Hej everyone! In this blog post, I want to share my experience during January and the Christmas holidays of applying for a Ph.D. position at Linköping University. I hope this post will give you some insight into the process for those who are considering applying for a Ph.D. position in the near future.
Pursuing a Ph.D. is an idea I have always had in my head and during the month of December I found the perfect opportunity to apply for a Ph.D. at Linköping University in the area of design and sustainability that I am interested in.
To apply for a Ph.D. student position, you have to do it as you apply for a job at the University. You should look on the University’s vacancies website and there you will find the different positions with their description and deadline.
Within each description, usually explains the project in which the Ph.D. student will be involved, and the background requirements needed to apply for the position. In my case, it was a Ph.D. student position that could be carried out in English so language was not a problem although they did recommend knowing Swedish.
To apply for the position you must first register on the university’s vacancies page and there you can see all the documents needed for the application. In my case, I needed a letter of intent, my CV, documents from my previous bachelor’s and master’s degrees, language certificates, and letters of recommendation.
If you are going to apply for a Ph.D. position I can give you two pieces of advice after my process. First of all, is to check that your documents are official. In my case, my bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Spain did not offer an official document in English, so at the last minute, I had to pay for the official translation of my master’s transcript document. It can take some time to get the document and for me, it was not a cheap process, so I recommend you plan that in advance.
On the other hand, applying for letters of recommendation takes some time as you need to contact professors who want to recommend you for the position, and they should send you the letters of recommendation before the application deadline.
Once I had all the documents ready to submit the application, I submitted it days before the deadline, and recently, two weeks after applying I received an email I have been one of the applicants selected for the interview phase.
The interview was with two of the professors carrying out the research project and questions were asked about my skills and abilities related to the goals of the project. Both professors were very friendly and the interview was comfortable.
The last step of the process will be to receive the result of who will be chosen for the position, but so far I have not received a reply.
I personally find that a Ph.D. student position at the University of Linköping is a different application process than in my home country, Spain. For example, students in Spain would not have a salary but would depend on educational grants.
I believe that applying for a Ph.D. is a new academic challenge that I would love to be part of and I am looking forward to knowing if I could finally be selected for the position and start this new phase of my life in such an attractive research university as Linköping University is.
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