The two-day REACH conference will consist of a variety of talks and workshops. Because the goal of the conference is exchange, interaction and creating a network, we are hosting several activities to this end:

Keynotes

During the conference, three keynote presentations will be held. Each presentation is scheduled for 45 minutes with 15 minutes of discussion. We aim for each keynote to comprise interdisciplinary research, preferably funded by Dynamics of Youth and/or the Early Childhood community.

Posters

Throughout the conference, all posters will be on display to review for conference attendees, students and faculty of Utrecht University. There will be two designated poster walks. During the first poster walk, a session of flashtalks will be organized so researchers can pitch their poster. After the second poster walk, the prize for best poster will be awarded. The committee to award this prize will comprise of DoY researchers from different faculties. Posters will be graded on quality of research (either executed or intended), interdisciplinarity, adhering to FAIR and Open Science principles and (potential) scientific and/or societal impact.  We welcome regular scientific posters presenting recent or current research, ‘recycled’ posters from previous conferences and posters where new research ideas are presented.

Scientific sessions

To give a large number of researchers the opportunity to present their work, we will organize six scientific sessions. During these sessions, researchers are invited to present current or recent work in 15 minutes, followed by 5 minutes of discussion. We aim to include a large variety of researchers and divide the sessions based on research topic/theme, age of the study population, and/or technique. Depending on the number and topics of submissions, we aim to facilitate a variety of ways to connect during the scientific sessions. For example, we can organize a speed-dating event at the beginning or end of a scientific session or we can host a panel discussion between the presenters.

Doctoral consortium lunch

During the conference, one Doctoral Consortium session will be held during lunch. The goal of this session is to provide PhD students with an opportunity to present their work and/or research plans and get feedback from senior researchers who are not their supervisors. The PhD students will be selected based on their submitted abstract (either for a presentation or poster) and are matched with a senior researcher based on the content of their submitted abstract and the expertise of the senior researcher.

Forum sessions

To support discussion of specific topics from different points of view, several forum sessions will be held. The goal of a forum session is to support exchange and network building. Researchers who want to host a forum session can indicate this on the registration form. The format of a forum session is open and can be designed by the initiating researcher. You can for example host a round table discussion or think of another format that suits your vision. If you want to host a forum session, we can help you to further develop your idea and together create inspiring session, focused on sharing perspectives, knowledge, experiences and maybe even datasets.

Workshops

During the two workshop sessions in this conference, scientists will get the opportunity to practice their research skills or start a collaboration with one of our societal partners. We aim to host 4-8 workshops, depending on the number of forum sessions that are requested. Workshops will focus on science communication and outreach, grant writing, collaborating with societal partners, exploring research methodologies.

Meet your peers game

During the conference, we will host a continuous ‘meet your peers’ game. During registration, researchers can indicate which research area they are part of and who they would like to get to know (e.g. ‘I am a social scientist and I want to know more about research in the medical field). During the conference you get the opportunity to find your ‘opposite match’ (e.g. a medical researcher who wants to know more about social sciences) and make a new connection.