News, Jobs, Events, Opportunities and lots more...
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A quick round up of this week's news, jobs and opportunities
News
Reflections on ACCESS Leadership College Retreat 2025
A couple of weeks ago we enjoyed three wonderful days at the ACCESS Leadership College Retreat at Dartington Hall.
ACCESS Director, Patrick Devine-Wright said:
"The 2025 ACCESS Leadership College retreat was a great success! A highlight was the contribution of Gemma Harper, Chair of the JNCC, [pictured] who gave an impassioned, personal, inspiring and thoughtful keynote on environmental leadership that was appreciated by everyone who was there. We look forward to the continuing involvement of Gemma and the JNCC in ACCESS in the future."
And Birgitta Gatersleben, ACCESS Co-Director added:
"The college fellows now know each other well and there was a great positive atmosphere in which people discussed challenges and innovative ideas. Michael Winter introduced Task Force 2, which focuses on Nature Recovery. His introduction inspired a fascinating discussion around the meaning and value of nature. It also highlighted the value and importance of reflecting on our own personal relationship with nature and the impact this has on our work in research and practice. These ideas will be brought back to the TF2 team and will be hugely beneficial for shaping the ongoing work."
Interview with Dr Gemma Harper OBE, Chief Executive of the JNCC
ACCESS interviewed Dr Gemma Harper at the Leadership College Retreat.
Gemma spoke about her experience as a social scientist running the JNCC, about why we need to tell better stories to bring about the changes we need to see, and about how hope and responsibility influence her own style of environmental leadership.
You can watch the interview above or by clicking here.
Now Enrolling: ACCESS Summer School 2025
Monday 22 – Wednesday 24 September, Cumberland Lodge, Windsor
Join a small group of environmental social scientists from diverse sectors at our third residential ACCESS Summer School.
ACCESS Summer School focuses on fostering collaborative research. This retreat-style event will provide a relaxed and friendly environment in which to:
- Build relationships across sectors
- Develop and practice skills for collaboration
- Scope collaborative research ideas
We will address three main themes; nature and biodiversity, circular economies, and liveable cities.
Delegates can be working in any sector, but must be working in the UK and can be at any career stage, but we especially encourage those at an early career or mid career stage to register.
Deadline for applications: Friday 13 June
Events
Apocalyptic Authoritarianism: Climate Crisis, Media, and Power
Monday 19 May 2025, 4 – 5pm, online
The Centre for Climate Communication and Data Science (C3DS) is presenting a webinar by Prof Hanna E. Morris (Assistant Professor at the School of the Environment at the University of Toronto), who will discuss her new book Apocalyptic Authoritarianism: Climate Crisis, Media, and Power.
Email c3ds@exeter.ac.uk to register
Leading from the Middle – empowering Early Career Researchers
Tuesday 24 June & Tuesday 1 July, 9.15am – 1pm, online, OR
Wednesday 25 June, 9.30am – 4.30pm, Loughborough University
Led by Dr Katy Mahoney, this in-person course from C-DICE (Centre for Postdoctoral Development in Infrastructure, Cities and Energy) is designed for postdoctoral and early career researchers (ECRs) navigating the complexities of managing relationships with senior academics while mentoring junior colleagues.
It provides practical strategies for effective upward management and mentorship, addressing the unique pressures faced in these roles. You will learn techniques for advocating your own
research needs, supporting junior colleagues, and balancing these often competing demands.
Key topics include:
- Techniques for advocating research and career development needs
- Strategies for supporting junior researchers
- Enhancing communication skills for research-related leadership
Save the date: British Environmental Psychology Society (BrEPS) Conference 2025
Thursday 4 – Friday 5 September, University of Nottingham
The conference theme is “Maximising Environmental Psychology's impact for Sustainability, Equity, and Social Transformation”.
There will be a mix of keynotes, research presentations, posters, workshops, and symposia, plus networking opportunities, social activities, and access to the restorative benefits of the University Park campus.
The conference will be free. All are welcome to attend. Students and early career researchers are highly encouraged. To promote inclusivity and lower the carbon footprint of participants, they will be dedicating a session within the conference to virtual presentations. Due to limited availability, contributions from researchers in emerging economies and the Global South will be prioritised for the virtual presentation slots.
Email any questions to: info@breps.co.uk
Jobs
Project Managers and Senior Project Managers, Environment Agency (SE England)
The Environment Agency is recruiting Project Managers and Senior Project Managers to lead and deliver innovative projects that reduce the risk of flooding to communities and enhance the environment across the South-East.
You will manage project delivery process from initial strategic planning, through to feasibility, detailed design and then into construction and handover.
Deadline for applications: Sunday 11 May, 11.55pm
Postdoctoral Research Associate in Biodiversity and Health, Leipzig
The Helmholtz-Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ) and the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) in Leipzig are looking to recruit a postdoctoral research associate in Biodiversity and Health. The postdoc will be working in Professor Aletta Bonn's Biodiversity and People Lab.
German is not a requirement as English is the working language of the lab.
Deadline for applications: Sunday 18 May
Postdoctoral Research Fellow, UK Energy Research Centre & University of Edinburgh
The University of Edinburgh is recruiting a postdoctoral Research Fellow, with expertise in energy and society, to research the relational and place-based aspects of energy efficiency retrofit and heat decarbonisation.
You will join the UK Energy Research Centre’s current phase of whole systems energy research and also act as deputy lead for research on Affordability, Justice and Economic Impacts.
You will conduct research into the development and delivery of neighbourhood-based energy retrofit and heat decarbonisation programmes. This will involve working with communities and delivery agencies to review interventions, delivery mechanisms, outcomes and the role of socio-cultural relations in supporting equitable place-based delivery. The post will carry out research in the West Midlands, and possibly other locations, working closely with local retrofit organisations.
Deadline for applications: Monday 2 June
Senior Coordinator for Research Facilitation and Management, University of Vienna
The Environment and Climate Research Hub (ECH) at the University of Vienna is looking for a Senior Coordinator for Research Facilitation and Management.
If you're passionate about tackling climate change, biodiversity loss, pollution and social change, and ready to help shape the future of research across disciplines—this is your chance to advance interdisciplinary environmental and climate research.
You will:
- Coordinate high-impact research activities
- Facilitate cross-disciplinary collaboration
- Engage with leading scientists and societal partners
- Help drive capacity-building and innovative science support
- Engage with and get to know a diverse group of scientists from natural and social sciences and humanities
Deadline for applications: Friday 13 June
Post-doctoral Research Associate in Just Energy Transitions, University of Reading
The successful applicant will join “JUST-Systems”, which is a £5.6 million research programme, funded by the UKRI.
JUST-Systems is a multidisciplinary research project with an inclusive environment supporting career development, management and transdisciplinary training on Just Transitions and systems approaches.
The research will focus primarily on initiatives to expand heat networks in the Reading area. The research will be primarily qualitative, using multiple methods aimed at the development and evaluation of scalable solutions. There will also be opportunities to work with colleagues involved in quantitative and policy analysis, with the aim of developing a holistic systems approach.
The PDRA will work closely with Reading project leads. These include Dr Martin Green, Dr Mehdi Shahrestani, Prof. Libby Schweber and Prof. Stefan Smith.
Deadline for applications: Wednesday 18 June
Environment Agency: Resilience & Response to Natural Hazards Fellowship
This UKRI fellowship at the Environment Agency is an opportunity to apply social and behavioural sciences to improve the effectiveness of delivery of emergency response for diverse communities to a range of natural hazards.
The Environment Agency is seeking to embed a Natural Hazards and resilience fellow – early or mid-career – in the national Social Science team to work closely with our Incident Management and Resilience function. The fellow will explore how social and behavioural sciences can be deployed to improve the effectiveness of preparedness, warning and response activities to natural hazards. Such hazards include droughts, floods and pollution episodes such algal blooms in lakes and rivers.
Contact Peter Bailey for more information: peter.bailey@environment-agency.gov.uk
Deadline for applications: Tuesday 15 July at 4pm
Read more
Apply here
Cabinet Office Clean Energy Mission fellowship
An opportunity to work at the heart of government supporting the evaluation and delivery of the Clean Energy Mission, to drive a step change in evidence-based decision-making and public sector reform.
Work will cover the breadth of the Clean Energy Mission, including how we deliver clean power by 2030 and accelerate to net zero through the decarbonisation of our buildings, industry, transport and agriculture.
This 12-month placement, starting in February 2026, is open to early and mid-career researchers.
Deadline for applications: Tuesday 15 July at 4pm
Funding
Environmental Protection Agency Ireland - Research Call
The EPA Research Call 2025 is now open for applications with €6.6M in research funding available support innovative research projects to support policy- and decision-making addressing environmental, climate change and sustainability challenges.
Met Éireann, the Office of Public Works, and the National Parks and Wildlife Service are participating as co-funders on this call.
Deadline for submissions: Thursday 29 May at 4pm
Opportunities
EPSRC-Defra Circular Economy Workshop
Together with the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) are now exploring future opportunities more broadly within the circular economy
Interdisciplinarity is key to research and innovation outcomes in these areas and they would like to bring together individuals from different parts of the research and innovation ecosystem to learn more from you, and are excited to offer the opportunity to offer insights, and highlight any significant omissions in their thoughts so far.
They will host workshops in June 2025 to gather views from across the community. Each workshop will last no more than 4 hours, and they will offer in-person, hybrid and virtual participation. Dedicated networking sessions will also be facilitated for delegates.
They strongly encourage early and mid-career individuals to apply, and those from underrepresented minorities.
Deadline: Monday 19 May
Tell the Untold! An Environmental Writing Competition of the Rachel Carson Center
With this writing competition, the Rachel Carson Center for Environment and Society (RCC) in Munich invites writers to submit works of 1) short fiction or 2) creative nonfiction that respond to the entangled social and ecological challenges of our contemporary world, or to 3) reflect in a short essay on the role and relevance of (literary) fiction, such as that of Amitav Ghosh or other environmental authors, for the environmental humanities.
Deadline: Friday 6 June
Call for Abstracts: Just Energy Transitions online conference
The Royal Geographical Society's Energy Geography Research Group is organising a one-day online conference for postgraduate researchers and early career researchers.
This one-day online conference will provide postgraduate researchers and ECRs with an opportunity to showcase their work on justice in the field of energy scholarship. Our aim is to foster dialogue on new and emerging methodologies, concepts and trajectories in the study of Justice and Energy Geographies.
Reach out to Nivedita Singh with any queries: nivedita1116@gmail.com.
Deadline for submissions: Tuesday, 10 June
Abstracts of no more than 200 words to be submitted here
CECAN Fellowship Scheme
CECAN (The Centre for the Evaluation of Complexity Across the Nexus, based at the University of Surrey) has established a Fellowship Scheme, which provides opportunities for those from Government and business to forge useful and lasting connections with researchers, and for CECAN’s work to be informed by and linked closely to practical evaluation.
The free programme consists of a series of one-to-one mentoring meetings (video calls) with experts from the CECAN network, tailored to specific challenges which the Fellow faces in their work. Successful applicants can expect to have up to four mentoring meetings held over a four-month period. Fellows are asked to produce a report at the end of the fellowship, along with a blog for the CECAN website. Fellows may also be invited to present a CECAN webinar.
Applications are welcome from academics, evaluators, policymakers and evidence analysts. Click here to take a look through their existing portfolio of fellowships and understand the kind of work they have supported to date.
Deadline: Monday 30 June
Info
Working at Westminster
Melissa Marselle, one of our ACCESS Co-Investigators at the University of Surrey, has written a blog post describing her placement at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) through the Royal Society Pairing Scheme.
She shares her experience of working at Westminster and top tips for engaging with policy makers.
"The Pairing Scheme provided me with an opportunity to widen my network by engaging with different scientists and civil servants while also gaining an understanding of the challenges of getting our research into policy. I would encourage anyone who shared the goal of using science for policy to apply for the Scheme. It opens doors!"
Hopelessness and fear leads to failure to adapt to climate change
A study of 3,000 cocoa-producers in Southern Bahia, Brazil, found the measures they were taking to reduce their risk from climate shocks such as severe droughts were more likely to increase their long-term vulnerability.
The article by Lucrezia Nava (University of Exeter) et al. in Strategic Management Journal combines four years of data with in-depth interviews.
The researchers found that cocoa-producers with direct experience of climate change were unlikely to adopt adaptive strategies such as reforestation and more likely to use ‘maladaptive’ measures that degraded ecosystems and increased long-term risks.
The research offers a deeper understanding of climate change adaptation and highlights the role of emotions like fear and hopelessness in decision making.
Belief updating in the face of misinformation
New research from Greta Arancia Sanna and David Lagnado (both University College London) shows how people revise their beliefs when confronted with misinformation and subsequent corrections.
Unlike previous studies that often find people “cling” to false beliefs, this article in Cognition suggests that people update their beliefs in a rational way when source reliability is emphasised.
The study highlights the importance of credible sources in efforts to correct misinformation.
Becoming an Environmental Psychologist: Autobiographical Career Paths Toward Applied Social Science.
This new book, edited by Lindsay J. McCunn (University of Washington Tacoma), explores the interdisciplinary pathways that environmental psychologists have taken to become educators, researchers, and consultants in this highly applied and growing field.
Individuals with backgrounds in architecture, urban planning, and geography, as well as in the health sciences (and beyond), describe how they discovered environmental psychology—and hope that others will follow.
Are you on the ACCESS Environmental Social Science expert database?
Join our searchable database of social scientists and experts working in the fields of climate and environment. The database includes both academics in universities as well as those working in the public sector, charities and businesses. It's quickly becoming one of our most visited web pages. A useful resource for people looking to collaborate and connect with environmental social scientists.
It only takes 15 to 20 minutes to complete the online form.
