Training 2019

Professionalizing Transferable Skills Programmes: Learning from Experience

From 25 to 27 March 2019 the University of Luxembourg hosted the second PRIDE training. 22 professionals in doctoral education from all over Europe met to learn and exchange about professionalizing Transferable Skills Programmes.

This two and a half day PRIDE training on “Professionalizing Transferable Skills
Programmes”, facilitated by Paule Biaudet (Sorbonne University) and Verity Elston (University of Laussane), provided participants the opportunity to learn from the experience of professionals who have been leading and running transferable skills programmes for many years. The setting of the workshop allowed you to exchange and network with peers from all over Europe.

The training programme included a mixture of presentations, case studies, as well as
interactive activities and discussions with experts. With this diversity of topics and training
methods, the format also served as an opportunity for participants to learn and share ideas for
new training content and methods for their programmes.

The following topics were addressed:

Establishing a transferable skills programme:

  • What do we mean by transferable skills
  • How to set up and run a good, solid transferable skills program for doctoral
    candidates?
  • Choosing the topics, the trainers, the formats

Managing a transferable skills programme:

  • Administrative, financial and logistical aspects
  • Evaluating a transferable skills programme
  • Should transferable skills training be made mandatory, or not?
  • Measuring and communicating the impact

Current issues in transferable skills training:

  • Ethics and research integrity
  • Wellness, stress management
  • Equality, diversity and inclusion
  • Open Access and Open Science
I participated in the Pride training course in Luxembourg. The three day course was an excellent place to learn new things about transferable skills training and to develop my professionalism. The training itself was interactive and included a lot of group work, which was great. The course was also a great place to meet my colleagues from other universities and to network and share ideas.
Sini Karppinen
University of Helsinki
Organizing doctoral training often means having your objectives swamped by everyday paperwork. At PRIDE, you get to take a step back and work with like-minded professionals : what does doctoral training mean ? Just like scientific conferences, doctoral professionals occasionally need to shares ideas and problems to get fresh perspectives
Hendrik Eijsberg
Université Confédérale Léonard de Vinci