Kia ora and welcome to November, the final stretch of the academic year! If you’re aiming to make real progress on your thesis before the summer break, this month’s line-up of workshops and activities has you covered.
If you’re in the thick of thesis-writing, there is probably something on offer this month to help you progress:
- Thesis Writing: Discussions (5 November)
- Thesis Writing: Understanding Thesis Structure (10 November)
- Systematic Review 3: Writing the Introduction and Method (10 November)
- Thesis Writing: Literature Reviews (11 November)
- Copilot Writing Lab: Using GenAI for Discussion Sections (18 November)
- Thesis Writing: Connecting Sections and Chapters (18 November)
- Getting Started with Research Writing (25 November)
Heading into data collection or analysis? Interviewing Skills for Qualitative Researchers (3 November) and NVivo Quick Start (5 November) could be well worth your time. And if your thesis document is giving you grief, both Thesis Formatting: BYO Text (11 November) and Thesis Formatting: The Works (25 November) could help you get it under control.
First-year doctoral students: Planning for the Confirmation of Candidature (and Beyond) (24 November) is designed with you in mind. This intensive half-day workshop will prepare you to write (and speak to) to your full research proposal. We’ll also cover ways to plan your timeline for the life of your doctoral project.
November is also the last chance to build your Tiriti o Waitangi knowledge online with the self-paced module Making Sense of the Treaty: Foundations for Research Practice. It takes around 3.5–4 hours to complete, and participants are expected to finish it within a month of starting. You’ll receive a digital badge and certificate on completion, and it’s good preparation for the webinars in the Tiriti-Led Research Webinar Series. Register here by 1 December.
Looking for some community alongside the workshops?
- The BEL PhD Peer Group (for PhD students in the Faculty of Business, Economics and Law) is meeting on 10 November.
- The Postgraduate Book Club is meeting on 27 November.
If you’d like to attend either, please get in touch with the organisers via the contact details on the student peer groups page.
And a warm welcome to any new PhD students joining us at the Doctoral Induction on 19 November. It’s a great starting point for getting oriented with the support and resources available to you.
Finally, join us in celebrating our scholarship recipients at the AUT Doctoral Scholarship Award Ceremony on Thursday 12 November, 4:00–6:00pm. The ceremony acknowledges recipients of AUT Vice-Chancellor’s Doctoral Scholarships, AUT Doctoral Scholarships and Te Aronui Postgraduate Research Scholarships, with time to mix and mingle afterwards. Bookings are required.
Read on for the full November workshop listings.
PG Research Workshops in November 2026
| What? | Where? | When? |
|---|---|---|
| Interviewing skills for qualitative researchers This workshop aims to help researchers decide when interviews are suitable as a data gathering tool. It will look at the aim of interviews, what research questions they can answer and what they can’t. | City campus | Tue 3 Nov, 10:00 AM – 12:00 PM |
| NVivo quick start This course is targeted at researchers wanting an efficient means of handling and analysing their qualitative data. No prior knowledge of the software is assumed; however a basic understanding of qualitative analysis procedures would be helpful. Bookings required. | Online | Thu 5 Nov, 10:00 AM – 3:00 PM |
| Thesis writing: Discussions Are you planning, writing, or editing the discussion section of your thesis? Take this workshop and get to grips with how to structure your discussion section. | Online | Thu 5 Nov, 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM |
| Systematic Review 3: Writing the introduction and method Builds on content covered in sessions one and two by providing an overview of the structure of introduction and method sections for a systematic literature review. Identifies common parts and distinctive features of these sections. Participants analyse and discuss text examples and relate these to their own writing or reading. | Online | Tue 10 Nov, 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM |
| Thesis writing: Understanding thesis structure Discusses how the different parts of a thesis connect to each other. We will analyse examples and practise using language to clearly show how existing knowledge connects to new research, to what others may do with it in the future, and where that information gets organised across a thesis. We also apply knowledge from the workshop to explore how Copilot can assist with the research writing process. Bring your device, plus an article you have read recently and a sample of your own writing. | Online | Tue 10 Nov, 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM |
| Thesis formatting: BYO text This practical, computer-based workshop is designed for research students who have started writing their dissertation/thesis in Microsoft Word and are having problems formatting their document. Bring your work along and get hands-on assistance solving your dilemmas. | City campus | Wed 11 Nov, 9:00 AM – 1:00 PM |
| Thesis writing: Literature reviews An overview of the structure of literature reviews within a thesis. Identifies typical functions and distinctive features of this section in relation to the whole research project. Participants analyse, discuss and relate text examples to their own writing, and explore how Copilot can assist with the research writing process. Systematic reviews are not covered. | Online | Wed 11 Nov, 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM |
| Copilot writing lab: Using GenAI for discussion sections of a thesis/dissertation Could AI be useful in your research writing process when writing discussion sections? This workshop helps you to evaluate where Microsoft Copilot could help you in your writing workflow. | City campus | Wed 18 Nov, 10:00 AM – 11:30 AM |
| Thesis writing: Connecting sections and chapters Explores how we can organise research writing so that our readers clearly see how paragraphs and sections within a chapter and different chapters connect. Participants will use the principle of ‘writing in layers’ to critically examine their own reading and writing samples. This principle can be applied to writing theses, dissertations, book chapters, and journal articles. We also explore how Copilot can assist with the research writing process. | Online | Wed 18 Nov, 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM |
| Planning for the Confirmation of Candidature (and beyond) Designed for PhD candidates approximately 3 months into enrolment, this workshop supports your doctoral research planning and prepares you for the Confirmation of Candidature milestone. | City campus | Tue 24 Nov, 10:00 AM – 1:00 PM |
| Thesis formatting: The works This workshop focuses on the best ways to use Microsoft Word to handle a long document such as a thesis. Topics covered will include: using styles, section breaks, table of contents, page numbering and using various techniques to move around a long document easily. | City campus | Wed 25 Nov, 9:00 AM – 2:00 PM |
| Getting started with research writing Focuses on strategies to help researchers digest reading in preparation for writing about what you’ve read. Try free-writing and mapping concepts as strategies to get words on the page and then create more structured writing. We will also explore how Copilot can assist with the research writing process. Bring your device and an article you have read recently. | Online | Wed 25 Nov, 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM |
