Government Social Research
Early plans are being put in place for the next DWP Social Researchers’ conference which is scheduled to take place in the first half of June.
Over the last year DWP has seen large numbers of researchers moving away from central social research teams in London and Sheffield to be located with policy and analyst colleagues in multi-disciplinary teams focusing on specific areas of DWP’s policy work. As well as this, DWP has recently recruited ten new researchers into the department.
These two things together mean that it is vital to have regular events to help people maintain their networks across the profession and to make sure that people have the opportunity to learn more about the work of other teams working in similar areas.
DWP’s June conference is intended to meet these needs and will be themed around professional skills in government and specialist skills for social researchers. In addition, part of the day will follow the format of the successful poster conference of November 2004 in asking various research teams to design and present an A3 sized poster summarising their work.