Job: Postdoctoral Fellow, Prentice Institute, University of Lethbridge, Canada

This posting did not publish a closing date for applications. Please check the original listing for updated vacancy information
 

Advertiser's description (via Prentice Institute - University of Lethbridge):

Work where the world comes to create, discover and learn.
We are one of Canada’s top universities and leading research institutions. With more than 8,000 undergraduate and graduate students, two campuses (Lethbridge and Calgary), seven faculties and schools, and more than 2,500 employees, ULethbridge is Lethbridge’s second largest employer. Faculty and staff come together to contribute, each in their own way, to establishing ULethbridge as Canada’s destination university. In 2022, Lethbridge was recognized as one of Canada’s top small cities.

The Prentice Institute for Global Population and Economy is an interdisciplinary research center housed at the University of Lethbridge. Its mission is to support research, training and policy development on complex, urgent and important issues concerning global changes in demography, natural resource use and the economy. The Institute works in four focus areas: Population, Health, Economy and Ecosystems. More specifically:
 

• The Prentice Institute supports and conducts research on the changing human populations and the potential impacts on social, environmental, and economic issues, and communicates its findings widely.
• The Prentice Institute and its collaborators seek to understand long-term changes in human and economic environments, within an historical context, with particular attention to the role human actions play in influencing these outcomes.
• The Institute conducts and integrates research on the dynamics of Canadian and global demography and their impact on economic well-being through migration, culture, trade, and natural resource availability.
• The Institute seeks to widely disseminate the output of our work and that of others to stimulate further research and to enable individuals, governments, and corporations to make better-informed decisions. We also contribute to the education and training of students and future researchers.

The postdoctoral fellowship will be supervised by the Director, or an Associate Director of the Prentice Institute for Global Population and Economy.

We are looking for...

The Prentice Institute for Global Population and Economy at the University of Lethbridge is offering a postdoctoral fellowship for one year ideally starting in September 2024. We are looking for a candidate specializing in one of the following areas:

1. Mobility and Migration, with an emphasis on rural contexts. The successful fellow will support the work of the Prentice Institute on issues related to population movements, mobility, and migration to and from rural and smaller communities in Canada and beyond. The successful fellow will work on projects that engage with topics of Canadian immigration policy (including temporary migrant pathways such as the temporary foreign worker program), the settlement and integration experiences of newcomers, identity and belonging in rural and smaller communities, and equity and people-centred models of social policy. Expertise in areas of international patterns of migration and forced displacement, Canada’s migration flows and policies, and understandings of rurality (as socially and politically constructed spaces) is a strength. Previous experience working with rural communities and newcomers, and with both quantitative, and qualitative methods, such as conducting focus groups and interviews, are also assets.
2. Ecosystems, from a Social Science perspective. The successful fellow will help to lead the establishment of a program that involves multiple partners, in different countries, focused on long-term human-environment relations from anthropological, historical ecology, or related perspectives, with an emphasis on topics such as long-term land use history and land use policy, anthropogenic legacies, Indigenous sovereignty and Indigenous-led agrobiodiversity and watershed management, Indigenous food security in the context of climate change, Indigenous knowledge systems and epistemologies in the context of biodiversity conservation policy and climate change mitigation, and socio-ecological restoration. Expertise in areas that are critical for planetary health, such as the Amazon, is a strength, as is fluency in Spanish and Amazonian Kichwa. The institute is particularly interested in the health of the planetary community, as might be explored through approaches such as Eco-health, One Health, or Planetary Health.
3. Employment/Employability, Education and Labor. The successful fellow will support the institute´s research on the relationship between human capital and economic development, and how the dynamics of Canadian and global population impact the labour market and economic well-being through migration. The emphasis of the research program is on employment/employability, education and labor. The successful candidate will work on project(s) in topics such as the role of tertiary institutions in enhancing employability through work integrated learning (WIL) programs; the reduction of skill gaps and global talent shortages; labor market flexibility related to the activities of labour unions, skills and training, and wage regulations; labor migration and effective domestic/global labor market policy implications; or strategies for effective human capital development for economic development in the Artificial Intelligence (AI) era. Previous work/research experience in the areas of education, human capital and labor mobility is required, and working knowledge/experience in both quantitative and qualitative methods are assets.

Qualifications

Candidates must meet the following criteria (as per Tri-Agency policy):

• Have completed a PhD within five years;
• Not hold a permanent faculty position or a faculty position leading to permanency;
• Not have applied more than twice before to the SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellowships funding opportunity;
• Not have already received a postdoctoral award (including a Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship) from SSHRC, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) or the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR); and
• Not be applying in the 2024-25 academic year to the NSERC Postdoctoral Fellowships Program or the CIHR Fellowship funding opportunity.