Young Scholars Matchmaking Workshop 2025 (CLOSED)

Online event: February 13, 2025 (online)

In-person event: March 19 to 22, 2025 (in Oxford, UK); Plus March 23 to 25 CSAE conference attendance.

Applications are now CLOSED - Deadline for applications: December 9, 2024, 23:59 GMT

Workshop Information

To strengthen the links between young scholars in high- and low-income countries working in the rapidly growing field of entrepreneurship and private markets research, the Private Enterprise Development in Low-Income Countries (PEDL) programme, the Oxford Martin Programme on the Future of Development and the Centre for the Study of African Economies are organising a matchmaking and project development workshop.

This workshop aims to bring together pre-dissertation PhD students (from year two onwards) from institutions in high-income countries with PhD students and young scholars (no more than three years beyond of their PhD) from institutions in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.

Over the course of five weeks, we will combine online and in-person meetings with the aim of fostering new ideas and developing projects, grant proposals, and, importantly, collaborations across these groups for research on the frontier of private enterprise development in Africa and South Asia. The workshop will begin with a virtual keynote highlighting open questions and opportunities for possible contributions. Participants will then come together for a virtual Ideas Fair, where they will pitch research interests and ideas that are open to collaboration. Based on this initial virtual meeting, participants will be grouped according to their interests. Over the following weeks, groups will collaborate virtually to explore and develop project ideas before coming together for an in-person, intensive Capstone week in Oxford, UK. Workshop facilitators will help the matched groups to identify, develop and present joint projects that may lead to fundable grant proposals. We expect that small seed grants will be available from PEDL to continue collaboration and develop proposals after the workshop. Note that the week in Oxford is timed to coincide with the CSAE Annual Conference and attendees to the matchmaking workshop will be expected to stay to attend CSAE Conference as part of the matchmaking workshop. The final session of the matchmaking workshop will take place on 25 March at the end of the CSAE Conference.

Organising Institutions

This workshop is co-organised by the PEDL initiative, the Oxford Martin Programme on the Future of Development, and the Centre for the Study of African Economies (CSAE). PEDL is a joint research initiative of the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) and the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO). PEDL pursues a research agenda focusing on private-sector development in low-income countries (LICs). The Initiative is motivated by the need to better understand what determines the strength of market forces driving efficiency in these countries. More information about the Initiative can be found on the PEDL website.  The Oxford Martin Programme on the Future of Development is a research initiative at the University of Oxford. It focuses on low- and middle-income countries and works on labour markets, human capital, entrepreneurship and technology adoption in small and medium-sized enterprises, and the green energy transition. The Centre for the Study of African Economies (CSAE) is an economic research centre at the University of Oxford which has been researching economic and social development in Africa since 1986.

Application Instructions – Applications close Monday, 9th December 2024 at 23:59 GMT

Those interested in participating should download and complete the application form available to download here and prepare a brief letter of motivation and an up-to-date version of their CV. The application form will ask candidates to clearly state the research question(s), potential methods to answer the question, and the geographic focus of the project. The ideas that you present in the application form should be ones which you are open to collaborate on with other workshop participants. 

In addition to these written application components, in order to facilitate tentative match-quality assessments, we ask all applicants to record a short video presentation (about 5 minutes). These videos will also be made available to other workshop participants upon finalising participant lists ahead of the initial virtual Ideas Fair. In the video, please explicitly address the following five questions:

1.    Introduce yourself: Your name, your institution, your current location and where you are from
2.    What brought you to conducting research in economics? 
3.    What are your career goals in having pursued a PhD in economics? 
4.    What are you most hoping to get out of this workshop? 
5.    What research questions excite you the most right now and why?
 
PhD candidates should also arrange to have a letter of support from a member of their PhD faculty sent to [email protected].

To submit your application please compile the following three documents into one PDF document: the completed application form, a letter of motivation and an up-to-date version of your CV. 

Please upload this PDF to the CEPR HUB by following the below instructions by December 9, 2024 23:59 GMT. In addition, please send either the video or a link to the video to [email protected] by the deadline.

Applicants who are CEPR affiliated or already have a CEPR profile can upload their submission by:

1. Going to https://hub.cepr.org/ and logging in
2. After you have logged in, go to https://hub.cepr.org/event/4525
3. Click on "Step 1: Apply"
4. Under "Apply to Attend" click "Yes"
5. Tick the boxes that apply to you 
6. Tick "Would you like to submit a paper?", upload your paper and supply the requested information.
7. Click "Submit form" to make the submission.

Applicants who do not have a CEPR profile can upload their submission by:

1. Creating a new profile here https://hub.cepr.org/user/register
2. After you have logged in, go to https://hub.cepr.org/event/4525
3. Click on "Step 1: Apply"
4. Under "Apply to Attend" click "Yes"
5. Tick the boxes that apply to you 
6. Tick "Would you like to submit a paper?", upload your paper and supply the requested information.
7. Click "Submit form" to make the submission.

We aim to inform accepted applicants by mid-January 2025. Any queries about the event or application process can be sent to [email protected].

Morgan Hardy, NYU Abu Dhabi

Christian Meyer, University of Oxford

Chris Woodruff, University of Oxford, PEDL and CEPR