Photo by Mike Erskine | unsplash.com

During last year, I found myself drawn to attend several workshops run by La Trobe’s Research Education and Development (RED) team. They had topics such as blogging and developing a digital profile. My interests sprang from a desire to get my research and writing on girl internees in Changi during World War II – and my wider interests in the editing and publishing worlds – out into the wider world.

However, kept coming up against an existential blockage: what sort of ‘me’ did I want to be when I’m out there in the digital world? And who did I want to connect with? Who did I want to share my work, words and thoughts with?

Why is being a digital ‘me’ such a complex question?


Who ‘I’ am in the digital world had been a fraught question for me – because ‘I’ contain many selves. Apart from being a (part-time, mature-age) PhD researcher doing a non-traditional style of PhD, I’m also an editor running a freelance business, a published author (for both young people and adult readers) and a family member/friend/local community member.

For a long time, I tried to take the marketing approach of segmenting your audience. That is, I worked to develop a different ‘voice and channel’ tactic to reach out  to different groups of people and organisations. However, most of the time that just lead to a form of textual shutdown. Was I writing to reach out to clients? Or members of the academic world? Young people who might want to read my work? Adults who might want to publish it? This pre-considered thinking made it all too tough to write. I didn’t write or participate anywhere, because I spent so much time being caught in an analysis loop.

What worked for me is when I started to think less about who I wanted to reach, and more about what communities I was a member of and what I had to offer. In other words, I stopped thinking about what the digital world could bring to me, and more about what I could offer the communities that resided in those spaces.


Who do I want to connect with? Who do I want to share my work, words and thoughts with?


My digital communities swirl around each other. I gravitate towards discussions about doing a PhD, writing and publishing, children’s and young adult literature, and editing. Sometimes, these worlds overlap, especially the writing and PhD worlds. The discussions that take place in these spaces revolve around topics such as strategies on getting the work done, balancing research, paid work and family life, upcoming conferences and opportunities, and general support.

Who I am in these communities is an extension of the kind of academic/writer I want to be. This is a mixture of my personality, preferred mode of working and who I am inspired by. I aim to be warm, encouraging, generous with my knowledge and vulnerable. These working traits – while some of them simply are just an extension of who I am IRL – are ones that I’ve carried over from my extensive editing career. Editing and publishing are collaborative work spaces – nothing is produced without the input of an entire team that bring their unique skills to a project. Long-term success as an editor – and especially as a freelancer – is dependent on building good working relationships as well as doing high-quality works. So, it is within the digital academic communities I belong to: the focus is getting the work done and getting it out there while being supported and nurtured as you do it.

I’m a highly text-based person, so I look mostly to Twitter and Facebook for my communities. Other visual- and video-based social media spaces – like Instagram, YouTube and TikTok  – are also useful spaces to browse. Here are some hashtags,  Twitter handles and moderated groups that I’ve found welcoming and useful:

PhD support and conversations about how to get it done

#phdlife
#phdchat
@WriteThatPhD
@PhDForum
@ResearchWhisper
@ThesisWhisperer

Editing and publishing conversations

#amediting
#amwriting
@IPEditors
@EditorsCanada
@The_CIEP

Writing for young people (children’s + young adult literature)

#LoveOzYa
@Ozlaureate
@WritersVic

Academic research in children’s literature

@ACLAR_
@IJBib
@IRSCL_news


So: who am I in the digital space?


I’m a member of overlapping sets of academic and writing communities. I’m a (proto-)academic and writer operating in a thoughtful, yet imperfect, way that offers – and is offered – peer support. I share resources and discoveries, and I’m not afraid to ask my communities for help if I need something. I do this with mostly with text, in digital spaces where my people are gathering. Being ‘me’ online means being a member of communities that support, nurture and foster academic and creative thinking and writing.

In the digital world, I am my outward-facing, flawed, blossoming, writerly self.

Update:


I’m writing this section in early April 2020, where COVID-19 restrictions are coming in to play. In my home state of Victoria, Australia, we are in Stage 3 restrictions. This has important ramifications for everyone, but for PhD researchers, it means the university campus is closed, people are working and studying at home, and all teaching is being done online. Furthermore, other institutions (like archives, libraries, museums) are also physically closed (although many are opening up their digital offerings). It means that for many of us, our research and its methods are dealing with wild and fluctuating changes. What we signed up for may no longer reflect what we are actually able to do.

COVID-19 restrictions also mean that the conditions that we are working under are massively affected. Many people have lost their jobs – and while the government is announcing financial help, this still causes stress and financial pain. Being restricted (mostly) to our homes means our home world is also now our work world; we may be suddenly sharing limited spaces with other members of our households. The adults we live with may also be working from home; our children might not be returning to school for months (which may mean that supervising online learning is coming our way). We may leaning into roles as carers in a way that we are not used to – or be the ones needing care when services are being altered on a daily basis. And, sadly, many of us may face severe illness and heartbreaking situations as this virus takes hold.

All of this has had me thinking a lot about being a PhD researcher in a digital world. Because now – more than ever, even more than when I wrote the original version of this post – we are operating in online spaces. We have been forced, in many ways, to quickly adapt and adopt to working online. We Zoom our university courses, our meetings, our conversations and even our social lives. We use apps to form study groups, writing circles and critique groups. And, despite the individual difficulties, there is also widespread (and in some cases, institutional) acknowledgment that we are all finding it tough.

Personally, I’m finding two useful – maybe even positive – elements are developing out of these conditions. The first is the emotional support that is being poured into digital spaces. We may being physically distancing, but it feels that for many of us, we are socially re-connecting online. The second is the movement towards digitising events. For example, in-person attendance conferences – often held in places far away from my campus – are currently being replaced with online events; making it easier to meet, learn from and collaborate with researchers from a global academic community despite geographical distances.

None of us know how long these restrictions and the resulting challenges will last. While being a PhD researcher in a digital world is certainly challenging, it feels more important than ever that we seek to remain connected. The threads (or should that be ‘optic fibres’?) that connect us are operating in two directions. They give us access to our peers, supervisors and colleagues, providing us with avenues to seek out information and support. In turn, we get to broadcast our empathy to others, express our vulnerability and provide support to others, investigate different modes of working plus communicate the results of our research to the world.

In the middle of this pandemic crisis, there is much to be gained from being a PhD researcher in a digital world. To be honest, for me, the digital world has a lot to do with what is making this time bearable, let alone productive. Here’s hoping that the positive outcomes outweigh the more difficult ones in the times ahead.

The post Being a PhD researcher in a digital world (Carolyn Leslie) appeared first on Research Education and Development.

While opening your research up to the public through the media can be a daunting step into the unknown, there are plenty of potential benefits, including a broader audience, collaboration opportunities, and increased funding.

For researchers at La Trobe, there is a cornucopia of resources available for researchers looking to write for the public, write a press release, or broaden their audience. But preparing for a media interview – whether it be for print, radio or television – is a challenging task for any researcher, thanks in no small part to the unpredictability of interviews!

As an agricultural scientist, my run-ins with the media have been somewhat unorthodox, to put it lightly. From small town papers to state-wide radio, giving media interviews has given me opportunities to think about my research from different perspectives, and reframe it in ways that make it accessible to different audiences.

I am a long way from an expert in interacting with the media, but if you feel ready to start answering questions from journalists, you’ll need to start asking yourself these questions first!

What are you getting yourself into?

Before you sit down to give any interview, take a look at some previous interviews conducted by the same outlet and try to answer the question: what is the audience of each piece presumed to know before they consume it?

Audiences, particularly Western ones, are comfortable with an introduction-problem-problem solved structure, and are more likely to absorb your research meaningfully if it is presented to them in a linear narrative.

This is why understanding the assumed knowledge of your audience is vital – if you have to backtrack mid-interview to explain concepts or terminology, the narrative structure is disrupted, and your audience is confused and eventually lost. Alternatively, a narrative that never makes it out of the introduction stage because a researcher labours over basic points is another way to help an audience lose interest.


What’s your key message?


By now, you’ve heard all about elevator pitches and three-minute theses, but interviews require a different type of distillation. In a media interview, you sign off a lot of control to the journalist opposite you – including the length of the piece, the questions asked and, to a certain extent, the topics broached.

You need to be able to compress your research into one core, simple message that your audience will be able to consume and then communicate themselves. As you don’t have control over the length or direction of the piece, your key message should be conveyed early on, and can become a touchstone for you to pivot back to if you get lost or overwhelmed.

Write your message down on a piece of paper and, if you’re giving a radio or phone interview, have it directly in front of you during the piece if your mind goes blank and, if nothing else, you have a strong closing statement to burn into the minds of your audience.


How can you benefit from fresh perspective?


When I present my research at a conference, I’m normally presenting to other scientists who, just like me, think like scientists. When I’m at a dinner party, I’m surrounded by a diverse group of people who don’t necessarily think like scientists (kind of like media consumers). This means that even though some of the smartest scientists in my field can ask me a doozy of a question, I’m often far more stumped by a question from a nurse or teacher who’s hearing about my research for the first time. A dinner party is honestly the closest parallel I have to giving a radio interview – interesting, thought-provoking and sometimes misinformed questions from an inquisitive audience who are attentive but don’t have all night to talk about just you. So, in preparation for your next interview, cook up a storm and invite a bunch of friends, sit back, and wait for the questions to come!


What’s something your audience might misunderstand?


During one radio interview, I was prompted to clear up a certain misconception about my study – something scientists in my field would know, but not necessarily the public. I realised that if the journalist hadn’t asked me directly, lots of people listening may have walked away with a message quite different to the one I was trying to get across.

Since then, I’ve addressed these potential pitfalls up front. If the results of your research only apply to a certain group of people, don’t forget to state that explicitly, so your findings are kept in context.

Understand that the journalist wants to maximise the ‘bang’ of their piece, but don’t feel pressured into answering uncomfortable questions or making outlandish claims. And don’t expect your audience to know the difference between ‘entomology’ and ‘etymology’; do expect them to spend your entire interview wondering why a word expert knows so much about bugs if you don’t make your job description clear.

If you can answer these questions, then congratulations! You’re ready to take the media interview plunge.

I look forward to seeing/hearing/reading all about it!

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David Cann is a third-year PhD student in the Crop Agronomy Group at La Trobe University. 


Dave’s research focuses on breeding winter wheat varieties for low-rainfall zones, helping crop farmers in southern Australia adapt to changing climate conditions. He is interested in farm management, sustainable agriculture and global food security. 

David is an avid traveller and has a Diploma of Languages in Italian. He tweets from @the_ag_lab.

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The post Preparing for a media interview (David Cann) appeared first on Research Education and Development.

When I first received the email, I thought it was a scam.

It was from a someone who claimed they were from a media production company telling me that I had been selected to potentially be part of an SBS TV series with a well-known health journalist who would host the show. The project was vague, and I knew of the journalist they mentioned, but I wasn’t a big fan of their ideology and methods.

We had a zoom meeting where the media production company wanted to get a sense of who I was and the work I’ve done previously. Throughout the conversation, I was up front and honest with my opinions about the journalist’s work and approach to health. In fact, I was pretty blasé about the whole thing and tried not to think of the TV aspect as it made me anxious. Being a fairly introverted person, a TV appearance was not on my list of career aspirations.

Just like any other interview I would do about my research, I explained my thoughts and views on the journalist’s methods with supporting evidence and examples.

Towards the end of the interview, I asked how they came across my name and research. “Social media!” was the response I received. Never in a million years did I think that being active on social media and building my public profile would lead to my research career (that’s a story for another time), let alone a potential TV appearance!

A couple of months went by and I had almost forgotten about this whole thing until I received an email saying that I had been shortlisted for a screen test in Sydney alongside two other potential co-hosts for the show. I wasn’t sure if the anxiety, panic or excitement won, but I felt them all to varying degrees. It was definitely time to contact the La Trobe media officers!

The team at the media office were extremely supportive and talked me through some of the questions I should be asking to get a better picture of what would be required and to make sure that my interests and reputation were protected.

The most important advice they gave me was to be true to myself and my expertise, which was a theme that resonated through the screen test later. It had also dawned on me this TV series would likely reach a lot of people. Therefore, it was extremely important that I stayed true to what I believed in, even if they conflicted with those held by the host.

The screen test itself was an intense and long day but one full of learnings. While I had some experience in front of the camera, it was often for recording serious health messages or lectures. Here, they wanted to capture my personality together with my beliefs and values. It was easy to slip into rote learning mode as I tried to remember all the things I wanted to say but the production team were more interested in me just being me, rather than being ‘an academic’.

We talked about all the things I loved in my research, why this topic was important to me, and what I was looking forward to in this project. I also had the opportunity to chat with the journalist who would be hosting the TV series so they could see what our relationship would be like on screen. This was probably the most intimidating part of the day as we had very conflicting views as times in our approach. It felt like my PhD confirmation all over again. Except, this time, I was proud to say there were no tears and I managed to stand my ground and articulate my arguments in a balanced way!

At the end of the day, the media production crew were extremely supportive and patient, I learned some gossip about the TV world, and we ended up having the best time. Unfortunately, SBS decided to go with another person who was already adopting the hosts’ approach to health.

As soon as I heard, I caught myself breathing a massive sigh of relief. While this would have been an amazing opportunity, something about it just didn’t feel right. Plus, I wouldn’t have had the time or energy to be fitting in a hectic filming schedule on top of all the conferences and teaching I had already committed to. However, this experience has reinforced the importance of building your public profile and staying true to your research interests.

For now, I’m happy to keep doing what I’m doing and wait for the right project to take me beyond my comfort zone again.

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Ashley Ng is an accredited practising dietitian, an academic and a diabetes advocate. She completed her PhD in 2018 on using mobile health to support young adults with diabetes during life transitions. 


In 2017, Ashley joined the LTUnutrition team (@LTUnutrition) at La Trobe as a Lecturer in Dietetics and Human Nutrition.  


Through her lived experiences, Ashley is passionate in streamlining our healthcare system through digital health, including social media, for greater accessibility. 


Ashley is the co-founder of Beta Change, an organisation that aims to support and empower diabetes advocates and people with diabetes around the world. She tweets from @HangryPancreas.

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There’s a first time for everything and the first time for the ‘Blogging your research’ series of workshops was Semester 1, 2019!

We (Tseen and Jamie – RED team members) wanted to run these sessions because we’re both big fans of academic blogging, and have gained so much value from the practice both professionally and personally. It has been a lot of fun sharing our knowledge, tips, and strategies with highly engaged La Trobe staff and graduate researchers from different stages of career and a varied bunch of disciplines. And we have learned a lot in the process of bringing together these workshops.

One of the activities for the final workshop is to work with the class on writing, formatting, and publishing a blogpost. We wanted to make it live from within the workshop itself! So, that’s what this post is: a communal post from the inaugural RED series of blogging workshops.

We asked our participants to reflect on the sessions they’ve attended and the discussions we’ve had. What was the most valuable thing they learned from them?

“Over the course of the blogging workshops the key lesson I’ve learned is that planning is essential for a blog to be both engaging and rewarding. 

A sense of one’s audience(s) is important if the blog is to be successful. Think about what it is you wish to achieve with the blog and the nature of the content to be uploaded.

What images shall I use? Who can I get to write up content for the blog? How do I moderate the account? How much leeway do I give to others who may wish to curate the account if it’s a blog that has multiple hosts?” – David O’Keeffe, Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society.

After asking our participants to contribute their thoughts in this way, it’s only fair that Jamie and Tseen share what they found most valuable about running this first set of ‘Blogging your research’ workshops.

JAMIE: First of all, this was a fantastic opportunity for me to work with Tseen – a communicating your research guru – and our group of researchers who have rich ideas on the kinds of blog posts they want to write and read. One of the key things I am taking away from this workshop is the importance of finding the right image to accompany a blog post. What initially drew me to blogging was a love of writing, but images are important parts of blogging – they draw people in and are an important  aspect of online communication. Tseen shared this helpful website – Unsplash – which has images that are freely available for use. I suggest checking it out! 

TSEEN: One of the key things I learned was that I make too many presumptions about where people are with their level of technical knowledge and social media skills. I need to work on this! 

It’s also good to consider the work of blogging as the whole cycle from concept to publication, to sharing and promotion. Talking this through conveys honestly how much is involved in managing and writing for blogs – the value is definitely there, but so is the workload!

Overall, we found the series to be a good space for reflecting on whether blogging is right for how you might want to communicate your research. If it was, then how are you going to do it? What are you in for? These and other questions and experiences were actively discussed and shared.

Blogging can be a lot of fun and an excellent way to activate and gather a community around your research. Managing a regular blog is also a lot of ongoing work. It’s good to be aware of this when you start so you can plan to invest time appropriately in this space (that is: don’t set yourself up to fail!).

We are very much looking forward to seeing our colleagues start their blogging projects. We’ll update this post with their blogs when they do!

The post Blogging your research appeared first on Research Education and Development.

Only six people ever read my doctoral thesis. Six. After years of research blood, sweat and tears poured into this document, that is the impact my work will have. It was that realisation that drew me to writing for Wikipedia.

Wikipedia is by far the largest encyclopedia to have ever existed, replacing – for free – what used to be a luxury item only a few decades ago. The encyclopedia is one of a set of projects hosted by the WikiMedia Foundation, which is refining its strategy through to 2030 to be a leader in the open knowledge movement.

Academic publishing readership versus Wikipedia’s yearly readership.  (Thomas Shafee CC BY 4.0)

Since I started editing and writing for Wikipedia in 2013, I’ve been busy trying to promote new ways of engaging academics, researchers and experts in improving its accuracy. By working with PLOS and the WikiJournals, I’ve helped develop ways to entice experts to write Wikipedia articles by combining the best bits of the encyclopedia’s massive reach, and the rigour of scholarly peer review. They’re likely to be the most-read work that most academics will ever write.

Thomas Shafee and Katherine Maher, Wikimedia Foundation CEO  at the recent Berlin strategy summit (Thomas Shafee CC-BY 4.0)

In March/April this year, I was one of the invited representatives at the Wikimedia Foundation’s strategy summit in Berlin. Most countries were represented at the event, as were several special interest groups focused on e.g medicine, teaching, and librarianship. The event was very energetic, and there was plenty of discussion about a range of open knowledge topics: How can information be accurately translated across hundreds of languages? What about getting it to people without internet access? What about people who can’t read? How can reliability be ensured? How can poorly documented topics or people be represented? How can we help foster a healthier and happier online community of contributors and readers? Should it take a more active role in advocacy? How can vulnerable contributors be protected in countries where freedom of expression is not protected?

It is these issues of knowledge equity and progressing society as a whole that drive my work on Wikimedia projects. Though Wikipedia has matched Encyclopedia Britannica’s accuracy since 2005, reaching its true potential needs the depth and rigour of academic input.

In my estimation, La Trobe is probably the most Wikipedia-engaged university in Australia, with its endeavours to improve the encyclopedia profiled in both Science and Nature. We punch well above our weight on this front, and I think it demonstrates the La Trobe research community’s commitment to engagement with the wider knowledge ecosystem and support for open and free information.

In particular, industrious La Trobians are a part of bringing Wikipedia up to academic standards. Their topics range from medicine to linguistics:

• Lysine – Cody Hall, Tatiana Soares da Costa (1200 views per day)
• Apoptosis – Aaron Smith, Michael Parkes, Georgia Atkin-Smith, Rochelle Tixeira, Ivan Poon (1800 views per day)
• Gene structure – Rohan Lowe, Thomas Shafee (2800 views per day)
• Transcriptomics – Rohan Lowe, Mark Bleackley, Thomas Shafee (100 views per day)
• Anthracyclines – Alison Cheong, Sean McGrath, Suzanne Cutts (250 views per day)
• Yolmo – Lauren Gawne (13 views per day)
• Teladorsagia circumcincta – Michael Stear, David Piedrafita, Sarah Sloan, Dalal Alenizi (17 views per day)

Together that adds up to being viewed 2 million times per year – the majority of all readership of La Trobe’s output, and plenty more is in the works. Wikipedia editing is even part of the Evidence Based Oral Health Practice course, with Leigh Blackall teaching students to prioritise what information is needed, find appropriate sources, and collaboratively edit a range of dentistry topics.

Who reads Wikipedia’s science content? (Thomas Shafee CC BY 4.0)

The RED team and La Trobe Library has a monthly Wikipedia editing meeting at which all interested people are welcome (idea hatched by Tseen Khoo; with participation from University of Melbourne’s Wiki Community of Practice), along with yearly workshops (hosted by me). Jan Strugnell (previously La Trobe Life Sciences, now at James Cook Uni) was also instrumental in organising the writing of 117 biographies of women antarctic researchers, a feat that was profiled in Nature.

The efforts of La Trobians on Wikipedia have also various news media including ABC News, ABC science show, Huffington Post, EuroScience, and AOASG.

I hope that this is only the beginning.

Our Wiki community at La Trobe plans to engage research groups and Centres of Excellence across the university to get more involved in their specialist topics.

It is not only possible, but easy for students to be taught to assess and improve Wikipedia as part of their coursework. It is common for lecturers to implore their students not to read Wikipedia or use it as a reference in their work. Yet that sort of abstinence-only education doesn’t work. Not only do students frequently read Wikipedia, most of their professors do too! It’s much better if students are taught robust information literacy skills such as how to trace and appraise the cited sources, combine and cross-reference information, and read all sources critically. The rise of online misinformation demands that we better equip our students with a skill-set for clear-headed critical skepticism in all aspects of their lives.

Next time you think about participating in Wiki activities, rest assured that you’re part of a huge global movement – one that our university is very much a part of.

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Thomas Shafee is a postdoctoral researcher in evolutionary biochemistry at La Trobe. 

You can also find him on Wikipedia as User:Evolution_and_evolvability

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Did you know that every researcher at La Trobe now has a university academic profile page?

Yes, EVERY researcher!

Academic staff have always had one and now all graduate researchers do, too! This coincides with the issuing of institutional staff accounts for grad researchers, a move that gives everyone a great opportunity to present their researcher profiles as they would like.

This post is for all those researchers out there – no matter what stage of career you’re at – who have yet to populate their academic profile page.

I give many workshops about developing digital identities. It’s a really good thing to be deliberate and savvy about how you cultivate your online presence. It’s not just about the technicalities of knowing how to use LinkedIn or Twitter, or making sure your work is accessible and more widely understood. These elements are involved, but having an effective digital presence means telling a cohesive story about yourself that’s then backed up by the other evidence that’s findable online. Usually, you’re never just found as a single entity on the internet; you may well be spread across several sites and listings.

One good way to be found is via a well developed institutional page, one that points people to other ways you might be online.

Here’s what I’d recommend to get you started with a strong academic profile on La Trobe’s Research and Teaching Scholars directory:

Writing a good bio

I like using Pat Thomson’s blogpost Writing a bio-note to get people started when writing their profile text. It’s a good piece that sketches out notions of audience and how you want to represent yourself as a researcher.

Let me talk you through the bio I have for my La Trobe academic profile page. It’s by no means perfect but here’s my thinking around why I wrote what I did.

FIRST PARAGRAPH:

Dr Tseen Khoo is a Lecturer in the Research Education and Development team, Graduate Research School, La Trobe University. She’s been a Senior Advisor (Research Grant Development) at RMIT University, and a research fellow at Monash University and the University of Queensland. She has written on research funding issues, early career researcher experiences, alternative academic streams, and racial diversity issues in Australia. 

I wrote this first paragraph to give people an instant snapshot of my current position and areas of scholarly expertise. If they don’t read any further, it’s OK. They have a good overview and it’s the kind of bio that can run alongside any media commentary or be picked over for appropriate quote attribution (e.g. ‘Dr Tseen Khoo, a lecturer at La Trobe University, stated…’).

SECOND PARAGRAPH:

Tseen is the founding convenor of the Asian Australian Studies Research Network (AASRN; 2006-2017), and a founding editorial advisor for the Asian Australian arts and culture magazine, Peril (2006-2013). 

This second paragraph gives a bit more detail about the depth of my formal experience and expertise in an area that is the bulk of my scholarly background (but that may not ‘show’ as obviously in the role I’m currently in). If people want to dig around and see what else I’ve done, this paragraph gives them signals about where they’d find more.

THIRD PARAGRAPH:

With Jonathan O’Donnell, Tseen created and runs the research development and research culture blog, The Research Whisperer (researchwhisperer.org).

I use this as my short final para because it’s a major part of my academic identity in the area of researcher development and the source of many of my collegial networks. It’s current, and it’s important to who I am as a scholar. I want to make sure people know about it and how to find the Research Whisperer project (which is why I included the URL, even though I’ve also linked to it in the left-side column of the profile page; note that you cannot put active links in the bio text).

The key to getting your bio text written is to remember that it’s not set in stone! It’s better to have something there than nothing at all, and there is no perfect way to do it. If circumstances change, or you want to emphasise another aspect of your experience/expertise, edit away!

Don’t have a good photo for the profile photo? 

You can look out for the photo sessions that are being run at La Trobe in forthcoming issues of the Graduate Research Scholar, or you can organise to take your own without spending a heap of money.

Here is an article with a simple set of tips for taking flattering photos of yourself and another for taking good profile photos with some nice examples. There’s heaps out there on the internet about  how to stage your own photo-shoots so you can get a good result.

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So, go forth and fill in your La Trobe academic profile! Don’t let people who are interested in you find nothing but your email address and a blank avatar.

If you want to know more about how to set up your academic profile page and the technicalities of adding information, the Library and RED are running a whole series of sessions on this, or you can read this fabulous Library Guide on Academic Profiles.

The post You and your academic profile (Tseen Khoo) appeared first on Research Education and Development.

There’s considerable confusion about what ‘impact’ is, and this is no surprise given that it’s a term that’s used for so many things in the contemporary research space.

For my research, I’ve had many, many conversations with people across higher education in Australia and Canada at all career levels (graduate researchers, Early Career Researchers, Mid Career Researchers). Alongside the confusion about what impact is is what impact means (and will mean) to academics.

The following primer is a brief history of the impact landscape, an exploration of some of the trends in higher education, and some things to consider as you start your ‘impact journey.’

So, let’s start by clarifying some of the many meanings of impact. I find it easiest to consider impact as happening either inside (internal) or outside (external) of academia.

Internal impact are the kinds of impacts that academics have been talking about, tracking, and trying to increase for years. These impacts are front of mind for academics as they’re often related to annual reviews, promotion and tenure. These types of impacts are also often referred to as academic or research impact. Generally, if you see a university library advertising a session on increasing your impact, this is what they’re discussing.

Examples of academic impact activities may include:

• publishing in well regarded journals
• presenting at research conferences
• measuring reach; g. citation counts, h-index, bibliometrics (e.g. Web of Science (Clarivate) and Scopus (Elsevier))
• academic social networks, e.g. Research Gate and academia.edu
• acquiring grants ($)
• receiving awards / recognition

Increasingly, when university administrations ‘discuss’ impact, they are talking about the impact academic research has outside of the academy, or external impact. This type of impact may be on politics, health, technology, the economy, law, culture, society or the environment.

Examples of external impacts (as a result of research):

• Improved health outcomes
• Increased agricultural yield or resiliency
• Enriched safety/security standards
• Decreased cost or increased revenue
• Transformed education practices (e.g., curriculum)
• Increased public safety/national defence
• Integration of research recommendations into regulatory frameworks, policy, or law
• Adoption of methods to improve tracking/measuring
• Decreasing disease prevenance
• Implemented sustainability practices

Put simply:
Getting a journal article published is internal impact.
Having that research create change in the world, is external impact.

The ‘impact agenda’ has been spurred on by several factors, but the most dominant has taken the form of institutional assessments. In an increasingly ‘accountability’ driven higher education space, such assessments have been adopted to provide tracking of and justification for the investment of public money in university-based research. The history of impact goes back to the early 2000s with various schemes and pilots having been run along the way. The notion of ‘Impact’ (external) really took hold in 2014 when the Research Excellence Framework (REF) in the UK introduced an impact assessment. The REF 2021 will also have an impact component. Impact is not going away.

In Australia, the Engagement and Impact (EI) Assessment was run in 2018 as part of the Excellence in Research Australia (ERA) process, by the Australian Research Council (ARC). Results were released at the end of March. Each university in Australia submitted case studies of research in each FoR code (Field of Research, which is a broad disciplinary categorisation) to be assessed in engagement, impact, and approach to impact. Each submission was scored by a panel of experts as either low, medium, or high. If you were at a university that did not have philosophy department, you would not submit a case study for FoR 22, but if you did have a philosophy department you were expected to submit (with a few exceptions).

To complicate things even further, there is retrospective and prospective impact. Retrospective impact is the impact your research has already had (or is having). Prospective impact is the impact that you would like — or hope — your research to have. I recently heard impact described in a meeting as ‘big I impact’ and ‘little i impact.’ The former being the big institutional assessments (REF, EI) that only a few high performing researchers will be involved with. Whereas “small i impact” is how each individual researcher will consider how impact is incorporated into their research plans, evidenced, and reported on. The national interest test may, for example, be considered ‘small i impact,’ as the onus sits on the individual researcher to account for how the research will make an impact that benefits the interests of the nation. Increasingly, researchers are being required to account for the expected impact of research through impact statements on grant applications.

Some universities have recognised the need to resource external impact more fully in response to the institutional impact assessments and an increased focus on impacts in grants. Universities have hired writers to assist with impact statements, communications experts to assist with building academic profiles, knowledge mobilisation specialists, and a full complement of expertise to meet their local needs. Other universities, have been unresponsive, perhaps conceiving of impact as an academic fad. In the UK funding is attached to impact through the REF. In Australia, the Engagement and Impact Assessment is not, at this point, related to funding. Resourcing will likely be dictated by the trajectory impact takes in the coming years.

It is important to note that this isn’t a settled space. Our understandings of how to account for the impact of academic research in society is still evolving, and along with that, our language to describe it. For example, because the REF and EI utilised a case study approach, those supporting and promoting impact might avoid quantitative words such as ‘measures,’ and instead adopt ‘indicators.’

It is clear that impact is not just coming, it is here. Knowing how to talk about impact and chart pathways to impact — the various engagements along the way that will aid research being taken up — will become increasingly critical for academics. We have been talking about internal impact for years but being able to articulate external impact will be increasingly important for academics’ success.

This blogpost is cross-posted today at The Research Whisperer.

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Wade Kelly is the Senior Coordinator, Research Impact, at La Trobe University, in Melbourne, Australia.

Wade’s PhD research focused on how and why universities and academics engage with communities. This is Wade’s personal website and he tweets from @wadekelly.

The post The Emerging Impact Landscape (Wade Kelly) appeared first on Research Education and Development.

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Photo by Fabian Gieske | unsplash.com

In recent years, career development researchers have focused on the role of chance and luck in career development. They’ve found that, although on reflection we have a tendency to ‘reframe’ our career success in terms of luck, there are certain behaviours and attitudes that contribute to taking advantage of ‘chance’ events. Dr Rachel Loney-Howes a Lecturer from the School of Health and Society here at UOW was ‘lucky’ enough to start an ongoing academic position 6 months after her PhD (yes – 6 months!) In this blog post, she talks about one of the behaviours that helped make that happen.

I still can’t believe my luck. Six months after graduating from my PhD from La Trobe University in Melbourne, I was offered an ongoing position at the University of Wollongong as lecturer in Criminology in the School of Health and Society. Six months.

I was under the impression that I would be casually or contractually employed for at least three – maybe even five years – before I would be gainfully employed, as so many of my friends and colleagues were and currently are. At an HDR Panel for postgraduate research students in the School of Health and Society, which ran in October 2018, I was asked to speak about how I got so lucky. What was it about my experience as a post-graduate research student that made me a competitive candidate for my current role? And what pearls of wisdom could I share with emerging ECRs that might help them as they enter the academic job market. In this blogpost, I discuss some elements of that “luck” I encountered during my candidature as a PhD student – most of which came about because I literally “showed up.”(Note 1);(Note 2)

I learned about “showing up” in the first year of my PhD – advice from a mentor who was not a supervisor. “Showing up” is the informal part of your PhD training whether you are interested in an academic career or not; it not only helps you with networking, but also demonstrates your ability to be a team player – something highly valued by all workplaces. There are three key ways I believe “showing up” helped mould me into an employable ECR. These might seem trivial or self-evident, but I assure you they are vital if you want to succeed in being employed upon graduation – and you must do them regularly and with sincerity.

The first act of showing up for me was quite simple – at least in theory. It meant going into the office most week days, using the workspace I had been allocated (I was lucky enough to have one), and getting to know my officemates, fellow post-graduate students and staff in the department (including the administration staff). This also involved being seen in the tearoom, and attending post-graduate workshops/meetings, as well as student and staff gatherings. Not only did people learn my name and what my research interests were, but this also led to teaching opportunities and research assistant work. It also meant I learned what other people were working on and had amazing critical discussions over lunch, coffee and beers during my candidature. It also helped me to make friends, which is so important given the isolating nature of PhD research.

“Showing up” for morning tea led to the second act of showing up, which is a little more daunting. It involves leaving your building and going to meet other post-graduate students and staff members in different faculties in formal and informal contexts. I was fortunate enough to be selected as a committee member on a number of different projects through attending university-wide events for post-graduate students, and participated in competitions like the “three minute thesis” through which I met different staff and students from across La Trobe University. This also provided me with a wider support network beyond my department and people recommending me for more governance-related projects.

The third act of showing up takes you beyond the confines of your university setting to conferences, workshops and seminars – either attended by academics or people working in your industry or sector. And you should present at one conference a year at a minimum. If you can, volunteer your time to be part of the organising committee, show up at “post-graduate” days now a staple of most conferences in Australia as you will inevitably meet post-graduate students with whom you can collaborate (or commiserate!) with, and attend the conference/workshop dinners. I attended many of these alone during my PhD candidature, and as a result became close friends with a number of other PhD students – some of whom have also obtained secure academic employment incredibly quickly after completing their PhDs. Having networks beyond La Trobe also proved fruitful in securing casual and contract work once I completed my PhD and was looking for permanent work.

“Showing up” in all these spheres took a lot of time and effort. However, it was a vital part of becoming a scholar.

So, yes, on the one hand, I did get lucky with this job. I was in the right place at the right time, with a Head of School prepared to take a chance on someone who was not yet established, and I was willing to move (you must be prepared to move). However, on the other hand, I worked hard at not only writing a PhD (soon-to-be-book) that was well researched, methodologically rich and topical, but worked on showing up.

I made sure people knew who I was but not in a way that was vested in self-importance (at least I hope not!), but rather in a way that was based on respect, reciprocity, and a commitment to seeing myself as part of the department and the academic community. I did not want to be a PhD student who only surfaced every six months to report on their progress.

I “showed up” in different ways, almost every day for three and a half years – and this has paid off in dividends.

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(Note 1) I should note here that my “advice” on showing up stems from a privileged position in which I undertook my PhD with minimal responsibilities outside of my research and teaching commitments – I had no children to look after, was on an Australian Post-Graduate Award for 3.5 years, and had a partner in full-time employment who was able to support me financially. I also lived in close proximity to the university, so I did not have to travel far to campus. I therefore fully acknowledge that this made “showing up” much easier for me than other people. I also had two wonderful supervisors who encouraged me to attend workshops, introduced me to people at conferences, and supported me emotionally throughout my candidature. For this, I am eternally grateful.

(Note 2) Because of the challenges associated with juggling family responsibilities with study or being far away, another possibility is “showing up” and connecting through social media. For example, on Monday afternoons I used to attend a virtual “shut up and write” session through Twitter. You can also attend webinars, and follow and retweet conference hashtags if you can’t be present. I also strongly recommend tapping into the broader postgraduate community in Australia via weblogs, such as The Thesis Whisperer, where you realise that everyone is just making it up as they go along.

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Dr Rachel Loney-Howes is a Lecturer in Criminology in the School of Health and Society at the University of Wollongong, Australia. 


A critical socio-legal studies scholar, her research explores the nature, history and scope of anti-rape activism, with a particular focus on the relationship between activism, support services and law reform. Her book, co-edited with Dr Bianca Fileborn (University of Melbourne), titled #MeToo and the Politics of Social Change was released in May 2019.


Rachel tweets from @rloneyhowes.

The post Showing up (Rachel Loney-Howes) appeared first on Research Education and Development.

Thanks to podcasts I now have a new way of keeping myself entertained while tackling some tedious data entry or walking an extra few bus stops home.

Individual episodes of on-demand content have breathed new live into the audio genre, and while the medium has many fictional serialised dramas and blokes laughing at their mates’ jokes, there is also a robust, and growing, genre of podcasts that make you feel smart just for listening to them.

In particular, I love researcher-driven podcasts. They make complex topics personable, without necessarily having to sacrifice nuance or complexity.

I enjoy listening to podcasts in my own area, but I also love learning more about Roman history (Emperors of Rome), queer theory (Queers podcast), and science (Science Vs.), from podcasts run by academics, or that frequently interview them. 

Since November 2016, I’ve been making Lingthusiasm, a podcast that is enthusiastic about linguistics, with my friend and fellow linguistic Gretchen McCulloch. Gretchen is a full-time pop linguist, and we met online thanks to our blogs (Superlinguo & All Things Linguistic).

When we finally met up in non-internet space to teach at a linguistics summer school in 2016, we had so much fun talking about linguistics, we decided to combine our shared enthusiasm into a podcast project. We record between Melbourne and Montreal thanks to the magic of the internet. Twice a month we release half-hour long episodes in which we discuss topics like why vowels are so cool, how to learn languages like a linguist, and why everyone speaking a single language won’t lead to world peace.

I’ve learnt lots of great lessons as a podcast maker and listener, and below are my five top tips for researchers who are interested in the medium.

If you like the idea of podcasts, but don’t have the time or resources, consider looking into whether your university has a podcast series where you could be a one-time guest, or look for podcasts in your field that run interviews and pitch an idea to them. A lot of these tips will help you feel more comfortable with joining in on someone else’s podcast too.

1. The internet is full of audiences, know yours

A global audience means that there are eager ears for topics that might be considered too specific by traditional platforms. We knew we wanted to make a show that was engaging for non-linguists, relevant to linguistics students, and still fun for linguists. This influences how we go about the show. We limit terminology to a few key concepts each episode, and spend a lot of time talking about why these concepts are important.

2. Decide on your format, and record a few episodes before you launch

Listen to a range of podcasts to get a feel for a format that works for you. You might go for a lightly structured conversation, like Talk the Talk, or bring on interviewees, like Vocal Fries. You might even decide that your best option is a solo-presenter podcast like The History of English, or something that weaves together interviews and commentary with lush production like The Allusionist. All of these podcasts are about linguistics or language, but they have different formats that suit their aims, audience and personalities.

Whatever format you decide on, record and edit at least three episodes before launching. If you can’t get that many together, you probably don’t have the time to commit to a regular podcast. Give the test episodes to people whose feedback you trust. Are the episodes long enough? Too long? Do you need to fix your intro to make the premise clearer? Ironing out these wrinkles before you launch into an ever-growing podcast market will help you feel more confident.

3.Always keep your audience in mind

Once you know your audience and format, always keep your listeners in mind. You don’t want your audience to feel like a third wheel. My favourite conversational podcasts make me feel like I’m right there with the hosts, in in the conversation. This can mean adding more structure, or taking time to clarify a topic even though you and your co-host/interviewee already know what you’re talking about. It’s a tough balancing act to keep the audience in the conversation without losing the flow, but it makes for better listening.

4. Podcasts require time and resources

I’ve been running a linguistics blog since 2011. Superlinguo is now weekly, but I used to post three times a week. I do it in my spare time, and the budget is a few dollars every year for the domain hosting. Lingthusiasm is much more resource intensive. Episodes take time to research, prepare and record, and then they need to be edited, uploaded, and linked with descriptive text. We also provide transcripts for our episodes. This means that people can access our show even if they can’t or don’t want to listen.

Gretchen and I already had a lot of work, so we knew that the only way we’d be able to keep to a schedule was to bring other people onto the team. We now have an audio editor who puts the show together, and a production editor who manages the transcripts and other logistics. This meant that we knew early on that we had to find a way to fund the show. We decided on Patreon, a model where people support creators on a monthly model. Half of our episodes are released as Patreon-exclusive bonuses, and it’s our patrons that not only keep the show running and ad-free, but also allowed us to buy Gretchen a better microphone, and grow the show to two full-length episodes a month.

5. Podcasting gives you great skills to bring back to your academic work

Podcasting requires you to think about your area of expertise for a new audience. Talking about my research for an intelligent non-expert has made it easier for me to feel comfortable in interviews, and to write plain language summaries of my work for grants. Of course, we cover a much broader area of linguistics than just my research areas in the podcast. I bring a lot of my favourite content from my teaching to the show, and then I get to bring it back into the classroom with an extra dose of enthusiasm. 

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Lauren Gawne is a David Myers Research Fellow in the Department of Languages and Linguistics at La Trobe University. 


Her research focuses on grammatical evidentiality and the gestures people use when they speak, with a focus on Tibeto-Burman languages. 


Lauren is also interested in research data management, internet English, and public linguistics. Lauren co-hosts the podcast Lingthusiasm with Gretchen McCulloch and run the generalist linguistics website Superlinguo. Lauren is on Twitter as @superlinguo.

The post Why podcast your research? (Lauren Gawne) appeared first on Research Education and Development.

George Atkin-Smith only started her Instagram account @someblondescientist in late September 2017. 


In that short time, the account has gained almost 3600 followers and is going strong!  


The RED Alert invited Georgia to write about her Instagram experiences. Read on to see what it takes to create and manage a successful Insta account!

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I had been thinking for a while about setting up an Instagram account about my daily science life and general scientific communications (#scicomm).

But it took a lot of encouragement for me to take the leap!

Personally, I love social media and use many different forms. I reasoned that, if I was going to invest my time in it, it may as well be for something that not only helped me and my career, but also supported others along the way.

I created my ‘InstaBlog’ (an Instagram account that followed my day-to-day research adventures) without even realising the amazing scientific community I was joining.

Instagram is FULL of amazing #scicomm accounts that share scientific lives, give advice and discuss news in the scientific world. The platform allows me to share photos, stories, live videos and short or extensive content – so, it is perfect for representing the kind of work I do.

There are many Instagram accounts that have influenced, encouraged and inspired me. To name but a few these include: @science.sam | @stories.of.a.scientist | @fitgrad.andreea | @scigirlsash | @emmanigma_. These people have really made a difference to my research journey as they clearly depict the lives of scientists, showcase the diversity of this community, and are a clear demonstration of what you can achieve when you have a passion for communicating your research.

I’ve found the support within the scientific community on Instagram to be incredible. Everyone encourages and supports others, and I’m honoured to be a part of it.

My primary motivation for setting up my account was to have fun! So, it’s important for me not to feel pressured about how I run it. I tend to post whenever I feel like I have something to say. I actively avoid posting ‘because I need content’ or because I haven’t posted for a while. If I am doing something interesting in the lab or have an intriguing thought, I’ll create an Insta update out of it.

The main element I try to include in my Instablog is honesty. To me, it’s very important to show a clear representation of what it is like to be a scientist. Sometimes, things work; most of the time, they don’t. Therefore, I want to ensure that what I am posting truly reflects me and the sector I’m working in. When you’re having a bad day in the lab, it is really comforting to see that you’re not the only one!

If you’ve ever browsed through Instagram, you’ll see that users drop in many hashtags! I’m still learning when it comes to how to use these best…there is so much to learn! Hashtags can be really useful, clever, funny and an easy way to promote posts. For example, the recent #scientistswhoselfie movement gained a lot of fantastic support and involvement. Keeping up to date with the community is a good way to stay on top of trending tags and debates.

Overall, I am so happy I ventured into the world of #scicomm on Instagram. I really enjoy getting involved in the community, talking to people from all over the world and learning about everything science. I have received so many messages from students from all around the world seeking advice, asking questions about life as a scientist or simply saying that they can relate to, or feel inspired by, the content.

Knowing that I can help people through what I post or connecting with this community is an incredible feeling.

I would really encourage people to get involved in research communications, no matter what their field of interest! It’s so important to convey our niche jobs and expertise with the public to gain their trust and educate others.

My two key pieces of advice for people wanting to set up a similar thing is:

1. Be honest: People relate to honesty and it’s so important to show a wholistic representation of a job, career and life in general.

2. Share the support: Engage in your community and support others – this support will find its way back to you!

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Georgia Atkin-Smith is a final year PhD student in the field of Biochemistry and Immunology. 


In addition to research, Georgia has a passion for scientific communications and is an advocate for women in STEM. 


You can follow Georgia’s science life on her new Instagram Blog, Some Blonde Scientist (@someblondescientist).

The post My Instagram and me (Georgia Atkin-Smith) appeared first on Research Education and Development.