Each year, BiB offer placement year opportunities for undergraduate students eligible to complete a ‘sandwich year’ as part of their degree programme. We would like to offer this opportunity for academic year 2027/28 to university partners working with the NIHR Yorkshire and Humber ARC Healthy Families theme.
Students would join BiB/YHARC as a Research and Implementation Assistant and are currently paid £13,000 (2026/27 rate, this may be reviewed periodically) over the course of the ten-month internship which runs from September to July. The placement is funded by BiB and is typically paid via a bursary through their university with the university invoicing BiB for the funds. The roles are full time, Monday to Friday, with some degree of flexible working patterns (occasionally requiring weekend and evening working) and are hybrid with a minimum of 60% of time spent in-person in Bradford (either at Bradford Institute for Health Research at Bradford Royal Infirmary or in community locations) and remaining time with ability to work from home.
What are the benefits of a placement year with BiB?
Students completing a placement with BiB/YHARC will gain experience in:
- Applied, epidemiological and public health research methods
- Research data collection, including:
- Recruiting and consenting participants for research.
- Administering questionnaires, cognitive tests, and basic anthropometric measures according to study protocols.
- Inputting and analysing data.
- Assisting in preparing applications for required project permissions as per regulatory requirements, e.g., ethics and NHS research governance
- Collaborating with colleagues and partners on reports, conference presentations and peer-reviewed publications.
- Working in a diverse city and with diverse communities.
- Working in multi-disciplinary teams to influence health and inequalities in society.
- Project management of research projects.
- Engagement and dissemination to the general public (including the use of use social media)
- Building a professional network.
Previous placement students have gone on to achieve high first-class honours degrees, funded PhDs (sometimes in collaboration with BiB/YHARC), and have returned to full-time research roles with BiB, plus many other positive destinations in their chosen career fields.
Our ask of university partners:
- Share our advertisement resources and promote the opportunity with eligible students.
- Support students to complete application forms/ prepare for interview.
- Facilitate student payments for successful students (template financial agreements and contracts can be shared on request).
- Provide students with support (academic, pastoral, financial) as appropriate for students you’re your institution undertaking placements.
If your institution would like to explore participating in the BiB/YHARC Placement Year scheme please contact Rossyln Kerr (Rosslyn.Kerr@bthft.nhs.uk) or Kate Lightfoot (Kate.Lightfoot@bthft.nhs.uk) for further information.