Online training on transversal issues for Early-Career Researchers

We are delighted to invite Early-Career Researchers (ECRs) to our online training sessions on transversal issues. These online trainings are free of charge, but you will have to register for each session. Past sessions are also available to watch below.

Training sessions

 


22 November 13:30–15:00 CET

Global Horizons: An Insider’s Guide to International Academic Mobility

This course will be organised thanks to King’s College London, University of Oslo and Université Paris Cité.

This Circle U. webinar will provide an insider’s guide to international academic mobility. This is your opportunity to hear from a global panel of academics, at different career stages, about their international experience including tips on finding opportunities and thriving in another institution.


9 January – 2 April 2024: Every Tuesday via Zoom from 6 PM to 7.30 PM (CET)

Calling all Future Trialists!

Explore the trial design, conduct high-quality trials, master data management, and publish groundbreaking results. Shape the future of healthcare through evidence-based medicine. Enroll now to become a trailblazer in investigator-initiated clinical trials! Don't miss this golden opportunity!

Conscious II

The course includes twelve modules, such as: Clinical trial designs, Early phase trials, Paediatric Trials, Quality and Regulatory affairs, Trial management, Data management and statistical analysis, Pharmacovigilance, Trial methodology, Medical Devices, Leadership for PIs, Open Research and Scientific Publishing, Teaching the teachers. For more information on each module, click on the dedicated sections in the flyer.

Classes are scheduled on Tuesdays at 6 pm CET online during the second semester.

"These courses are innovative on several levels. First and foremost, it is its interdisciplinary thematic approach, ranging from statistics to biomedical humanities, that makes it unique. Another strength of the programme is its format, which combines a flipped classroom model with the use of a digital platform for prior knowledge acquisition, and synchronous, face-to-face online courses with a team of European professors, during which students will be able to develop concrete skills using their prior learning by solving problem-situations related to trial design and management, publication, leadership and even teaching. All this in international teams, which can only strengthen European collaboration in the biomedical research of the future. It is in this sense that this course is visionary," explains Professor Mouly and Viktoria Nagy.

Detailed programme with time and dates (pdf)

 

Register for the training sessions. Deadline 30 November


This two-part training will be organised thanks to King’s College London.

  • 20th November 11:30–13:30 CET (part 1)
  • 27th November 11:30–13:30 CET (part 2)

Introduction to Public Engagement

How can we engage the public with our research? Who are the public anyway? And why does any of it matter? This two-part course will answer these questions, giving you a set of easy-to-use tools that can shape your future public engagement activities.

Aimed at doctoral students and early career researchers with little or no prior experience of public engagement, each session will help you develop skills and an understanding of public engagement with research, as well as help you consider possible public engagement you can carry out with your own research.

During this course, you will explore the following:

  • Raise awareness of the importance of public engagement
  • Develop skills and understanding around public engagement best practice
  • Increase confidence in undertaking public engagement projects

After completing this course, you will be able to:

  • Understand the basic principles of Public Engagement with Research (PER)
  • Develop PER activities that are deliverable within the resources available, and responsive to your audience's needs
  • Evaluate and reflect on PER activities

About the trainer

Dom McDonald brings over 25 years of experience in the development, delivery and evaluation of informal science learning. Alongside his work as a freelance public engagement consultant, he leads the practical modules on Cambridge University’s postgraduate Science Communication courses. Dom has developed and delivered public engagement training courses for early career researchers on behalf of a wide variety of organisations in the UK and internationally, including the Wellcome Trust, the Royal Institution, and the Singaporean Agency for Science, Technology and Research.

 


The online training on Soft skills consists of two independent modules and is provided by University of Pisa.

Online sessions

27 September and 11 October: Soft skills and organisational utopias

  • Online, 27 September 2023, 14:00-17:00 CET
  • Online, 11 October 2023, 14:00-17:00 CET

The online training on Soft skills and organisational utopias consists of two correlated trainings and is provided by Luca Mori, teacher from University of Pisa.

The thought experiment of utopia is one of the most complex thought experiments ever conceived. Addressing it as a group can be both exciting and challenging. Reducing it to its essential terms, this thought experiment consists of asking ourselves what we should do if we wanted to create a place (a country, an organized system), as founders, where we could live in the best and fairest possible way, integrating individual and collective needs as best as possible.

The task has no predefined level of difficulty, as it is the group itself that raises or lowers the level of difficulty based on the questions and answers it manages to formulate. Step by step, on the other hand, for those who undertake the thought experiment, the distance between utopia and reality decreases significantly, since the difficulties encountered in the mental simulation refer to the typical difficulties of any organization.

The elaboration of a utopia as a group puts the participants' soft skills to the test, as it requires them to:

  • Weave together and tune in individual creativity and group creativity
  • Collaborate in the search for shared solutions to problems of various natures
  • Collaboratively develop complex organizational hypotheses
  • Manage disagreement and possible conflicts between very different points of view

28 September and 12 October: Critical thinking and problem solving with AI: A support or an obstacle?

  • Online, 28 September 2023, 15:00-17:00 CET
  • Online, 12 October 2023, 14:00-18:00 CET

The online training on Critical thinking and problem solving with AI consists of two correlated trainings and is provided by Filippo Chiarello, teacher from University of Pisa.

It takes practice to master critical thinking and problem-solving skills. For these reasons, students are expected to understand the main concepts of critical thinking and problem solving, to start their learning journey through these soft skills. What is important as a takeaway from the course is that we as humans are terrible critical thinkers and that there are methods that can help us make better decisions while solving problems. Even (or maybe more?) with the support of AI.

 


This hybrid seminar will be organised thanks to the CORSCI (Official body representing the scientific staff of the Université Catholique de Louvain).

Online session

30 October: From Research to Policy

Hybrid, 30 October 2023, 15:00 - 16:30 CET

This training would aim to build awareness for policy work among the ECR (Early-Career Researchers) community and highlight the benefits to their careers (both inside and outside academia) of strengthening the related competencies. The training will also highlight what initiatives researchers can take during the ECR phase to contribute to a strong, inclusive and positive academic culture. This will occur through the involvement of expert speakers, but also through the discussion among the ECRs present, sharing their knowledge, practices and projects. Finally, the series will allow participants to network and build international collaborative bonds.

The involvement of ECRs in policy work also has great benefits for the universities themselves. It has the potential to alleviate some of the pressure on senior academic and administrative staff by ensuring broader participation in policy work, while adding to its broader relevance. In addition to this, at many universities, the ECR community represent the most diverse staff group. So including their voices in decision-making and policy projects infuses the university with a more dynamic set of perspectives, allowing for greater creativity and innovation, and hence greater potential for impact.

Invited guests

  • Margherita Romengo
    Chargée de Recherche at the ULB
    Former Attaché to the Equal Opportunities Directorate at the Wallonia-Brussels Federation
    Ph.D. Literature (Gender Studies)  
  • Olivier Malay
    Economist ACV-CSC
    Ph.D. Economics
  • Stephane Berghmans
    Director of Research and Innovation EUA
    Ph.D. Veterinary science

Outline

  • Introduction to the event 
  • Panelist question: How and why did you transition from research into policy 
  • Q&A open to online and in person participants
  • Panelist question: How can researchers prepare for policy experience?
  • Q&A open to online and in person participants
  • Discussion where participants are asked for suggestion of a follow up event on integrating policy issues into research

 


The online training on Data Management consists of two independent trainings and is provided by teachers from University of Belgrade. Please note that all times on the agenda are in CET.

Recorded sessions on Data Management

EOSC and RDM

  • EOSC skills for students, teachers and researchers
    M. Ševkušić will tackle on the digital skills for FAIR principles, open data, and open educational resources. More specifically, European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) tools and services will be presented.
  • RDM: Practical Insights
    O. Vučkovac will present basic principles of Research Data Management (RDM) practices and tools for both researchers and librarians. Additionally, useful tools for generating machine-actionable Data Management Plans will be presented and discussed.

Open Licenses for Researchers

  • Open licenses for researchers - An overview and use cases
    N. Miljković will summarize most commonly used Creative Commons (CC) licenses with an overview of licenses for software and hardware. The lecturer will also share her experience in re-using and licensing materials in academia, as well as selected use cases.

Watch the online sessions on Data Management


The online workshop on Diversity will be provided by Dr. Edwin Hoffman thanks to the Université Catholique de Louvain.

Recorded session

Diversity, Inclusive Communication and Cooperation

“Cultures don’t meet, people do”. In an international context, you meet people from different cultural and linguistic backgrounds. Communication and cooperation have become therefore an intercultural matter. The importance of diversity competence: the ability to understand and manage human social interaction in culturally diverse contexts of working, studying and living is rapidly increasing. The seminar Diversity inclusive communication and cooperation teaches you how to approach diversity in multicultural and multilingual interactions and equips you with tools - the TOPOI-model - to apply theory to intercultural practice.

In this seminar we explore:

  • What do we mean by intercultural communication?
  • A diversity inclusive approach to intercultural communication that focusses on a dynamic (‘non-essentialist’) view of culture and diversity, an inclusive notion of people’s multiple cultural identities and an emphasis on communication and dialogue.
  • The TOPOI model: an analytical tool to detect possible misunderstandings during or after an intercultural encounter. Instead of focusing on cultural differences or dimensions, the TOPOI model takes the communication of unique individuals, embedded in their social context, as its starting point.

Watch the online sessions on Diversity, Inclusive Communication and Cooperation


White text on blue background saying Online training: Open ScienceThe online training on Open Science consists of two independent one-hour trainings and is provided by Dr. Margaux Larre-Perez, Open Science trainer from the Direction des bibliothèques et musées of Université Paris Cité.

Recorded sessions on Open Science

The Contemporary Open Access Ecosystem: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

Open access, i.e. the unrestricted availability and use of scientific publications, is changing at a very fast pace. Paywalls and academic journal subscription costs were the most salient issues discussed ten years ago among scientists and research librarians. In 2023, the ever-growing cost of Article Processing Charges (APCs) worldwide, as well as funders’ mandates on the right retention strategies by scientists on submitted articles are among the most pressing issues in open access. This training aims at helping early career researchers navigate current issues in open access, in particular the growing cost of APCs on research institutions and the publisher strategies to survive widespread open access. The goal is also to raise awareness on the fringes of open access, notably predatory publishing, and to help researchers estimate the open access actors’ legitimacy in a constantly evolving industry.

The Future of Scientific Integrity in an Open Science: Challenges and Prospects

By allowing for scrutiny of the entire scientific process, open science, i.e. the worldwide movement aiming at disseminating and reusing all scientific productions, is used to promote scientific integrity. However, the fast-paced changes in technology and the academic publishing industry both make scientists constantly reassess the nature and the enforcement of scientific integrity. From paper mills to ChatGPT, scientific integrity faces numerous challenges that were nonexistent a few years back and yet may well be our future. The goal of this training is to help early career researchers understand and implement open science strategies to promote scientific integrity. It will also help them assess current threats and challenges to scientific integrity.

Watch the online sessions on Open Science


White text on blue background saying Online training: Well-being and Academia

A series of five online events from the University of Vienna. You can register for individual sessions or the whole series.

Past sessions on Well-being & Academia

  • 23 February: Perfectionism and Imposter Syndrome

  • 23 March: Isolation and Belonging

  • 20 April: The Power of Saying No

  • 15 May: Navigating Uncertainty in Research

  • 16 June: Strategies for Managing Our Well-being in Research

Published July 6, 2023 11:32 AM - Last modified Jan. 3, 2024 8:55 AM