Role
Rachel Handforth leads on the development and delivery of a training programme for doctoral students and supervisors involved in the Co(l)laboratory programme, an 8 year, £7.4m project that supports place-based, co-produced doctoral research focused on addressing the needs of communities across the East Midlands.
Career overview
Rachel Handforth joined NTU as Senior Lecturer in Doctoral Education and Civic Engagement in January 2023. Rachel is an experienced researcher, evaluator, and project manager with a current focus on researcher development. Previously a Research Fellow in the Sheffield Institute for Education at Sheffield Hallam University, and Research and Evaluation Manager at the Careers Research and Advisory Centre, she has undertaken a range of commissioned research and evaluation projects within the higher education sector for clients including the Office for Students, DfE and the Royal Society.
Research areas
Rachel has research interests spanning gender, doctoral education, public attitudes to higher education and career transitions.
External activity
Outside academia, people aren’t well informed about PhD research – and that’s a problem The Conversation, April 2026
A new model for doctoral training informed by the community Blog for WonkHE, April 2023
Considering the ‘leaky pipeline’- are we missing the point on leadership diversity? Blog for WonkHE, May 2018