Research Assistant Or Research Fellow In River Restoration

School of Water, Energy and Environment

The River Restoration Centre

Research Assistant or Research Fellowin River Restoration

Fixed Term Contract for 12 months, or until 30 September 2025 (whichever is sooner)

Research Assistant (if Masters obtained)               £28,303 to £32,039 per annum

Research Assistant (if close to completing PhD) £34,450 per annum

Research Fellow (if PhD obtained)                           £37,337 per annum

Location: River Restoration Centre, Cranfield, Bedfordshire

We are looking for an experienced individual to help design and deliver a decision support software for assessing pressures and impacts on river ecology, that will be used by non-specialists across the UK for River Restoration.

About the Role

You will be key to the delivery of an ongoing Ofwat Innovation Fund applied research project with South-East Water, where you will use national-scale datasets to assess ecological responses to different human stressors. By statistically deriving pressure-impact relationships affecting riverine species and communities, you will help design and develop a decision-support software (CatchmentLife) that will support River Restoration planning and Water Framework Directive assessments. The decision support software will be made available to a wide community of end-users from public and third sector organisations. The outputs will need to be comprehensible by a wide audience including members of the public and non-specialists. This will be the main part of your job and you will be expected to progress most of these tasks independently with the support and supervision of the Science and Technical Manager and other team members. It is not expected that you will be proficient at delivering all aspects of the work, but that you have an ability and willingness to learn new skills and apply them to this project.

Depending on qualification and experience, you will be employed as either a Research Assistant or Research Fellow. Research Fellows will be expected to perform most tasks independently with minimal supervision.

About You

You will have a relevant postgraduate qualification (such as physical geography, geomorphology, ecology, statistics or similar) and a good understanding of river ecology, morphology, pressures and impacts. You will have experience of statistical modelling of large datasets as well as some programming skills. You will have the ability to write complex technical and/or scientific reports as well as simple non-technical summaries and guidance tailored to a specific audience or for broad appeal.

You will be able to quickly integrate into a small busy team of highly motivated individuals sharing common purpose and values: understanding river form and function, restoring natural processes, communicating evidence-based knowledge and sharing best practice.

About Us

As a specialist postgraduate university, Cranfield’s world-class expertise, large-scale facilities and unrivalled industry partnerships are creating leaders in technology and management globally. Learn more about Cranfield and our unique impact here.

The River Restoration Centre (RRC) is an independent, not-for-profit organisation which fulfils a unique role facilitating the restoration and management of rivers and catchments across the UK.  RRC is committed to actively promoting the re-establishment of natural processes, features and habitats of river systems by collating evidence; deriving new knowledge and solutions; and identifying and sharing best practice across the river management community. RRC independently funds its activities through UK environmental agency funded service level agreements and a variety of advisory projects, training courses and dissemination activities.

RRC is proud to be hosted at Cranfield University in the Water Sciences Institute (CWSI). Our employment contracts and terms are through Cranfield University whilst all day-to-day work is directed by the RRC.

Values and Commitments

Our shared, stated values help to define who we are and underpin everything we do: Ambition; Impact; Respect; and Community. Find out more here.

We aim to create and maintain a culture in which everyone can work and study together and realise their full potential. We are a Disability Confident Employer and proud members of the Stonewall Diversity Champions Programme. We are committed to actively exploring flexible working options for each role and have been ranked in the Top 30 family friendly employers in the UK by the charity Working Families. Find out more about our key commitments to Equality, Diversity and Inclusion and Flexible Working here.

Working Arrangements

Collaborating and connecting are integral to so much of what we do. Our Working Arrangements Framework provides many staff with the opportunity to flexibly combine on-site and remote working, where job roles allow, balancing the needs of our community of staff, students, clients and partners.

How to apply                                   

For an informal discussion about this opportunity, please contact Marc Naura, RRC Science and Technical Manager, on (T): +44 (0)1234 752979 or (E): rrc@cranfield.ac.uk

Apply online now. Please do not hesitate to contact us for further details on E: peoplerecruitment@cranfield.ac.uk. Please quote reference number 4774. In addition, you will need to upload a covering letter explaining why you want to work for The River Restoration Centre.

Closing date for receipt of applications:   24 March 2024