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Podcast | Pod-ip #3: The Challenges of a Doctorate with Olga Cunha
The Post-ip group, comprised of a group of INET-md students, has just launched the third episode of its "Pod-ip" Podcast. This week's episode features Olga Cunha, coordinator of NOVA FCSH's Personal Development and Social Inclusion Office, who will discuss the challenges of completing a Doctorate. You can watch it on Pod-ip's YouTube channel and Spotify page tomorrow at 12pm.
In the third episode of Pod-ip, we delve into the challenges that can arise during a Doctorate and explore strategies for dealing with them, with the help of Olga Cunha, Coordinator of the Office for Personal Development and Social Inclusion at NOVA FCSH, which includes the Psychology, Inclusion and Equality Services (PsII+) and the areas of special educational needs, gender equality, mentoring, institutional volunteering, and partnerships, across the entire educational community of the faculty.
Mobilizing the testimonies she has heard over more than twenty years of psycho-pedagogical support and guidance in professional training, Olga Cunha lists some of the recurring concerns she encounters in doctoral students, such as difficulties with writing, anxiety, relationships with the guidance team, time management and compatibility with other aspects of personal life (such as maintaining friendships or carrying out relevant tasks in the family context).
With an empathetic and optimistic outlook, Olga Cunha enriches the clinical perspective with her personal experience, both in the past, during her PhD in Psychology, which she completed in 2016, and today, as a PhD student in Gender Studies.
Stressing that a doctorate is more than just a thesis, Olga Cunha offers some practical advice that may be useful for future doctoral students and for those who are already studying for a doctorate.
Mobilizing the testimonies she has heard over more than twenty years of psycho-pedagogical support and guidance in professional training, Olga Cunha lists some of the recurring concerns she encounters in doctoral students, such as difficulties with writing, anxiety, relationships with the guidance team, time management and compatibility with other aspects of personal life (such as maintaining friendships or carrying out relevant tasks in the family context).
With an empathetic and optimistic outlook, Olga Cunha enriches the clinical perspective with her personal experience, both in the past, during her PhD in Psychology, which she completed in 2016, and today, as a PhD student in Gender Studies.
Stressing that a doctorate is more than just a thesis, Olga Cunha offers some practical advice that may be useful for future doctoral students and for those who are already studying for a doctorate.
Olga Cunha | With a career spanning more than twenty years in psycho-pedagogical support and guidance in vocational training, Olga Cunha is the coordinator of NOVA FCSH's Personal Development and Social Inclusion Office, which includes the Psychology, Inclusion and Equality Services (PsII+) and the areas of special educational needs, gender equality, mentoring, institutional volunteering and partnerships, across the entire educational community of the faculty. She has been President of the Board of RESAPES - Network of Psychological Support Services in Higher Education, since 2023, and was part of the technical committee of the Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education, within the scope of the program to promote mental health in higher education students. In 2016, she completed her PhD in Psychology at the Higher Institute of Applied Psychology (ISPA), specializing in Community Psychology, with the thesis "Psychological Sense of Community: a multi-method study in an associative context". She maintains a close relationship with the institution, as a collaborating researcher at the Applied Psychology Research Center Capabilities & Inclusion (APPsyCI), and as an Invited Professor, responsible for the chair of Methods of Planning and Evaluation of Community Programs in the Master's Degree in Community Psychology. She is currently studying for a PhD in Gender Studies at NOVA FCSH.
