Career Development Academy

Strategy

The five-year strategy of the GOSH-BRC Career Development Academy (CDA) will ensure that we continue to attract, train and retain innovative future leaders of translational medicine relating to childhood, ensuring sustained and increased capacity nationally. We will achieve this in partnership with our Junior Faculty (JF) by providing focused support for all postgraduate career stages, across all professions, whilst ensuring equity for all. We will deliver this through training schemes including internships, PhD studentships and post-doctoral fellowships, alongside mentoring and opportunities for ECRs to gain leadership experience.

Objectives

We will:

• support individuals from any non-medical background to develop research careers: through our flagship Nursing/AHP Internship scheme which will expand to include all non-medical healthcare professionals
• train future academic leaders: by appointing clinical and non-clinical PhD students and fellows
• support Doctors, Nurses, AHPs, HCS and non-clinical scientists, to submit competitive post-doctoral fellowship applications: through our competitive JF led ‘Catalyst Fellowship scheme, and new bridging fellowships to support nurses, AHPs and HCS. All ECRs will be able to access a programme of peer review, chalkboard seminars, mock interviews and mentoring.
• deliver local and national paediatric training activities for those at GOSH, UCL and beyond: providing bite-sized videos; training courses; pan-London translational paediatric training programme; national academic paediatric residential courses; interdisciplinary knowledge transfer partnerships between clinical and non-clinical researchers, AHPs and HCS; establishing joint innovative surgical-scientist training programme with Alder Hey.
• support mid-career researchers to submit funding applications and their transition to independence/group leader positions: through a programme of peer review, chalkboard seminars, mock interviews, mentoring and support from JF and Senior BRC members.

Work in areas of strategic need

Ensuring future capacity for childhood translational medicine by:

• attracting, training and retaining future leaders in areas where critical mass is lacking e.g., genomics, bioinformatics, health data science
• ensuring all wider healthcare professionals are eligible for support
• maximising career progression particularly at later postdoctoral levels, especially for nurses, AHPs and HCS.

Pathways to impact

• Monitoring numbers of individuals: applying for CDA schemes, attending career development events, applying for internal and external funding and the outcome. Recording support received and their healthcare speciality alongside next destinations
• Gathering attendee feedback
• Recording numbers of papers published and CDA members receiving prizes
• Capturing data relating to EDI across all areas above to inform future policies and ensure equity for all.

Collaboration

We will collaborate nationally with other centres:

• through our Paediatric Excellence Initiative partner hospitals: joint PhDs, joint JF committees, access to catalyst awards, digital resources, internship programmes
• offering training, including courses and videos, and our bespoke academic paediatric residential courses for clinical and non-clinical researchers, AHPs, nurses and HCS.

We will collaborate locally with:

• GOSH departments including the Learning Academy (GLA), Clinical Research Facility (CRF) and Centre for Outcomes and Experience Research in Children’s Health Illness and Disability (ORCHID); and the UCL Academic Careers Office to support health-related academic careers and to develop translational research development opportunities. Courses and videos developed will be available nationally through a translational research hub.