The months since our last update in February have been full of activity. When the PhD Network last wrote for the bulletin at the start of 2026, we were looking ahead to the Spring Conference in Liège, and we are glad to report that both events lived up to the anticipation. Alongside those, new opportunities arose to carry the spirit of Cultivating Curiosity and Community-Engaged Research into spaces beyond our usual programme.
At the Spring Conference in Liège in March, local PhD researchers at the Centre for Ethnic and Migration Studies (CEDEM-ULiège) had crafted a thoughtful programme centred on the tensions of doing migration research in politically charged times. The panel with Myriam Cherti, Marco Martiniello, and Xingcheng Wen was a perfect start, and the workshop that followed gave PhD candidates the space to speak about knowledge production under pressure.
This was also the occasion for our in-person board meeting, the first time the current board has been in the same room together. We used the time to step back from the day-to-day and think critically about how we are working. The conversations were honest and productive, and we left with a clearer picture of where we stand and where we want to go. We clarified roles and responsibilities within the board, which should make it easier for new members to orient themselves and for existing members to share the load more effectively. We also took a closer look at the broader IMISCOE structure and its various committees, and how we can use that knowledge to the PhD Network's advantage. We reviewed and consolidated our existing activities with an eye to building in more structure as the network continues to grow, and we agreed on strategic priorities for the next months. Concretely, this means our activities will revolve around four workstreams:
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IMISCOE Conferences, which include all PhD activities during the Spring Conference, Annual Conference and the IMISCOE Forum,
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PhD Connections, formerly known as the Buddy System, whose main purpose is to facilitate connections (virtual and otherwise) between PhD researchers,
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Blog, which features relevant research and societal issues in migration studies, and
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Communications, to make sure our network is informed and up to date about the latest opportunities and research across our field.
In April, Tulika Bourai and Denis Zeković had the opportunity to take the PhD Network's work into a new setting. The Collaborative Research Centre 1604 at the University of Osnabrück organised a PhD Spring School, and we were invited to facilitate two workshop sessions as representatives of the IMISCOE PhD Network Board. The Spring School itself was organised by local PhD researchers and combined keynotes, paper presentations, and a poster session. Our two sessions were designed around the themes that have framed our activities of the last two years: Joy in Academia and Curiosity and Community. We ran them as open discussion spaces, deliberately leaving room for the kind of conversations that rarely make it into research seminars. The questions we posed revolved around motivation along the PhD trajectory, navigating the supervisor relationship, and how to hold on to the things that drew you to research when times get busy.
The IMISCOE PhD Blog has also resumed its activities with two new blog posts. Filipa Saraiva explored how religious belief, lived experience, and environmental pressures intersect in shaping the future of climate-induced displacement in Portugal, while Aneesha Jhonny wrote about how the Supreme Court of India foregrounded a child-centric approach to protect Rohingya refugee children’s right to education.
As we move into the summer and towards the Annual Conference, the theme of curiosity and community continues to guide what we do. We are grateful to everyone who has contributed to and participated in the events of the past months, and we look forward to what the rest of the year holds.
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