Cambridge ESOL, part of the Cambridge Assessment Group (Europe's largest assessment agency) wishes to provide funding for potential graduate students who would like to enter one of the Ph.D. Degree programmes offered by the University of Cambridge Research Centre for English and Applied Linguistics (hereafter RCEAL) in the area of English and Applied Linguistics and/or Computational Linguistics.
The scholarship is offered to inform the English Profile Programme (EPP) and as part of RCEAL's contribution to the second phase of the EPP. The Ph.D. candidate would investigate criterial, discriminative linguistic features of the different Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) proficiency levels, exemplified in the Cambridge Learner Corpus (CLC) and other learner texts being gathered as part of the EPP. For further information about the EP, see http://www.tinopolisphp.com/ep/.
An appropriate candidate for the Ph.D. studentship will have a good first-class honours or equivalent degree in an applied linguistics or computational linguistics area. An ability to conduct searches in a tagged and parsed corpus is essential. Further expertise in computational linguistics and in statistics is a clear advantage.
For information about research carried out at RCEAL, see http://www.rceal.cam.ac.uk/.
For information on entry requirements and admission procedures to the University of Cambridge, see http://www.rceal.cam.ac.uk/Courses/Admissions/.
Cambridge ESOL Scholarships are highly competitive and are awarded to citizens of the United Kingdom and the European Union as well as citizens of any country outside the European Union. The award is for a three-year Ph.D. programme (from 1 October 2009 to 30 September 2012) and will cover fees and maintenance for a University of Cambridge arts Ph.D. studentship (up to a total cost of £25,000 a year).
Scholarships are awarded on the basis of academic excellence, a successful application to the aforementioned programme, and a good fit between the candidate's research proposal and the goals of the EPP. Applicants are encouraged to email the Graduate Secretary at RCEAL (email bej12@cam.ac.uk) for more detailed instructions before submitting their applications.
The closing date for applications is 31 May 2009. When applying, please quote reference UD05071.