Re-Imagining Reproduction project hosts another interactive writing workshop at the Women’s University if Africa, Zimbabwe on the 27th of June, 2024. As is our practice, in attendance were scholars at different levels, including senior staff, Doctoral, Masters and Honours students. The interactive sessions entailed sharing on academic writing and publishing.

The following pieces of feedback showcase the highlights of the day:

       As a student of Honours, this workshop helped me in my dissertation writing.  I learned about writing tools, techniques and accredited journals. 

      The workshop was very insightful and detailed.  I particularly like the participatory approach. Well done to the facilitators for being concise and straight to the point.

     The process was very educative for academics as it explained the crucial issue of writing for publication and what that entails.  I liked how I was educated on how to avoid predatory journals.

     Thank you so much for this writing workshop, it was very enriching.  The sessions were well-structured, enabling us to share experiences in a relaxed environment.

       I liked the active participation that was encouraged in the second session and how participants were divided into specific groups.  I liked the professionalism of the presenters.

The interactive learning sessions, especially, the one I participated in with doctoral students, made me appreciate the fact that students, irrespective of their context, experience similar hurdles when it comes to post-graduate training. Most of the issues raised in last year’s Kenyan event were the same as those that were being raised in Harare. Issues of supervision and publishing before being allowed to graduate were ‘harassing’ students in both instances.

My take-home message;

As a supervisor of postgraduate students, I need to continue in the shift from just being a supervisor to becoming a mentor. This would promote growth and resilience in postgraduate studies.

To lobby the administration to look into other avenues of promoting publications among students that do not ‘push’ them towards predatory journals.