PhD Courses in Denmark

Dates and time: 5 + 26 March 2026 from 9:00 to 15:00

Do you fear that your PhD project will end in the drawer and never get used?

This two-day course is for PhD students who wish to explore and enhance the usefulness of their research beyond academia. The overall aim of the course is to inspire PhD students to create impact and societal engagement through the exploration of relevant theories, methods and practical knowledge.

We apply an integrated approach to investigate impact that goes beyond ‘knowledge transfer’. We think about impact through terms such as ‘knowledge mobilization’ and ‘knowledge exchange’ that foreground continuous collaboration with practice/policy partners along with impact-strategies that consider all phases of a given research project. We will mainly focus on pathways to impact for social science research, but the course is also relevant for students from the humanities or STEM fields.

As part of the course, representatives from public and private organisations will give presentations and feedback to the individual PhD projects. The representatives are selected experts with many years of experience in practice-oriented research mobilization, multi-stakeholder partnerships, and knowledge brokering between people and institutions.

During the course, the PhD students will develop an impact strategy consisting of a theory of change, an activity plan and a stakeholder mapping for their particular project.

The course is open to PhD students at all stages of their PhD project. For those who have just initiated a PhD project, focus will be on establishing collaborations from the very beginning. For PhD students in the final phase, focus will be on developing a plan for integrating and implementing research results in collaboration with relevant organisations.

Course structure
On the first day of the course the PhD students will get an introduction to relevant theories and methods. Furthermore, there will be presentations by representatives from various public and private organisations on their practical experience of collaborating with social scientific research and the role of research seen from their perspectives.

In between the two course days, the PhD students will develop an impact strategy and prepare a presentation for a pitch session.

On the second day of the course, the PhD students will pitch their impact strategy for a panel consisting of researchers with an expertise in impact and representatives from public and private organisations and receive individual feedback.

Teachers
Lise Tjørring, programme manager, Queen Mary’s Center, University of Copenhagen.
Guest teacher: David Budtz Pedersen, professor of science communication and impact studies, AAU
Further, invited guests from public and private organisations will offer presentations and feedback.    

Language: English

ECTS: 2.5

Max. numbers of participants: 20

Course fee: The PhD School at the Faculty of Social Sciences participates in Denmark’s national network for PhD courses. This course is free of charge for PhD students enrolled at one of the participating PhD schools (PhD students enrolled at a Danish University, except Copenhagen Business School). Other PhD students will be charged a course fee of DKK 1,200 per ECTS for participation in the course (PhD students enrolled at Copenhagen Business School or a University outside Denmark).

Registration: Please register via the link in the box no later than 3 February 2026.

Further information: More detailed programme and readings will follow. For further information get in touch with Lise Tjørring (alt@samf.ku.dk).