Early Career Summer Course
Early career scholars, especially graduate students, are invited to apply for the ESRS Summer School. This interactive and targeted session will take place on the 7th of July 2025. The goals of this workshop are to create an open and engaging environment for early career scholars to network and further develop their professional skills. In this workshop, we will focus on developing a broad range of useful skills including networking, knowledge mobilization, and publishing.
To express your interest in the activities for early career researchers, use the ExOrdo submission system. Please note that due to limited space, we may not be able to guarantee spots for everyone who expresses an interest in attending.
The goals of this workshop are to create an open and engaging environment for early career scholars to network and further develop their professional skills.
Schedule
9:30–11:00 | Welcome: Imagining liveable rural futures together Jessica Duncan & Emily Duncan |
In this interactive session, we begin with a round of introductions. We then discuss the ins and outs of academic conferences, sharing tips and tricks to facilitate more meaningful engagement. We end this session with a creative exercise that helps us explore the theme of the conference, our relationship to that theme and the interconnections in the group. | |
11:00–11:30 | Coffee break |
11:30–13:00 | Part 1: Knowledge mobilization: research for impact Emily Duncan |
Knowledge mobilization is a key part of the research process. This session will present creative options for knowledge mobilization that will help you to plan ahead to ensure that your research has an impact. We will discuss a variety of knowledge mobilization options, tips for interacting with media, and introduce tools that are useful in communicating research. | |
13:00–14:00 | Lunch |
14:00–15:00 | Communicating your Research Emily Duncan |
Combining the networking tips and knowledge mobilization lessons learned from earlier in the day, participants will have time to interact and refine how they communicate their research. | |
15:00–15:30 | Coffee break |
15:30–17:00 | Part 2: Expert insights into academic publishing Ruth McAreavey & Apostolos Papadopoulos, Editors and Chief of Sociologia Ruralis |
Ever wondered how the review process works? Not sure about how to structure your article so that you can be published? In this session the Editors of Sociologia Ruralis will tell you more about the journal and will unpack the publication process. They will explore how peer review works, including what they are looking for in an article, and they will talk about how to write a good review. |
Bios
- Emily Duncan
Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Sociology and Social Studies, University of Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada
Emily Duncan’s SSHRC-funded Postdoctoral Fellowship investigates the social consequences of digital agricultural technologies. Drawing on science and technology studies and agrarian political economy, she explores how algorithmic decision-support tools in agriculture lead to specific environmental management outcomes and analyzes their impact on the Canadian agri-food sector. Her research connects the trends of digitalization in agriculture to on-going issues related to consolidation, financialization, and climate change. Ultimately, Dr. Duncan’s research aims to produce knowledge that will advance the resiliency and sustainability of agri-food systems. She is a member of the Scientific Committee for the European Society for Rural Sociology (ESRS).
- Jessica Duncan
Scholar and educator committed to social-ecological justice. She works as Associate Professor in the Politics of Food Systems Transformations at the Rural Sociology Group, Wageningen University (The Netherlands).
Jessica holds a PhD in Food Policy from City University London (2014). Her research pioneers new ways of understanding and imagining food governance processes to support just and sustainable transformations. She effectively translates this knowledge into impactful teaching. Her teaching has been recognized but a number of awards, including Teacher of the Year at Wageningen University (2017).
Jessica sits on the Editorial Board for the journal Sociologia Ruralis and is a founding member and ambassador for the Centre for Unusual Collaborations. She is currently chairing the Scientific Committee for the European Society for Rural Sociology (ESRS) and recently served as an expert on the EU Standing Committee for Agricultural Research’s 5th Foresight Report on resilience and transformation.
- Ruth McAreavey
My research focuses on migration, governance and ethics. I am interested in inequalities faced by migrants in the labour market and in other parts of everyday life. I have published extensively on rural governance and regeneration, international migration and on research ethics and methodologies. I am an active member of various international research networks including the European Society for Rural Sociology (ESRS) and European Sociological Association. I am currently co-editor-in-chief of Sociologia Ruralis. I am an elected Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences and a trustee of the Plunkett Foundation.
My research is strongly oriented towards migration and I continue to conduct research with migrant communities in the UK. I have a practitioner background and prior to working in higher education I held various positions in the voluntary and community sector and within local government. I consistently collaborate with external partners including third sector organisations and local government.
- Apostolos Papadopoulos
Professor of Rural Sociology and Geography, Department of Geography, Harokopio University, Athens
My research is focused on the factors and mechanisms related to rural transformation, social change and social class. An important domain of my research refers to the impact of migration on host societies. In recent years I am interested on the asymmetries between social transformation and migration processes at various spatial scales. Rural areas being the main arena of my research, although it is increasingly challenging to look at the interactions between urban and rural areas.