42 Resilient Assemblages: ePortfolios and the Future of Doctoral Scholarship in a Post-Pandemic World

Wendy Smidt
Cape Peninsula University of Technology, Mowbray Campus, South Africa

ABSTRACT

The COVID-19 pandemic exposed vulnerabilities in traditional scholarly communication, highlighting the need for more adaptable and accessible formats. This chapter argues that ePortfolios offer a resilient solution for communicating doctoral scholarship in a post-pandemic world. While the conventional dissertation remains dominant, this work explores the transformative potential of integrating ePortfolio principles to create dynamic and comprehensive research narratives. Operating through a post-qualitative lens, the author uses the term “assemblages” (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987) to emphasise the interconnectedness and fluidity of elements coming together to create something new. This concept describes ePortfolios as dynamic assemblages of different media, experiences, and reflections. This work explains how integrating ePortfolio principles can enhance communication, dissemination, and the impact of doctoral research through practical application. By exploring existing examples of post digital scholarship and considering future trends in doctoral education, this chapter provides actionable strategies for doctoral candidates and supervisors on designing and implementing effective ePortfolios. It proposes that ePortfolios can not only withstand disruptions like pandemics but also transform the doctoral assessment and redefine the presentation of scholarly work in the post digital age, preparing graduates for a rapidly evolving academic landscape. This work argues that ePortfolios are not merely digital versions of traditional dissertations but offer a fundamental shift in how doctoral work is conceived, presented, and assessed, ultimately contributing to a more resilient and impactful future for doctoral scholarship.

Keywords: ePortfolio, doctoral scholarship, post-pandemic world, post-qualitative, resilient assemblages

The Evolving Nature of Scholarly Communication

And always I strive to push the boundaries of what we know and what seems possible to us at this moment in time.

—Theo Jansen, BMW | ‘Kinetic Sculptures’, 2011, 0:00:39

Imagination is the prerequisite of understanding.

—Hannah Arendt, The Life of the Mind, 1978, p. 257

Scholarly communication faced significant challenges adapting to digital environments even before the COVID-19 pandemic, despite offering new opportunities (Kayembe & Nel, 2019; Mlangeni & Seyama-Mokhaneli, 2024; Olaitan et al., 2024). Early research, like Clark and Neumann’s (2009) study at the Institute of Education (IOE), University of London, identified ePortfolios as effective online repositories and reflection tools for doctoral students, aiding in organizing PhD experiences and constructing academic identities (pp. 8, 29). While this foundational work highlighted initial implementation challenges, it demonstrated ePortfolios’ capacity for self-reflection and identity formation. A recent review of technology-enhanced learning (TEL) in African higher education further illuminates both profound opportunities and challenges in this digital transformation (Habarurema et al., 2025), exemplified by the growing adoption of ePortfolios for reflective writing (Jenson & Treuer, 2014; Yang & Wong, 2024).

The pandemic sharply revealed vulnerabilities in traditional and early digital scholarly communication frameworks. This underscored the urgency for more adaptable and accessible formats that would support dynamic interaction, foster reflective learning, and facilitate broader engagement (Benites, 2023, p. 302). The ePortfolios’ relevance in assessment is demonstrated by their utility in providing 360-degree feedback and promoting robust learning in teacher education, including in South Africa (Modise & Vaughan, 2024). Consequently, digital technology transforms the writing process, demanding continuous adaptation across cognitive, linguistic, social, and emotional dimensions (Kruse et al., 2023, p. xv; Kruse & Anson, 2023, pp. 26, 232, 479). Despite the potential of ePortfolios as a transformative solution, implementation is fraught with challenges related to technology, student engagement, faculty workload, privacy, and digital equity (Bay Path University, n.d.).

Theo Jansen’s artistic philosophy, emphasizing the constant push beyond perceived boundaries (CUT & PASTE GENERATION, 2011, 0:00:39), directly mirrors the imperative to reimagine scholarly communication beyond conventional forms. Similarly, Hannah Arendt’s assertion that imagination is the prerequisite of understanding (Arendt, 1978, p. 257) underscores the critical role of creative thought in navigating these emergent challenges and envisioning new possibilities for doctoral scholarship.

This chapter argues that ePortfolios, conceptualized as dynamic “assemblages”—a Deleuze and Guattari (1987, p. 73) concept describing the “holding together of disparate elements” to create new meanings—offer a resilient solution for communicating and assessing doctoral scholarship in the post-pandemic, post digital age (Ball & Savin-Baden, 2022; Jandrić et al., 2018). This frames doctoral work as purposeful collections of diverse artifacts (e.g., multimedia, hyperlinks, text), aligning with early visions for doctoral ePortfolios, such as Clark and Neumann’s (2009) “co-owned content management system” (p. 7) for tracking progress, managing resources, and fostering doctoral-level competencies and identity (p. 8).

Operating through a post-qualitative (PQ) lens, this chapter views scholarly communication as dynamic, interconnected processes. Post-qualitative inquiry (PQI) moves beyond traditional objective representation, emphasizing entanglement and the constant ‘becoming’ of phenomena where knowledge is actively constituted through complex interactions (St. Pierre, 2011; Jackson & Mazzei, 2012). This lens is crucial for understanding doctoral ePortfolios, as the concept of ‘assemblages’—rooted in post-structuralist though—aligns with PQI by emphasizing the fluidity, heterogeneity, and non-linear interconnectedness. This combined perspective allows for analyzing how ePortfolio artifacts, reflections, and digital interactions actively perform and co-constitute scholarship in an ever-evolving manner within the post-pandemic, post-digital landscape.

The rapid transition to digital tools during COVID-19 accelerated the adoption of existing practices on a massive scale (Lang, 2023, p. 175; Castelló et al., 2023, p. 134), stressing their capabilities and highlighting pre-existing deficiencies. These shortcomings were evident in supporting the full spectrum of academic writing and scholarly engagement, from informal pre-writing and collaboration to formal assessment and feedback (Modise & Vaughan, 2024), especially within mandated institutional systems. The limitations exposed by this shift offer insights for developing more adaptable digital writing environments.

This chapter explores the future of doctoral scholarship in a post-pandemic world through three key dimensions: fostering reflective learning via digital platforms, facilitating effective online collaboration, and informing strategies for disseminating research to diverse audiences. These dimensions draw on concepts like networked thinking, self-regulated learning, and e-assessment feedback (Bräuer & Ziegelbauer, 2023; Habarurema et al., 2025; Kruse & Anson, 2023; Lam, 2021; Modise & Vaughan, 2024; Yang & Wong, 2024), recognizing the distributed nature of doctoral writing workflows (Cummings, 2023, p. 490). Ultimately, this inquiry reveals that the pandemic underscored the critical need for adaptable digital platforms like ePortfolios, which are multifaceted tools transforming doctoral development. Embracing ePortfolios strategically re-envisions scholarship, cultivating resilient, impactful, and globally connected researchers. Conceptualizing doctoral work as a dynamic assemblage allows ePortfolios to synthesize disparate elements of a scholar’s journey into a living, interconnected, and impactful body of work beyond conventional outputs, thereby enhancing communication, dissemination, and long-term relevance (Benites, 2023; Kruse et al., 2023; Lam, 2021; Link et al., 2023).

This chapter explores “Resilient Assemblages: ePortfolios and the Future of Doctoral Scholarship in a Post-Pandemic World” through three central lines of inquiry:

1. How can digital platforms foster reflective learning within doctoral scholarship, particularly in light of vulnerabilities exposed by the pandemic and the increasing need for adaptable academic practices? This section investigates the role of digital platforms in fostering reflective learning, drawing on concepts of “networked thinking and learning” (Bräuer and Ziegelbauer, 2023, pp. 248, 250), insights from Kruse and Anson (2023) and Technology-Enhanced Learning (TEL) systems (Habarurema et al., 2025), and work on reflection in e-portfolio creation (Yang & Wong, 2024), focusing on self-regulated learning with e-assessment feedback (Lam, 2021; Modise & Vaughan, 2024).
2. What effective models for online collaboration can be integrated into doctoral scholarship, addressing the limitations in existing digital technologies and practices revealed by the rapid shift to online learning? This section discusses models for online collaboration, focusing on Bräuer and Ziegelbauer (2023), Habarurema et al. (2025), and Modise and Vaughan (2024), who extensively cover collaborative work within digital platforms. While Yang and Wong (2024) do not explicitly detail online collaboration models, their work on ePortfolios suggests the importance of shareability and facilitating idea exchange—aspects inherent to collaboration. Similarly, Lam (2021) characterizes ePortfolios by their connectivity, community of practice, and networked writing, all implying collaborative dimensions.
3. In what ways can ePortfolio principles inform strategies for disseminating doctoral research to diverse audiences, thereby enhancing its communication, impact, and long-term relevance in future academic contexts? This section considers strategies for disseminating research to diverse audiences, informed by Bräuer and Ziegelbauer (2023), on ePortfolio’s pedagogical aspects and potential for learning and reflection. Their insights into ePortfolios as tools for self-regulated learning and writing parallel those of Lam (2021). Furthermore, Lam (2021), Modise and Vaughan (2024), Yang and Wong (2024) offer insights into how ePortfolios and related digital platforms can serve as strategies for scholarly digital identity formation and for disseminating research, skills, and learning outcomes to diverse audiences, such as employers and the broader public, via social media. TEL systems (Habarurema et al., 2025) broadly help prepare students for future employment and increase their inclusion, thereby enhancing communication, impact, and long-term relevance.

These central lines of inquiry will now be explored in sequence, beginning with the role of digital platforms in fostering reflective learning.

THE ROLE OF DIGITAL PLATFORMS IN FOSTERING REFLECTIVE LEARNING

Bay Path University’s Doctorate in Higher Education program uses ePortfolios as comprehensive collections of evidence, including manuscripts, multimodal texts, and mentor and peer observations. These platforms extend beyond mere display to capture students’ reflections on their growth as leaders and scholars, fostering personal ownership and professional identity—aspects also highlighted by Clark and Neumann (2009) and Modise and Vaughan (2024).

The pandemic underscored the need for adaptable scholarly practices, exposing challenges in supporting deep reflection within existing digital environments. Addressing these vulnerabilities, this section explores how digital platforms can foster reflective learning in doctoral scholarship.

Technology-Enhanced Learning (TEL) systems, as Habarurema et al. (2025) note, facilitate self-regulated learning and engagement. In the post-pandemic world, ePortfolios offer a persistent online space for doctoral students to curate, contextualize, and reflect on their evolving research journey. Habarurema et al.’s (2025) emphasis on digitalization shows how ePortfolios can become resilient assemblages, allowing continuous intellectual development even amidst disruptions. However, their work also warns that TEL alone is insufficient; ePortfolios must be pedagogically integrated to genuinely scaffold reflective practices, moving beyond simple content display to deeper self-assessment.

The pandemic amplified the relevance of web-based ePortfolios, demonstrating their accessibility and utility in assessment. Reinforcing this, Modise and Vaughan (2024) position ePortfolios as key digital platforms for fostering reflective, personalized, and collaborative learning. This aligns with Clark and Neumann’s (2009) empirical findings that ePortfolios serve as effective “online repository and reflection tool[s]” for doctoral students, helping organize their PhD experiences and construct their professional academic identity” (p. 17). The Community of Inquiry (CoI) framework, which underpins their work, further emphasizes purposeful critical discourse and reflection.

In contrast, Lang (2023, p. 175) notes that while the pandemic placed Learning Management Systems (LMSs) “at the center of nearly every educational institution’s operations”, this centralization exposed their inadequacy for complex academic writing pedagogy. LMS platforms often lack the flexibility for instructors to use established writing pedagogies and practices without compromise and are designed for “information storage and retrieval rather than the communicative, recursive interaction valued in writing theory and pedagogy” (p. 179).

Despite these limitations, Yang and Wong (2024) indicate that ePortfolios can help students become reflective learners, facilitating self-understanding, goal-setting, and professional development. Lam (2021) also posits that ePortfolios encourage students to reflect upon evidence of learning, though he highlights the need for more research on how multimodal components support or hinder self-reflective thinking.

Building on this, Bräuer and Ziegelbauer (2023) offer further insights into how specific design principles foster deeper levels of reflection. They position ePortfolios as tools for self-regulation and reflective practice, scaffolding students to draw meaning from experience. This process, often a written activity within the ePortfolio, supports identifying (‘what?’), interrogating (‘so what?’), and evaluating (‘now what?’) critical moments. Bräuer and Ziegelbauer contend that Schön’s (1983) phases of reflection (‘reflection-in-action’ and ‘reflection-on-action’) are well-supported by ePortfolios, which can scaffold writing tasks for diverse levels of reflection.

Networked Thinking and Learning

Bräuer and Ziegelbauer (2023, p. 248) argue that ePortfolios offer robust opportunities for “networked thinking and learning.” This concept involves making inherent connections to other texts and allowing writers to share, comment, and reflect, which transcends traditional scholarly methods. Applied to doctoral scholarship, networked thinking within an ePortfolio helps scholars connect disparate ideas, sources, and different stages of their research. The visibility of this thinking, enabled through dynamic links and connections, makes the process of idea formation tangible. This process awareness is crucial for doctoral-level reflective practice, where recursive engagement with ideas is fundamental. By supporting this interconnectedness of thought and resources, ePortfolios foster the deep engagement necessary for doctoral-level reflection.

Fostering Collaborative Reflection through Community Interaction

Beyond individual reflection, Bräuer and Ziegelbauer (2023, p. 250) highlight the significant potential for “interaction within larger communities of portfolio users.” This enables shared digital composition and communication with peers and instructors, making collaboration and feedback integral to the writing process. For doctoral scholarship, reflective learning is rarely a solitary endeavor; it relies heavily on interaction with a community of supervisors and peers. The “interaction within larger communities” facilitated by ePortfolios supports critical aspects of scholarship, such as receiving and providing feedback, negotiating meaning, building communities of practice and intellectual support networks, and engaging in shared digital composition. Bowen and Whithaus (2023, p. 162) further explain that “always-there” access to peer support and resource sharing can facilitate idea generation, problem-solving, and collaborative moments that enhance the writing process. This “always-there” access aligns with the concept of “on-demand copresence,” which plays a significant role in fostering dynamic reflective and collaborative processes. “On-demand copresence” describes the capacity to access the presence and guidance of others through networked digital technologies (Bowen & Whithaus, 2023, p. 162). While often associated with instant messaging (IM), this principle relies on a “background copresence” that creates an “always on environment for “immediate conversation coordination, exchange, and feedback” (Bowen & Whithaus, 2023, p. 162). This relies on existing social relations and shared purpose, forming “on-demand communities” (Bowen & Whithaus, 2023, p. 162). For doctoral scholarship, the potential for “immediate conversation coordination, exchange, and feedback” is particularly valuable. The “awareness of” accessible support within these communities encourages timely reflection when scholars encounter challenges, rather than waiting for formal meetings. This continuous, flexible interaction fosters a more agile and responsive reflective process, enhancing the overall scholarly endeavor.

Relating to Pandemic Vulnerabilities and Adaptability

Bräuer and Ziegelbauer’s insights are particularly relevant when considering the vulnerabilities exposed by COVID-19. Traditional academic practices and rigid digital tools like Learning Management Systems (LMSs) proved inadequate for complex activities such as writing instruction. As Lang (2023) noted, LMSs lack flexibility for established writing pedagogies and are optimized for information storage rather than communicative interaction.

By contrast, ePortfolios, through networked thinking and community interaction, provide digital environments designed to support the communicative, recursive processes that traditional systems lack. Networked thinking allows for fluid, recursive movement between ideas and resources, while community interaction facilitates the feedback loops hindered by rigid platforms. The pandemic highlighted the urgent need for more adaptable scholarly formats. ePortfolios, with their inherent flexibility, represent a more resilient solution, capable of integrating diverse tools, configuring for various purposes, and facilitating connections across different digital spaces.

In short, Bräuer and Ziegelbauer’s concepts of “networked thinking and learning” and “interaction within larger communities” are crucial for fostering reflective learning in doctoral scholarship. They describe the digital environment necessary to support the complex, recursive, and socially embedded nature of advanced academic work, which has become even more vital in the post-pandemic context.

CULTIVATING RESILIENT ONLINE COLLABORATION FOR DOCTORAL RESEARCH

Setting the Stage for the Collaborative Challenges

As writing instruction migrated online, faculty found mandated LMSs insufficient, forcing them to use external tools like email, cloud services, and conferencing platforms (Lang, 2023, p. 179). This reliance on disparate tools highlighted the absence of integrated environments within core systems and potentially intensified the “tool separation” friction that can disrupt the writing process (Pitura, 2023, p. 108). The rapid shift online exposed significant disparities in student access to reliable technology. Lang (2023, p. 175) reports that over half of enrolled students experienced connectivity, hardware, or software problems severe enough to impact their coursework. This starkly revealed that the foundational digital infrastructure for online academic work was not universally available, hindering basic participation in digital writing and learning environments. A PQI (Smidt & Waghid, 2024) demonstrates how participants in an arts-based digital short film-making project navigated technological limitations and social challenges to foster collaborative communication and community interaction.

How Collaborative Tools and Challenges Emerged

With physical interaction restricted, digital tools for collaboration and informal support became crucial (Castelló et al., 2023). The pandemic accelerated the trend of collaborative writing, yet students increasingly turned to “non-academic, familiar tools” like WhatsApp and Discord for idea generation, coordination, and peer support (Bowen & Whithaus, 2023, pp. 156–168). This widespread re-purposing of tools designed for social interaction suggested that traditional academic platforms lacked adequate features for collaborative workflows. Early empirical work by Clark and Neumann (2009) also explored ePortfolio’s potential for peer interaction and collaboration (p. 16) but noted limitations in certain scenarios. While cloud-based tools like Google Docs enabled synchronous collaboration (Castelló et al., 2023, p. 125; Devitt et al., 2023, p. 429; Rapp et al., 2023, p. 37), the shift online highlighted their shortcomings. Anson (2023, p. 205) notes that, unlike in-person review, it is difficult to have a genuine conversation about a draft using these tools. The forced move online made these difficulties in replicating rich, dialogic interactions more apparent. For instance, a PQI (Smidt & Waghid, 2024) of a digital short film-making project shows how participants overcame cultural and language barriers through digital collaboration, but it also revealed challenges in navigating limited digital access and developing new competencies.

Online Collaboration: Workflow and Multimodality in Collaborative Writing

The pandemic-driven reliance on diverse digital tools underscored the growing importance of digital literacy and competency (Kruse et al., 2023, p. xviii; Lam, 2021, p. 211). Students had to navigate complex interfaces and evolving practices like automated feedback, and the rapid shift amplified challenges for those lacking these skills. The move online also highlighted how writing is a distributed “workflow” across various tools and spaces (Cummings, 2023, pp. 484, 490), revealing that traditional tool designs might not adequately support this flexible, non-linear process. As digital writing increasingly involves multimodality—drawing on visual, linguistic, aural, and spatial communication rather than just text (Bowen & Whithaus, 2023, p. 169)—multimodal chat-based applications stand out. They leverage these various communication modes to create a stronger sense of shared presence and facilitate collaborative writing (p. 167). This integration of multimodality is a significant aspect of the broader digitization trend in academic writing (Devitt, 2023, p. 434; Kruse et al., pp. iv, xviii), and it also has implications for the automated scoring of writing (Link et al., 2023, pp. 438-439, 442).

EFFECTIVE MODELS THAT ADDRESS THESE CHALLENGES AND LIMITATIONS

The evolution of ePortfolios has increasingly centered on student agency, moving beyond early limitations of institutional control to empower students with greater autonomy over their digital collections (Clark & Neumann, 2009; Tosh et al., 2005). This allows them to manage access, tailor content, and select tools to showcase progress (Jenson & Treuer, 2014; Yang & Wong, 2024), foster self-regulation (Bräuer & Ziegelbauer, 2023), and curate professional identities (Modise & Vaughan, 2024). EPortfolios are now a holistic means of demonstrating a wide range of academic manuscripts, artifacts, and mentor observations through multimedia, hyperlinks, and interactive features (Bay Path University, n.d., Clark & Neumann, 2009; Yang & Wong, 2024). This connects learning experiences across academic, professional, and community contexts (Mohamad et al., 2016; Tosh et al., 2005; Yang & Wong, 2024).

ePortfolios are pivotal in fostering self-regulation, providing a scaffold for students to draw meaning and construct knowledge from experiences (Bräuer & Ziegelbauer, 2023; Modise & Vaughan, 2024; Mohamad et al., 2016; Yang & Wong, 2024). This process is supported by diverse feedback (self, peer, and expert), which helps students diagnose their own learning and develop critical thinking (Modise & Vaughan, 2024; Yang & Wong, 2024). Ultimately, ePortfolios help students curate professional identities, allowing them to tell their evolving story as learners and professionals and connect their experiences for long-term career success and continuous professional development (Bay Path University, n.d.; Clark & Neumann, 2009; GITES, n.d.; Modise & Vaughan, 2024). The demand for flexible, open systems that accommodate creativity and move beyond restrictive, template-driven designs is clear (Tosh et al., 2005). There is a pressing need to integrate formal and informal writing and collaboration spaces. Students widely repurpose non-academic chat applications like WhatsApp and Discord for essential pre-writing activities such as idea generation and peer support (Bowen & Whithaus, 2023, p. 158). This trend demonstrates that future academic environments must better support these aspects, often referred to as “coming to writing” (p. 159). Designing for this integration involves several key elements:

• co-presence within a shared virtual space and on-demand peer support (p. 162);
• multimodal brainstorming and communication, incorporating visual and audio elements alongside text (p. 165);
• flexible collaboration and resource sharing that extends beyond formal document co-editing,
• and recognition and integration of the “messy, pre-writing stages of text production” (p. 158) that occur in informal digital spaces.

As Bowen & Whithaus (2023) state, “academic work and pre-writing composing activities cannot be separated from their everyday digital writing practices and spaces” (p. 159). The “interplay, the ways in which ideas move between chat programs and formal academic writing spaces, is key” (p. 161). These “alternative, non-academic communication spaces” (p. 163) effectively support academic work.

Habarurema et al. (2025) emphasize that technology-enhanced learning (TEL) systems promote active engagement and collaboration. The pandemic exposed limitations in pre-existing collaboration tools, making platforms designed for collaboration particularly salient. ePortfolios can serve as central hubs for collaborative doctoral work, facilitating shared reflection spaces, co-creation of content, and peer feedback. Successful TEL integration, however, requires balancing technology with pedagogical content knowledge; effective models must integrate specific pedagogical strategies into the ePortfolio to ensure collaborative activities are meaningful and contribute directly to the doctoral research, rather than being mere substitutions for in-person interactions.

Modise and Vaughan (2024) reinforce this, highlighting ePortfolios as specifically supporting collaborative learning, particularly through the integration of 360-degree feedback from multiple sources. This approach fosters student-centered interaction where learners and teachers become co-creators of knowledge. Their study, conducted during the pandemic, underscores how ePortfolios became a relevant tool to facilitate peer interaction and community building. The Community of Inquiry (CoI) framework, also referenced in their work, further aligns with a PQ understanding of knowledge co-creation in online environments.

Designing for Flexible Workflows in Collaborative Scholarship

The reliance on disparate tools like email, cloud services, and conferencing software alongside the LMS demonstrates that scholarly writing has evolved into a flexible workflow spanning multiple platforms (Cummings, 2023, p. 490; Lang, 2023, p. 179). This reality calls for a design philosophy that prioritizes interoperability and flexibility, allowing writers to move seamlessly between applications for tasks such as note-taking, argumentation mapping, collaborative drafting, reference management, and feedback, rather than being confined to a single platform.

This practical need is conceptually grounded in the framework of interconnected “assemblages” (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, p. 73). From this perspective, writing is not a singular activity but a dynamic formation of diverse elements interacting via processes like “mutual insertion” and “transcoding” (pp. 93, 314) Therefore, models for online collaboration should support this emergent, non-linear workflow, enabling various tools and modalities to effectively contribute to collective scholarly innovation.

The ePortfolio as Assemblage: A Framework for Adaptable Digital Scholarship

This section shifts from examining the vulnerabilities of traditional scholarly communication and existing digital tools to proposing a more adaptable ecology for future academic contexts. It argues that a new approach is necessary for scholarly communication, one that can meet the challenges and opportunities highlighted during the pandemic. To address this, this chapter proposes that doctoral ePortfolios, when conceived as dynamic “assemblages” (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, p. 73), offer a highly resilient and transformative solution. To visualize this concept, consider the kinetic sculptures of Theo Jansen, known as strandbeests (CUT & PASTE GENERATION, 2011). These ingenious creations are composed of countless individual PVC pipes and fasteners. Yet, when interconnected in specific, purposeful ways, these disparate parts interact to produce fluid, seemingly organic movement.

Much like a strandbeest is not merely a pile of plastic, an ePortfolio is more than a static repository of documents. It functions as a dynamic assemblage, a deliberate collection where diverse elements—texts, videos, reflections, drafts, and external links—interact and connect to generate new meaning, demonstrate developing scholarship, and present a coherent narrative of the doctoral journey. The ePortfolio, like the strandbeest, is perpetually in motion, adapting and evolving as new components are added and existing ones are re-contextualized to convey a learner’s emergent understandings and capabilities. This approach directly addresses the need for greater adaptability and resilience in scholarly communication, moving beyond the fixed constraints of traditional formats.

STRATEGIES FOR DOCTORAL RESEARCH DISSEMINATION IN A POSTDIGITAL AGE

The Imperative for Dissemination

The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the vulnerability of traditional scholarly communication, such as the conventional dissertation, and revealed an urgent need for more flexible and accessible formats for disseminating doctoral research (Cummings, 2023; Lang et al., 2023; Yang & Wong, 2024). Doctoral candidates are increasingly adopting roles beyond content creation, including social justice advocacy, which necessitates communication strategies that reach beyond academic audiences to address societal issues (Benites, 2023; Kruse et al., 2023; Lam, 2021; Link et al., 2023). While the dissertation remains a cornerstone, integrating ePortfolio principles offers a powerful way to create dynamic and comprehensive research narratives, ultimately enhancing the communication, dissemination, and potential impact of doctoral scholarship.

The University of Roehampton’s PhD (Portfolio) in Education exemplifies this approach. Designed for experienced professionals, the program grants academic recognition for existing professional work, enabling students to expand their established research fields instead of completing new, standardized assignments. Candidates compile three prior works (e.g., projects, papers, presentations) into a portfolio that includes reflective commentary, thereby demonstrating original knowledge contributions. Although the model does not explicitly refer to an ‘ePortfolio,’ it values diverse practical outputs and offers international students a global framework for their work, supported by remote study, peer reviews, and online discussions.

ePortfolio Principles as Informing Mechanisms

Defined as purposeful digital collections showcasing an individual’s skills, accomplishments, and progress (Jenson & Treuer, 2014; Yang & Wong, 2024), ePortfolios embody several principles that directly inform effective dissemination strategies for doctoral research. Central among these is multimodality, which enables a more comprehensive and engaging presentation of scholarship than the text-based dissertation (Bräuer & Ziegelbauer, 2023; Bowen & Whithaus, 2023; Lang et al., 2023; Link et al., 2023). By serving as curated, multimodal repositories for diverse artifacts— including multimedia files, hyperlinks, and interactive features—ePortfolios allow scholars to tailor their communication for varied audiences, from academic peers to the general public.

ePortfolios also support reflection and narrative construction, acting as a tool for self-regulated learning (Bräuer and Ziegelbauer, 2023; Mohamad et al., 2016). They enable learners to connect artifacts to their skills and goals, thereby articulating their learning journey and constructing comprehensive research narratives (Bräuer & Ziegelbauer, 2023; Kruse & Anson, 2023; Yang & Wong, 2024). Crucially, ePortfolios facilitate showcasing both the research process and product (Kruse & Anson, 2023; Yang & Wong, 2024), making cognitive development visible and allowing audiences to understand the scholarship’s evolution. This inherent flexibility, combined with networked thinking and connectivity, facilitates sharing, commenting, and feedback, thereby supporting a community of practice. Ultimately, ePortfolios empower doctoral students with significant agency in cultivating their digital identity and mediating interactions with diverse audiences (Link et al., 2023).

Specific Dissemination Strategies Informed by ePortfolios

ePortfolios offer a dynamic and multifaceted approach to scholarly communication, transforming traditional research dissemination into a flexible, audience-responsive, and deeply engaging process. Content can be curated to highlight theoretical contributions for academics, practical applications for professionals, or policy implications for specific groups using tools like secret URLs for targeted dissemination (Kruse et al., 2023). This strategic tailoring allows communication to precisely align with diverse audience expectations and reach beyond traditional academic circles (Smidt & Waghid, 2024). Leveraging the multimodality of digital environments (Yang & Wong, 2024), ePortfolios present complex research through rich visualizations, integrating multimodal and interactive components alongside text. This fosters “genre innovation and makes research more engaging for expanded audiences (Link et al, 2023). Furthermore, ePortfolios have the capacity to showcase the entire research journey (Bräuer and Ziegelbauer, 2023), including research logs, methodological reflections, drafts, and the evolution of ideas. This provides deeper insight into the research’s emergence, making cognitive processes visible through links and graphs (Cummings, 2023). Functioning as a mediated repository for interaction (Bräuer and Ziegelbauer, 2023), they facilitate dialogue and feedback from peers and experts. This encourages timely reflection and enhances communication about research in progress through iterative exchanges. Scholars can effectively use ePortfolios to cultivate robust digital identities, controlling their self-description and mediating interactions with various audiences to increase the visibility and impact of their work. Existing on digital platforms, ePortfolios can reach a broader, more varied audience than traditional print formats. Conceptualizing doctoral work as dynamic ‘assemblages’ of diverse media, experiences, and reflections enables a richer, more comprehensive, and interconnected presentation that moves beyond linear narratives, inviting audiences into the emergent inquiry process.

Enhancing Communication, Impact, and Long-Term Relevance

Implementing these ePortfolio-informed strategies significantly enhances the communication, impact, and long-term relevance of doctoral research. As Habarurema et al. (2025) note, TEL systems help prepare students for future employment (Bay Path University, n.d.) and increase their inclusion, benefits directly applicable to how ePortfolios disseminate and sustain the relevance of doctoral research. By functioning as a dynamic, curated ‘home base’ for scholarly outputs, an ePortfolio allows students to present their work in a compelling, multi-modal format that transcends traditional dissertations. This digital strategy reach diverse academic and non-academic audiences, amplifying research impact. However, Habarurema et al. (2025) caution regarding the digital divide, highlighting that dissemination strategies must ensure equitable access. ePortfolios should be designed to overcome these barriers, capitalizing on their communicative potential to reach a broader public and professional sphere, thereby ensuring their long-term relevance.

Further reinforcing these capabilities, Modise and Vaughan (2024) highlight ePortfolios as tools for purposeful presentation and reflection on learning. A key insight from their work is how ePortfolios assist students in developing professional identities and making learning visible, which facilitates recognition within specific social contexts. For doctoral scholarship, this translates into leveraging an ePortfolio to curate and present one’s research journey, findings, and expertise to establish a scholarly identity and increase the work’s visibility among diverse audiences. By showcasing the process as well as the product of learning, an ePortfolio can narrate the story of the research journey, making it more accessible and potentially increasing its long-term relevance.

The combination of multimodal, tailored presentations and a focus on the research process makes complex research more understandable and engaging for diverse audiences. Furthermore, ePortfolios allow researchers to demonstrate a wider range of competencies beyond the final research text, such as digital literacies, communication skills, and reflective practice. This is particularly valuable for employability in diverse career paths (Bay Path University, n.d.). As a lasting ‘embodied scholarship,’ a dynamic, publicly accessible ePortfolio grants researchers greater control over how their work is perceived, fostering professional growth and cultivating a digital identity. The ability to maintain and develop the ePortfolio after graduation allows doctoral work to remain relevant and impactful over time, supporting continuous professional development and bridging education and professional life (GITES, n.d.; Modise & Vaughan, 2024; Yang & Wong, 2024).

Future Academic Contexts

In the evolving academic landscape, characterized as post-pandemic and post-digital (Jandrić et al., 2018; Ball & Savin-Baden, 2022), ePortfolio principles and the strategies they inform are crucial. ePortfolios embody a fundamental shift in how doctoral work is conceived, presented, and assessed, moving beyond merely digitizing dissertations to redefine scholarly presentation in the post digital age. By providing adaptable, accessible formats for communication and dissemination, showcasing comprehensive research narratives, and fostering innovation, ePortfolios contribute to building a more resilient and impactful future for doctoral scholarship. They prepare graduates for a rapidly evolving academic landscape by equipping them with vital digital communication and presentation skills. Successful implementation, however, requires addressing challenges related to technology, training, and policy to ensure their effective and resilient use.

IMPLICATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

My exploration of ePortfolios yields several crucial lessons for doctoral scholarship in a post-pandemic world. First, the pandemic illuminated a critical need for adaptable and resilient digital platforms, as traditional academic structures and existing digital tools proved insufficient for the complexities of modern scholarly practice. Second, ePortfolios are revealed as multifaceted tools transforming doctoral development by enabling deeper, reflective learning, facilitating multimodal online collaboration, and empower strategic research dissemination. Finally, this inquiry reinforces the value of conceptualizing doctoral work as a dynamic assemblage, highlighting how ePortfolios can synthesize a scholar’s disparate journey and research into a living, interconnected, and impactful body of work that extends beyond conventional outputs.

For Universities

The pandemic revealed significant limitations in traditional academic structures and standard LMSs, highlighting issues like “tool separation” (Pitura, 2023, p. 108) and lack of integrated environments (Lang, 2023). To foster adaptability, universities should strategically invest in dynamic, multimodal, and interoperable digital tools (Cummings, 2023; Lang, 2023). These platforms are crucial for enabling flexible academic workflows, supporting diverse scholarly articulation beyond the traditional dissertation—from portfolio-based PhDs like Roehampton’s to multimodal short film-making projects in South African doctoral research (Smidt & Waghid, 2024). This integration also enhances communicative interactions such as peer reviews (Bräuer & Ziegelbauer, 2023). By systematically integrating ePortfolios, institutions can equip graduates with vital digital communication and presentation skills, empower them to establish scholarly identities, extend the relevance of doctoral work to broader public and professional spheres, and prepare them for an ever-changing academic landscape. However, successful ePortfolio implementation and resilient use require addressing challenges in technology, training, and policy (Yang & Wong, 2024), prioritizing digital equity to ensure the long-term relevance and broader visibility of doctoral work,

For Faculty (Including Supervisors and Subject Matter Experts)

Moving to online learning, faculty found mandated LMS features insufficient for writing instruction and collaboration, necessitating more integrated and flexible digital environments. Faculty play a crucial role in fostering reflective learning by integrating specific pedagogical strategies into platforms like ePortfolios, moving beyond simple content display to support deeper self-assessment and metacognition. They are also integral to fostering collaborative reflection and community interaction, mediating engagement, providing feedback essential for driving iterative improvement, and participating in shared digital composition. Integrating feedback from multiple sources—self, peer, and teacher—through ePortfolios provides a powerful model for online collaboration. Furthermore, faculty can use ePortfolios to model this behaviour and, by curating and presenting their own research journey and expertise, to establish their scholarly identity and increase the visibility of their work among diverse audiences.

For Doctoral Students

Doctoral scholarship requires deep reflection and ongoing learning, and the pandemic highlighted vulnerabilities in supporting these processes digitally. ePortfolios offer a persistent online space to curate, contextualize, and reflect upon the evolving research journey. They have the potential to assist doctoral students in becoming reflective learners, facilitating self-understanding, goal-setting, and continuous professional development (Clark & Neumann, 2009; GITES, n.d.; Modise & Vaughan, 2024; Yang & Wong, 2024). Doctoral scholarship relies heavily on interaction with supervisors, peers, and the wider scholarly community, and ePortfolios facilitate this necessary communication, feedback exchange, negotiation of meaning, and community building. The increasing reliance on digital tools means doctoral writing is a distributed “workflow” (Cummings, 2023, p. 490) across various applications and spaces, highlighting the need for adaptable tools and the development of digital competency. ePortfolios offer a powerful pathway for disseminating doctoral research beyond traditional formats, allowing students to use multimodality (integrating multimedia alongside text), showcase their research journey (process and product), and tailor communication for diverse audiences (academics, industry, policymakers, and the public). This not only enhances communication and impact but also demonstrates a wider range of skills valuable for employability in diverse career paths (Bay Path University, n.d.). Maintaining and developing an ePortfolio post-graduation allows scholarly work long-term relevance and impact, fostering continuous professional development (GITES, n.d.; Modise & Vaughan, 2024; Yang & Wong, 2024).

For Policymakers

The pandemic revealed significant disparities in student access to reliable technology—a digital divide starkly highlighted in developing countries and teacher education programs, which highlighted challenges of broadband access and ePortfolio-curriculum disconnect (Modise & Vaughan, 2024; Smidt & Waghid, 2024). This underscores the need for policy interventions to ensure foundational digital infrastructure is universally available (Habarurema et al, 2025). Policymakers have a crucial role in addressing challenges related to technology, training, and policy for effective ePortfolio implementation. Ensuring digital equity is a vital consideration for policies on digital dissemination strategies, particularly given connectivity challenges in doctoral research contexts in developing countries (Habarurema et al., 2025; Modise & Vaughan, 2024; Smidt & Waghid, 2024).

CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS

The pandemic-driven shift underscored a clear imperative: future academic environments and tools must be more adaptable, flexible, and aligned with the realities of multi-year doctoral inquiry in an ever-changing knowledge landscape. This demands embracing the social, collaborative, and multimodal nature of digital writing; supporting fluid workflows across diverse platforms; improving feedback mechanisms; and actively cultivating students’ digital literacies and critical thinking to effectively navigate their evolving perspectives.

Ultimately, this chapter highlights how investing in ePortfolios, supported by universities, faculty, and policymakers, empowers doctoral students to engage in profound reflective learning, robust collaboration, and impactful dissemination, fundamentally re-envisioning scholarly practice. Embracing ePortfolios is not merely an adoption of new technology but a strategic re-envisioning of scholarship itself. It cultivates resilient, impactful, and globally connected researchers prepared to push the boundaries of knowledge and understanding, fostering the imagination crucial for navigating an increasingly digital future.

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AUTHOR

Wendy Smidt holds a Doctor of Education from the Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT), South Africa. She is a postdoctoral research associate at the Global Institute for Teacher Education and Society, CPUT, and at the University of
Johannesburg Methods Lab. Her research, rooted in post-qualitative, arts-based inquiry, focuses on developing critical self-awareness and transpersonal growth among post-school youth through film literacy. Wendy’s scholarly publications extend this work, exploring the advancement of transformative educational research and leadership, and addressing educational leadership in the Fourth Industrial Revolution and the critical role of ePortfolios in future doctoral scholarship.
Email: smidtwendy@proton.me