EUR REDPOP or Graduate School in Demography and Population Sciences

The REDPOP (Réseau universitaire de Recherché en Démographie et sciences de la Population) or Graduate School in Demography and Population Sciences project developed and promoted by the University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne and INED, and supported by 6 universities, 8 PhD schools and 10 research units*, is one of the 29 projects to have won “Investments in the Future” state funding earmarked for university research programmes (EURs). The EUR initiative, managed by France’s National Research Agency, is aimed to “bolster international impact and attractiveness … in one or more scientific fields by organizing Master’s and PhD training programmes supported by one or more high-level research laboratories”. The objective is to promote the graduate school model in France by forming networks between universities and research institutions and consolidating ties with economic actors. The model aims to strengthen the research approach in graduate-level training programmes and to make French study programme organization more legible at the international level by creating a continuum between the Master’s degree, the PhD and professional integration.

The REDPOP project brings together the most important French actors in demographic research and encompasses all areas of expertise in demography and population science, fields in which France enjoys an exceptional international reputation. The project’s ambition is to make the methodological and topic-centred expertise of project partners available to Master’s and PhD students throughout France, specifically in the two areas of “demographic dynamics and social transformation” and “social inequalities and vulnerability”.

A main component of the REDPOP project is establishing a national network of training programmes for Master’s and PhD students. REDPOP will offer courses and research projects specifically designed by project partners. First-year Master’s (M1) students, for example, will have access to online courses and a collaborative tutoring programme in connection with a collective research project, while second-year Master’s (M2) students will be able to access intensive training modules in methodology with a view to the following stage of drafting a PhD project. PhD students will be offered modules on methodology and specific topic areas. The EUR will also develop an on-going education Master’s degree targeting working policymakers wishing to acquire specific knowledge in demography. And project partners’ international networks will be pooled to provide students with a wide range of opportunities to train abroad.

EUR REDPOP’s training programmes will include:

• Training for M1 students, run by the University of Paris Nanterre: classroom or online courses, certified tutoring project;
• Training for M2 students, run by the University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne: multi-language courses, workshops in methodology and initiation in research, research seminars;
• Distance learning at the University of Bordeaux: EUR-certified M1 and M2 courses;
• On-going training at the University of Strasbourg: a three-module Master’s in “public policy and populations”: the fundamentals, assessing public policies, writing a Master’s thesis;
• PhD-level training, run by INED in connection with the European Doctoral School of Demography: organization of theoretical and technical training models on the model of the iPOPs Laboratory of Excellence Résodémo PhD training programme.