Overview
The School of System Change, in partnership with the Risman Foundation, is seeking a systemic researcher to lead on participatory research and production of a report exploring the social and digital crisis amongst young people: the dynamics, barriers, gaps and opportunities to support the rising generation to thrive socially, emotionally and mentally.
Please note: applicants for this role must be based in the UK.
The Project
“From Anxious to Thriving” (working title)
From Anxious to Thriving - a systemic inquiry into the rise of young people experiencing a social digital crisis and what it would take to create a positive impact on young people’s development.
The School of System Change (School) is thrilled to partner with the Risman Foundation (TRF) to convene the wider ecosystem supporting youth development* in order to strengthen, support and build their capacity and connections to address the social digital crisis affecting UK adolescents; thus moving from siloed, isolated solutions to a wider networked approach guided by a collective vision.
By engaging those directly working on a complex issue that is deeply impacting this age group, this project will empower participants to collectively craft a lighthouse for the ecosystem, identify pathways for a sustained reversal of worrying trends, and support champions to intervene. The project also aims to inform funders, policymakers and other institutions on their own strategic interventions to transform the “anxious generation” to one that is emotionally, socially and mentally thriving.
Together, the School and TRF aim to deepen the wider sector’s practical understanding of the Social Digital Crisis as it plays out in the UK, and build a collective diagnosis of the system dynamics.
Through a participatory inquiry process, this project aims to:
- Support the development of a collective vision for a thriving generation that enables various actors to collaborate, thereby accelerating widespread reversal of the ill effects of the social digital crisis;
- Support ecosystem actors to identify barriers, opportunities and where the greatest potential for transformation lies; and
- Support funders and policymakers to make informed decisions about strategic investments that would support transformation, based on evidence from research as well as experience and perspectives directly from the field.
* As a starting point, we envision schools, champions of play and extracurriculars, parent campaign groups and expert researchers. The scope will be further defined during the project’s design stage to consider relevant actors supporting wider development of children.
Research and report
We are looking for an experienced researcher who is enthusiastic to take the lead on the cross-sector, multi-disciplinary and multi-method research and report.
This work will surface a shared diagnosis of issue dynamics as they are practically experienced on the ground, collating insights, spotlighting solutions and proposing pathways forward. It will contribute thought leadership as a ‘lighthouse’, serving as a beacon for greater collaboration across the ecosystem.
The intention for the report is to inform future intervention strategies ecosystem actors - from funders and policymakers, to NGOs, coalitions, schools and communities - seeking to transform the status quo, by articulating: what would it take to change the system and where there are promising areas for leverage and experimentation to raise a generation of thriving young people in the digital age?
The researcher’s scope will have two elements:
- Secondary research including desk research, data analysis and expert interviews where needed, based on existing resources and studies.
- This research must be delivered on a timeline to help inform the design of the project’s learning programme.
- Primary research working alongside the participants of the learning programme, drawing insights, stories and learning from participant action inquiries.
The goal is to weave together secondary research and the stories of the participants through qualitative analysis and story telling in order to answer the research questions and our overarching action inquiry.
Insights from the two stages of research will then comprise the report. Both the diagnosis and the writing up must be systemic in approach.
Role Description
Working in close collaboration with the research supervisor and project director, the researcher will be the lead writer on the sector report.
Responsibilities include:
- Co-designing the framing of the report, developing research and inquiry questions together with the project team.
- Manage the research project to an agreed timeline, collaborating with the project lead and the learning programme lead.
- Conduct research about the topic - bringing in primary and secondary data - this will help inform the design of the learning programme as well as part of the analysis of the sector report.
- Curate insight and knowledge from desk research as well as the workshop and learning programme we will be running.
- Set up structures and processes alongside the learning programme to help gather and synthesise knowledge.
- Ensure that the analysis in the report is both rigorous in its research as well as grounded in the action inquiry and insights coming from the participants of the learning programme and workshops.
Capabilities required:
- Strongly familiar with the sector and context of the social digital crisis and youth development well, and at the same time is open to new learnings and findings and seeing things from a different angle: someone who is able to take a systemic, broader view.
- Has great experience in analysing and sensemaking of quantitative and qualitative data including working with and alongside the action inquiry work of participants from the learning programme.
- Is able to take a systemic approach, i.e. using and finding appropriate mapping and narrative building approaches that match the contextual needs.
- Can work with systemic data and lived experience: drawing out learnings from participants’ action inquiries from the learning programme and feeding the analysis of these stories into the narrative that will answer the research question of the report.
- Is able to link into our broader action inquiry, insights from the learning programme with the secondary research, especially the analysis of quantitative data.
- Is open to our bigger inquiry question and participating in that and the content we set in our workshop and learning programme.
Desired qualifications and experience:
- Applicants must hold a graduate-level degree (Master’s or on track to pursue doctorate).
- Has advanced research skills in writing reports and essays; track record of peer-reviewed publications desirable.
- Applicants must have experience in taking a systemic approach to research so they can ensure that the diagnosis and writing of the report is systemic. Evidence of peer-reviewed publications or equivalent scholarly contributions in the field of systems change are highly desirable.
- Applicants should demonstrate a strong track record of research in areas related to the social digital crisis (e.g., technology and society, digital well-being, online harms, youth and digital culture).
- Prior experience in youth and development, education, social work, or related fields is highly desirable.
- Prior examples of research conducted in the field of the social digital crisis is desirable.
Practicalities
Timeline
Key deadlines:
- Initial research must be complete to a level to shape learning programme design by 13 March 2026
- Initial workshops will be run w/c 13th April 2026 (tbc)
- Learning programme will be run between 13th April and 6th November 2026 (tbc)
- Report should be drafted by 9th November 2026 (tbc)
- Report should be finalised by 7th December 2026 (tbc)
These dates are subject to change and are offered as indicative.
Fee
The fee for this work is £12,825 (excluding VAT).
Contract
This is a fixed-fee, deliverables-based freelance contract with set deadlines over 9 months. The contract and role will be managed by the School through its host organisation, Forum for the Future.
How to apply
In order to apply for this role, please send an email to [email protected] including:
- Your CV, and
- Up to 1 page about:
- What makes you a good candidate
- How you would approach this work
- Subject line: Application for systemic researcher - name
Deadline for applications
The deadline for applications is 16 January 2026 but we will review applicants for this freelance role on a rolling basis and may hire before the deadline if we find the right candidate.
Please note: applicants for this role must be based in the UK.
