Online event for EUF universities
Date: September 20th, 2023, 10:30AM – 12:30PM CEST
Registration is open to primarily career offices, HR staff, PhD supervisors, Staff from doctoral schools from EUF network universities.
This session will focus on how to design career support services that can best guide PhD candidates towards their careers of choice, either within or outside academia. Invited speakers from Western Norway University of Applied Sciences and the University of Limerick will:
- Outline the necessary steps to create effective career support services, from identifying the needs of the target groups to designing the services and evaluating their implementation
- Discuss how to collaborate with the non-academic sector to promote career development of PhD candidates
- Present best practices and successful initiatives
While the session will focus primarily on career support for PhD candidates, the information presented can also be adapted and used to improve existing services for Bachelor’s and Master’s students.
The session will be chaired by Bjarte Håvik, Project leader for Researcher Development, Western Norway University of Applied Sciences.
Agenda*
| Introduction |
| A step-by-step approach to improving career support for doctoral candidates: identifying needs and services Bjarte Håvik, Project leader for Researcher Development, Western Norway University of Applied Sciences |
| Best practices on how to help PhD candidates pursue careers within and outside academia Gerard Downes, Postgraduate Research Development Manager, University of Limerick |
| Guided discussion on how to improve career mentoring and support for PhD candidates |
| Conclusions |
Agenda subject to change.
Speakers
Dr. Bjarte Håvik is project leader for Researcher Development at Western Norway University of Applied Sciences (HVL) where he is tasked with establishing a Researcher Development Management Centre. He holds a PhD in Natural Sciences from the University of Bergen. Dr. Håvik has an extensive background from research in both academic and industrial organizations and he has previously worked on establishing industrial ecosystems for the development of new export industries within Life Sciences. He has also worked on developing national policies for higher education, and he served as a diplomate and special envoy from the Norwegian Ministry of Higher Education and Research to North America, covering science, technology and innovation.
Dr Gerard Downes is Postgraduate Research Development Manager at the University of Limerick (UL) Doctoral College. He holds a PhD in Political Science from UL. His role involves delivering a range of institutional projects aimed at improving the number and quality of postgraduate students on research programmes at UL, as well as ensuring that the support structures for research postgraduate programmes are in place and at the required level. He supports the development and implementation of PGR training and professional development opportunities, including delivery of the weekly GPS Webinar Series on research skills for PhD candidates. Recently, as part of the Doc Talent4EU consortium of seven universities and the European University Foundation, he led the UL bid for funding under the Horizon Europe Call, ‘Developing an effective ERA talent pipeline’. The project aims at enhancing PhD employability by improving transferable skills training, delivering a series of courses for PhD researchers, using a machine learning prototype to match job ads to the CVs of PhD researchers, and developing local talent management centres for PhD candidates and employers.