Category Archives: Toolbox

Do you need to update the PGR Toolbox for the 2021 APR forms?

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The APR forms will be released on Tuesday 1st June – do you need to update the PGR Toolbox?

The PGR Portfolio of Activity and the Record of Supervisory meetings must be up to date by the 31st May for this data to be included in the 2021 APR form. Any data added to the  PGR Portfolio of Activity and the Record of Supervisory meetings after the 31st May will not be included in the 2021 APR form. You are recommended to review your progress over the last year to ensure that you have a full record for the last academic year.

Below, we provide further information to help you complete the PGR Portfolio of Activity and the Record of Supervisory meetings for the current academic year. Guidance to help you complete the APR forms will be available on the LDC Student Experience team web-site.

Preparing your Record of Supervisory meetings for the APR

Please ensure that your Record of Supervisory meetings is up to date before the end of May. The APR contains the complete list of the dates of all supervisory meeting records that have been signed off by your supervisor.  You may want to remind your supervisor that they should sign off all records before the 1st June.

You should check that you have recorded the correct number of required meetings:

  • At least one meeting per month if you are a full-time student
  • At least one meeting every two months if you are a part-time student

NB You can enter meetings retrospectively. The record should include relevant Zoom or Skype meetings.
You are not expected to record meetings for any periods of suspension.

Preparing your PGR Portfolio of Activity for the APR

The PGR Portfolio of Activity is your record of your activities and achievements over the last year, which supplements your research and support your long-term development. For example, the record can include the training and development workshops/webinars that you have attended, conferences and research meetings that you have participated in, work with industry or organisations outside academia, public engagement and public communication  and so on. This record can include any activities taken place online.

The APR form will display data from the PGR Portfolio of Activity  in a non-editable format, i.e. any changes to the Portfolio of Activity after the 31st May will not be reproduced in the APR form. We recommend that you revisit the Portfolio of Activity before the 31st May and check which of your records you want to be visible in the APR. All records for the past year are included by default, but you can de-select any activities that you want to be kept private.

The APR will include data from the PGR Portfolio of Activity under the four headings in the Portfolio of Activity, which correspond to the four domains of the Researcher Development Framework. The data that is transferred to the APR will be limited to:

  • Records with dates in the period from the 1st June 2020 to the end of May 2021.
  • The type of activity, the title, and the date of the events that you have recorded in the Portfolio.
  • Records that you have kept marked as ‘selected’ in the Portfolio.

The APRs will not include further information such as the longer record description or the ‘RDF descriptors’.

You may want to check the event titles carefully to ensure that this accurately represents the event, since the event description is not included in the APR. For example, if you recorded attendance at a three day conference, you might include the dates in the title.

Example of how APR form appears

Example of Portfolio of Activity data as it will appear in the APR    – set for the year 2017-18. Only items added in the year 2020-21 will appear in the APR for this year.

If you have not entered data into the Portfolio of Activity, the APR will include empty text boxes where you can add any additional information in relation to your professional development to record in the APR process. The choice of which of the four boxes to use to record each training or development activity is a personal choice, but could help you ensure that you can demonstrate a wide range of development.

If you have any problems with this process or you encounter system issues in relation to the Portfolio of Activity before the APR forms are released, please contact the LDC Development Team at pgro@liverpool.ac.uk.

LDC Development Programme: Jan – March 2021

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The Liverpool Doctoral College Development team programme for Jan to March is listed below and events are open for registration. Follow the links on each title for more information and to book a place. The list below is loosely organised to our programme themes, with some overlap between themes. All events will take place online, mostly in Zoom.*
NB Places are limited – please only book if you can attend!

Taking Ownership of your PhD

Workshops for those who have recently begun their PhD

03 Feb13:00 – 15:15Starting the PhD
17 Feb13:00 – 15:15Project Management of the PhD
24 Feb13:00 – 15:15Time-management in the PhD

We also offer a webinar to support those new to the PGR Toolbox:

10 Feb13:30 – 14:30Webinar: Effectively Using the PGR Toolbox

 Improving your resilience … and your productivity

Managing your own motivation is important to maintain research progress. We offer an early workshop to help you set goals for the coming year, and then two workshop series, the first to help you manage yourself and your motivations and the second to build better working relations with others.
NB you will need to register for each workshop in these series separately.

21 Jan13:00 – 15:15Setting PhD Goals: Looking Ahead to a Great PhD Year
  9 Feb14:00 – 16:00From Surviving to Thriving, 1:
Developing Your Resilience 
16 Feb14:00 – 16:00From Surviving to Thriving, 2:
Managing Your Procrastination
23 Feb14:00 – 16:00From Surviving to Thriving, 3:
Cultivating Your Productivity
02 Mar14:00 – 16:00From Surviving to Thriving, 4:
Nurturing Your Happiness 
 09 Feb09:30 – 12:30Working with Difficult People 1: People – Similarities
16 Feb09:30 – 12:30Working with Difficult People 2: People – Differences
23 Feb09:30 – 12:30Working with Difficult People 3: People & Change

Finally, we are able to repeat the two day workshop, ‘Becoming a Mindful Researcher’ in March:

15&16 March09:30 – 12:00Becoming a Mindful Researcher

Preparing for presentations and conferences

We have two workshops, repeated in March, to help those preparing for presentations and a webinar for those new to academic conferences:

20 Jan13:00 – 15:15Planning an Effective Research Presentation 
27 Jan13:00 – 15:15Delivering a Convincing Research Presentation 
03 March13:00 – 14:30Webinar: Making the Most of Online
Academic Conference
16 March13:00 – 15:15Planning an Effective Research Presentation
23 March13:00 – 15:15Delivering a Convincing Research Presentation

Writing and analysing research papers

 We are repeating the three workshops offered in Autumn 2020 to help you prepare and start your academic writing:

03 March09:30 – 13:00Getting Going on Your Thesis Writing
10 March09:30 – 13:00Critical Analysis of Research Papers
24 March09:30 – 13:00Getting your Work Published

Our online writing retweets will continue, which provide community writing support, particularly for those managing the final write-up in isolation. For details see:

Online Writing Retreats

 This year we will include some longer retreats. For Jan and Feb the dates are as follows:

  • 12th January 09.45 – 12.00
  • 19th January 09.45 – 15.00
  • 2nd February 09.45 – 12.00
  • 23rd February 09.45 – 15.00

A further peer group of researchers organise their own meetings within a Microsoft teams groups. Details are shared within the above meetings.

Careers preparation

We are continuing our series of workshops to support those preparing for a career despite these difficult times.

11 Feb09:30 – 12:00The Career Wise Researcher
11 March09:30 – 12:00Effective Career Networking
18 March09:30 – 12:00Using LinkedIn to Develop your Career

A full list of all events is available on our programme timetable.

*If you have problems in connecting, or have other access issues, please get in touch with us directly at ldcdevelopment@liverpool.ac.uk as it may be possible to make alternative arrangements.

Introducing ‘Taking Ownership of your PhD’

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A new series of online workshops for researchers in the first few months of their PhD.

For new researchers we offer a series of half day workshops presented online in Zoom. Each workshop may be taken on its own, but together they will support you to take ownership of your own PhD. Collectively the series includes:

  • Advice to settle into the PhD in the first few months to an activity to help you envisage the whole PhD
  • Guidance to manage your own working time and support to build a good working relationship with your supervisor
  • Ways to build your resilience for the challenges in research and take a professional approach to your own development
  • Starting your networking and gaining practice in introducing your research to your peers

All workshops in the ‘Taking Ownership’ series are discussion based and include opportunities to network with other researchers from across the University. The use of a microphone and webcam are recommended for use in the small group discussions

These workshops will be delivered by Dr Shirley Cooper, from the LDC Development team, working with PGR tutors, who will share their own experiences of doing a PhD at the University.

We also offer a further webinar on how to effectively the software in the PGR Toolbox.

The full timetable for these workshops is listed below. The workshops in October are open for registration (follow the link on the title)

Places will be limited. If you book and find that you can no longer attend, please cancel your place so that it can become available to another researcher.

Getting your Toolbox data ready for the Annual Progress Reports

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The APR forms will be released on Monday 1st June!

Your PGR Portfolio of Activity and the Record of Supervisory meetings must be up to date by the 31st May for inclusion in this year’s APR form.

You are recommended to review your progress over the last year before this data is copied into the Annual Progress Report (APR) forms. Whilst the period prior to lock-down may now seem distant, it remains important to maintain a full record for the last academic year. Any data added to the  PGR Portfolio of Activity and the Record of Supervisory meetings after the 31st May will not be included in the APR forms.

Below, we provide further information to help you complete the PGR Portfolio of Activity and the Record of Supervisory meetings before the records are added to the APR form. Guidance to help you complete the APR forms will be available on the LDC Student Experience team web-site.

Preparing your Record of Supervisory meetings for the APR

The APR contains the complete list of the dates of all supervisory meeting records that have been signed off by your supervisor.  You may want to remind your supervisor that they should sign off all records before the 1st June.

Please ensure that your Record of Supervisory meetings is up to date before the end of May. You should check that you have recorded the correct number of required meetings:

  • At least one meeting per month if you are a full-time student
  • At least one meeting every two months if you are a part-time student

NB You can enter meetings retrospectively. The record should include relevant Zoom or Skype meetings.
You are not expected to have recorded meetings during periods of suspension.

Preparing your PGR Portfolio of Activity for the APR

The PGR Portfolio of Activity is your record of your achievements over the last year. You might include the training and development workshops/webinars that you have attended, conferences and research meetings that you have participated in, work with industry or organisations outside academia, public engagement and public communication  and so on. This record can of course include any online activities that you have engaged in recently. In fact you can include  other activities that supplement your research and support your long-term development.

The APR form will display data from the PGR Portfolio of Activity  in a non-editable format, i.e. any changes to the Portfolio of Activity after the 31st May will not be reproduced in the APR form. We recommend that you revisit the Portfolio of Activity before the 31st May and check which of your records you want to be visible in the APR. (All records for the past year are included by default)

The APR will include data from the PGR Portfolio of Activity under the four headings in the Portfolio of Activity, which correspond to the four domains of the Researcher Development Framework. The data that is transferred to the APR will be limited to:

  • Records with dates in the period from the 1st June 2019 to the end of May 2020.
  • The type of activity, the title, and the date of the events that you have recorded in the Portfolio.
  • Records that you have kept marked as ‘selected’ in the Portfolio.

The APRs will not include further information such as the longer record description or the ‘RDF descriptors’.

You may want to check the event titles carefully to ensure that this accurately represents the event, since the event description is not included in the APR.
For example, if this is a three day conference, you might include the dates in the title.

Example of how APR form appears

Example of Portfolio of Activity data as it will appear in the APR    – set for the year 2017-18. Only items added in the year 2019-20 will appear in the APR for this year.

If you have not entered data into the Portfolio of Activity, the APR will include empty text boxes where you can add any additional information in relation to your professional development to record in the APR process. The choice of which of the four boxes to use to record each training or development activity is a personal choice, but could help you ensure that you can demonstrate a wide range of development.

If you have any problems with this process or you encounter system issues in relation to the Portfolio of Activity, please contact the LDC Development Team at pgro@liverpool.ac.uk.

New to PhD Research at Liverpool?

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  • Are you feeling confused and disorientated at the start of your PhD?
  • Are you seeking opportunities to connect with other researchers in similar positions?
  • Are you aware of what the LDC Development programme has to offer?

Starting the PhD can often be a bewildering process as you try to find a structure and make sense of what you need to do, not just to start your research, but to manage all those various administrative processes. Unfortunately, there is no generic roadmap for the PhD.

I liken the start of the PhD to setting out on a sea voyage in an unfamiliar boat, to an unknown destination and with limited charts. You might have some guidance from your supervisor, some supervisor can be very helpful but others may have limited time. Your first trip out usually involves considerable trial and error; you will need to learn many general skills and gain new knowledge, how to handle your ‘boat/research’ , how to communicate with the ‘shore/work with collaborators’ as well learning the navigation/research skills. The first destination may not be where you expected, as research is about exploring the unknown, but, the first voyage will give you a much better idea of how to approach the next trip.

Remember; Many other PhD researchers do feel  ‘in the same boat’ !

The Liverpool Doctoral College provides a range of induction material for new starters, including the LDC Handbook, and your School or Institute should also provide an induction.  The PGR Toolbox includes the Record of Supervisory Meetings, a tool that all PhD researchers must use. There is a range of online help for this tool.

For more information see Essential University Links and a video Introduction to the LDC Development Programme

LDC Development programme

The LDC Development programme also offers sessions with opportunities to network with  researchers from across the  University and share experiences. In particular, we offer two events of specific interest to those just starting the PhD at Liverpool:

  • Webinar: Effectively Using the PGR Toolbox  5 Feb  12:30 – 13:30 – learn more about this essential tool and an opportunity for questions.
  • Taking Ownership of your PhD 11 Mar         09:15 – 16:30  – a day of activities and discussions to help you understand the processes and milestones in the PhD, working with your supervisor, planning your own professional development and starting networking.

The programme includes a range of further workshops and  webinars to help new researchers develop the wider skills, particularly in communication and productivity to succeed as a researcher. See our programme timetable for details.

Peer Support – PostGrad Society and the Peers for PhDs group

Finding support from your peers can be valuable early on in the PhD, so that you build on their experiences. You will probably find it useful to both seek both communities within your department/school or subject area and with mixed communities from other areas.

There are a couple of University PhD student groups that offer frequent meetings on campus and are open to all PhD researchers; look out for events run by the PostGrad Society and also the Peers for PhDs group, who offer facilitated discussions to share  experiences and plan to move forward.

Is your development record ready for the APR and progress panels?

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The APR forms are released on Monday 3rd June!

Your PGR Portfolio of Activity and the Record of Supervisory meetings must be up to date before  the 3rd June for inclusion in the APRs.

This is a time for a review a review of your progress over the last year, through both the Annual Progress Reports (APR) and your assigned progress panels. Your panels are likely discuss your personal development over the last year, so this is a good time to review what you have achieved over the past year; including the training and development workshops/webinars that you have attended, conferences and research meetings that you have attended, work with industry or organisations outside academia, public engagement and public communication  and so on. In fact you can include  other activities that supplement your research and support your long-term development.

Any data added to the  Portfolio of Activity and the Record of Supervisory meetings after the 2nd June  will not be included in the APR forms.

Below, we provide further information to help you complete the PGR Portfolio of Activity and the Record of Supervisory meetings. Guidance to help you complete the APR forms can be found from the PGR Student Administration team web-site.

Preparing your Record of Supervisory meetings for the APR

The APR contains the complete list of the dates of all supervisory meeting records that have been signed off by your supervisor.  You may also want to remind your supervisor that they should sign off all records before the 3rd June.

Please ensure that your Record of Supervisory meetings is up to date before the end of May. You should check that you have recorded the correct number of required meetings:

  • At least one meeting per month if you are a full-time student
  • At least one meeting every two months if you are a part-time student

NB You can enter meetings retrospectively.
You are not expected to have recorded meetings during periods of suspension.

Preparing your PGR Portfolio of Activity for the APR

The APR will display data from the PGR Portfolio of Activity  in a non-editable format, i.e. any changes to the Portfolio of Activity after the 31st May will not be reproduced in the APR. We recommend that you revisit the Portfolio of Activity before the 31st May and check which data you want to be visible in the APR.

The APR will include data from the PGR Portfolio of Activity under the four headings in the Portfolio of Activity, which correspond to the four domains of the Researcher Development Framework. The data that is transferred to the APR will be limited to:

  • Records with dates in the period from the 1st June 2018 to the end of May 2019.
  • The type of activity, the title, and the date of the events that you have recorded in the Portfolio.
  • Records that you have kept marked as ‘selected’ in the Portfolio.

The APRs will not include further information such as the description or the ‘RDF descriptors’..

You may want to check the event titles carefully to ensure that this accurately represents the event, since the event description is not included in the APR.
For example, if this is a three day conference, you might include the dates in the title.

Example of how APR form appears

Example of Portfolio of Activity data as it will appear in the APR    – set for the year 2017-18. Only items added in the year 2018-19 will appear in the APR for this year.

If you have not entered data into the Portfolio of Activity, the APRs will include empty text boxes where you can add any additional information in relation to your professional development to record in the APR process. The choice of which box to use to record each training or development activity is only approximate and will be a personal choice.

If you have any problems with this process or you encounter system issues in relation to the Portfolio of Activity, please contact the LDC Development Team at pgro@liverpool.ac.uk.

Important information for those who have entered data into the Portfolio of Activity

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The Annual Progress Reports (APRs) to be released in June 2018 will, for the first time, include selected data from the PGR Portfolio of Activity. The data will be displayed in the APR under the four headings in the Portfolio of Activity, which correspond to the four domains of the Researcher Development Framework.

The data that is transferred to the APR will be limited to:

  • Records with dates in the period from the 1st June 2017 to the end of May 2018.
  • The type of activity, the title, and the date of the events that you have recorded in the Portfolio.
  • Records that you have kept marked as ‘selected’ in the Portfolio.

The APRs will not include further information such as the description or the ‘RDF descriptors’ that you can add to the Portfolio of Activity.

Example of Portfolio of Activity data as it will appear in the APR    (link to file attachment)

Further Guidance for the APRs: Further information on the changes to the APRs will be released during May, including the updated Student Guidance for 2018 to help you complete the form and the dates of supporting workshops organised by the PGR Student Team.

If you have not entered data into the Portfolio of Activity, the APRs will include empty text boxes where you can add any additional information in relation to your professional development to record in the APR process. The choice of which box to use to record each training or development activity is only approximate and may be a personal choice. We recommend that you aim to complete development relevant to all sections of the Portfolio over the course of your PhD, as this will help you to make the most of your PhD experience and to prepare you for your ongoing career.

You do not need to add activities for all Portfolio of Activity sections within the APR form. Non-completion of any of these boxes will not delay completion of the APRs.

Preparing your Portfolio for the APR

The APR will display the data in a non-editable format, i.e. any changes to the Portfolio of Activity after the 31st May will not be reproduced in the APR. We recommend that you revisit the Portfolio of Activity before the 31st May and look over the data that you want to have included in the APR.

You may want to check the event title to ensure that this accurately represents the event, since the event description is not included in the APR.
For example, if this is a three day conference, you might include the dates in the title.

If you do not want data to be transferred into the APR, please ensure that you untick the box in the column labelled ‘Select’ in the portfolio.

If you have any problems with this process or you encounter system issues in relation to the Portfolio of Activity, please contact the LDC Development team at pgro@liverpool.ac.uk

Reminder – 31st May is the completion date for the record of Supervisory Meetings.

As in previous years, the APR will also include the complete list of the dates of all supervisory meeting records that have been signed off by your supervisor. Please ensure that your record of Supervisory meetings is up to date before the end of May. You may also want to remind your supervisor that they should sign off of all records before the 1st June.

Postgraduate Researcher Week 9-13 October 2017

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Join us for a week of bespoke workshops and wider events for both new and more advanced researchers.

Full Programme


New Researchers

Postgraduate Researcher Week offers a wide range of events that serve as a welcome for new researchers and aim to help you learn more about the training and development opportunities available to you as a postgraduate researcher at the University of Liverpool.

The LDC Development Team is offering the following events for new researchers:

Taking Ownership of your PhD –  10th  Oct,    12th  Oct

This one-day workshop offers new researchers the opportunity to explore how to take ownership of the PhD. Through discussions and activities, you will identify the milestones and planning processes involved in pursuing a PhD and learn how to successfully work with your supervisor. You will also have an opportunity to introduce your research to fellow researchers and plan personal objectives in order to achieve your longer-term professional ambitions.

Webinar: Effectively Using PGR Toolbox  – 11th Oct 1pm
This lunch-time webinar aims to help new PGRs make effective use of the PGR Toolbox in Liverpool Life.  We will provide an overview of the key systems and processes and step-by-step instructions with a live demonstration.  There will be time for questions and answers throughout the webinar.

Solving the Challenges of Part-Time Research- 13 Oct-14.00-15.00– This workshop is open to all part-time researchers and offers the opportunity to share your experiences and explore potential solutions to any problems you are facing.

For more Advanced Researchers

There are a variety of sessions running during the week including, Your Thesis: why you should start your writing now!, Planning your Final Year, Thesis writing afternoon and Viva Survivor.  There are also several careers oriented events for those considering their future after their PhD.

Webinars for Effectively Using the PGR Toolbox

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Webinar: ‘Effectively Using the PGR Toolbox’

PGR Development are offering a numbers of webinars to help newly registered PGRs make effective use of the PGR Toolbox.  The following dates are open for booking:

6th October, 12:00-13:00

13th October, 12:00-13:00

16th November, 12:00-13:00

2nd December, 12:00-13:00

Webinar Description

During the webinar we expect to offer:

• A brief introduction to the Institutional requirements
• A demonstration of how to use the software in the PGR Toolbox
• A question and answer session where you can raise any queries or problem you have had using the software.

The webinar will specifically address the PGR Toolbox within Liverpool Life, including:

• Record of Supervisory Meetings, including how to arrange meetings with your supervisors, set an agenda and targets, upload documents, and send Outlook appointments to your supervisors.
• PGR Portfolio of Activity, including how to record your training activities, email your portfolio to your supervisor, how to print your portfolio for compiling your CV.
To attend you need only have Internet access. We will send a link to the Webinar software to all registered participants at least 15 minutes before the session starts, to allow you to test your connection.

How to book

To book your place, click on the links above or visit the Educational Development Booking web page. http://www.liv.ac.uk/cll/booking/index.htm?filter=toolbox&button=Go! and scroll down to the appropriate date.

Webinar: Effectively Using the PGR Toolbox – 8th Sept

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8th Sept 2015 — 12 – 1pm (approx)
+ further dates to be announced soon

You will need to book a place through the Educational Development Booking web page:

http://www.liv.ac.uk/cll/booking/index.htm?filter=toolbox&button=Go!

PGR Development are offering a webinar to help newly registered PGRs make effective use of the PGR Toolbox. During the workshop we expect to offer:

  1. A brief introduction to the Institutional requirements
  2. A demonstration of how to use the software in the PGR Toolbox
  3. A question and answer session where you can raise any queries or problem you have had using the software.

The webinar will specifically address:

  • PGR Toolbox within Liverpool Life
  • Record of Supervisory Meetings, including how to arrange meetings with your supervisors, set an agenda and targets, upload documents, and send Outlook appointments to your supervisors.
  • PGR Portfolio of Activity, including how to record your training activities, email your portfolio to your supervisor, how to print your portfolio for compiling your CV.

To attend you need only have Internet access. We will send a link to the Webinar software to all registered participants at least 15 minutes before the session starts, to allow you to test your connection.

To book your place, visit the Educational Development Booking web page. http://www.liv.ac.uk/cll/booking/index.htm?filter=toolbox&button=Go!  and scroll down to the appropriate date.