1. Overview

The Student Ambassador programme responds to the project’s network building capacity. It especially reflects the project’s focus involving students in developing IDenti-T related resources such as blog posts, short videos, artworks, podcasts, as a way to introduce students to research on identity and democracy. For instance, lecturers could encourage undergraduate or masters’ students who submitted essays on IDenti-T related themes as part of an assignment or PhD candidates to publish on the IDenti-T hub (the website) as a way to disseminate their work.

Each institution will build their own group of students to be appointed as members of the IDenti-T Ambassador Programme. The programme should be introduced to them as a pivotal opportunity to connect with fellow scholars and practitioners, expand their European professional network, and potentially travel to ENLIGHT institutions such as Göttingen and Bordeaux to present their work. It also offers exposure to stimulating research topics and to the research environment more broadly, particularly beneficial for master’s students who are considering pursuing a PhD.

2. Tasks

Their ongoing task includes promoting the network through generating content such as videos, podcasts and blog posts which will be published on the IDenti-T hub (the website). This content will also be used as part of the educational material for the four institutional webinars.

3. Key Events

Identi-T webinars

Student ambassadors are invited to attend the webinar series facilitated once a year by each university partner over 2 hours, a space for members to present on specific IDenti-T related clusters.

Democracy Breakfasts (organised locally)

The ambassadors can participate in the consortium’s democracy breakfasts, organised in a community or university space by every institution twice a year, inviting policy-makers, citizens, artists, and NGO representatives to meet in person and discuss identity-related challenges.

PhD symposium in Göttingen

The PhD student ambassadors can submit a paper to the in-person PhD symposium in Göttingen at the end of Year 1 (month 13). Here, they will have the opportunity to hear fellow doctoral students’ presentations regarding their research on identity and democracy. They will be able to network with the fellow researchers and also receive feedback from their peers constituting the consortium.

ECTS Online Course

For the ECTS Online course the ambassadors are further encouraged to develop materials in collaboration with policymakers and NGO representatives which they will have previously met during the democracy breakfasts. This content is then used in the development of case studies for this course.

Final Conference in Bordeaux

The student ambassadors can receive grants as part of the €6,000 total which covers travel to and from the final conference at the University of Bordeaux (month 24).