RETHINKING RESEARCH METHODOLOGY, 16.11.2016 IN TURKU SUMMARY OF FEEDBACK The FinEd Network organised together with the UTU Faculty of Education a Conference for all the doctoral candidates of FinEd on November 16th, 2016 in Turku. The title of the conference was Rethinking Research Methodology. The programme of the Conference included digital poster presentations of the doctoral candidates of the Faculty of Education, UTU. As the keynote of the conference, Professor Niina Nummela from Turku School of Economics gave a lecture entitled "Put in the sugar, and then add the eggs... or is it the other way around? Mixing qualitative and quantitative methods". In the afternoon, there were eight parallel workshop sessions, concentrating on methodological and other themes. At the end of the conference, there was a buffet dinner. See the programme of the conference in the FinEd webpage https://www.utu.fi/en/units/edu/units/fined/annual_seminar/pages/home.aspx. Altogether 77 doctoral candidates participated in the conference: 23 from the KEVEKO Doctoral Programme of the UTU Department of Education, 25 from the OPPI DP of the UTU Department of Teacher Education, 21 from other FinEd universities (ISY, JY, LY, OY, TaY, ÅA) and 8 from the University of Helsinki. In addition, there were 30 supervisors or senior researchers and audience in the conference After the seminar, 23 out of 77 doctoral candidates gave feedback (30 %; 20 from UTU, 2 from other FinEd universities and 1 from the University of Helsinki). In addition, 4 supervisors / chair persons / workshop teachers and 2 people from the audience shared their experiences. A summary of all feedback is presented here. 1. Numerical evaluation of the conference (29 respondents) The numerical evaluation of the conference gives a very positive picture of the event as a whole, as well as concerning different parts of it. The great majority of the respondents were very satisfied with nearly all of the listed 19 the components (see more in the table below). The table shows with yellow colour how the majority of the answers was focused on. The most popular parts of the conference (mostly very satisfied answers) were the buffet food, the keynote of professor Niina Nummela and the overall theme of the conference. The respondents were also very or somewhat satisfied with for example the advertisement of the conference, the digital poster sessions, their own workshop group and the expertise and pedagogical skills of the teachers / chairs. The views of the respondents were most diverse concerning the arrangements and information provided before the conference, the personal contacts and networking with doctoral students from other universities as well as the personal contacts with the supervisors or personnel of the faculty.
Very satisfied Somewhat satisfied Somewhat dissatisfied Very dissatisfied I don't know / Not applicable Advertisement of the conference 14 14 0 0 1 Arrangements and information provided before the conference 8 14 7 0 0 Theme of the conference 16 12 1 0 0 Digital poster sessions 12 11 1 1 4 Welcome by Marja Vauras & Erno Lehtinen 8 13 0 1 7 Keynote of Niina Nummela 17 6 1 0 5 Your workshop group 13 12 3 0 1 Atmosphere in the social event and buffet 16 9 1 0 3 Food provided in the buffet 21 4 1 0 3 Schedule of the day 14 12 1 1 1 Expertise of the teachers/chairs 14 12 1 0 2 Pedagogical skills of the teachers/chairs Personal contacts and networking with doctoral students from your own university Personal contacts and networking with doctoral students from other universities Personal contacts with the supervisors or personnel of the faculty 11 14 1 0 3 11 9 1 4 4 3 13 8 2 3 7 10 4 3 5 Your own contribution during the day 7 19 3 0 0 Development of your scientific thinking and skills 10 17 1 0 1 Benefits for your doctoral research 7 13 4 0 5 General value of the conference 10 16 1 0 2 2. Examples of written feedback on the digital poster sessions POSITIVE - 5 minuutin posterinesittely + lyhyet kysymykset ja sen jälkeen vielä hetken kuluttua mahdollisuus keskustella posterista osoittautui toimivaksi konseptiksi. / Discussion and time for interaction went very well. / 5 min hyvä aikarajaus, tiivistämisen taito kehittyy. - I liked the welcoming and easy atmosphere of the poster sessions. Everyone was helpful and nice, and especially the ones chairing the sessions tried to make everyone welcome and also kept up the conversation about every poster. / Sessioissa oli runsaasti kiertely- ja keskusteluaikaa - mikä ei isommissa kansainvälisissä konferensseissa oman kokemukseni mukaan toteudu näin hyvin. / I really appreciate the discussion part of the poster session. Especially we discussed different topics like an exhibition and presenters can freely communicate with the audience. - Posterisessiot toimivat hyvin, vaikka osa esittäjistä varmasti pohti, mitä formaatti tarkoittaa. Omasta mielestäni "liikkumatila" esityksen tarkan rakenteen suhteen oli vain hyvä asia, ja oli kiintoisaa
nähdä erilaisia toteutustapoja. / Digiposteri oli kätevä esitysformaatti ja se antoi esittäjän luovuudelle tilaa. - It was good to learn to use prezi. - I liked a lot these poster sessions although the time was limited. It was a good start to discussions. I like this style to have more time to discuss in English, because I have a limited possibility to speak English in my work. TO BE DEVELOPED - The content of the posters was not specified, so every presenter tried to share all elements of the article they're working with at the moment. I think the poster sessions could have been more focused on the methodology part, if the idea of the conference was to focus on research methodology. But this should have been specified already when preparing the posters. - Parannettavaa - etukäteisinformaatio sähköisen posterin muodosta / Epäselväksi jäi, pitikö käyttää preziä. Jos se oli tarkoitus, yksityisen prezi-tilin käyttö tuli mahdolliseksi vasta deadlinepäivänä. - I have to say that 5 minutes of presentation was quite short and the discussion wasn't much about giving feedback but learning more about the research. Perhaps that time could be used to present more the study and then have time for advises and comments. - Presentation time was bit short, & if we are to use the same screen, PPT rather than poster will be better as most can read the slide. Poster on that screen is too small for others to read. - The digital poster is a good idea to save budget, but I miss the old tradition. There were some other topics shown by other presenters that I wish I could see afterward. à NB: THE DIGITAL POSTERS HAVE BEEN ADDED IN THE WEBPAGE OF THE UTU FACULTY OF EDUCATION IN https://www.utu.fi/fi/yksikot/edu/tutkimus/tohtorikoulutus/vuosikonferenssi2016/sivut/home.aspx. - I guess next time a poster should be a poster and not a combination of slides. The slides disrupted the smooth slow of the poster presentation. 3. Examples of written feedback of the conference as a whole POSITIVE - I love that we need to learn a new skill/a new way of presenting every year. I love learning more and improving myself. - The keynote speech was really informative. / This conference was very good for me because I was just struggling with my mixed-methods data and Nina Nummela gave me a good perspectives in the workshop. / Nummela oli loistava niin puhujana kuin pienryhmän ohjaajana. / I think the keynote was the best element this year. - Almost all the workshops were really really interesting, I wish I could attend more than one.
- The atmosphere in the conference (from my point of view) was better than in earlier conferences. It might be that some of us knew each other and with our friends, we got to know other doctoral students. - It was wonderful that there were also other doctoral students from other universities. It was really mind-expanding. - Tämä oli hyvä kokonaisuus markkinoinnista, esitteistä, tarjottavista, postereista ja niiden ekoohjeista syömisiin. Hyvä! - Vaikka tilaisuus tarjosi mahdollisuuden kv-konferesseihin "treenamiseen", mielestäni Annual Conference seisoo tyylikkäästi omilla jaloillaan, omana konferenssinaan muiden joukossa! TO BE DEVELOPED - Infoa konferenssista tuli sähköpostiin jatkuvasti "tiputellen" ja se vähän ärsytti. / The information about the conference came as too many separate and small pieces. - Miten tällaisissa tapahtumissa verkostoidutaan? Tuntuu, että porukat istuu aina omiensa seurassa. (How do you network in conferences like this? It feels that you just sit with your old friends.) - There were no supervisors and lecturers/staff from the department in the poster sessions except the organisers of the conference. - Yhdessä kt-päivien kanssa marraskuulle latautui aika paljon tavaraa, mutta toisaalta monille varmaankin tällainen yhteisajoitus taas sopi hyvin. 4. Comments and ideas for the future seminars or ideas for development of the doctoral education of the UTU Faculty of Education, UTU? Comments and ideas about the cooperation with the FinEd Network? ON THE WORKSHOPS - Maybe a two day long event would be better so that we could attend to more workshops after having the presentations on the first day. - Työpaja oli erinomainen osuus konferenssissa. Hienoa, että työpajassa oli käytännön tekeminen mukana. Metodologia ja tutkimusmetodit teemoina olivat hyödyllisiä ja mielekkäitä - niitä kannattaa harkita tulevienkin vuosien teemoiksi. - Ehkä voisi rakentaa päivät myös työryhmien varaan pikemmin kuin lyhyiden suullisten esitysten ympärille, mutta ilmeisesti halutaan kehittää monipuolisesti valmiuksia, mikä myös ihan hyvä asia. - Työryhmätyöskentelyä ja teemoja voisi kehittää vielä enemmän. Olisi hyvä ehkä tiedustella etukäteen seminaaripäivän lähestyessä millaisia työryhmiä tarvittaisiin. Tällä kertaa valikoima oli hyvä, mutta edelleen saattoi olla vaikeaa löytää ryhmää, joka sopisi itselle hyvin. - I think that workshops should be at least couple of hours. - Taitavia asiantuntijoita vetämään workshopeja. Kiireen tuntu pois. - Hyvä idea olla rinnakkaisia sessioita eri vaiheessa oleville tutkijoille.
- Discussion and time for interaction is very good. INSTRUCTIONS AND THEMATIC COHERENCE - Theme this year very good (rethinking research methodology) but most the poster were quite general and presenters didn't touch the method parts in depth. Probably next year, based on the theme, clear instruction should be given to presenters to prepare in accordance with the theme. FUTURE THEMES / CONTENTS - I would like to participate in a conference that informs the PhD students about their future. Future opportunities and career choices. - Ilta / päätöstilaisuus jossakin muussa tilassa kuin yliopisto. - "Round table discussions? - The buffet was great this year; let us keep the catering service! - I am loving the change of method of presentation every year, very beneficial in my opinion - Many researchers from our faculty are using or beginning to use Nvivo software for qualitative data analysis. However, many have expressed their lack of prior training on the use of Nvivo thereby limiting their data analysis. If a short one or two session workshop on basic Nvivo use coming spring semester, it will be of great help to many researchers. - A lot of doctoral students are doing their thesis as articles, so maybe it could be a nice idea to arrange a workshop or a course providing some insights to the questions related to writing the compilation part. - FinEd Network should be with us (i.e. University of Helsinki), definitely.