Material jobs in United States

Job Title: Tutor (Research)
School: Arts & Humanities
Programme: Jewellery & Metal
Grade: 9
FTE: 0.8
Tenure: Permanent
Responsible to: Head of Programme

The Royal College of Art (RCA) is the world’s leading art and design postgraduate institution, renowned for the excellence of its teaching and research. The School of Arts & Humanities brings together a dynamic range of programmes where critical thinking, material engagement, and cultural analysis intersect across fine and applied arts, curating, writing, and the history of design. Our close links with internationally respected galleries, museums, theatres and cultural institutions ensure that our work is both publicly engaged and critically relevant.

The Jewellery & Metal (JaM) MA programme, situated within the Applied Arts cluster alongside Ceramics & Glass, fosters a material-led approach to research and practice. Our students and staff explore the evolving relationships between people, materials, and the wider world—moving beyond traditional disciplinary boundaries to embrace innovation and critical engagement with the past, present, and future of object-making. Through experimental methodologies, conceptual exploration, and an acute sensitivity to the politics and poetics of materiality, JaM challenges assumptions and redefines the language of jewellery, metal, and the broader applied arts.

We are now seeking to appoint a Tutor (Research)—a practitioner-researcher with a strong research profile and an innovative, critical approach to material-led practices. The successful candidate will have a wide grasp of the theories and philosophies that underpin contemporary approaches to jewellery, metalwork, and applied art more broadly. You will demonstrate a clear and sustained contribution to your field through both your research and practice, with evidence of outputs at a minimum of 3* REF quality.

You will be an inspiring educator with a commitment to postgraduate teaching and a desire to foster intellectual, creative, and cultural exploration in your students. The role will involve supervising and supporting MA students through seminars, lectures, tutorials, workshops, and critiques, and contributing to the wider academic life of the School and College—including initiatives such as Urgency of the Arts and AcrossRCA.

As part of the team, you will collaborate closely with colleagues to shape curriculum development and deliver research-informed, innovative teaching. You will also be expected to pursue external funding for your research and to lead or participate in collaborative projects that contribute to the vibrant research culture of the School of Arts & Humanities.

We are looking for someone with a strong sense of collegiality, a willingness to engage in programme administration, and an eagerness to act as an advocate for the programme, its students, and the RCA more broadly.

This is an exciting opportunity to join a world-leading institution at the forefront of material-led research, and to work within a creative and interdisciplinary environment that values experimentation, intellectual rigour, and public impact.

Please see the information pack for more details.