Professor David Locker Scholarship

About the award

The Professor David Locker Scholarship is a £7,500 scholarship for two students with a social science or dentistry background who come to Sheffield to study for a Masters in Dental Public Health (MDPH). We are looking for talented students who wish to continue David’s work and contribute to the development of dental public health in their home countries

The award is paid as a contribution towards your tuition fee.

About Professor David Locker

Professor David Locker completed his degree in Dentistry at the University of Sheffield in 1971. He gained his BDS (Distinction) from Charles Clifford Dental School Sheffield in 1971 before gaining a Postgraduate Diploma in Health Services Management in Leeds a year later. He studied Sociology at the University of Kent where he completed a Postgraduate Diploma and eventually a PhD in 1975. From the outset, he was interested in research that broke disciplinary boundaries, publishing his PhD on disability in 1983 and a later book on social and behavioural sciences in dentistry.  

He started his career as a lecturer in Social Science at St. Thomas' Hospital Medical School before being appointed as an Associate Professor in the Department of Community Dentistry in the Faculty of Dentistry, University of Toronto. He became a Professor there in 1990 and became the Director of the Community Dental Health Services Research Unit in 1991. He eventually went on to become Associate Dean for Graduate and Postgraduate Studies in 2003. He was also a Visiting Professor at Guy's Hospital Dental School, King’s College London and the Turner Dental School, Manchester from 2000 and at the Peninsula Dental School from 2007.

In his later career, Professor Locker maintained strong links with the University of Sheffield, working with colleagues at the Unit of Dental Public Health. He believed that good quality applied social science and dental public health would make a difference in the lives of patients and to oral health care in general. After his death, he bequeathed a sum of money to support students seeking to do social science research in the field of oral health and dental public health.

Eligibility

To apply for the scholarship, applicants must

• be currently undertaking a PhD in Social Science and/or Dental Public Health at the School of Clinical Dentistry, University of Sheffield
• not be funded by a research council, government, private enterprise or any similar organisation

How to apply

Applications will open on Monday 16 June 2025.

Selection process

This is a competitive process and not all applications will be successful; a panel of senior members of staff will select the strongest application.

The panel will be looking to see in particular if you have

• an excellent academic record (evidenced by awards, relevant publications and conference presentations)
• provided a clear outline of the contribution of your PhD work to social and behavioural sciences and dental public health
• outlined challenges you have faced to your academic and professional progress and provided details of how these barriers have been overcome successfully
• outlined examples of relevant work experience, including community and voluntary work
• clearly articulated future ambitions by referring to further publications (essential) and if relevant grant applications (desirable)

Terms and conditions

• The scholarship can not be deferred and students taking a leave of absence, or any other break in their studies, will not be eligible to receive the award when they return.
• The successful applicant will receive their scholarship as a contribution towards their tuition fees. No cash alternative is available.
• Scholarship recipients are not eligible to receive any other University scholarships advertised and awarded to prospective students.
• Students studying by distance learning are not eligible to apply.
• All decisions made by the University are made in good faith and we reserve the right to remove the scholarship.
• Part-time students will receive a pro-rata payment each year.