Well-being and productivity: International PhD students’ academic journeys at Warwick
Well-being and productivity: International PhD students’ academic journeys at Warwick
Team leader: Meifang Zhuo (Applied Linguistics)
Team members: Siyu Wang (Applied Linguistics); Mehmet Onur Sahin (WMG); Peter To (Psychology)
Summary
A PhD is challenging. Doing it in another language makes it even more so. This one-day conference, focusing specifically on international doctoral students at Warwick, aims to map out the various challenges they face and work out possible coping strategies for them and many more to come. The overall purpose of this conference is to enhance their well-being and productivity during their academic pursuits at Warwick.
This one-day conference consists of morning activities, including networking (PhD speed networking activity) and mapping out challenges (Zine-making activity), and afternoon activities focusing on well-being practices (mindfulness activity) and working out solutions (Robin Robin brainstorming).
This conference will be inclusive, collaborative and interdisciplinary, with team members and participants from various cultural backgrounds, based in different departments at Warwick.
This conference will provide international PhD students at Warwick with the much-needed opportunities to connect with peers of the same identity, explore their challenges in a safe and supportive environment, and learn hands-on techniques for well-being and productivity. They will gain validation from other’s challenging PhD stories and understand that they are never alone. Most importantly, they will cooperate with each other to work out possible solutions to the common problems faced by international PhD students at Warwick, benefiting themselves and many others in the Warwick community. By the end of the conference, all the international PhD students involved in this event (including the four organizers) will be invited to 1) write up, or 2) make a video, sharing their PhD life stories, describing their difficulties, highlighting the solutions, and giving tips for those just starting their PhD journey at Warwick.
The output of this conference will include:
(1)A collection of zines by participants, documenting the challenges they face as international PhD students at Warwick.
(2)A report detailing the conference and outlining possible solutions to the challenges, implications for various stakeholders on how to support international PhD students in a more targeted and efficient way for their well-being and productivity.
(3)A collection of written/video stories by volunteered participants, sharing their unique life stories as international PhD students at Warwick.