CAD (from Portuguese “Conselho de Alunos de Doutoramento”) of CICECO was founded in 2019. Its main purpose was to create an entity that would represent all CICECO’s PhD students inside the research unit in which they are developing their work. Realizing the necessity of promoting a closer proximity between the PhD students, the students Eduarda Morais, Inês Cardoso and Sónia Pedro suggested the creation of an entity in CICECO that would allow the communication and exchange of experiences between the PhD students and director board of CICECO, enabling the rapid resolution of problems within the institute.

This idea was rapidly presented to Prof. João Rocha, the director of CICECO, who agreed with the creation of the PhD’s student council and legally instituted CAD as an entity in CICECO’s structure in 2020. CAD was also presented to CICECO’s PhD students and the CAD’s founding committee was later approved in an online format. The founding committee was initially composed by 6 students, each representing one of the six investigation groups in CICECO. The founding committee represents were Carlos Bornes (G1). Rui Pinho (G2), Alice Marciel (G3), Sónia Pedro (G4), Inês Cardoso (G5) and José Pereira (G6).

During the 1st year, the installer commission focused on the creation of workshops that would promote the development of student’s soft and hardskills (AIM to Learn), a main event, with the goal of gathering all PhD students in the institute (AIM Further). Due to the amount and scope of the planned work it was necessary to increase the size of the organizing team and 13 students volunteered to be part of the organizing committee for the planned activities, taking a special place in the success and the continuity of CAD (Aneeta Jaggernauth, Celestino Gomes, Eduarda Morais, Fábio Silva, Inês Rocha, Joana Lopes, Joana Pereira, João Pereira, Marguerita Rosa, Mariam Kholany, Rodrigo Neto, Rute Pereira and Zélia Alves). To publicize all the events the installer commission as created a set of digital platforms (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter) and to promote the better communication with the students, a official e-mail account and this webpage were designed.

CAD wants to improve its functions every year by listening to the students’ opinions since they are the driving force for the development of new activities. Therefore, we propose that an activity plan will be drafted every year, focused on solving PhD students’ issues and focusing on learning and acquiring new skills and knowledge.

In this sense, the installer commission vows to finish the present year with this objective in mind, working towards the goals described above. We finish this first year’s journey thanking everyone who made this possible, all students for their collaboration and participation in the events, and wishing the new commission a very successful year.

You can read a full version of our yearly report here