Historic Environment Scotland: Safeguarding heritage skills

Apply for this SGSAH-funded internship with Historic Environment Scotland, up to 12 weeks FTE, between January & October 2025.

The project is titled Safeguarding heritage skills and will involve producing a short report on a chosen topic, including methodology, findings and recommendations.

Deadline for Applications is 15th November 2024.

Location

Depending on the preference of the intern, either home working, in person in the Engine Shed in Stirling or Longmore House in Edinburgh or hybrid. This will be agreed between the intern and mentor.

Project

The project is titled "Safeguarding Heritage Skills" and will involve 2 potential projects.

The refreshed Skills Investment Plan for the historic environment (SIP) was published in April 2024 following extensive consultation with sector organisations, training providers and key stakeholders. It is a collaborative framework for collective action and identifies priorities and where resource needs to be invested. However, we have gaps in our evidence base in key areas around whether the supply (provision) meets current and future sector needs as identified in the SIP, and would like to offer an internship to help us address some of these gaps.

Skills and the ability to develop skills and knowledge is important to the historic environment sector. The need for skills, and the requirement to have suitable pathways to develop them, is becoming ever more vital as sector organisations as they try to navigate today’s fast-moving challenges in the face of declining provision.

The two potential projects are:

1. How effectively does current skills provision meets current and future skills needs in one of the following areas (depending on interest)?

Industrial heritage

Digital

Heritage Science

Skills to support the transition to Net Zero

Historic landscapes and Gardens

This will involve using data sets from the Scottish Funding Council and Skills Development Scotland and primary research from further, higher, third sector and private education providers, as well as key organisations in the Historic Environment sector

2. How can we better utilise research outcomes to develop skills outputs?

This project will involve primary research from key stakeholders in the research field and relevant training and education providers.

Outputs

For both projects we want the researcher to produce a short report on their chosen topic, including methodology, findings and recommendations.

The first project will also create a dataset of relevant provision, and the extent it meets needs alongside a visual representation using a platform like Powerbi.

The Second project will include case studies of best practice.

Timescale

Application Deadline: 15th November 2024

Start date (or must start by): Flexible

End date (or must end by): Flexible

Project can be worked full time, part time or flexibly in blocks

Benefits to the Researcher

The intern will benefit from the project by actively helping to understand and shape the delivery of a national skills strategy, and by learning to apply their research skills within an applied situation. They will gain insight into the work of both HES and the wider historic environment sector, and gain contacts across the education and heritage sector.

Key Relationships

The researcher will work within the Strategy and Policy team, in the External Relations and Partnerships Directorate at HES, and work principally with the team co-ordinating delivery of the Skills Investment Plan. They will also work with HES colleagues working in their areas of interest. There will also be opportunities to build relationships with a wide range of sector organisations, sector support bodies and education providers

Person Specification

Apply here

Return to the Internships & Artists Residencies 2025 page to see other internship opportunities.

First published: 4 October 2024