English

Twice every semester

The aim of the course is for PhD students at the IIIEE to strengthen their ability to develop relevant, coherent and compelling interdisciplinary research through scientific writing practice and peer review throughout the writing process, both in the role as writers and as peer reviewers.

This is done through seminars devoted to presentation and discussion of own journal and conference manuscripts at different stages of development, and through the provision of constructive feedback on fellow PhD students’ work. The course also includes addressing general challenges in interdisciplinary research.

The course is constituted of four progressive modules (levels). Since the course aims to support a continuous learning process, the modules can be repeated at the different levels throughout the PhD education. Ideally, the PhD students are continuously enrolled in the course throughout their entire education.

The course includes in-class activities and preparation. The in-class activities take place during half-day seminars approximately every second month during the academic semesters. Preparation includes preparing manuscripts for presentation, reading peers’ manuscripts, and reading assigned literature. The manuscripts are closely related to, and contingent upon, the students’ on-going research. In the seminars, PhD students reconsider or defend contested issues in their own work and comment on each other’s work. The seminars also include addressing specific themes in research design and writing, as identified throughout the course. Relevant themes for each session will be jointly decided upon, based on the specific contributions from the PhD students and on the students’ current writing challenges. Senior researchers may be invited based on the theme for the specific session. In addition to the sessions for discussion of PhD students’ own writing, one session per year will be fully devoted to discussing practices and challenges in interdisciplinary research on a more general level, including topics such as common methodological and theoretical approaches, the relationship between disciplinary and interdisciplinary research and suitable publication outlets, and more. Students taking the course at the advanced level will be responsible for arranging this seminar.

The course is self-paced, meaning that students can enrol at any point in time and receive their credits after finishing the required elements for a single module. These elements are
• participation in four seminars
• presentation and discussion of one’s own manuscripts and submission of the associated revision of this manuscript, and
• commenting on minimum four manuscripts (written and oral)
• writing of a reflection paper on a theme decided for each module and that will be discussed during a seminar (500 words)

The design of this course as self-paced serves to ensure an even flow of written contributions at different stages of development from the PhD students. It also provides the possibility to integrate new PhD students from the beginning of their PhD studies.

be able to refer to key scientific writing and peer-review principles (basic level)
be able to name important publication outlets for interdisciplinary research in the field of environmental policy and management (basic level)
be able to refer to common methodological approaches in the field of environmental policy and management (intermediate level)
be able to refer to different theoretical approaches in the field of environmental management and policy research (upper intermediate level)

be able to formulate a compelling research problem (basic level)
be able to organise scientific knowledge (e.g. problem definition, methodology, results) in a structured manner in line with interdisciplinary research practices (basic level)
be able to critically read and comment upon peers’ texts (basic level)
be able to organise scientific knowledge (e.g. problem definition, methodology, results) in a concise, structured and convincing manner in line with interdisciplinary research practices (intermediate level)
be able to deliver critical, structured and constructive peer-review feedback (intermediate level)
be able to constructively address peer critique of the own work (intermediate level)
be able to organise scientific knowledge, including own empirical material, in a concise, structured and convincing manner in line with interdisciplinary research practices (upper intermediate level)
be able to discuss and justify own research in relation to other interdisciplinary as well as disciplinary research (upper intermediate level)
be able to develop compelling research based on the active consideration of alternative research designs and ways of presenting the research (advanced level)
be able to reflect upon and discuss the strengths and weaknesses of written work of peers (advanced level)

be able to generalize quality criteria in interdisciplinary research and reflect upon the associated challenges and opportunities in meeting them (advanced level)
be able to identify strategies to improve own research manuscripts and the manuscripts of others (advanced level)

Seminars

Self-study literature review

Oral exam

Written assignments

Seminars given by participants

For each course module, the assessment is based on

• active participation in the in class activities (oral examination)
• submission of one’s own manuscript and the revised version, based on peers’ comments
• written comments on peers’ texts
• a reflection paper of approx. 500 words

For each level of the course, the student is expected to demonstrate the respective individual learning objectives through these activities.

Failed, pass

The course is given as part of the PhD education at the IIIEE and is open to all PhD candidates enrolled at the IIIEE.

 

The reading consists of students’ own manuscripts as well as selected literature related to the specific topics addressed. The literature will be announced in relation to the relevant session.

Course coordinator: Jenny Palm, Professor, IIIEE, 046 2220242, jenny.palm@iiie.lu.se

MIM005F

 -12-12

Cintia Bertacchi Uvo