University of Technology, Sydney

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Research Strength

Postgraduate program

PhD in Institutional Arrangements for Decentralised Sanitation Systems in Developing Country Contexts Scholarship applications close 26 June 2013

The Institute offers a Doctoral program in Sustainable Futures (three years full time) and a Masters by Research program in Sustainable Futures (two years full time) but no undergraduate or course work degrees. ISF supports postgraduate study that addresses complex societal problems and the challenges of creating change towards a sustainable future.

Sustainability and sustainable development is a broad area. Hence, topics covered by our graduates and current students are diverse, ranging from water policy to climate change to creating change in the building industry. We have plenty of ideas about future sustainability research as well, which you can find on our research topic pages.

Sustainability is a complex and challenging area. Postgraduate researchers at the Institute will typically work across multiple disciplines, while seeking to create tangible change towards sustainable futures. We recognise that our postgraduate researchers need high-quality support to meet their objectives and we have developed a program of activities such as retreats, peer groups, workshops and seminars to help create a supportive community of scholars.

The Institute supports students taking an interdisciplinary approach to research whilst building on their existing expertise. Prospective research students must demonstrate from either their past research or course work, employment or community activities their capacity to solve whole problems, integrating knowledge from several disciplines. If you think you'd be interested in studying at ISF, please follow our internal application process.

The Director of ISF's postgraduate program, Professor Cynthia Mitchell won a prestigious Associate Fellowship from the Carrick Institute (now called the Australian Learning and Teaching Council) to investigate the issues associated with assessing the quality of transdisciplinary research. The outcomes of her research include the following two papers and two workshop resources:

  • Quality in interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary postgraduate research and its supervision: ideas for good practice. Download/view PDF (553.82KB)
  • Quality criteria for inter- and trans-disciplinary doctoral research outcomes. Download/view PDF (533.24KB)
  • Zen and the art of transdisciplinary postgraduate research: workshop resources. Download/view PDF (343.88KB)
  • Quality in interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary postgraduate research and its supervision: workshop slides. Download/view powerpoint slides (6.1MB)