The Ambassadors for Open Science program of the Berlin University Alliance (BUA) aims to promote the knowledge and application of Open Science in various subjects. As Open Science experts and enthusiasts, the ambassadors show researchers, students and decision-makers at their institution how they can benefit from and make use of Open Science infrastructure (“Auftakt Für Neu Ernannte BUA Open Science Ambassadors” (2024)).
As ambassadors for the philosophical faculty Dorothea Strecker and Catharina Ochsner organized a writing retreat in collaboration with Dr. Kaitlin Montague for the PhD students of the philosophical faculty of the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (HU Berlin). The retreat took place at the workation space coconat and offered 16 doctoral students the opportunity of focused writing time, writing workshops, and Open Science-focused discussions in a new and peaceful environment. The workshop was designed for doctoral students to discuss and develop essential skills of academic writing. During the weekend we addressed Open Access publication strategies for doctoral students as well as a range of writing-related issues, including style and voice, writing discipline, drafting, narrative development and organization, models of accountability, taming the “internal editor,” and peer review.
We thank the BUA for making this writing retreat possible and we thank all participants for joining us and engaging in many discussions on their writing process, Open Access, and Open Science. In addition to focused writing time and courses on Open Science and Open Access the students were able to socialize with their peers and build a small community that will hopefully continue beyond the retreat.
Further information about the research group can be found on our official website.
This text – excluding quotes and otherwise labelled parts – is licensed under the CC BY 4.0 DEED.
References
Citation
@online{strecker2026,
author = {Strecker, Dorothea and Ochsner, Catharina},
title = {Recap: {Writing} {Retreat} for {Doctoral} {Students} of the
{Philosophical} {Faculty}},
date = {2026-04-16},
url = {https://doi.org/10.59350/49j36-nmy28},
langid = {en}
}