Academic Quality Framework Chapter 17, Part C

Introduction

1. The PhD Programme Management Board, University of Kent and Northeastern University London (‘the PhD PMB’) will ensure that only appropriately qualified and prepared students will be admitted to research courses. The admissions process provides assurance that balanced and independent admissions decisions are made and that admissions procedures are clear, consistently applied and demonstrate equality of opportunity.

Procedure

2. Prospective students are required to submit a CV and covering letter indicating how their skills and experience are suitable for the proposed research project. All applications received by Northeastern University London (‘the University’) will be forwarded to the Doctoral School (‘DS’).
3. The DS is responsible for ensuring that all applications are reviewed by the University’s primary supervisor and the University of Kent’s second primary supervisor. All candidates must be interviewed by the supervisory team in person, via Teams or via a similar virtual system before an offer of admission can be considered.
4. The PhD PMB has responsibility for ensuring that the candidate meets the criteria for admission:
   1. The candidate holds a good UK second class honours degree or better (or equivalent qualification/experience);
   2. The candidate meets the approved programme’s specification criteria for competence in English;
   3. The skills and experience of the candidate are appropriate for the proposed area of research and fall within the scope of the programme for which the candidate has applied.
5. The DS must also be satisfied that there exist sufficient facilities to provide all students on research courses with a suitable research environment such as research centres/connection to Signature Research Themes.
6. The DS must allocate supervisors with the appropriate research experience while at the same time ensuring that no one supervisor is overloaded with supervisory responsibilities.
7. Recommendations on approval for all applications must be made by the appropriate DS in conjunction with the subject-area nominees.
8. Formal offers of admission are made by the University Admissions Office. The DS should make clear recommendations on matters such as the need for preliminary or additional courses, so that these can be specified in the offer and brought to the attention of the student and their sponsors where relevant.

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