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Reflecting on 2023
Episode 14 • 22nd December 2023 • Changing Academic Life • Geraldine Fitzpatrick
00:00:00 00:13:26

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In this short episode I reflect on the podcast season so far and on my own year of transitions. And I offer some prompt questions to help us reflect on what we have achieved and learnt this past year and encourage us to take some time to savour and celebrate it.

Overview:

00:05 Introduction

01:32 Podcast highlights

05:50 Transitioning to a new phase

7:35 Reflection prompts

10:17 Gratitude & looking forward

13:26 End



This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy

Transcripts

Geri:

Welcome to Changing Academic Life.

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I'm Geraldine Fitzpatrick, and this is

a podcast series where academics and

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others share their stories, provide

ideas, and provoke discussions about what

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we can do individually and collectively

to change academic life for the better.

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Welcome to this short

episode at the end of:

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And in this.

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I just would like to reflect on.

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What's happened in 2023.

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Both for the podcast to myself,

as well as to provide some prompt

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questions that you might find useful.

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To help you reflect on 20 23 as well.

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And what I particularly be wanting

to encourage us all to do is to.

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Stop and take some time.

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To reflect on the year and in

particular, just to celebrate.

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What we've done, we've been able

to achieve what we've been able to

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get through and that we got here.

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We often don't take the time.

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To just sit with and recognize what

we've done, because especially in

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academia, there's always the next thing.

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And.

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Yeah, so end of years, always.

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It's nice transition points

for just taking that time.

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So with the podcast.

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I did an end of season reflections and

transitions piece in July this year.

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So just reflecting on

the episode since then.

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We've produced 13 episodes.

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At.

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Up to this point, this'll

be the 14th for the year.

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Some of them have been

interviews with people.

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Some have been more my reflections

bouncing off something that was

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said in one of the episodes.

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Doing a quick recap, we had Karen

Stroobants Talking about how we can change

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research culture and reform research

assessment, and particularly talking to

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us about what's happening at the European

level in terms of the CoARA initiative.

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Which is really exciting in terms of just

seeing some of these shifts taking place.

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Suzanne Bødker talked about yeah,

similar issues around culture.

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Importance of research culture.

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And also what I thought was particularly

interesting was the making of choices.

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That aren't just about advancing

career, but bringing in other

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values that are important in life

around family and connections.

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We had Irina Shklovski also talking

to us very honestly and openly.

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About her burnout experiences and

the process of coming back to work.

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And again, just through that we

heard about the value of having a

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supportive, collegial research culture,

because her colleagues were really

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key in helping her being able to.

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Take the time off that she

needed to heal and recover.

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And then the process of coming back

and just learning how to do enough and

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be enough and saying no appropriately.

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And continuing this theme.

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We also had Mark Reed talking about the

challenges of mental health and burnout.

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And the importance of self

compassion and self reflection

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and self care in that process.

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And he also talked about being driven

by a desire to make a difference

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and what having an impact means.

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In academia, sort of pointing to

some of the work that he's producing

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and putting out into the world.

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I often find myself since then

asking the question that he poses.

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Which is what would love do.

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And it's been an interesting

and valuable exercise.

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So thanks mark for sharing that one.

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And the laSt episode in terms of

conversation was with Katta Spiel and

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part two will be something to look

forward to in the new year and . In part

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one Katta talked about the precarities

that were discussed particularly by

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Sarah Davies in, in a previous episode.

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And what that means, the tensions

there and also Katta, engaging with

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issues around gender identity and

health all through this process.

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And the reward of the ERC

grant that's starting soon.

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And as I said, my in-betweeners were

often just reflecting on some issue

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that was raised in a previous interview.

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So in this new season, I had

tried moving to a weekly program.

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I also was in the process of moving to

a new platform, both in terms of the.

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Tools for recording the interviews

as well as for processing the audio

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and producing the transcripts.

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And also revamping the website.

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So there'll be a new website

launched in the new year.

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I think I'll be moving back to

fortnightly or giving myself permission

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to do release episodes, flexibly

between weekly or fortnightly,

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depending upon what else is going on.

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It was in hindsight or on reflection.

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A little too ambitious, given everything

else that's happening to aim for weekly,

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given that it's a team of me basically.

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And one of the reasons for it being

a little ambitious was it has been

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quite a turbulent or not turbulent,

but a year of transitions for me.

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And.

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Part of that was dealing with

a lot of uncertainties as well.

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So we talked previously about having

mandatory retirement at our university.

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So that happened for

me at end of September.

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And that was interesting.

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Just the whole.

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Emotional journey around that, as

well as the practical journey of just

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cleaning at your office and years

of things that you've kept there

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filtering through books to decide

what you keep and what you take away.

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In some ways there's shedding of

identities and then the opportunity

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to reform reshape identities.

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And I'm hoping to do that more.

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With some more consulting and

development and training work.

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Cause I think I can still contribute

and help towards making a difference in

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creating more collegial, collaborative

research cultures and enabling

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researchers to find their version

of what a good academic is as well.

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So if I look back on my 2023,

it's been a big year and I'm

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proud to be standing here today.

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Having gone through all that.

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And I.

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Would like to encourage us

all to think about what.

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When we look back on our

23, that we've enjoyed.

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Achieved survived.

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Learned.

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And to take a little bit of time

to pat ourselves on the back.

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And just sit with these achievements.

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Just for a little bit of time.

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I can give some particular prompts

that may be useful for you.

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If you want to gift yourself five or 10

minutes, just to sit maybe with a piece

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of paper and pencil, or maybe just to

sit and think, and you may want to take

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note of these questions, or you may

want to pause the recording and just

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reflect on each one as I go through them.

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So I just offer these questions

for whatever they're worth.

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They may or may not connect for you or

be relevant, but let's see how you go.

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And here are the questions.

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What three words would you use

to describe your last year?

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What are you proud of?

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What went well?

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And it could be the usual sort

of achievements that we often

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celebrate, like publications or

grants or collaborations or so on.

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It could also just be things

like we made it to the end of the

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year, met the challenges we faced.

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Or how we were able to look

after ourselves and others.

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And then when you reflect on,

when you've been at your best.

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This year, when you felt most alive, most

energized, most engaged when you've been

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most in love with what you've been doing.

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How do you reflect on that in

terms of what it says to you

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about what's important for you?

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Not for anyone else.

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What your strengths

are . What your values are

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When and where and how is it that you're able to have most impact.

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Because if we can reflect on these things

and identify those patterns, We could

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start being more deliberate, maybe about

making choices in the next year, that

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enable us to connect more to our values.

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Use more of our strengths, do

more of the things where we.

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We're at our best and have most impact.

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We can also reflect on what

maybe didn't go so well.

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Not in terms of blame , but

really through that.

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What do we learn from it ? What

do we learn about ourselves?

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Or what do we learn about the issues

that we were trying to address?

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And what might we take away

from these experiences?

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That we might take forward into 2024

to try to do differently next time.

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And then we can ask.

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What are we grateful for?

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And who are we grateful for?

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I

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guess there's so much in our day-to-day

life that we can take for granted.

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And whether that just be the everyday

social connections at work or family,

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whether it's our health the relative.

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Peace and safety of where we live.

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Having enough to eat.

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What are we grateful for?

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And who are we grateful for?

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The people who've been important to us.

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So just encouraging you to take

some time to stop and reflect.

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And to celebrate and savor.

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What you've achieved and think about.

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What you want to take

forward into next year?

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What you might want to leave behind.

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And what you might want

to be doing differently.

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So thank you for listening

with me for this year.

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And for the feedback that you send

in, it really makes a difference and

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makes the work that goes into this

worthwhile, knowing that it does

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connect for people in different ways.

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Because I am really committed to how we

can change academic life for the better.

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And that's a collective endeavor

and I also often talk about it.

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And so do other people indeed about it?

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Being both a top down and a bottom

up process and we can all contribute

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right where we are right now

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Wishing you all the very best for your holiday season.

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However you celebrate it.

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May you have time to, with to

spend with people you care about.

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To take time for yourself

to rest and relax May it be

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filled with laughter and joy.

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And see you back in 2024 and

we'll have part two of the

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conversation with Katta Spiel.

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You can find the summary

notes, a transcript and related

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links for this podcast on www.

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changingacademiclife.

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com.

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You can also subscribe to

Changing Academic Life on iTunes,

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Spotify and Google Podcasts.

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And you can follow

ChangeAcadLife on Twitter.

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And I'm really hoping that we can

widen the conversation about how

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we can do academia differently.

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And you can contribute to this by rating

the podcast and also giving feedback.

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And if something connected with

you, please consider sharing this

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podcast with your colleagues.

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Together, we can make change happen.

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