Beyza Björkman Nylén Photo: Private

Beyza Björkman Nylén is a professor at the Department of English and a course leader for two courses. The first course, “Academic Writing for International Publication”, deals with how to structure and create a research article and is given once every academic year. The second course, “Open Science for PhD students”, is taught by Beyza together with three colleagues from the university library. The course will be held in spring 2024 for the second time. Here are Beyza’s thoughts about what the Doctoral School has to offer PhD students.

Why do you want to contribute to the Doctoral School?

I am deeply interested in the development of doctoral students from learning about knowledge created by others to joining the knowledge construction practices of their research community and becoming independent knowledge creators. This is an important psychological transition. I love being a part of that journey and supporting PhD students on their path there; seeing how they develop from submitting a first draft of a scientific article to getting it published in a scientific journal. It is very enriching. 
When I was a PhD student, the opportunities offered by the Doctoral School did not exist. The Research School is a fantastic resource with interesting courses and the opportunity to meet other doctoral students from different disciplines.

What experiences do you take with you from the Doctoral School?

It's great to gain insights into how academic writing can vary so much between different research fields. By meeting doctoral students from different departments, such as archaeologists and linguists, I learn more about their research fields and develop an understanding of their scholarly practices. Getting positive feedback from our doctoral students, such as that they have had an article published, makes my day!

Do you have any advice for those thinking of offering a course within the Doctoral School?

The course should be relevant to several research fields in the humanities and be of use to many doctoral students, so it is important to be able to adapt the course to a broader interest. This creates a favorable environment where doctoral students from different disciplines can learn from each other and find similarities in differences. It's great to see! By talking to each other, they understand their own research fields better and reflect on their practices. I see clear results of this in the course output and evaluations, where doctoral students report learning about their own practices by observing others’.