Dear Applicant,
You have arrived at the applications site for the Alef Trust and Liverpool John Moores University collaborative PhD programme in Applied Transpersonal Psychology, and we look forward to receiving your application shortly. Our relationship with LJMU goes back some 30 years, and it was at LJMU that in the early 1990s Les Lancaster first pioneered attendance and online distance-learning postgraduate programmes in Transpersonal Psychology.
The Alef Trust was established in 2012 to facilitate the delivery of high-quality global education programmes in areas we perceive to be of vital importance for human flourishing. Our mission acknowledges the post-materialist turn in understanding mind and consciousness, and we foster a learning community which facilitates dialogue amongst those sharing our values. Our community operates in the context of the profound interconnectedness of all systems—human, technological, ecological, planetary.
The collaborative PhD is a research degree awarded following examination of a research thesis. Your time on the programme is devoted to conducting a research project under supervision. The collaborative basis of the PhD means that you will receive guidance from supervisors from both Alef Trust and LJMU. Given our expertise in the topic, the Alef Trust supervisor will lead in most academic aspects of the programme. However, it is a requirement for this collaborative PhD programme that at least one supervisor must be from LJMU. We take on the responsibility to find an LJMU member of staff suitable for this role. In the unlikely circumstance that there are no LJMU staff wanting to supervise your specific research question, then we will be unable to progress your application.
There are no specific taught classes that you are required to attend. However, each student will be expected to work with their supervision team to establish a research training plan which will require you to attend appropriate sessions selected to support the development of research skills. You will be able to take advantage of online trainings offered by Alef Trust and LJMU’s Doctoral Academy to support you in growing as a rigorous, creative, and effective researcher.
More details of the programme will be found through clicking on the right of this page. The one aspect we would stress here is the importance of your research proposal, which is included in the application form that you will download when you click on the “Complete Your PhD Application” button at the top of this page. In evaluating your application, the admissions team will pay particular attention to the research proposal since we want to be satisfied that you have the potential to engage in the research process effectively and with a reasonable degree of autonomy. We are seeking to facilitate high-quality research in the broad field of transpersonal psychology and need to ensure that our doctoral candidates have a sound grasp of what translates a stimulating idea into an effective programme of research—one that is practical and likely to lead to persuasive outputs. It is the research proposal that gives us a measure of your potential for realising these goals.
So, we advise you to craft your research proposal carefully as you complete the application. We look forward to working with you in this exciting new doctoral programme.
Sincerely,