This year marked the 10th anniversary of the establishment of Network 8. This landmark anniversary gave us a welcome opportunity to reflect on developments, collaborations, joint publications and other developments since the establishment of the Network (more details below).
This year the Network accepted 28 submission to the ECER Conference, held virtually. We would typically have 40-45 accepted submission; the reduced volume mirrored the overall decline in the submission pattern for ECER 2021 of 25%. However, we noted that attendance at sessions was not very different from attendance in physical ECER conferences (from 12-20 in the different sessions), which was heartening.
This year marked the appointment of new link convernor, Dr Catriona O’Toole (Maynooth University, Ireland), who replaces Monica Carlsson (Aarhus University, Denmark). The decision of appointing Catriona as the new link-convener was taken at the network meeting through a formal voting process. The co-conveners are Deana Leahy; Venka Simovska; Emily Darlington; Carole Faucher; Kevin Dadaczynski; Marjorita Sormunen; Ros McLellan; Teresa Vilaça, and Monica Carlsson.