The Glasgow School of Art (GSA) has secured significant investment as part of the UKRI Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC)’s newly announced Doctoral Focal Awards programme announced today, 3rd July. The award is designed to champion the next generation of researchers and academics, offering future-facing training in areas vital to the UK’s creative economy and societal well-being.
The funding will enable the GSA, in collaboration with the Open University and Scotland’s Rural College (SRUC), to create a distributed training college of twenty doctoral researchers, recruited from across Scotland’s rural and island communities. The seven-year programme of doctoral study and enterprise training will support PhD researchers based in these communities, developing talent in situ and helping to address regional inequalities and underrepresentation in the doctoral college and creative economy, in support of national economic ambitions.
Building on the GSA’s growing rural footprint— including its Highlands & Islands campus and newly launched GSA Rural Lab research centre, both based in Moray— this award represents a strategic expansion of the GSA’s presence across Scotland, and a significant investment in place-driven and craft-led innovation, enterprise, and knowledge exchange.
The GSA’s vision, titled ‘A Golden Thread: Crafting the Creative Economy from Scotland’s Highlands, Lowlands & Islands’, aims to strengthen Scotland’s craft sector— a vital, 80% women-led industry that contributes an estimated £70 million every year to the Scottish economy, yet remains undervalued as an industrial sector. The programme aims to generate wider economic and social impacts through supporting interdisciplinary study at the intersection of craft and future-focused industries such as space, biomaterials, and regenerative design.
This world-class doctoral training programme is designed to drive and embed enterprise, innovation, and economic progress, while opening new pathways into doctoral study for underrepresented communities.
“This significant AHRC Focal Award is a powerful endorsement of our vision for place-driven, innovation-led education. It enables the GSA to extend our footprint across rural Scotland, creating a distributed training model that connects local creative and craft economies with national priorities and global agendas,” says Professor Penny Macbeth, Director & Principal of The Glasgow School of Art.
“Critically, this transformative investment addresses underrepresentation in the doctoral college as well as Scotland’s craft sector, closely aligning with and building on the work of GSA Rural Lab, launched in April this year and positioning us as a key player in Scotland’s rural economic strategy.”
Professor Irene McAra-McWilliam OBE, Deputy Director and Vice Principal (Research and Innovation) at The Glasgow School of Art, and Director of the GSA Highlands & Islands Campus, adds: “By fostering research talent in communities across Scotland’s Highlands, Islands and Lowlands, this programme will tackle regional inequalities and unlock fresh creative potential. This award is not just an investment in doctoral training – it’s an investment in Scotland’s creative innovation economy and in the global impact of rural enterprise.”
“At the heart of this programme is equality of access to world-class postgraduate training”, says Dr Clare Devaney, GSA Senior Researcher (Innovation) and Project Lead.
‘Innovations include wraparound mental health and wellbeing support for students and supervisors, a bespoke package of industry-led coaching, mentoring and enterprise development training, digitally enabled delivery and ‘in motion’ evaluation. We are delighted to lead this programme from GSA Rural Lab, and look forward to working with our academic, sector and community partners in realising its transformative potential.”
“Scotland’s Highlands, Islands and Lowlands represent some of the most resource-constrained environments. The best of human ingenuity and innovation is required to overcome these challenges and pioneer sustainable living,” says Dr Mahesh Anand, Professor of Planetary Science and Exploration at The Open University, and one of the proponents of the project.
“It is exciting to see this project funded, resulting from our Knowledge Exchange activities associated with the 2024 European Lunar Symposium, organised by the OU in Scotland. The theme of this award has parallels with working and living in space, which is another example of a resource-constrained environment. This doctoral award paves the way to engage the creative minds from the Scottish rural communities, harnessing their experience and expertise, in using local craft for sustainable living and contributing towards the next big leap for humanity by enabling sustainable exploration of space.”
Recruitment for the GSA-led PhD programme will start in January 2026, with the first cohort beginning in September 2026. The programme will grow to 20 students by 2029/30, with graduations until 2033. Read the AHRC Focal Awards full press release HERE.
For further information please contact press@gsa.ac.uk
NOTES FOR EDITORS
About the Arts and Humanities Research Council
The UKRI Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) funds internationally outstanding independent researchers across the whole range of the arts and humanities: history, archaeology, digital content, philosophy, languages and literature, design, heritage, area studies, the creative and performing arts, and much more. The quality and range of research supported by AHRC works for the good of UK society and culture and contributes both to UK economic success and to the culture and welfare of societies across the globe.
About The Glasgow School of Art (GSA)
The Glasgow School of Art (GSA) is internationally recognised as one of Europe’s leading independent university-level institutions for education and research in the visual creative disciplines. Our studio-based, specialist, practice-led teaching, learning and research draw talented individuals with a shared passion for visual culture and creative production from all over the world. Originally founded in 1845 as one of the first Government Schools of Design, the School’s history can be traced back to 1753 and the establishment of the Foulis Academy delivering a European-style art education. Today, the GSA is an international community of over 3500 students and staff across architecture, design, fine art, innovation and technology in our campuses in Glasgow and Altyre (in the Scottish Highlands) and a thriving Open Studio programme delivering non-degree provision to over 1500 students annually.
About The Open University in Scotland
The Open University (OU) is the largest academic institution in the UK and a world leader in flexible supported online learning. Since it began in 1969, the OU has taught more the OU has taught more than 2.2 million students worldwide and currently has over 200,000 students, including over 19,300 in Scotland. 82% of the OU’s research impact is assessed to be world-leading or internationally excellent (Research Excellence Framework, 2021) and our teaching has received the Gold rating in the Office for Students (OfS) 2023 Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF).
The OU in Scotland is the largest provider of part-time undergraduate higher education in Scotland and has ranked first in Scotland for student satisfaction in the National Student Survey 2024. The OU works with Scotland’s employers and businesses to provide high quality learning and skills including a range of funding to enable training. 72% of OU students in Scotland are in full-time or part-time employment, and three out of four FTSE 100 companies have sponsored staff to take OU courses.
For further information please visit The Open University.
About SRUC
Scotland’s Rural College (SRUC) was established in 2012 through the merger of the Scottish Agricultural College (SAC) with Barony, Elmwood and Oatridge Colleges. Through these institutions, we can trace our lineage back over 100 years. Today, SRUC is on a journey to become Scotland’s enterprise university at the heart of our sustainable natural economy.
Our mission is to create and mobilise knowledge and talent – partnering locally and globally to benefit Scotland’s natural economy. To achieve this, we draw upon SRUC’s longstanding strengths in world-class and sector-leading research, learning and teaching, skills and training and consultancy (through SAC Consulting).
A natural economy is fuelled by responsible use of our natural resources: people, land, energy, water, animals and plants. It is an interlinked, shared, living system that creates opportunities and prosperity. It is multi-scale, dynamic and resilient through creative management and mindful custodianship.
By focussing on the sustainable natural economy, SRUC will strive to lead the way in delivering economic, social and environmental benefits for all, in Scotland, and beyond.
