News and Blog

We are very pleased to announce that Dr Rhys Jones of Aberystwyth University is the new convenor of WISERD’s Language, Citizenship and Identity thematic reference group. Dr Jones succeeds Professor Graham Day of the School of Social Sciences at Bangor University. We would like to thank Professor Day for steering the group and for his…

WISERD wins £1M to evaluate “one of the most important educational policies since devolution in Wales” Researchers based at Cardiff University have secured a £1M bid – commissioned by the Welsh Government – to evaluate the Foundation Phase early years education policy. The high-profile team, led by researchers at the Wales Institute of Social and…

An innovative biomapping research project funded by WISERD was presented at the recent Royal Geographical Society / Institute of British Geographers Conference in London (31st August – 2nd September 2011). The annual event is the second largest geography conference in the world, attracting 1300 speakers and 1500 delegates. The research, devised and constructed by Dr…

An exciting project at WISERD is encouraging social science researchers to test and review new geoportal software. The WISERD Geoportal (WGP) initiative aims to develop a web-based software application to enhance a researcher’s ability to discover socio-economic research data relating to Wales. Run by the WISERD Data Integration Team, the WGP hopes to encourage collaborative…

As part of the second phase of the research programme, WISERD researchers have begun working on a series of mini-projects. These projects build on existing research undertaken by WISERD to date and enable further analysis of key themes and issues identified during the first phase of the WISERD research programme. The projects are diverse in…

Knowing Localities, the WISERD localities programme, is an integral part of the research being undertaken by WISERD. A key activity undertaken by the localities team over the past 24 months has been the stakeholder interview programme.  With the fieldwork now fully completed, and second stage analysis fully underway, WISERD research staff (and a wider tranche…

Professor Gareth Rees has been elected to the Fellowship of the Learned Society of Wales in the most recent round of nominations. Fellows are elected to the Society for demonstrating a record of excellence and achievement in academia and for making distinguished contributions to the world of learning that are used by other learned societies….

Residents of Grangetown in Cardiff are being encouraged to explore their neighbourhood through producing audio walks. The ongoing ‘Sounding the Way’ project funded by Beacon for Wales, is led by Dr Kate Moles of WISERD Cardiff and Angharad Saunders of Glamorgan University in conjunction with Voluntary Action Cardiff. As one of the more deprived areas…

The Welsh Government has announced that it will be supporting four research studies into the economy of Wales by awarding them with Economic Research Grants. These grants have been designed to help develop research capacity and widen knowledge of the economy in Wales by encouraging innovative, smaller-scale economic research. Researchers at WISERD will be involved…

On 28th and 29th June 2011 colleagues from across the WISERD partner Universities, invited speakers, representatives of voluntary organisations, postgraduate students and representatives from the public sector met in Swansea to present their work at the second WISERD conference. Over 140 delegates attended what is quickly becoming established as the major ‘shop window’ for social…