Year 3 Three-Day Online Writing Retreat 

9th Mar 2021 10:00am - 10th Mar 2021 3:30pm 

To attend this course please book on Inkpath. Inkpath is an app available to all Techne students, if you're not already using please click here to find out how to get started.

Year 3 Writing Retreat with Anne Wilson and Katie Grant - Getting it done; getting it done well

This writing retreat is for Techne students in the third year of their PhD (or equivalent year of part-time study). The retreat will run on 9th and 10th March, with a follow-up day on 7th April. You need to be able to commit to attending all three days.

Writing up, whether during a pandemic or not, can be an isolating experience, and sharing challenges with those at the same stage can energise and motivate. Days 1 and 2 of this three-day retreat (days 1 and 2 consecutive, day 3 a month later) offer timed, goal-oriented writing sessions, with one-to-ones kicking off a month-long, self-directed writing achievement programme. Researchers set specific goals for their writing, both productivity and skills. The goals are reviewed during one-to-ones on Day 3 when we come back together in a mutually supportive space to reinforce techniques and boost the momentum and confidence needed to push through to submission.

Anne Wilson has a background in journalism (features) and corporate communication (scripts, speeches, screen media copy), combining her writing with facilitating writing workshops in HE. She was Royal Literary Fund Fellow at Brunel University for three years, and now runs workshops on academic writing and professional communication for postgraduates and staff at Brunel and other universities. She also coaches students for the 3MT competition (won by Brunel in 2017). She has recently collaborated with the Brunel Occupational Therapy department to investigate what kind of feedback helps students to improve their academic writing.

Katie Grant co-created the Advancing Academic Writing skills website for the University of Glasgow, where she was the Royal Literary Fund Writing Fellow for three years, helping undergraduates, Masters and PhD students with their writing. A columnist, occasional broadcaster, author of ten novels (Sedition, her latest, is published by Virago), chair of the panel of judges for the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction, an occasional book reviewer for, amongst other publications, the New York Times and a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, she runs writing workshops on improving the quality, reach and impact of academic writing for all levels of HE. Long experience of the practical, emotional and organisational challenges of writing for deadlines and for different audiences informs all her workshops. She understands from first-hand the value of getting writing done and getting it done well.