The EAS Doctoral Student Forum 2026 brought together 21 participants from 10 European countries in Vienna, highlighting the strong interest in this important segment of the EAS. The DSF 2026 was led by professors Andreas Lehmann-Wermser and Eva-Maria Tralle.
Taking part in the Doctoral Student Forum in Vienna gave me the opportunity to be surrounded by other doctoral students and academics whose work is focused on music education, something I do not often experience in my doctoral community at Reading. Hearing about the wide variety of research taking place across Europe helped me to reflect on and develop my own thinking, while the challenge of creating a one-minute thesis forced me to really focus on what my research is trying to find out and why it matters. I particularly valued becoming part of a community of doctoral students who have continued to keep in touch, providing encouragement during those inevitable moments when work and life get in the way of making progress.
Being part of the wider EAS conference also gave me opportunities to talk about my research with delegates who came to hear our one-minute presentations and were genuinely interested in what we were exploring. Those conversations have helped me to forge relationships and friendships with music education researchers across Europe, with exciting possibilities for future research collaborations.
Mark Aitchison, University of Reading (UDSF s)