybe some advice here about how you go about applying for that now of course for undergraduate and postgraduate taught degrees the primary relationship is with the institutional and with the department and obviously that does matter for PhD students as well you are applying to the department of development studies after all however the main relationship is with a supervisor so you'll be supervised by a main or a first supervisor and then you have a second supervisor as well who together oversee your search providing support and advice throughout the whole process and because this is I suppose the main relationship you have to this this matters when you're thinking about how to apply so the first thing to remember is that it doesn't matter how good your research project is and how good you are in terms of your kind of intellectual experience to date if there is nobody who is capable of supervising that project because you're doing it on a topic that no one has expertise on for example then we're not going to be able to make an offer so the first thing you do before you apply it's really important to have a look at the department and see in that department who would be a good fit for your project who works on a similar area it might be they work in the same geographic area on the same country or region or it might be they work on a different country but on the same theme the same focus of your research and once you've identified that person or those people you should get in touch with them before you apply introduce yourself send them a draft copy of your research proposal and it's really important to do that we can't really make any decisions unless we see a draft proposal as well as your CV and ask them if they would be interested in supervising your project if you can kind of get an informal agreement that will really help in your application process not least because they can offer advice about how you might want to reframe your draft proposal so do go through that informal process if you can if you don't it doesn't mean that you won't be accepted it just means that it might take a bit longer because it'll have to be seen by more people rather than going directly to the right person but it can help you not least because that way you can be confident that there is someone in that institution who has the knowledge and the breadth of knowledge in order to be able to supervise you on your project in terms of how it works obviously there are some cases where this isn't the model but generally speaking in your first year you work on the theoretical background getting get into grips with what else has been written on the subject and on the various theories in order that you know what contribution you will be making and you produce an upgrade paper so essentially it will look like a chapter around 10 000 words where you explain what your project is you talk about the methods you're going to be using in your fieldwork and that is used to upgrade you from the M fill to the PhD so everyone starts as an M fill student and at the end of the first year they upgrade to the PhD with the full PhD program in your second year most people will be going off then to do their fieldwork and then in their third and their fourth year if they need it that is spent writing up most students will be coming of course back to London to do that and they'll spend that time writing up their draft thesis and then polishing it up for final submission and then examination if anyone does have any questions about the PhD program if you're thinking about applying for that obviously you can ask those in the discussion that will follow so what is it that we're looking for so again you'll have seen from our websites that you know are kind of standard core admission criteria which is basically the equivalent of a second class degree or higher in a relevant subject and by relevant we generally mean a social science subject but and I think this is really important for you to remember we look at all applications so if you don't fall into that category but you think you can make a strong case for why you should be accepted then you should get in touch with us you should apply you can always get in touch with the admissions tutor before you formally apply to explain and get their advice as to what the prospects are for you being expected we have people who come from all kinds of backgrounds people who've done fine art degrees have done physical sciences or engineering degrees as well as kind of the standard social science degree we've accepted people in the past who have had no degree but they've had really good you know long-term experience of working in global development so if you don't fit that pattern don't assume that you won't be accepted but do get in touch with the relevant admissions tutor and perhaps talk to them and ask them what kind of things they would like to see in order for them to be able to make a decision because most importantly we're looking for students who are motivated who care about the world and finding their place in addressing global challenges we're looking for students who are curious who are willing to think about new ideas who are willing to have their own views and assumptions challenged to think about how others perceive the world people who are prepared to challenge common assumptions and common sense and inverted commas and understand why they're doing so and think about what the alternative solutions or answers or debates might be and we're looking for students who take a global perspective on the issues we face today and the issues we'll be facing tomorrow and thereafter because it's our students who really make the department what it is and we're really proud of our current and our former students who've gone on to do some truly amazing things our students are really engaged whilst they're studying campaigning demanding change helping us frame what it is that our programs do and they take those skills that knowledge and that passion with them when they graduate so of course we'd love to have you join us and help you reach your potential as global change leaders and finally I've seen there's a question there I'll come back to that when I open up for questions so please do have a look at our websites this has all of the information that you need to help you make a decision it has outlines of all the programs it has the detailed structure of what that program would look like what modules you would take as well as if you click through onto those modules you can see exactly what each individual module focuses on you can also find details of all of my colleagues including the admissions tutor for the programs and if you have a specific question about that program please do feel free to reach out to them just email them and you can ask any kind of question you want or you can email me I can always pass things on whichever you prefer so look as I've said it's our students who make the program we're really proud of all of our students so it would be great to see you here with us next year or perhaps the year after to help you reach your potential as global change leaders so what I'm going to do we've got about 15 minutes or so for questions so if you want to ask a question you can either put it in the chat site as user I had done as done and I'm going to respond to that one first or if you put your electronic hand up I will see it and I'll call on you to ask your question please don't be embarrassed to ask a question if you want to ask it it's almost certain that someone else wants to hear the answer to it as well but if you don't if you if you don't want to ask a question in a public setting that's fine or if you after this is finished you suddenly remember the question that you wanted to ask you can always get in touch with me separately and ask it that way um so user has asked um if your undergraduate degree does not have a strong link to the program how can you compensate compensate for that besides work experience okay look so this what we're looking for that's a good question so essentially is you know if you don't have that kind of social science degree uh which is the the the basic qualification that we're looking for uh what do you need to do in order to persuade us that you would be good uh you would be kind of suitable for this program so there I think it's about explaining why you're interested in global development so it may be that you have been involved in um some kind of student organization or you've been involved in some kind of campaign or some kind of process you've done volunteering work so you should make sure you mention that some people this is kind of an entirely new change of direction they've kind of reflected on what they're doing and they decided actually no although I don't have much experience in this I want to move on so there I think it's about explaining your reasons explaining your rationale for why you wanted to do this project and it can really help if we're clear that you have actually looked at what we're doing looked at what we're teaching and you've used that so you're saying the reason I want to do this program is because and you can show how the things that we're teaching the structure fits in with what you want to do um the best thing to do is to get in touch with the admissions tutor before you apply and speak to them and just say who you are give your background give your reasons and then they can give you specific advice um and even just doing that shows that you're keen shows that you're interested uh and that's of course one of the major things we're looking for I'm just going to take a couple that I've seen have come up in the chat then I'll come to you Kumar um so uh John asks if ICT for development is available for research or a cover topic at university we don't have a specific module on that John um we do have PhD students who are looking at that so a PhD you get to define the project you want to do so it isn't a question of whether we do it we'll do it if a PhD student it'll be done because that PhD student is doing it um at master's level you know we have lots of master students who look at those kind of issues particularly as part of their dissertation so for example it happens that you know two of my master students last year looked at those kind of issues fintech and other ICT issues as part of that so you can build it into your program even if it isn't a specific module um I'm just going to take one more from the chat then I'll come to you Kumar so Junior has asked a question and I imagine all of you are thinking about which is about tips on scholarships and financial aid the sad thing is and I you know I really wish this wasn't the case it is really difficult to get scholarships it is really difficult to get that kind of support it's not impossible um so the best way you can maximize your chances are firstly have a look and see what scholarship have a look at the scholarship page on the SOAS website because that has a list not only of the scholarships that are offered by us as an institution but other scholarships that are available to our students some of them will depend on your nationality or on other factors so it's really useful to get a sense of the full range of what you can apply for in most cases have a look for deadlines if you're thinking of applying for a scholarship it probably means you need to have applied by the end of this year by the beginning of early in 2022 and then think about the deadlines because many most of them will expect you to have an offer of a place before they consider you so the earlier you apply the better it maximizes your chances of getting a scholarship but the first point of port of call have a look at the scholarships page on the SOAS website which would outline all of the scholarships that are available it does get updated if new ones come in so if you looked at it a few months ago it would still be worth going and having another look okay I'm going to go to the main room now and just take a couple of questions and then I'll come back to the chat site. Kumar go ahead. I'll put my camera on probably it's easy to see so thank you very much Michael and I'm an alumni of SOAS having done a Masters in Global Diplomacy my questions are the following I'm very much interested in pursuing something linked to ethics and in the world of development international development so what would be the links with the faculty on philosophy and the second is the fieldwork that you mentioned for a poster for a PhD in the second year can that be combined I'm based in Europe and I'm working at a full-time job could that be combined with what I'm doing as as work and could in some way with regular visits to SOAS there be a sort of an online component that would supplement following the PhD. Yeah those are good questions so I think in terms of the PhD obviously your projects sometimes span departments and so what we would tend to do there is to think of your first if you applied to the development studies department your first supervisor will be a member of the development studies department because obviously your thesis has to reflect that discipline so you need that kind of advice and support but we would probably think then about is there someone in the philosophy department who works on this kind of issue actually there are also people in the politics department who works on work on issues around ethics so depending exactly what you want to do but your research committee would be built up of people who have expertise in that knowledge and of course you know as a PhD student you know often our PhD students are taking master's modules to get kind of background knowledge and they can take those across the university we work out what is relevant for them and their needs rather than saying it just has to be done within the department just to do a quick segue for master's students that you know one of the good things about our program is that it also allows you to take what we call open options and these are these are modules that are offered from across the university as a whole that may not look like they're directly relevant to development studies but these allow you to choose things that you're interested in as well as that development studies in terms of the online we don't have the capacity at the moment to do online teaching for the PhD process I think the best thing to do would be to identify a potential supervisor and then talk to them about the way that it might work and what might be required we do have a residency requirement for the first year but you know I think you need to have those kind of conversations with the potential supervisor and to see what might be done but sadly at the moment we don't have an online facility for PhD it's in discussion so it may occur but I don't know I'm not involved in that working group so I couldn't give you any timelines on that um Jackie you've got your you're welcome Jackie you've got your hand up Jackie Habib Hi yes thanks so much for this information Michael my question is regarding part-time online studies I'm interested in both the MSc in humanitarian action and in international development and I'm trying to understand the structure of both programs a little more so I understand that there is modules in April and October and so I just want to ask a little bit about how that's structured and I also don't see on the website a deadline for the April start so I'm wondering if you know what that is yeah that's a good question I don't have to know what the deadline for the April start is I imagine that it's I mean I suspect that you could still for the online program I think you can probably still apply in March if you can you if you email me after this if you send me a direct email I'll follow up and then I'll get back to you on that issue of the deadline if you just remind me of the question in terms of yeah yeah in terms of the actual structure yeah so we have two start dates because people taking the online program are often working full-time so it's a slightly different structure we know people will come to it in in different places so the timing is different as you know I suppose it's the structure is the same as any program in that you know we have these times when these modules are running so you would either you know once you're on the program you'll probably take some modules in April then you'll take other modules in October and you'll gradually build up the credits overall and they they run kind of you know they run online but they have kind of a timetable so they run over a set number of weeks and they have those set sessions obviously the the modules themselves might look a little bit different depending on what they're done depending on which department they run out of some of the the modules are on different department the best thing for any kind if you're interested in one of those programs and you have a very specific question about the structure the best thing to do would be to email the convener and the admissions tutor they're the same person so and they can give you very specific advice on that specific program or on an individual module within that but if you email me after this then we can carry on because I will have to find out and get back to you on that sure thanks so much Michael and if you're able to just share your email address again that would be helpful yeah sorry let me just go back there we go I'll leave that slide up so that gives all of us thank you okay I'll take uh so I've got Susanna and then I'll go back to the chat site hi hi thank you thank you very much I have an anthropology background and I'm very interested in political ecology so I I read that the master's in environmental politics and development has a strong approach on that and I was wondering I've also noticed that there's like a new master's in anthropology named anthropology of global futures and sustainability so I wanted to ask you if you can tell me a little about a little about the difference between those programs yeah I can't really because I don't it's in the anthropology department so I don't I mean I don't if it's new as well I don't know anything about it and so I I wouldn't feel confident enough to give you accurate information I think the best thing to do there is to um have a look at the structures you can put them up side by side and you can look at the structures the main the main thing that I can talk about is that you know in the anthropology department the approach is anthropological um so that will be the the disciplinary focus in the development studies department you we have many anthropologists in the department but the overall approach of the program is not vested in any one particular discipline so for example you may choose a module within the department that that doesn't take an anthropological approach that might take a political economy might take a mixed approach you might might take a whole range of different approaches so I suppose if you're looking for something that is solely within the anthropological discipline then that might be a factor in choosing which program will be most suitable if it's on the topics and the best way to do that is to kind of just put up the two structures side by side see what specific modules you take as part of that program and then get a sense for whether one more meets your kind of needs than the other um but you know we're a small university so the reality is that you know our students take modules in the anthropology department students in the anthropology department take our modules so there's an awful lot of overlap um as well so if they're not complete separate silos um so I think you just need to kind of get a sense for which program structure works for you best thanks look I'm just going to go back I'll ask if we've got time I'll come back uh actually that may maybe aren't any more hands up okay I'll just go to back to the chat site so someone is asking is wanting to apply to the gender studies and the development with gender reference um and as two of your options should you include your interest in development in your personal statement I think if yeah I think it's always worth giving as much information about your intentions and your interests and your background and your personal statement no matter what program uh you're applying for um because it tells whichever program you're applying for it just tells us kind of who you are as a student in a way that kind of a university transcript or even a CV can't really tell us so yeah I would certainly put some of that in particularly if you're kind of applying uh for one or the other of the programs um so Olivia's maybe it's not quite similar but in a similar area perhaps Olivia is asking if you're unsuccessful in getting into your first choice course are you able to apply to another yes yeah you can uh you can apply to other courses that's fine um if you're unsure about whether you will be accepted um I strongly just just get in touch with the pro the admissions tutor and say you know what do you think um you know again it it tells us something firstly that you are keen enough to to get in touch um and we'll we'll always get back to you and and and consider you so um yes you can but you know hopefully you'll get your first choice okay uh so bonka's asking about if I can expand on the humanitarian humanitarianism aid and conflict program um I mean again I think the best thing here if you have pro questions about a specific program I mean obviously I you know I know the mic if I help set it up um but of course the really detailed granular knowledge will be those uh by the the the person who is running that module and as I've said you know the admissions tutor and the program convener are the same person so for anything very specific get in touch with that convener because they can give you a really detailed view and they can kind of even tell you you know in this module these are the the things we look at week by week as part of that module um in terms of kind of more general comments I guess about humanitarianism um it's I mean it as the title suggests this is a focus not on on global development but actually on humanitarian action so responding when people are in need you know in during emergencies be that conflict be that natural disaster and so on so the module as a whole is looking at the challenges for humanitarian organizations the debates uh and uh difficulties with the way the humanitarian principles operate but also looks at you know what what does it mean to be in the midst of a humanitarian emergency for those kind of communities and individuals on the ground so it's very much embedded within humanitarian discourses and debates rather than global development of course there's overlap of course because of the modules you can take um you will get a sense uh of both more broadly but it's very much focused within that particular area uh and students can kind of bring their own experience and bring their own interests in terms of geographic regions to the way that they study and the things they look at their answers they might focus on in their essays and so on as is true of course for all of the programs but get in touch with the convener Alfea Maria Rivas and she'll be able to kind of really talk you through the the nitty gritty of that program uh I'm going to just take one more from the chat and then I'll go um back to the main room so Gabriella is asking if someone's interests and personal statements are aligned with the program does being a recent graduate make a huge difference during the admissions process look you know we we don't you know we have students you know maybe half of our students are what we would call recent graduates you know either they've literally just finished their undergraduate program or within a year or two and the other half are coming with a bit more work experience and and both groups are welcome and do really well within our department we don't particularly distinguish between that what we're looking for are you know do you have you know if you have that kind of basic um uh you know that second-class degree in a relevant subject um then you know obviously that means we know that you're going to be capable of doing the program we will still look at your personal statement and that's what we're looking for there is I supposed to get a sense of who you are but perhaps you don't need to do as much persuading in that personal statement as you might do if you don't have that second-class degree in a relevant and a social science degree so it's very it's important to do and we look at all elements and we consider all elements it's just if you don't have kind of that relevant degree issue that's when you need to do a little bit more work in your personal statement uh than someone who does have that um if I if for anyone whose question I've kind of tried to answer if I haven't answered it properly before um apologies I can only take one more question because I think this room is going to be used by the next person but if you if you have next presentation but if you have any questions uh and I haven't answered them and I know that I haven't answered them get in touch with me and I can answer them by email um Kristen I can take one more quick question I think okay so thank you for sharing I want to know more about a master of research in international development is it more recommend if I have PhD study plan because I haven't decided whether should I pay PhD but I have some interest about research yeah I mean it it doesn't it exists because we need it to have I mean it's a good program and I'm not going to put anyone off it it but it doesn't make a difference as to whether you need to do um whether you want to go on and do a PhD the only difference it makes is for those people who already have funding for a one-year masters followed straight away by a PhD program because the funders then want them to take that specific program but if you whatever program you take you can take an option for example an optional module on research methods and all of the programs that we offer we consider and other institutions consider extremely good training for going on to do a PhD so my advice to everyone thinking about a degree no matter what institution you're thinking about is find the degree that you are most interested in worry less about the title and more about the content and does that match are you going to be excited to do that and if you are then that's the program for you if not maybe you want to to look around at another one but all masters programs in global development are excellent training for those who want to go on to do a PhD or of course for those who want to go on and do something different to work in a career and so on thanks everyone I'm aware there's a huge number of questions please email me with them I'll get back to you as soon as I can with answers I'm sorry we didn't have more time for questions but thanks everyone for coming and if you haven't got a question now but you have one that comes up again get in touch with me and I'll do my best to answer it thanks everyone