Doctoral education

Doctoral School

The Doctoral School at our university supports the Faculties in implementing doctoral education, while the supervisors are based in the Faculties. The Faculties also grant doctoral study rights and degrees.

The Doctoral School supports by organising courses for Philosophy of research and researcher skills. The courses are open to all doctoral researchers at the University of Lapland. We also coordinate the thematic studies (15 ECTS) in the multidisciplinary doctoral programme the Arctic in a Changing World.

Through the Doctoral School, you will also find guidelines that we put together to benefit the whole academic community. Currently there are guidelines about e.g. applying for a doctoral study right, good supervising practices, funding, career planning, and preparing for your public defence. We also organise workshops focused on these topics.

The University of Lapland is involved in various national doctoral training networks. The Doctoral School of the University of Lapland is part of the national doctoral education network. The doctoral education network is part of the Finn-ARMA network – an extensive co-operation network established by universities in the field of research administration, research support and research services. The University of Lapland is also a member of the EUA-CDE network.

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Intake in spring 2023

The doctoral programmes of the University of Lapland have been renewed. In the application round, new doctoral students will be taken into the discipline-specific doctoral programme or the new thematic, multidisciplinary doctoral programme The Arctic in a Changing World. The programme brings together thematic doctoral education of the University of Lapland. The themes of the programme are:

• communities, inclusion and welfare
• governing transitions in the Arctic: environment, law and politics
• art, design and service innovation.

The content of a discipline-specific doctoral programme is determined according to the requirements of your Faculty. However, students of the discipline-specific programme also have the opportunity to choose studies extensively from the teaching offer of the Doctoral School.

Esko Riepula Grant for finalising dissertations

You can apply for a grant for the finalisation stage of your dissertation. The submission timetable for grant applications is four (4) times per year: March, June, September, and December. You need to submit your application by the 11th day of the submission month.

Anniina Koivurova

Marika Savukoski

Mikko Pikkujämsä

Maria Virranniemi

Heikki Huhtamäki

Maija Gellin

Anne Ollila

Linus Schaaf

Telling it like it is

Salti Theodora currently holds a position as a doctoral candidate at the University of Lapland, specifically within the Faculty of Art and Design. She has a prior history of internship experience as a research assistant at the same institution. With a background rooted in drama and early childhood education, she successfully completed a Master of Science in Educational Research from the University of Gothenburg in Sweden. Notably, her expertise encompasses specialized areas, including pedagogical environments, art pedagogical leadership (pedagogista), and art education (atelierista), all interwoven with the principles of the Reggio Emilia pedagogical philosophy.

Read her blog entry >

Pilvikki Lantela is a PhD candidate in the Faculty of Social Sciences. Her research interests lie in questions about power, feminism, gender, and organizing in religious or non-corporate contexts. In her dissertation she combines cultural history and organization studies by examining two women who were active in Finnish revivalist movements in the late 1800s and the first half of the twentieth century.

Read her blog entry >

Gabriele Leone is a PhD student in Political Science and International Relations at the University of Lapland with a research project entitled "The Kurdish people: between diaspora, new wars and biopolitics.". He graduated from the University of Calabria majoring in Political Science in 2011 with a thesis on "Antisystem Parties: From Unfair Opposition to Protest" and received his Master's degree in Political Science and International Relations in 2013 with a thesis entitled: "A Transnational People. The Odyssey of the Kurds in Search of a Homeland.”. He is also Member of the editorial board of Occhialì-Rivista sul mediterraneo islamico, the Open Access journal of the Department of Languages and Educational Sciences of the University of Calabria, Italy.

Read his blog entry >

Päivi Hanni-Vaara, Master in Tourism & Hospitality Management, belongs to the Culture-Based Service Design research group in the Faculty of Art and Design. Her research focuses on empathy in a digital customer journey of tourism and hospitality. Hanni-Vaara values her background in the tourism business combining applied and practical knowledge with research. The study is multidisciplinary and combines empathy from psychology, customer journey from art & service design, and digital transformation from information and communication technologies.

Read her blog entry >

Auður H Ingólfsdóttir did her doctoral dissertation as a joint degree PhD candidate

Auður H Ingólfsdóttirʼs dissertation Climate Change and Security in the Arctic. Analysis of Norms and Values Shaping Climate Policy in Iceland was examined in the Faculty of Social Sciences. She carried out her doctoral research as a joint degree PhD candidate in the field-specific doctoral programme, in accordance with an agreement between the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Lapland and the Faculty of Political Sciences at the University of Iceland.

Piritta Parkkari did her PhD on the practices of organisations that promote entrepreneurship

Piritta Parkkari defended her thesis in management and organisation studies, showing that the promotion of entrepreneurship affects the way in which entrepreneurship is perceived.

Ethical review

If your research topic or setting requires ethical consideration, you can ask our research ethics committee for a statement. Due attention to ethical questions is in order if your research involves minors, for example. The funding source, co-operation partner or publication channel of your research may also require ethical review.

Funding doctoral studies

If your doctoral study application is successful, you are granted a doctoral study right. Please note that you must personally arrange funding for your doctoral studies; it can be based on either salary or grants. The most financially stable way is to get an employed position in a doctoral programme. Such positions are open quite rarely and they are understandably actively competed for. Therefore, it is wise to explore other funding opportunities as well.

Even though doctoral candidates are not required to pay tuition fees in Finland, living costs here are substantial. Thus, funding is not something that can be disregarded.

Publishing a dissertation

The process of your manuscript to become a published doctoral dissertation can take several months, even up to nine months. This is due to some factors influencing the process that are not dependent on the doctoral candidate or the supervisor.

Please be active well in advance of your public defence and familiarize yourself with the guidelines and process of publishing a dissertation. We recommend that you contact the Doctoral School (dissertations(at)ulapland.fi) about publishing your dissertation three months before the date of you public defence.

Doctoral dissertations at the University of Lapland are published mainly electronically in our own Acta electronica Universitatis Lapponiensis series. The publishing platform is the Lauda repository which is the institutional repository of the University of Lapland. Publishing a dissertation in electronic format is free of charge for ULapland doctoral researchers and the university offers you the layout and standard cover design. The University of Lapland covers the expenses of print copies made for the public defence: the doctoral researcher, custos, pre-examiners, and the home faculty of the doctoral researcher will each receive a copy. If the doctoral researcher wishes to have extra copies in print format, this can be done on the their own expense. The print copies of the dissertation are no publications but copies of the electronic publication.

Your dissertation must be published at least ten (10) days prior to the public defence. This is also when your electronic dissertation is put on public display on the ULapland front page, and a print copy is delivered to the main hall of the ULapland main building (address: Yliopistonkatu 8, Rovaniemi). If you are not publishing your dissertation electronically, only a print version will be put on public display.

If you are graduating from the Faculty of Art and Design and your dissertation includes an artistic production, a series of productions, a product development project or their recording, you must announce the location for viewing at least ten (10) days prior to the public defence.

Press release about a dissertation

The Communications and External Relations at the University of Lapland will e-mail the doctoral candidate well before the public examination to discuss communication about the dissertation. The candidate should write a draft to be further edited into a press release. The draft should be delivered to the Communications and External Relations no later than two weeks prior to the public examination.

Language versions and their distribution should also be agreed on well in advance.

Lectio praecursoria

A lectio praecursoria is a short presentation or an introductory lecture given by the doctoral candidate about the background and most interesting points of the research. A good lectio praecursoria is understandable also to those who have not familiarised themselves with the dissertation earlier.

Public defence

The faculty council grants the doctoral candidate permission to defend the dissertation. The council also appoints both the opponent and the custos. The public examination is usually arranged no earlier than eight weeks after permission to defend the dissertation has been granted so that there is enough time for preparations. When the permission has been granted, the administrative secretary of the faculty advises the doctoral candidate in writing about the arrangements. The faculty covers the travel and accommodation costs of the opponent while helping with other practicalities. The administrative secretary also contacts the custos and the opponent to make necessary arrangements.

All ULapland public defences are streamed online. The administrative secretary of the faculty makes the arrangements in collaboration with the e-learning services.

Read the guidelines >