Doctoral Reseachers’ Section
The Doctoral Researchers’ Section (DRS) is a community for all doctoral researchers at the University of Oulu. It is run for doctoral researchers by doctoral researchers. DRS was established in autumn 2013 to provide a network of peer support and advocacy for doctoral researchers.
The DRS is the official voice of the doctoral researchers across disciplines, promoting high quality doctoral studies and inspiring academic experiences. It also offers opportunities for networking with peers across disciplines. All doctoral researchers are in – no sign-up is needed!
The section uses English as its working language. You do not need to be a member of OYY to join the activities of DRS. However, if you wish to be appointed as a representative in the administrative organs, or to work as the section chair or vice chair, the OYY membership is required. You can check the Membership pages to find out what benefits OYY offers for doctoral researchers and how much the membership fee is.
Meeting materials and documents
Join the DRS Teams workspace to find our meeting materials. DRS Teams can also be used for contacting us and other doctoral researchers. Log in with your University account to gain access.
The Doctoral Researchers’ Section gathers approximately once in 1-2 months to discuss doctoral students’ points of view concerning the development of doctoral training. The task of the student representatives is to take doctoral students’ proposals and opinions forward. The Section also organizes events for doctoral researchers, such as afterwork events, peer support seminars and workshops.
The Section watches over University decision-making and doctoral training practices, proactively advocates doctoral students’ interests and well-being, and promotes doctoral students’ awareness of their rights and their ways of influencing University decision-making. DRS nominates the representatives of doctoral researchers for the administrative organs, and the Board of the Student Union makes the nominations.
DRS meetings and events serve as central forums for sharing topical issues and questions. You can contact the Chair of DRS or the committee representatives if you have a question or a concern about doctoral studies and research, or if you have a topic that you would like to be discussed in the meetings.
What does it mean to be a committee member?
Working as a committee member involves familiarizing yourself in how academic decision-making functions and cooperating with other committee members and other stakeholders. Your main task as a representative of doctoral researchers is to make sure that decisions are made on equal grounds, and to advocate for change when needed. Depending on the committee there are meetings roughly once a month. You will get the meeting materials beforehand so you will have time to go through the agenda and discuss the topics with the other representatives in the committee. You can also raise topics for discussion in the committee, for example by contacting the coordinators.
Making it visible what you have learnt during the committee work:
- Apply for study credits to be included in your doctoral studies. See UniOGS recommendations of ECTS for different activities related to doctoral studies
- List the positions under Other key academic merits for your CV. For example, see the CV guidelines by Academy of Finland.
For more information about the committee work, see the Student Unions’ resources for representative work in the administrative organs: Administration Guide. You can also contact the current representatives or the DRS Chair for further details, see below. Please note that you need to be a member of OYY to be eligible for the representative positions.
Check open positions and apply via halloped.fi
DRS representatives in the UniOGS committees
UniOGS Management Group:
The chair of DRS is the member of the UniOGS Management Group. The task of the UniOGS Management Group is to support the Dean of UniOGS in leading and developing doctoral training and implementing the strategy of the University. The Management Group discusses e.g. the development of doctoral training processes, admission times and admission criteria and the amount of travel grants.
- Chair of the Doctoral Students’ Section / Member of the UniOGS Management Group
- Vice-chair of the Doctoral Students’ Section / Vice-member of the UniOGS Management Group
Education Group of UniOGS
The task of the Education Group is to evaluate and develop the general and transferrable skill courses and field-specific training at the University of Oulu. The Education Group discusses e.g. how to improve the courses of UniOGS according to feedback and what kind of new courses UniOGS could offer.
Doctoral Training Committees
The decisions of the Committees have a significant impact in the lives of doctoral researchers. The Doctoral Training Committees direct, develop and evaluate the activities of the doctoral degree programs in the specific fields of the Committee. The Committees e.g. assess admission applications, doctoral training plans and final PhD theses. Additionally, the Committees are also responsible for organizing field-specific doctoral training. The Committees gather approximately once a month.
- Health and Biosciences (HB-DTC)
- Human Sciences (HS-DTC)
- Information Technology and Electrical Engineering (ITEE-DTC)
- Technology and Natural Sciences (TNS-DTC)
DRS representatives elsewhere in the University Administration
Research Council
The Research Council supports the University Board of Directors, Management Group and the Rector in advancing scientific research at the University. The Council also makes proposals about policies of research and evaluates the quality of research on University level. The Council discusses e.g. new scientific directions, doctoral training, recruitment, ethical principles of research and quality assurance of research.
Education Council
The Education Council supports the University Board of Directors and the Rector in advancing education, provides initiatives regarding education policy as well as initiatives for developing teaching, and evaluates the quality of University education. The chairperson of the Education Council is the Vice Rector of Education
Dear doctoral researchers,
You are welcome to join our first DSS meeting for the year 2021 on 22nd January 2021 at 14:00 in DSS Teams space, link to the meeting: Click here to join the meeting
Please, DO NOT forget to join the Teams space with your University credentials to join our meetings also in the future and get access to the DSS files and folders!
The meeting is also a great opportunity to ask about applying to UniOGS committees for the year 2021. For open positions, see: https://www.halloped.fi/en/oulu/calls . In the committees, you will be able to participate in decision making and do important ADVOCACY work for the benefit of all the doctoral researchers at the University of Oulu. You can apply for study credits to your general and transferrable skills courses as an acknowledgement of the skills and knowledge gained. Further details in the UniOGS webpages: https://www.oulu.fi/uniogs/recommendations_of_ects
Those who are not employed at the University of Oulu will get a compensation for the meetings. If you are employed at the University, negotiate with your line manager to be able to use working hours for the meetings.
Other topics of the meeting include news from the committees and planning year 2021. You’ll find the full agenda and other materials in DSS Teams space, when you would join with your university credentials. For the link, see https://www.oyy.fi/doctoral-students-section/
DSS meeting 01/2021
Friday 22nd January at 14:00
At DSS Zoom Click here to join the meeting
We hope to see many of you, so that we can plan the activities for the year 2021!
Riikka & Namrata
To keep yourself up-to-date on our events and current topics, follow us in social media, join our Teams space DSS Teams (log in with your University account to gain access). We also send emails on our main events and meetings via UniOGS email list.
If you have comments or questions, send us an email or contact us via social media.
- Follow us in Facebook
- Join the Facebook group
- WhatsApp group: send email to the DSS chair to join our WhatsApp group.
You can contact us also via email (firstname.lastname AT oulu.fi)
Riikka Tumelius
DSS chair 2020
Namrata Baruah
DSS vice-chair 2020
For information and contact details of current DSS representatives in the university administration, see the section on DSS Advocacy work.