Tom Vickers is employed as an Associate Professor in Sociology within the School of Social Sciences at Nottingham Trent University. Prior to this he worked at Northumbria and Durham Universities.Education: Tom graduated from Durham with a BA (1st class hons.) in Youth and Community Work in 2005. During the final summer of his undergraduate programme Tom was awarded a Junior Research Associate bursary by the Faculty of Social Sciences and Health, undertaking research with Professor Sarah Banks which contributed to an ongoing evaluation of the Empowering Communities training programme. After a period as a professional youth worker Tom returned to academia in 2006 to undertake research into the changing relationship of social professionals to social and political action, funded by an ESRC 1+3 postgraduate study grant. He achieved a distinction in the Social Research Methods (Social Work) MA in 2007, and submitted his PhD thesis in 2010, passing his Viva examination on 4 January 2011 with no corrections, examined by Professor John Solomos (City University London) and Professor Gary Craig (Durham University). Tom was awarded best undergraduate student in the School of Applied Social Sciences in 2004, and best postgraduate student in the school in 2010. Membership of other bodies: Tom is a Fellow of the National Insitute for Health Research School for Social Care Research, an Associate of the Higher Education Academy, a member of the Runnymede Trust Emerging Scholars Forum, and a Research Associate Consultant with the National Institute for Adult and Continuing Education. He is a co-convenor of the BSA Activism in Sociology Forum.Specialties: Social research, qualitative methods, policy/practice evaluation, social work, community organising, campaigning.A related set of themes run through Tom's research: the impact of international, national and local economic and political contexts on policies affecting migrants and ethnic minorities; the interaction between policy, professional practice, and community action; and the use of qualitative methods to bring into focus voices which are often marginalised or ignored in policy debates.