academic research notion template

7 Essential Notion Templates for Academic Researchers

Academic researchers are often tasked with juggling multiple projects, from conducting studies to writing papers and teaching. Notion templates can help create a structured environment, making the research process more organized and efficient. Here are seven indispensable Notion templates for academic researchers.

1. Notion Project Management Template

Overview: An organizational tool built to manage research projects from hypothesis to publication.

Key Features: Task assignments, progress tracking, database linkages for research materials and deadlines.

Pros: Streamlines project management for individual or collaborative research.

Cons: May need customization for specific academic research methodologies.

Pricing: Free.

Best for: Research teams needing to track progress on collaborative projects or individual researchers managing their workloads.

2. Notion Budget & Finances Hub

Overview: Designed to manage grant funding, project budgets, and track expenditures in research projects.

Key Features: Budget categories, expense tracking, funding allocations.

Pros: Facilitates transparency and scrimping in managing research funds.

Cons: Requires consistent entries to maintain accuracy.

Best for: Academic researchers tracking project budgets or managing grant funds.

3. Notion CRM Template 2.0

Overview: Manages stakeholders involved in research projects, including fellow scholars, participants, and funding agencies.

Key Features: Contact management, segmented lists, relationship timelines.

Pros: Ensures no communication or opportunity for collaboration is missed.

Cons: More comprehensive than necessary for simpler projects.

Best for: Building and maintaining a network of academic contacts, collaborators, and participants.

4. Notion Content OS Template

Overview: Assists in structuring academic writing, teaching materials, and publishing schedules.

Key Features: Content strategy planning, editorial calendars, target audience segmentation.

Pros: Ideal for those who need to publish regularly or update teaching content consistently.

Cons: Requires input and maintenance to remain effective.

Best for: Researchers teaching classes or looking to publish their findings and build a body of work.

5. Notion Course Creation Template

Overview: A structured format for planning, creating, and delivering online academic courses or workshops.

Key Features: Sections for course outlines, materials, and student tracking.

Pros: Streamlines course development and aids in digital pedagogy.

Cons: Spacious for one-off courses or seminars.

Best for: Professors and educators designing comprehensive curriculums or online learning modules.

6. Notion Employee Directory Template

Overview: Maintains an organized database of team members, assistants, and student researchers.

Key Features: Profile storage, contact details, role descriptions.

Pros: Facilitates team organization, especially for larger research groups.

Cons: May not be necessary for solo researchers or very small teams.

Best for: Research groups and academic departments looking to centralize team information.

7. Notion Competitor Research Template

Overview: A template for conducting and organizing comparative research within an academic field.

Key Features: Competitor tracking, SWOT analysis, strategy mapping.

Pros: Provides strategic insight into one's position in the academic field.

Cons: Can become irrelevant if not updated with the latest research trends and findings.

Best for: Researchers analyzing peer work, establishing benchmarks, or identifying collaboration opportunities.

Adopting these Notion templates can significantly bolster an academic researcher's ability to manage complex projects, collaborate effectively, and disseminate their findings, all while balancing teaching and publication requirements.

Gerrard +  Bizway  AI Assistant

Doing a literature review using digital tools (with Notion template)

I’ve recently revamped my literature review workflow since discovering Notion . Notion is an organization application that allows you to make various pages and databases. It’s kind of like your own personal wiki- you can link your pages and embed databases into another page, adding filters and sorting them using user-set properties. The databases are what I use the most. I’ve essentially transferred all of my excel sheets into Notion databases and find it much easier to filter and sort things now. In this post, I’ll go through how I do my literature review and share a Notion template that you can use.

I like to organize my literature review using various literature review tools along with two relational Notion databases: a ‘literature tracker’ and a ‘literature notes’ matrix. You can see a flow chart of my literature review process below (it’s inspired by this post by Jenn’s Studious Life and the three pass method for reading papers which I wrote about last week in this post ):

As you can see, this process involves a couple of decision points which helps me focus on the most important papers. This is an iterative process that keeps me up to date on relevant research in my field as I am getting new paper alerts in my inbox most days. I used this method quite successfully to write the literature review for my confirmation report and regularly add to it for the expanded version that will become part of my PhD thesis. In this post, I’ll break down how this works for me and how I implement my Notion databases to synthesise the literature I read into a coherent argument.

You can click on the links below to navigate to a particular section of this article:

The literature search

The literature tracker, the literature synthesis matrix, writing your literature review, iterating your literature review, my literature review notion template, some useful resources.

This is always the first step in building your literature review. There are plenty of resources online all about how to start with your search- I find a mixture of database search tools works for me.

The first thing to do when starting your literature review is to identify some keywords to use in your initial searches. It might be worth chatting to your supervisor to make a list of these and then add or remove terms to it as you go down different research routes. You can use keyword searches relevant to your research questions as well tools that find ‘similar’ papers and look at citation links. I also find that just looking through the bibliographies of literature in your field and seeing which papers are regularly cited gives you a good idea of the core papers in your area (you’ll start recognising the key ones after a while). Another method for finding literature is the snowballing method which is particularly useful for conducting a systematic review.

Here are some digital tools I use to help me find literature relevant to my research questions:

Library building and suggestions

Mendeley was my research management tool of choice prior to when I started using Notion to organize all of my literature and create my synthesis matrix. I still use Mendeley as a library just in case anything happens to my Notion. It’s easy to add new papers to your library using the browser extension with just one click. I like that Mendeley allows you to share your folders with colleagues and that I can export bib.tex files straight from my library into overleaf documents where I’m writing up papers and my thesis. You do need to make sure that all of the details are correct before you export the bib.tex files though as this is taken straight from the information plane. I also like to use the tag function in Mendeley to add more specific identifiers than my folders.

Mendeley is also useful for finding literature related to those in your library- I’ve found quite a few interesting papers through the email updates they send out each week with ‘suggested papers’. You can also browse these suggestions from within Mendeley and use its interface to do initial keyword searches. The key is to just scan the titles and then decide whether it’s worth your time reading the abstract and then the rest of it. It’s easy to get overwhelmed by the sheer amount of papers being published every day so being picky in what you read is important (and something I need to work on more!).

Some similar tools that allow you to build a library and get literature recommendations include Zotero , Researcher , Academia , and ResearchGate . It’s up to you which one you use for your own purposes. One big factor for me when choosing Mendeley was that my supervisor and colleagues use it so it makes it much easier to share libraries with them, so maybe ask your colleagues what they use before settling on one.

Literature databases and keyword alerts

There are a variety of databases out there for finding literature. My go-to is Web of Science as it shows you citation data and has a nice interface. I used this to begin my initial literature search using my keywords.

The other thing you can do with these kinds of tools is set up email alerts to get a list of recent work that has just been published with any keywords you set. These alerts are usually where I find papers to read during journal club with my supervisor. You can customize these emails to what suits you- mine are set to the top 10 most relevant new papers for each keyword weekly and I track around 5 words/phrases. This allows me to stay on top of the most recent literature in my field- I have alerts set up on a variety of services to ensure that I don’t miss anything crucial (and alerts from the ArXiv mean I see preprints too). Again, you need to be picky about what you read from these to ensure that they are very relevant to your research. At this stage, it’s important to spend as little time as possible scanning titles as this can easily become a time suck.

Some of the other tools I have keyword (and author) email alerts set up on are: Scopus , Google Scholar , Dimensions , and ArXiv alerts . I set 10 minutes maximum aside per day to scan through any new email alerts and save anything relevant to me into my literature tracker (which I’ll come to more later).

Literature mapping tools

There are loads of these kinds of tools out there. Literature mapping can be helpful for finding what the seminal papers are in your field and seeing how literature connects. It’s like a huge web and I find these visual interfaces make it much easier to get my head around the relationships between papers. I use two of these tools during the literature search phase of the flowchart: Citation Gecko and Connected Papers .

Citation Gecko builds you a citation tree using ‘seed papers’. You can import these from various reference management software (like Mendeley), bib.tex files or manually search for papers. This is particularly useful if your supervisor has provided you with some core papers to start off with, or you can use the key papers you identified through scanning the bibliographies of literature you read. My project is split into fairly clear ‘subprojects’ so these tools help me see connections between the various things I’m working on (or a lack of them which is good in some ways as it shows I’ve found a clear research gap!).

You can switch between different views and add connecting papers as new seed papers to expand your network. I use this tool from time to time with various different papers associated with my subprojects. It’s helped me make sure I haven’t missed any key papers when doing my literature review and I’ve found it to be fairly accurate, although sometimes more recent papers don’t have any citation data on it so that’s something to bear in mind.

Connected Papers uses a ‘similarity’ algorithm to show paper relationships. This isn’t a citation tree like Citation Gecko but it does also give you prior and derivative works if you want to look at them. All you do is put one of your key papers into the search box and ‘build a graph’. It will then show you related papers, including those which don’t have direct citation links to the key paper. I think this is great for ensuring that you’re not staying inside an insular bubble of the people who all cite each other. It also allows me to see some of the research which is perhaps a bit more tangential to my project and get an overview of where my work sits within the field more broadly.

I like Connected Paper’s key for the generated tree and that it shows where related papers connect between themselves. Again, it’s helpful for ensuring that you haven’t missed a really important work when compiling your literature review and doesn’t just rely on citation links between papers.

This is where I record the details of any paper I come across that I think might be relevant to my PhD. In some ways, it’s very similar to Mendeley but it’s a version that sits within Notion so I have some more customised filtering categories set up, like my ‘status’ field where I track which pass I am on.

Here’s what my literature tracker looks like:

The beauty of Notion is that you can decide which properties you want to record in your database and customize it to your needs. You can sort and filter using these properties including making nested filters and using multiple filters at once. This makes it really easy to find what you’re looking for. For example, say I’m doing my literature review for my ‘FIB etching’ subproject and want to see all of the papers that I marked as relevant to my PhD but haven’t started reading yet. All I need to do is add a couple of filters:

And it filters everything so that I’m just looking at the papers I want to check out. It’s this flexibility that I think really gives Notion the edge when it comes to my literature review process.

The other thing I really like about using Notion rather than excel is that I can add different database views. I especially like using the kanban board view to see where I’m at with my reading workflow:

When I add something to the literature tracker database, I scan the abstract for keywords to add and categorize it in terms of relevant topics. It’s essentially the first pass of the paper, so that involves reading the title, abstract, introduction, section headings, conclusions, and checking the references for anything you recognise. After this is done, I decide whether it’s relevant enough to my PhD to proceed to do a second pass of the paper, at which point I will progress to populating my literature notes database.

Once I’ve decided that I want to do a second pass on a paper, I then add it to the ‘literature notes’ database. This is part of the beauty of Notion: relational databases. I have ‘rollup’ properties set in the literature notes database which shows all of the things I added during my first pass and allows me to filter the matrix using them. You can watch the video below to see exactly how to add a new paper to the ‘notes’ database from the ‘tracker’ database:

During the second pass, I populate the new fields in the ‘notes’ database. These are:

Summary | Objective of study | Key Results | Theory | Materials | Methods | Conclusions | Future work suggested | Critiques | Key connected papers.

I also have various themes/questions/ideas as properties which I add a few notes on for each relevant paper. I then complete my ‘questions for critical engagement’ which are on the entry’s ‘Notes’ page and are stored in the ‘Article Template’. If you want to read more about this process, check out my ‘how to read a scientific paper’ post .

By, doing this I create a synthesis matrix where I can see a breakdown of the key aspects of each paper and can scan down a column to get an overview of all of the papers I have read. For example, if I wanted to see all of the papers about Quantum Point Contacts to get an idea of what previous work has been done so that I can identify my research gap, I can filter using the tag property and can then see the notes I wrote for each entry, broken down by section. I also have tags for my research questions or themes, materials used, experimental techniques, fabrication techniques, and anything else that comes to mind really! The more tags I have for a paper, the easier it is to filter when I want to find a specific thing.

The other property I have included in the literature notes database is ‘Key connected papers’. This is a relation but is within the database itself. So it means that I can link to the page of other papers in the literature matrix. I’ve found this to be useful for connecting to what I call ‘core’ papers. I can also filter using this property, allowing me to see my notes on all of the papers I’ve read that are related to a certain ‘core’ paper. This helps with synthesising all of the information and forming my argument.

For those papers most relevant to my research (the ‘core’ papers) I’ll also do a third pass which involves reimplementing the paper in my own words. This is quite a time-consuming task so not many papers reach this stage, but those which I have done a third pass on are the ones I know really well. My hope is that this will stand me in good stead for my viva. This process also helps me refine my research questions further as I gain a deeper understanding of the field.

I find that writing up a review is extremely intimidating, but having the literature matrix makes this process that bit easier. I won’t go into too many details as there are already loads of resources out there going into the details of writing up a review, but here’s a brief overview of my own process:

Identify your research themes

Using your literature matrix, review each research theme or question and decide which ones you are going to focus on. These will form the different sections of your literature review and help you write your thesis statement(s). You can also think about how your questions link to ensure that you’re telling a coherent story with your review.

Choose and summarize literature related to each theme

For each section, gather up the most important related literature and summarize the key points of each source. A good literature review doesn’t need to cover all the literature out there, just the most significant sources. I try to stick to around 10 or fewer key sources per section.

Critical evaluation of sources

This is where you utilize the ‘questions for critical engagement’. Make sure you evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the studies you’re writing about. By doing this, you can establish where our knowledge is lacking which will come in helpful later when establishing a research gap.

Analyse each source in relation to other literature

Try to make sure that you are telling a coherent story by linking between your sources. You can go back to the literature matrix here and use it to group similar studies to compare and contrast them. You should also discuss the relevance of the source’s findings in relation to the broader field and core papers.

Situate your research in a research gap

This is where you justify your own research. Using what you have laid out in the rest of the review, show that there is a research gap that you plan to fill and explain how you are going to do that. This should mean that your thesis flows nicely into the next section where you’ll cover the materials and methods you used in your research project.

In some ways, a literature review never really ends. As you can see in the flowchart at the beginning of this post, I regularly update and revise my literature review as well as refining my research questions. At this point in my PhD, I think that most of my research questions are quite well defined, so I’m mostly just adding any newly published work into my review. I don’t spend much time reading literature at the moment but I’m sure I’ll return to it more regularly when I’m in the write-up phase of my PhD. There is a balance to be had between reading and writing for your literature review and actually getting on with your own research!

Here’s the link to my Notion Literature Review Template . You can duplicate it and adapt it however you want, but this should save you some time setting up the initial databases if you’d like to use my method for organizing your own literature review.

Here are some resources on how to do a literature review that I’ve found useful during my PhD:

• The Literature Review: Step-by-Step Guide for Students
• 3 Steps to Save You From Drowning in Your Literature Review
• How to write a literature review
• How to become a literature searching ninja
• Mind the gap
• 7 Secrets to Write a PhD Literature Review The Right Way

If you like my work, I’d love your support!

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11 thoughts on “Doing a literature review using digital tools (with Notion template)”

Thank you so much for your insight and structured process. This will help me a lot kicking off my Master Thesis.

The perfect method to organize the literature that I have read and will read in the future. I am so glad to have found your website, this will save me from thrashing around in the swamp of literature. I was already feeling the limits of my memory when I was doing my master thesis and this will be so helpful during my PhD.

Thank you so much for this detailed post! Lily 🙂

Thank you very much for this. I’m doing my undergrad atm and reading a lot of papers. This seems like an excellent way of tracking everything.

Thank you, you made my beginning less stressful. I like your system and i helped me a lot. I have one question (more might come later), What do you mean by " journal club with my supervisor."

This piece is really really helpful! I started from this one and went through the rest blog writings. I agree on many points with Daisy. I had an unhappy experience of PhD two years ago and now just started a new one in another country. I will take it as an adventure and enjoy it.

This is an AMAZING template. I've found this so helpful for my own workflow. Thank you so much!

I found this post really helpful. Thank you.

thank you very much!

Hi! Thank you very much for posting this guide and sharing your notion template! I do have a question—do you manually enter the references into Notion, or is there any way to speed up the process? Ta x

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Notion for Academic Research & Note-Taking

I have to write a literature review for my master’s thesis. When I wanted to start, I didn’t know how to create a list of scientific papers to read and how to manage this growing list of literature. How do I keep track of all open tabs on my browser? How to find a paper X which used such a method? How to order and classify scientific papers?

There are Mendeley and Zotero , two well-known tools for saving articles and generating bibliographies, but these are only useful for keeping a list of papers. There is little customization possible at the folder or tag level. In any case, they never met my needs. Zotero only serves me as a bank of scientific articles, nothing more.

If you want to build yourself a real list of scientific articles classified according to your needs, as in the image below, continue reading this article to discover my method!

Why use Notion for academic research?

I was looking for a tool that would allow me to create my own fields to filter out articles that I found during my literature search.

For example:

• Rating to say how interesting the article is for my research
• Reading priority
• The main subject
• Reading status: to read/read

What sets Notion apart from all competitors is that this note-taking tool offers the possibility of personalizing everything from A to Z, which allowed me to customize the tool exactly for my needs and what I needed for my literature review.

Of course, the main disadvantage of Notion is that since it is a very customizable tool, the learning curve is quite steep: it is difficult to understand how Notion works when you start.

I started using Notion with the current project I’m going to explain in this blog post, so if you have never used Notion before, you should be able to get started with this project!

Related | 14 Ways to Get Motivation to Study NOW!

How to use notion to manage literature for graduate students, first steps on notion & creating the database.

Start by creating an account on Notion . From the left menu, create a new page. Enter a title, and you can also choose an icon to represent the page! Then, select “Table” under “Database” to create a new database to start entering your scientific papers.

Now that the database is created, we need to fill it up! To do so, I used the Google Chrome extension from Notion . 

Add scientific papers with the Notion Chrome Extension

When I’m on the website with the paper or PDF, I click on Notion’s Chrome extension and then select the database I want to add the new article. That’s it! The article is then automatically added to the database with a direct link to the web page.

Then, you can delete the 3 empty rows that were entered in the database automatically.

So, after adding a few papers, you get a database in which ALL of your papers are referenced, regardless of their research subject or methodology. Later, we’ll see how to create different “views” to sort through the papers.

Adding a paper using the Notion Chrome extension is very easy!

How to get the reference of the papers in the Notion database?

I use the Google Scholar Chrome extension to get the BibTex entry for that paper. All that I need to do is to select the title of the paper before clicking on the Google Scholar icon. 

Add properties to the research papers

Now that you’ve learned how to add papers to the database, the next step is to customize the properties you want for the papers! Properties are certain fields we can create to describe the papers in the database. There are many different kinds of properties one can create:

• Select (1 choice only), Multi-Select (Multiple choices)
• Dates (Custom date, Created date, Last Updated Date)
• Files & Media 
• Tag a Person 

Now that you know what a property is, it’s time to create some! To do this, click on a paper’s title to open the page. Then click on “Add a Property” and add the properties you want. Every property you add will be added to the complete database. You can start with just a few properties that you think will be useful to you, and you can always add more later as you learn to use Notion and discover new ideas for sorting your academic literature!

Here are some ideas of properties: 

• Status: To Read, Currently Reading, Finished Reading, which is a Select
• Interesting? : 1 to 3 stars rating, using Select
• Link to the article, using an URL property
• The date that you read the article, using a Date property 

Then you can add properties that are directly related to your search. For example, as I’m working on three specific Parkinson’s disease symptoms, I added a “selection” property that lists the symptoms the paper discusses.

The following image shows the properties that I created in my main database to give you some ideas and inspire you. I have a lot ! You don’t have to create that many properties. For me, my database grew from week to week, and I added more and more properties that I found interesting for my research.

Add different views to sort your papers 

The next step is to create different views to visualize the papers. A view is a way of filtering your main database and saving the filter with a specific name so that you can return to it later. You can filter the papers according to the properties we just created. For example, I created a view that will only show me the papers that I added the tag “To-Read”:

For example, the image below shows all of the different “views” I have of my main database.

• All: The main database that will show all the papers with no filter 
• Comparison Table: A view that shows certain properties that I have selected. It’s a little bit like an Excel table for me. I use this view to compare the papers for my literature review.
• To Read:  List of papers that I identified as a priority to read for my research.
• Read: List of papers that I finished reading.
• Symptoms: 3 different views showing only papers that are related to a specific Parkinson’s Disease symptom
• Uncontrolled Env: List of studies that were done in controlled laboratory environments  
• Scripted Tasks: Again, this view is for my research, but it’s a distinction between different ways to evaluate the disease with smartwatches 

Finally, here is an example of what my Reading List looks like, listing papers I identified as absolutely wanting to read:  

And here is a screenshot of my “Comparison table” view that I use very often: 

Related | My Research Internship at Johns Hopkins University

Conclusion .

I hope this article has been useful for you and helps you build the basics of your own Notion system for managing your scientific papers! Adapt this method to your needs, and don’t hesitate to share your projects with me. I’m curious to know what you will come up with!

Marie likes to push her limits and always keep learning new things. She shares her weekly learnings because "if you can't explain it simply, it means you didn't understand it well enough".

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Thanks for this post Marie ! I recently discovered it and I am using your template to manage the papers of my Master thesis. I never truly benefited from using Zotero and because I am using Notion for everything else, it seemed like the right decision to use it too for my research.

Hello Irene! Thank you so much for your comment. I’m happy to know this was helpful! Marie

Hi I am a PhD student and working on climate change. I also work a lot with big data and just started stepping on ML too. This blog post is very useful and what I have been looking for. Thank you so much for sharing it.

Hello Kyoung, Thank you so much for your comment! 🙂 Very happy to know my post was helpful! Marie

Thank you for your helpful article! I did have a question because I tried using your template and wasn’t sure how to get it to work the way you demonstrated. When I’ve tried using the Google Chrome extension to add articles, I’ve only been able to add them as a separate page, not as an entry into the database.

Hello! Yes, that is possible. When that happens, I actually drag and drop the item afterward in the database. Best, Marie

Oh my gosh, this is one of the most helpful articles I’ve found. Why didn’t I know about this before? It makes it easier to navigate and research. Thank you so much for these tips.

Hello Miranda, I’m so glad I was able to help 🙂 Marie

Thanks for this very informative blog-post.

I have been doing some google searching and I found an idea of have two linked tables. https://www.reddit.com/r/Notion/comments/gs0f6l/template_workspace_for_machine_learning/ it says for Machine learning but it is applicable to all fields.

Just wondering if you have worked with two linked tables and if you find this idea useful ?

The only time I used a linked database is to keep some important citations. I created a “citations” database, and when I wanted to keep an argument that might be useful for my thesis, I would add it to the citations database and link it to the actual paper in my Reading List database.

But for sure, the dashboard that I’m sharing in this blog post can definitely be pushed further!

Best, Marie

Hi Marie! This is super helpful, and exactly what I was looking for. Such a sophisticated and useful way of storing research notes. I just wondered how you capture all of the details of the academic paper? Do you manually copy and paste author name, year, journal etc? I didn’t really understand the BibTex google scholar extension part? Thank you for the template! Emma

Hello Emma! I’m glad I was able to help!

Yes, at the moment, I manually copu and paste the information that I want to have in my Reading List database on Notion.

Since I published this blog post, Notion has released their API, allowing some automation to be done. I haven’t looked into it yet, but you could search around that if automation is possible now for papers information 🙂

For the BibTex Google Scholar Extension part, did you see the gif I shared about that? Basically, I downloaded the Google Scholar extension for the browser Chrome. This means that I can highlight the title of a paper, and then, when I click on the extension, I can directly get all the BibTex information.

Hope this helps! Marie

Can we make the thesis report or write a research article in notion? Many prefer latex. Can we do it in Notion?

I don’t think I would suggest writing a research article on Notion. I prefer to use Overleaf, as it supports LaTeX, version history, collaboration, comments, etc.

Notion is better for Markdown!

Hi, I was wondering is it possible to import Mendeley’s library to notion? I have a 1000+ library and I would love to use my attention pdf. How are you dealing with the annotation of pdf? Are you using any pdf file or just doi with your own annotations for the paper within notion?

Hello! I am basically using this as a way to write notes instead of annotating a PDF on my iPad most of the times. I haven’t done a workflow that does both. Since your comment, Notion has released their API, so it might be possible to import your articles from Mendeley to Notion with such a tool: https://tray.io/connectors/mendeley-notion-integrations

But I haven’t tried it! Marie

I am considering adopting Notion and your post (forwarded to me by a dear colleague) is very useful! I have a quick question to help me appreciate better the power of Notion: what would be the difference between the Notion database of articles and a spredsheet (Google sheets, Excel, OO)? Thanks!

Hello Patricia! Glad to know people are sharing my blog posts! 🙂

I would say that Notion can be like a Google Sheet, but the opposite isn’t true. In a way, Notion can be more powerful. The interface is also prettier to work with, at least in my opinion, and more instinctive!

It also allows to add “properties” to each paper, which you can’t really do on Google sheets (or would be more complicated to implement), it would mostly just be columns and rows. In Notion you can do that, but also have more information and see it from different views.

Hope that helps! Marie

OMG, this is crazy <3 , exactly what I am looking for! Thank you so much!

Glad to hear that!

Hi Marie, have you made any updates to the template?

Hello, I have not!

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Academic Writing in Notion (with Template)

You’ve got that paper to write but no idea where to start? You are drowning in literature that’s scattered all over the place? And you just don’t have a system to turn all your research into some tangible results? Whenever I had some sort of Academic Writing to tackle, it usually started with the feeling of being overwhelmed. So much literature to go through. No structure in place to sort what I’ve found. And certainly no time to take a deep breath and look for a good system to do it all. I usually ended up writing notes in Word while copypasting links to sources in a frantic attempt to organise all my readings. Needless to say, it wasn’t a very effective approach. Luckily, Notion is absolutely amazing at organising any Academic Writing project. And with this Academic Writing in Notion Template, you can easily master your reading list, set your writing project up for success and start connecting the dots .

Read on for more explanations or jump to the bottom of the page to get this ( free ) Academic Writing in Notion Template

Your Academic Writing Hub in Notion

The main page of the template is designed to be the command center of your writing projects.

Up top, you’ll find the the Navigation Bar that will let you jump quickly between sections.

You can customise your Quick Links section according to your most used resources. Quick Notes lets you create a new note without interrupting your workflow. And with Active Writings , you never lose track of what you’re working on.

Next, you’ll find your Inbox that will keep track of all new readings that you’ve collected.

Tip: Use the Save to Notion Webclipper instead of Notion’s native clipper to customise how you import your sources.

And directly below, there’s your reading list, sorted by priority, so that you always know what to work on next.

Your Readings List in Notion

If you’ve ever struggled to organise your readings list or deal with all the material you’ve already worked through, then this is the section for you.

Your Readings shows you various views of your sources, so that you can focus on what really matters: working through the list and using your insights for your writing projects.

It contains an Inbox for new material that needs to be sorted and a Reading List that shows you what you should read next.

Further down the page, you’ll see your Most Used Readings . If you write a lot of articles, then this will become a treasure trove of your most useful resources so that you don’t have to sort through piles of documents to find that one article that you keep referencing everywhere.

See where you stand at a glance with the Status View. What are you currently reading? Which articles need to be summarised? Track your progress and make sure that nothing falls through the cracks

Lastly, the Master Table provides you with a comprehensive overview. Add the correct citation so that you can easily export your readings list to your literature cataloguing software of choice. Add a short summary and the relevance of this reading to sort through them quickly at a later time.

Think of your Readings section as your own personal knowledge management system , dedicated to a specific purpose: producing great writing.

Most importantly, add the Topics of the Reading to make some magic in Notion happen. How? We’ll get to that in a moment.

Your Topics in Notion

Topics are one of the coolest features of this Academic Writing for Notion Template.

Everyone who’s ever written an academic paper knows the struggle: how do you best match your readings to the content that you want to write? Your sources rarely only cover one aspect. Most of the times, a reading is relevant for several parts of your paper and on top of that, it might be useful for a different writing project too.

Enter Topics .

Simply tag each writing with the topics covered in it. Go as granular as you need – you can always delete topics later or add more, but try to get the gist of them.

This has three major benefits over the traditional let’s-take-notes-in-word-and-hope-we-find-it-again-later-when-we-need-it-approach.

First, you can open the My Topics to sort through your Topics and see recurring themes immediately. What topics keep popping up? It’s the first step to start connecting the dots.

Second, you can use a Topic to write so called Evergreen Notes . Evergreen Notes are notes that – like evergreen songs – are timeless and can be reused in a variety of ways. If you keep referencing certain concepts in your articles, then you can simply use your Evergreen Notes on that topic to quickly insert text snippets instead of having to start from 0 every single time.

Each Topic comes with it’s own dashboard to show you every single reading, writing or note that you’ve ever created for this topic. That way, creating your Evergreen Notes is a breeze.

The underlying concept for this part of the Academic Writing in Notion template is called Global Tags in Notio n and it’s super powerful.

The third thing is the magic we’ve talked about above and you’ll find it in the next step.

Your Writings in Notion

Now to the heart of the template, your personal Writing HQ.

First of, you have a general dashboard to keep track of all your writing projects.

Use the Master Table to add information to your projects. You can both create standalone Articles as well as Books and their respective Chapters for longer projects.

The Status View is your personal project management tool. Never forget an idea for a writing project again. And simply drag & drop a project into a different status once you’re ready to take the next step.

What’s even better though is the specific dashboard for each writing project. Any time you add a new project in your Academic Writing in Notion Template, the system will create it automatically.

Once you pick all related Topics for a writing project, it will automatically pull in all the relevant information that you’ve ever collected. Never dig through your notes again or frantically try to remember where you saved that paper that could come in handy now. They will all resurface on their own.

Like Magic.

( speaking of magic: have you tried my method to replace Siri with ChatGPT ? )

Your Notes in Notion

Lastly, no template would be complete without a dedicated section for Notes .

The Academic Writing in Notion Template comes pre-loaded with two types of notes:

• Meeting Notes to keep track of talks with your supervisor or colleagues, so that you always have their input within arms reach
• Brainstorming Notes to quickly jot down some thoughts that can be sorted later

Just remember to assign a Topic or Related Writing and your notes will automatically appear in the right context, wherever you need them.

Don’t forget to use the Quick Note feature on the main page of the template to make a quick note without interrupting your workflow.

Tip: You could easily integrate this part of the Academic Writing in Notion Setup with another template of mine: Zettelkasten for Notion , a simple tool for networked thoughts. If you need help setting this up, just tweet me @mfreihaendig .

Get Your Free Academic Writing In Notion Template Now

Streamline your workflow and start connecting the dots with my (free) Academic Writing in Notion Template:

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How to Use Notion for Academic Research and Study Planning: A Step-by-Step Guide

Notion has become a versatile tool for students and academics who seek an organized approach to manage their research and study schedules. Its multipurpose functionality allows users to create structured databases, manage tasks, and consolidate notes, making it particularly useful for academic research. Adapting Notion for educational purposes can streamline processes, offer clarity in organizing research materials, and foster a productive learning environment.

Developing an effective study plan within Notion begins with setting clear, actionable goals and arranging resources efficiently. Users can prioritize their subjects, break down complex projects into approachable tasks, and monitor their progress, ensuring a steady path toward their academic objectives. With Notion's flexible platform, custom templates can be designed to cater to the unique demands of various research projects.

In addition, Notion's capabilities extend to literature management, which is an essential component of graduate studies. By creating a dedicated workspace for literature review, researchers can effectively curate and reference a comprehensive database of articles, books, and papers. This centralized hub simplifies the process of locating and annotating key materials, which in turn saves time and enhances the quality of academic research.

To explore structured Notion templates for academic research, visit Best Academic Research Templates from Notion . For more on using Notion to manage literature and notes for graduate studies, consider reading further at Girl Knows Tech .

Getting Started with Notion

Entering the world of Notion equips students and researchers with a powerful productivity tool to manage their academic workflows efficiently. This comprehensive guide will detail the initial steps to harness Notion's capabilities fully.

Understanding the Notion Workspace

Notion's workspace is where all the content lives—it's the digital equivalent of a physical desk. Users can create multiple workspaces, each tailored for different projects or subjects. To optimize the workspace, utilize tags to organize content and tasks to prioritize work effectively.

Setting Up Your First Notion Page

A Notion page serves as a container for various types of content including notes and databases. To begin, click on the New Page button, name the page with a relevant title , and start adding content. Pages can be nested within each other to create a structured hierarchy.

Utilizing Notion Templates for Academic Use

Notion offers a variety of templates designed to boost productivity. Students can access preset templates for a variety of uses like a student dashboard or project management. These templates provide a starting point, which can be customized according to personal academic needs.

Exploring Notion's Basic and Advanced Features

Notion combines the simplicity of basic note-taking with advanced database functionality. Users can start with simple notes and lists, and gradually explore more complex features such as relational databases and linked records to manage information dynamically in real-time .

Learning Markdown and Formatting Options in Notion

Understanding Markdown and formatting options enhances the clarity and visual appeal of notes. Notion supports Markdown which allows users to format text using simple syntax quickly. This includes the use of bold , italic , and bullet points for emphasis and structure.

Importing and Exporting Content to and from Notion

For those migrating from other platforms, Notion facilitates easy import of data in various formats including HTML , Word, and CSV. Similarly, users can export pages and databases as PDF, HTML, Markdown, and CSV files to ensure seamless sharing and backup.

Integrating with Other Tools

Notion's strength also lies in its ability to integrate with popular tools such as Google Drive , Slack , and Trello . These integrations enable users to streamline their academic workflow by connecting with the services they already use.

Managing Notion's Offline Capabilities

While Notion is a cloud-based platform, it also offers an offline mode . Students can continue their work without an internet connection, making it possible to be productive in any environment. Changes made offline sync once they reconnect, ensuring no progress is lost.

Note-Taking and Organization

Note-taking and organization are pivotal for managing academic research and streamlining study planning. Notion offers versatile tools and features that cater to these needs, facilitating a structured and efficient approach to handling research materials and ideas.

Creating a Dedicated Research Database

Creating a dedicated research database in Notion is a fundamental step in academic research. By setting up a new Notion page or database, researchers can centralize their research materials. The database can contain tables with columns tailored to track details like book titles , article authors , and publication years. This structured database becomes the foundation for all subsequent research activities.

Using Notion for Effective Note-Taking

Notion’s versatile editor supports effective note-taking with features like Markdown for formatting and organizing content under clear headings . Researchers can directly take and store notes in their database, making it easy to revisit and revise ideas as the research evolves. Cards and full-page notes offer flexibility in how one captures and reviews research insights.

Organizing Notes and Research Materials

Within Notion, organization of notes and research materials is a clean process. Users can organize resources into pages and nest pages within each other, mirroring a physical binder system. Options to view pages as a list , table , or gallery ensure that one can choose the most appropriate layout for their study materials.

Implementing Tags and Connections for Enhanced Searchability

Using tags and connections greatly enhances the searchability within the database. Notion allows the addition of tags to notes and research materials, making it simple to filter and retrieve related content. Creating relations between different data points helps in establishing a web of interconnected ideas .

Developing a Customized System for Content Categorization

Lastly, Notion provides the tools to develop a customized system for content categorization . Users can utilize properties and filters to build a personalized framework that aligns with their research approach. Sorting features and customizable views in databases enable researchers to categorize content methodically—whether by theme, priority, or any other relevant criterion.

Academic Research and Management

In the realm of academic research, efficient organization is paramount. Notion provides a dynamic platform for scholars to effectively manage their research projects, literature reviews, and progress tracking with the added benefit of facilitating teamwork.

Managing Literature Review and References

Researchers can optimize their literature review process using Notion's table databases to catalog key papers, including important details like authors, publication years, and topics . By adding tags for themes and methodologies, they swiftly organize and retrieve literature. Notion allows for the collaboration among team members to review and discuss pertinent studies, streamlining the creation of a comprehensive bibliography .

Tracking Research Progress and Experiments

Notion's customizable dashboards are invaluable for monitoring research milestones and experimentation . Researchers can utilize checklists to follow up on tasks and tables to note down results and updates on ongoing experiments . By integrating figures and outcomes within the same workspace, teams establish an accessible and up-to-date visual progress tracking system.

Building a Database for Books and Academic Papers

Collecting and organizing books and academic papers becomes straightforward with Notion's database capabilities. Researchers build and tailor their database, incorporating custom fields for abstracts, citations , and access links, thereby enhancing their personal library. Advanced filtration and search functions equip users to access required materials promptly.

Designing a Notion Dashboard for Research Projects

A well-structured dashboard for each research project can centralize all necessary information, from research questions to methodology. Through the strategic use of linked databases , one can display recent papers , pending tasks, or upcoming deadlines. Notion's interface supports the integration of timelines, fostering clear visualization of a project's trajectory.

Cataloging and Managing Citations

For successful reference management , Notion's templates can be harnessed to craft a personalized citation database. Each entry can delineate information such as the title, author, year, and a brief summary. The referencing process is made efficient as users can quickly capture bibliography details and access them during the writing phase, ensuring accurate and easy citations .

Task and Project Management

Effective task and project management in Notion involves leveraging the app's features to organize tasks, track progress, and collaborate in real-time. This enhances productivity and ensures that all project deadlines are met efficiently.

Creating a Personalized Task List in Notion

Creating a personalized task list within Notion allows researchers and students to track their day-to-day activities alongside their academic goals. Utilizing tables or to-do lists , one can organize tasks by priority, subject, or deadline, offering a clear viewpoint on what needs to be addressed promptly.

Utilizing Calendar and Reminders for Deadlines

Notion's calendar function acts as a visual reminder for project deadlines and upcoming tasks. Integrating reminders with these calendar events ensures that no deadline is overlooked, and students maintain a productive rhythm in their studies and research projects.

Developing a Project Timeline with Milestones

Developing a project timeline in Notion is crucial for long-term planning. A timeline can be shown as a simple list with due dates or a more complex Gantt chart , marking key milestones to visually assess progress towards the final goal, aiding in better time management.

Customizing Kanban Boards for Workflow Management

Customizing Kanban boards in Notion is effective for workflow management. By dragging cards across columns like 'To Do', 'In Progress', and 'Done', users maintain a clear view of their workflow stages, which bolsters focus and drives completion of tasks.

Creating a Productive Environment with Collaborative Features

Notion’s collaborative features facilitate a productive environment where teams can work together on projects in real-time . Shared pages, collaborative editing, and comment functions keep all team members aligned on the project's status and next steps.

Setting up a Comprehensive Task Database

A comprehensive task database in Notion holds all tasks and their details. It can be filtered by various properties like status, due date, or assignee, making it a powerful tool for comprehensive task management and ensuring that both individual and collaborative efforts are smoothly coordinated.

Studying and Personal Development

Notion offers a flexible framework for students to enhance their academic experience. By leveraging Notion's organizational tools, students can plan study sessions, track progress, build a professional portfolio, and maintain a comprehensive lab notebook.

Planning Study Sessions with Notion

Students can use Notion to devise a structured study schedule that aligns with their academic objectives. Setting up a table with columns for subjects, topics, and deadlines, provides a clear overview of what needs to be studied and when. Each session can be tagged based on priority and tied to specific goals. Incorporating to-do lists beside each topic allows for ticking off tasks upon completion, which instills a sense of achievement and keeps motivation levels high.

Keeping Track of Academic Progress

Notion's progress tracking is ideal for monitoring academic milestones. A kanban board can visually represent different stages of study or project completion. Students can drag and drop tasks as they move from 'to do' , to 'doing' , to 'done' . Recording grades and feedback in a dedicated database helps analyze performance over time, allowing for timely interventions and strategy adjustments.

Compiling a Portfolio for Professional Development

Creating a digital portfolio on Notion is a strategic way for students to showcase their work for internships, jobs, or further studies. Compiling projects, research papers, extracurricular activities, and any recognitions or awards under one page with detailed descriptions and relevant dates serves as a comprehensive display of the student's body of work.

Creating a STEM Lab Notebook

For students in the STEM fields, Notion can be transformed into a detailed lab notebook . Here they can document experiments , protocols , and results in an organized manner. A typical entry might include the publication date of the experiment, a detailed account of the methodology, and observations. This digital format ensures that all data is easily accessible and can be updated with new findings or annotations.

Collaboration and Sharing

Utilizing Notion effectively can revolutionize the way scholars collaborate on various projects and share vital research materials. With tools designed to facilitate real-time cooperation and knowledge sharing, Notion is optimized to support academic endeavors on multiple fronts.

Collaborating on Group Projects

In Notion, collaborative features allow team members to work concurrently on the same page or database. They can assign tasks, discuss in the comments, and monitor the progress of the project through a shared workspace. Real-time updates ensure that each change is instantly reflected, keeping everyone on the same page.

Sharing Research and Ideas with Peers

Notion simplifies the sharing of research materials and ideas via shareable links or direct invites to colleagues. One can organize materials in databases or docs and adjust the privacy settings, allowing for selective sharing with peers or for obtaining feedback on ongoing work.

Utilizing Notion as a Knowledge Base for Teams

Teams can centralize their resources and research in Notion, creating a comprehensive knowledge base . Customizable databases , equipped with tags, filters, and sorting options, provide a structured repository of articles, papers, and other research materials that is accessible to all team members.

Using the Bookmark Feature for Team Resources

The bookmark feature in Notion is particularly useful for quickly accessing frequently used resources and external content. It allows teams to compile a gallery of relevant links, which can be categorized and retrieved effortlessly, ensuring that everyone has access to the same pool of information.

Advanced Notion Techniques

In this section, the reader will explore how to elevate their study and research productivity within Notion by automating tasks, integrating APIs for complex workflows, and refining their workspace with customizable filters and views.

Automating Tasks with Notion AI

With Notion AI , users can automate repetitive tasks to streamline their academic studies. By setting reminders and tasks , the AI can prompt users when to study or alert them of approaching deadlines. Notion AI can also suggest relevant content, draft outlines, and help with the initial stages of research.

Leveraging API Connections for Advanced Workflows

API connections markedly enhance Notion's capabilities as a productivity tool, allowing the users to create advanced workflows . By integrating with third-party services, academic researchers can seamlessly import data, connect to citation tools, or sync with other apps they use, such as calendar or email services, directly within their Notion workspace.

Mastering Filters and Views for Custom Dashboards

Effective use of filters and views is critical for developing personalized dashboards in Notion. Users can design complex filters to display only the most relevant information and employ different views like Kanban Board, Table, or Calendar to suit the specific needs of a research project or study session. Personalized views ensure that the dashboard acts as a centralized, efficient command center for all academic endeavors.

In enhancing academic productivity , Notion proves to be an indispensable tool. Its flexible environment facilitates comprehensive planning and organization of research materials. Scholars can create custom templates that align with their specific requirements, streamlining their study process. Examples of how Notion can aid in study planning include establishing clear goals and creating structured schedules.

Effective utilization of Notion's features leads to a systematic approach towards academic research. It allows them to prioritize tasks, track reading statuses, and improve document management. Notion's capacity to harbor databases, take dynamic notes, and manage tasks all in one place empowers students and researchers to maintain focus and continuity in their study endeavors.

The adaptability of Notion ensures that it meets the varying needs of individuals. Whether they are outlining a thesis or managing a plethora of documents, Notion's user-friendly platform enhances their academic journey. For those embarking on higher-level studies, such as a PhD, templates tailored to their field can reduce the time spent on organization, granting them more time for actual research.

In conclusion, Notion stands out as a comprehensive solution for academia. It encourages effective planning and execution of research-related tasks, fostering a culture of productivity and progress within the educational sphere.

Andy McDonald

Improve your research output by managing the input with notion.

The Academic Research Hub is an all in one Notion dashboard that allows you to seamlessly manage your research projects, academic references, thoughts and more within a single workspace

The Benefits

Connect your thoughts.

Quickly capture your thoughts and ideas so that you can easily make new connections and progress your research

No more switching between multiple apps to find your research notes and reference material

Keep Updated

Never miss a deadline by keeping track of upcoming conferences, submission deadlines and research article progress.

The Features

Powerful dashboard.

Keep track of your current and future research projects within a single dashboard.

Quickly capture new research ideas so that they can be fleshed out later into full research projects.

Interlinked Databases

Multiple linked databases allow you to connect your research with source articles, upcoming conferences and publications that you are considering submitting to.

Easily and quickly see related notes and ideas that can help you expand your research article.

Store Relevant Information

Published articles contain a large amount of metadata. This is often useful if you need to cite the article later in your research or see what other articles the author has published.

Once articles have been read, you can easily store a summary and key conclusions to save you having to re-read the article from scratch.

Capture and Store Figures

Pictures tell a 1,000 words is a phrase that is commonly used.

Using the Reference Figures and Tables database you can quickly store interesting figures or large tables of values for fast retrieval later on.

You will always know where a figure has originated from.

Speed Up Your Workflows with Predesigned Templates

When capturing information from published research it can be hard to know what to extract from it.

The New Article template allows you to capture the things that matter. Including the aims, methods and key results from the article. 

Once you have these, you can then create a short summary of the paper for future reference, which saves you from having to read it from scratch.

Want to see it in action?

If you want to have a closer look at the Academic Research Hub and see it in action, then check out this excellent review by Chris J Wilson.

Most frequent questions and answers

After you have purchased this template you will be given access to the template to duplicate into your own workspace.

Yes. It will! Once you have purchased the template you can duplicate the template into your own Notion workspace

Apologies in advance if you have come across any issues. Please feel free to drop me a tweet or a DM on Twitter: @itsandymcdonald

Buy the Academic Research Hub

To get the Academic Research Hub for Notion click the Get the Template Now button. 

You will be redirected to Gumroad to complete the checkout process.

Once purchased you will be able to directly duplicate the dashboard into your Notion workspace and make it your own.

Academic Research Hub

One-time purchase.

• All Academic Research Hub Features
• Life Time Access

• Research Advice

How to Use Notion to Organize Your Research, Classes, and Grad School Life

2024 is the year of Notion ! This notetaking and organization app is the BEST I have found. Notion is a web and app-based tool that allows you to create aesthetic and functional d templates for almost anything! Using Notion for graduate school is a fantastic way to keep your work organized in one space. And it automatically backs up, so you don’t have to worry about losing files!

I have been using Notion since 2021 to organize my graduate school life. As a Ph.D. student, I had to keep track of my research, coursework, and personal life. I found it hard to manage these aspects of my life using a notes app, paper planner, notecards, and lab notebook. I found myself losing files and notes! It was frustrating having everything spread out across different formats. Especially with the pandemic, I didn’t always have access to my lab notebooks at the University while working from home. Today, I use Notion for everything!

Over the past few years, I’ve developed several Notion templates for grad school, and I figured I’d share them all with other grad students so they can get organized too! So, in this post, I’m sharing with you all the grad school Notion templates I developed. All the Notion templates are available through the She Sciences Gumroad and Etsy Shop . One thing to note: these grad student notion templates are geared more toward STEM graduate programs, so you’ll see more references to experiments in these templates. Even if you aren’t a STEM graduate student, you can easily translate these Notion templates into your field of research.

What is Notion?

If you’re new to Notion , welcome to the club! Notion is an amazing tool, I honestly wish I had found it earlier. So, let’s talk a bit about what Notion is and how it works!

Notion offers both free and premium accounts . The free account is sufficient for graduate students, but if you’re working with a larger team, upgrading your account is a great option because the other plans offer more team functionalities. But if you sign up with a student or educator email, you will be upgraded to the Plus Account for free!

Notion now offers Notion AI , a fantastic AI tool that will take your Notion templates to the next level. You can ask questions and use it for autofill, brainstorming, and drafting.

Simple Graduate Student Notion Dashboard

The first Notion template I made was a simple graduate student Notion dashboard . This template is great if you’re starting out with Notion and you want something simple to organize your stuff. On this grad student dashboard, there is a weekly schedule where you put tasks and deadlines for the week. This way, you have a simple week at a glance! Below the weekly schedule, there are several pages for Classes, Teaching, and Research. These pages contain templates that help you organize each area og grad school. Keep track of your classes using the Course Schedule and Class Notes pages. These templates contain easy-to-use tables that keep your work organized! Similarly, you can use the Course Schedule and Lesson Plan pages to manage your teaching.

Under research, you’ll find the research dashboard, a page for group meeting notes, and a customizable table for literature review! On this page, I have everything I need at a glance. There is a weekly schedule and to-do list, a page for your thesis or dissertation chapters, pages for each project, and a long-term Gantt chart. You can organize each chapter into a simple table on the chapters page. In this table, you can create pages for each chapter, organize them by topic, and add at-a-glance notes about the chapter goals. The long-term Gantt chart shows your long-term project planning, including when you want to focus on writing and working on each project.

Each project dashboard page contains pages for Experiments, Manuscript, Key References, and Ideas.

On the ideas page, you can keep track of all your ideas and notes.

You’ll find a table to organize your key references on the key references page.

The experiments and result page has a table for keeping track of your weekly tasks.

The manuscript page includes a task list, a list for keeping track of figures, and another project timeline where you can keep track of experiments and writing.

Research Lab Notebook Notion Template

Since research is the biggest aspect of grad school, I decided to develop the research lab notebook Notion template to focus on just research and experiments. This template is designed for project management and for logging daily research activities. It includes a database for daily entries and a functional task list to categorize and track your progress over time. You can easily create new tasks and entries with the click of a button on the homepage! There are databases as well for literature review and protocols that can be easily linked to projects and lab notebook entries.

Ph.D. Degree and Dissertation Planner

After I learned some of the more advanced features in Notion, like relation properties, I decided to develop a graduate student Notion template with a dissertation focus to automate your task lists for research, coursework, and other Ph.D. milestones. There are a lot of milestones in a Ph.D., from completing courses to conferences to qualifying exams to manuscripts. So, I wanted to integrate all of that together into a single Notion template, so I made the Ph.D. Degree and Dissertation Planner. This planner uses a task database linked to all the Ph.D. milestones. Each milestone has its own page and template in a database so you can track your progress for each item.

The one thing I loved about building this homepage was the automated lists for daily tasks and weekly tasks! I added progress bars throughout the template for visual progress tracking. Within the last year, Notion added automated buttons, which I love for quickly adding tasks and entries to the database!

Ultimate All-in-One Graduate Student Notion Template

The all-one-one graduate student Notion template is the largest and most functional template that I’ve been able to develop. The all-in-one graduate student Notion template integrates your personal and graduate school life. It combines everything from the Ph.D. degree and dissertation planner with personal life and professional development.

The homepage of the All-in-One graduate student Notion template is the “second brain” of the template. This template uses more advanced features in Notion, like automations, formulas, and relations, but these features are already set up for you, so all you have to do is get started! Here’s a glance at the pages that are included! This is where everything is available at a glance, and databases are automated to populate, making it easy for you to see what needs to be done that day.

The template includes over 20 pages for coursework, research, professional development, travel, finance, goal setting, and more! Here is a quick look as the many pages included in this Notion template!

Shop She Science’s Notion Templates

Simple dashboard.

She Science’s simplest template!

✓ Coursework page

✓ Project organizer

✓ Literature review tracker

✓ Meeting notes template

✓ At-a-glance homepage

Lab Notebook

Template for research project management

✓ Daily lab notebook database

✓ Automated task tracker

✓ Protocols manager

All pricing is in USD. Notion account required.

Ph.D. Planner

Track and organize your Ph.D. milestones, including coursework, research, and dissertation writing.

✓ Degree tracker

✓ Coursework manager

✓ Research project manager

✓ Task lists and agenda

✓ Meeting notes page

✓ Literature review page

All-in-One Grad Student

Ultimate template for your entire graduate school life, including research, course, personal life, and more!

✓ Everything in the Ph.D. Planner!

✓ Habit tracker

✓ Goal tracker

✓ Writing tracker

✓ Professional network manager

✓ 10+ personal life pages

You may also like

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All-in-One Graduate Student Notion Template for Coursework, Research, and Personal Life

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Academic Research Hub

Who is this template for? This template is for PhD students, college students or anyone involved in research and development.

What problems does this template address?

Make it easier to mange your references, citations, literature notes and research projects within a single place

Save time and maintain your focus without needing to switch between multiple apps

Improve your quality of thought when generating new ideas

Improve the quality of your literature notes to make ideas clearer

Keep track of upcoming conferences, abstract deadlines and manuscript submission deadlines

How does the template address these issues?

Interlinked databases to connect your literature notes, references, projects and authors

Predesigned templates for projects and literature notes

All of your notes, projects and literature within a single Notion dashboard

Quick Notes & Ideas database to quickly capture your thoughts

Tasks database to manage all of your tasks

Dedicated database for storing figures, tables and screen captures from literature

How can I duplicate the template?

Once you're on the Notion page, you will have the button "duplicate" on top-right. Click on it and choose your workspace. Your template should be there in a few instants 🎉

Does this template works with Notion's free plan?

Yes. Every feature of this template will perfectly work if you are on Notion’s free plan.

What is a Notion template?

By definition, Notion templates are pre-built Notion pages that you can duplicate into your Notion workspace with a simple click. They can be simple pages or very advanced systems with multiple databases. Using templates can help you save time and hours of work to get started quicker with Notion.

Check out our other templates.

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So Many Papers, so Little Time

A blog about scientific publishing and academic productivity

• Paperpile News
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• Inspiration

Notion for research and research groups

We don’t recommend productivity tools lightly. Back in 2016, we recommended Slack as a productivity tool for researchers—now companies and institutions worldwide use it.

Today, Notion feels like the Slack of five years ago.

We’ve used Notion at Paperpile since 2017 and we couldn’t live without it. In many ways, our small company of 23 people isn’t much different from a busy research group.

We’re a better team thanks to Notion and we want to share how Notion can make your research (and your life) easier.

What is Notion?

The simple concept of “Everything in one place” eliminates searching and app switching.

Notion is a comprehensive online workspace where you can store and organize everything (yes, everything) in one place. Just the fact that Notion reduces the time and effort needed to find documents and switch apps makes it so powerful.

But it’s especially useful for research teams and collaborators because it’s:

• Structured and searchable : there’s no need to constantly interrupt your work to ask yourself, “where is this information?”
• Frictionless : you can create pages and subpages like in a Wiki, but it doesn’t feel like it’s from 2003.
• Minimalistic, yet extremely versatile : its clean UI is great for note taking, but hitting / (forward slash key) reveals unlimited possibilities for project management, documentation, database creation, website publishing, and much more.
• Everything you would expect from a modern app : documents are synced, multi-device capable, collaborative, and exportable in open formats like CSV and Markdown.

From simple note taking to a full fledged lab notebook

Notion is perfect for simple note taking and to-do lists:

• Just start writing — use plain text or formatted text via the menus or Markdown syntax.
• Create tasks and check completed tasks.
• Re-arrange tasks via drag and drop.
• Color code your notes and tasks for easy reference.
• Set reminders.
• Organize lists in toggle lists (if your long to-do list makes you nervous...).

Pretty much everything that you can do on your paper lab notebook you can also do in Notion.

It doesn’t stop there. I used to be a computational biologist and never had a formal lab notebook—I don't even know exactly what the requirements are. But, I would guess that pretty much everything that you do on paper (or in a dedicated electronic lab notebook), you can also do in Notion:

• Paste images of experimental results.
• Upload or link other data files such as spreadsheets.
• Create data tables.

Building internal documents and knowledge archives

Research groups create lots of documents: brainstorming docs, paper outlines, group meeting and seminar notes, lab protocols, etc. With so many documents and emails changing hands, a lot of information gets lost.

Google Docs or Word is is great for writing sophisticated documents with complex styling. But, for internal documents, Notion has the advantage:

• It’s highly structured and consistently formatted by default : the focus is on content.
• It’s easy to organize and—most importantly—browse : you can put all the information in Word files, but it will never be the same experience.
• It’s accessible and discoverable : if you and your collaborators use Notion consistently, you’ll build up a solid knowledge archive that can be referenced again and again.

Project management and planning

In a blog post from 2016 , we highlighted how Trello can serve as a great lightweight project management tool for researchers. We recommended the tool for organizing workshops, hiring new lab managers, or getting research done on time.

Notion allows you to create, organize, and link Trello-like cards and project boards.

With Notion, you can do all of those things and more:

• Create cards (that are also independent documents) and view them in a Trello-like column, or as a table or timeline.
• Add tags to cards for better organization.
• Link single cards to other cards or Notion documents to provide more context or information.
• Assign cards to people, so you know who’s responsible for each task.
• Add due dates and reminders to cards, so you don’t miss deadlines.
• Add data fields like checkboxes, numbers, or dates to keep track of relevant benchmarks.

Beautiful, frictionless, up-to-date lab websites

Notion allows you to publish documents with just one click.

A good lab website is important—but, let’s face it, it takes time to curate a site. That’s why so many lab websites are outdated. Notion allows you to publish documents with just one click.

Formatting options are limited to structured markup, but that’s a good thing: that’s how the web was meant to work in the first place.

But, you can add columns, header images, callout boxes and the results are both beautiful and functional.

As a proof of concept, I just googled “lab website” and chose a random lab website that came up: https://www.dietzlab.org/ . It took about 20 minutes to transfer the content of the homepage of this website to a Notion page.

Brought to you by the folks at Paperpile.

We love papers so we blog about it.

• Setups & Tech
• iOS & Mac

The 40 Best Notion Templates for Students in 2024 (Aesthetic & Functional)

Notion is a must-have if you’re a student in 2024. With how versatile the platform is, you can use Notion to do everything from planning out your semester, taking notes, tracking grades, organizing your extracurriculars, and more.

Starting a Notion workspace from scratch can be a time-consuming process, especially if you have a busy school schedule to begin with. To make your life easier, we’ve curated a list of the best Notion templates for students, that have already done the heavy lifting for you. Easily pick one that works best for your academic lifestyle and personal aesthetic!

Are you a teacher looking to streamline your semester in Notion? Check out our blog post featuring the best Notion teacher templates !

Looking for more productivity tips and tools? Subscribe to The Flow — our quick, snappy, value-packed focus and recharge newsletter. Also, don’t miss our several other  Notion template round-ups and guides !

• First Name First

Table of Contents

• All-in-One Notion Student Templates

Notion Study Templates

Notion student planner templates, notion class & assignment templates & trackers, notion student note-taking templates.

• Notion Templates for PhD & Grad Students
• Notion Medical School Templates
• Notion Law School Templates

Free Notion Student Templates

Aesthetic notion student templates.

Get the all-in-one Life OS template , the only Notion template you’ll ever need — with over 25 integrated templates built in.

All-in-One Notion Student Dashboard Templates

Manage every aspect of your student life with a Notion student dashboard template, where you can plan out your days, prioritize your daily to-dos , manage projects , take notes, and lots more!

For more dashboard templates, visit our roundups featuring the best Notion life OS templates and Notion dashboard templates !

Student OS: All-in-One Student Template

With over 15 templates in a centralized dashboard, Student OS by yours truly is the ultimate all-in-one workspace for everything you need for your academic career – both in and out of the classroom! Use the class planner, assignment and deliverables tracker, automatic grade calculator, study zone with flashcards, job and internship application tracker, reading tracker, and so much more to set yourself up for success for the next school year and for your whole degree.

Student OS template is available in two different themes, offering the same functionality:

• Template Available Here  [Aesthetic Edition]
• Template Available Here [Minimalist Edition]

Advanced Student Dashboard & Knowledge Base

Template Available Here

ADHD Student Daily Dashboard

Available in multiple themes!

For more templates like this, don’t miss our full round-up of ADHD-friendly Notion templates — and check out the ADHD FAQ section at the bottom of this very guide.

Template Available Here  |  Plus Version

Acadashboard: Notion Studio OS

Green University Student Notion Dashboard Hub

Academia – Academic Management System for University Students

Aesthetic University Student Productivity Hub

Notion x Student Workspace Template

Notion for University Students

Student Planner Hub

Ultimate Notion Template for College Students

Keep your focus and refine your study routine with a Notion study template. Create a healthy and efficient study routine with Notion, and ace your exams!

Tomato: The Ultimate Pomodoro Notion Template

Check out our full round-ups of Notion Pomodoro templates and Notion Pomodoro timer widgets to deck out your setup!

Notion Study Kit Template

Simple Flashcards Template

Check out our full post on Notion flashcards for more templates and a tutorial!

Notion Flashcard Template for Learning & Studying

Flocus is a free browser-based dashboard for both focus and ambience. Featuring aesthetic themes, personal greeting Pomodoro timer, and lots more! Get early access to Flocus here .

The balance between your social life, academic performance, and mental and physical wellness can be overwhelming during a busy semester. Use a Notion student planner template to help you organize your life and prioritize the things that need to be focused on first!

For more templates, check out our post rounding up the best Notion planner templates .

Notion Semester Planner & Tracker

academia – Notion School Organizer Template

Simple Notion Course & Class Schedule Template

Simple Notion Thesis Planning Template

It’s tough to keep track of all of your deliverables when you have a full class schedule and a life outside of school to balance. Thanks to these templates, you can be sure you don’t fall behind in class with Notion! Monitor your progress and stay up to date with assignments and marks with these templates.

For more templates like these, check out our full round-up of Notion assignment tracker templates !

Notion Courses Manager Template

Notion Syllabus Template

Notion Grade Calculator Template

Notion Advanced Grade Calculator Template

Notion’s beautiful UI makes it easy to jot down notes and organize your documents in databases so you can revisit information for each class easily! Depending on your note-taking style, here are some great Notion student note-taking templates that use beloved techniques such as Cornell, Zettelkasten, and more.

For more templates like this, check out our full round-up featuring the best Notion note-taking templates .

Note-Taking OS

Academic Research Hub – Notion Research Template

Zettelkasten for Notion – Personal Knowledge Management Template

Notion Cornell Note-Taking Template

FlexiNote Note-Taking Template

Simple Aesthetic Lectures & Class Notes

Smart Notes for Students

Notion Student Notes Index

Notion Spaced Repetition Notes Template

Synthetic Notes Template

Basic Notion Class Notes Template

Notion Templates for Grad & PhD Students

There are some great Notion student templates out there, and some even go as far as creating solutions specifically for grad, post-grad, PhD, and master’s students! Plan your thesis, set grad school goals, store notes, track your progress, and so much more with these grad school-ready templates.

Templates Available:

• Grad School & PhD Notion Hub
• Simple Notion Grad School Template
• Notion Academic Dashboard for PhD Students
• Minimal Notion Grad School Dashboard
• Graduate School Applications Template for Notion
• Notion Grad School Application Planner
• Academic Notion Website Template
• Academic CV Notion Template

Notion Templates for Medical Students

If you’re a med student, you know that between all the classes, resources, placements, exams, and everything else, life can get unwieldy. With the right Notion template, organize and centralize everything for your med school journey in one spot!

Check out our full round-up of the best Notion medical school templates for even more options!

• Simple Aesthetic Medical Student Template
• Medical School Dashboard Template
• Notion Medical School Student Dashboard

Notion Templates for Law Students

For the up-and-coming lawyers, these are the templates for you! Organize your law school courses, track firms you want to work at or have applied to, store the hundreds of resources and links you need as a law student, and so much more with these Notion templates for law students.

• Notion Template for Aspiring Solicitors | Video Tutorial
• Aesthetic Law Student Dashboard | Video Tutorial
• Aesthetic Notion Law Student Planner & Dashboard Template | Video Tutorial

If you’re looking to use Notion for your studies, but don’t have the extra coin to pay for templates, there are a ton of simple free Notion student templates to meet basic needs. Here are some of our favorites!

Looking for more free templates? Check out our full list of free Notion templates .

Bright & Airy Aesthetic Student Dashboard Template

Simple Notion Student Homepage

Notion Academic Dashboard Template

Aesthetic Minimal Academic Life Organizer

Notion University / College Hub Template

JaniceStudies Student Notion Dashboard

The Ultimate Notion College Hub Template

Notion Student Loan Tracker Template

Notion School Dashboard Template

Student Hub

Notion Roommate Space Template

The beauty with Notion is that you can personalize your student setup with your favorite visuals, colors, and themes! For inspo, check out these aesthetic Notion student layouts.

Interested in more aesthetic templates? Check out our detailed blog post showcasing the most aesthetic Notion templates !

Cafe Themed Student Planner

Botanical Academia

College Life Academic Planner

Uni-Verse: The Student Template

School Life Dashboard

Aesthetic Matcha Student Planner

Purple Aesthetic Notion Student Template

Sailor Moon Themed Student Dashboard for Medical Students

Notion for Students: A Quickstart Guide

New to Notion? Get to grips with this popular productivity app with our quick guide to Notion for students!

Is Notion a good tool for students?

Yes, Notion is one of the best and most popular productivity tools for students! Thousands of real students use Notion to enhance their academic experience.

Here are a few reasons why Notion is a good tool for students:

• Track every element of your student life — from your assignments and notes to extracurriculars and chores — in Notion’s powerful, connectable databases.
• Features like Notion’s toggle blocks are great for active recall and spaced repetition, helping you take study sessions to the next level.
• Notion is fully customizable, letting you create minimalist or aesthetic spaces — whatever suits your brain and keeps you motivated!
• Collab with other students in real time on Notion — ideal for group projects.
• Use third-party tools to sync your Google Calendar , access helpful widgets , and much more.

Want to learn more about how Notion works? Check out How to Use Notion as a Student: A Full Guide !

What about Notion for ADHD and neurodivergent students?

Notion is an excellent organizational and productivity tool for ADHD and neurodivergent students. On Reddit, you’ll find dozens of posts ( like this one ) from neurodivergent students looking for the best ways to use Notion.

Here are a few reasons Notion is good for ADHD and neurodivergent students:

• Storing your notes, assignments, and other essential info in Notion can prevent distractions and tab-switching.
• Filters, statuses, and other database features help combat “time blindness”, helping you better prioritize tasks.
• ADHD-friendly organization systems like Zettelkasten can be easily set up in Notion.
• To-do lists, calendars, progress bars , and databases let you break big tasks down into small steps — and organize your academic life in a way that makes sense to your brain.
• Dozens of specially-made, ADHD-friendly Notion templates make setting up your student hub quick and easy.

Is Notion free for university and college students?

Notion offers a free plan for everyone that gives you all the functionality needed to help you conquer your coursework.

Students at US-accredited higher education institutions are eligible for a free Notion Plus Plan. The Plus Plan lets you share your Notion pages with up to 100 guests, access 30 days of page revisions, and more.

Unfortunately, Notion does not offer its free Plus Plan to high school students.

You can access Notion Plus for free as long as you have access to a valid educational email address. (Notion doesn’t accept student IDs as proof.)

To redeem your Plus Plan, make sure the email address of your Notion workspace matches your student email. To change your email address, open Settings & members from your Notion sidebar, then select My account > Change email .

To learn more, visit Notion’s help center .

Is Notion AI free for students?

Notion AI is a separate paid add-on. You can test out Notion AI for free with a set number of complimentary responses.

Many students find Notion AI useful for summarizing text, creating bullet points out of class notes, and highlighting key points.

It’s worth noting you shouldn’t use Notion AI to generate essays and assignments — doing so almost certainly breaches your university’s policies on plagiarism.

Which Notion templates for students would you recommend? Are there any Notion student templates that we’re missing from the list? Let us know in the comments below!

Gridfiti is supported by its audience – when you buy something using the retail links in our posts, we may earn a small commission at no additional cost to you. Read more  about our affiliate disclaimer.

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How to use Notion Note-taking Application for Research

• posted on June 28, 2020 August 10, 2020
• Comments Off on How to use Notion Note-taking Application for Research

An Introduction to Notion Note-taking Application for Research.

Article Outline

Why Notion?

Creating a new page, creating an inline table.

• Generating a Linked Database Table

Code Embedding

Recently, I have started using a beautiful app called  Notion . Yes, you guessed it, this is a note-taking app and I really like the flexibility this application offers. From the past 3 years, I have been an Evernote user but I did not like the rigid folder structure where one could only able to create a sub-level notebook. I believe Evernote is still good for many users because it is mature and well developed but the Notion application is one step ahead of every other competitor.

I am a Transportation System Engineering Ph.D. student at Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati (Department of Civil Engineering). I work in the field of pedestrian safety. Those who are in the academic field definitely knew about the headache of managing literature. If your literature is not well managed it could cause a big headache during article or thesis write-up.

Now, in the era of digital note-taking, there are plenty of candidate apps you could find on the internet. I recently started using  Notion  for managing my  research work . So let me demonstrate how you could also manage your literature/research smoothly.

This is my Notion  Home  Page.

Note:  Notion is free for students and educators. You just need to sign-up using an academic email address.

Let’s start with the Notion. Everything in Notion is a  block  even if it is a text or image. There is no drop-down menu but you could call the menu using a  forward slash  “ /” . For creating a new page just select page from the forward-slash menu and it will create a  blank page .

This is an example of a  blank page , where you could add a meaningful title, an icon or a cover.

Once you create a page, you can create a table by calling  table inline  using the  forward-slash  “ / ”. The table contains a name, tags and files field by default. Here is a gif of how to create an inline table.

You could add more field based on your requirement. It could be  text, number, select/multi-select option, date, person, files  and many more.

Here you can see, I have customized my  master literature table . You could add as many as rows or columns you want as per your requirement.

One thing to note that in the first column “ Article Title ”, each row contains a notion page which you can open to write about the literature review in detail. You could include study objective, location of the study, primary findings and many more.

Here you can see I have opened the  Article 1  as separate page for further editing.

Next, you can edit the page in more detail for detailed record keeping. Here, you can see I have added details about the  study location, Model used  and  Outcomes .

Creating a Linked Database

One of the best features of Notion is that you can create  sub-table  using linked database feature. For example, I have created a master literature table and tagged each journal with meaningful keywords (see the above figure’s  Tags  column). I could call this table from any new page and filter out the table articles based on keywords/tags.

Say, you planned to write an article regarding worldwide road accidents statistics. Earlier, during the literature review, you had tagged all your accident-related articles (read) in the master literature table. So, rather skimming through your 100 of literature you entered in the master literature table. You could create a new page in Notion and call your master literature table there and filter out articles based on your keywords/tags. In this way, one could create separate study tables on different pages using a linked database.

The obvious question would be why not filtering and reading out from our master literature table. This could be one option but very traditional. By using old fashioned tricks you could not  leverage the potential  of linked database.

The main advantage of having a linked database table inside a new page is that once you start reading more papers and start updating your master literature table, your linked database also automatically update itself if you tag it with specific keywords.

For example, say in future I start reading more accident-related literature and added them to my master literature table with  accident  keyword, then it would also reflect inside other pages where I have linked that master literature table with  accident  filter. Isn’t it awesome?

Here, I have added a small video clip to illustrate, how you could create a linked database.

For demonstration purpose, I have created two linked database page. One for  New Reads  and another for  Pedestrian   Accidents Stats .

Let’s open the  accidents stats  linked database table, see below Table (a). You can see, there is an arrow on the top left side, indicating that the table is linked to the original literature table using a linked database feature. Now, if I add another article to my master literature table with “ accident ” tag then this article will appear to  Pedestrian Accident stats  table too and vice-versa.

Note : You can create a linked database based on any column. Here in my case I can create a linked database based on journal priority type, say only five stars journals (most important reads).

The next feature that I like the most is  code embedding . Notion supports code embedding for a significant number of programming languages. As a researcher, I have to develop plots and models using R and Python. So, this feature helps me manage and search embedded codes.

To add code just call the forward-slash “ / ” menu and type  code . This will create an empty code block.

To change it to another language, just click the bottom right side arrow. This will pop up options for different languages.

Here you can see popular languages like R, Python, Ruby and PHP.

In the figure below I have presented an example of R code embedded inside notion’s block.

Here is a video from Notion’s YouTube channel on advanced features. Here you could learn about

• Database views
• Adding content to databases with templates
• Connecting databases with relation & rollup
• Linking Databases to create advance dashboards

There are plenty of features available in the Notion that would make your research work smooth and hassle-free.

Notion offers:

• Ready to use templates
• Table of content
• Numbered and toggled list
• Callout (for highlight or message)
• Link to page (linking one page to another)
• Inline Equation
• Different table view (Board, Gallery, List and Calendar)
• Audio, image and video upload
• Web-bookmark
• Embedding (Pdfs, Google map, Google drive, Tweet, Github Gist and many more)
• Math equation (like latex)
• Mentioning page inside a write-up

Here, I have shown only two major features i.e., the linked database and code embedding that I personally enjoy most. You could explore more watching  Notion for beginners  YouTube videos.

I hope this would help.

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Notion Template Lists

10 Best Notion Academic Research/PhD Templates 2024

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Keeping track of movies and TV shows can help you sort and review them for better organization. A Notion movie tracker template can also help … Read more

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A trading journal is crucial for monitoring your current trades and identifying future trends. On top of that, it acts as a helpful guide where … Read more

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A portfolio is crucial when you want to attract new clients or potential recruiters. A Notion portfolio template helps you design a stunning portfolio website … Read more

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10 Best & Free Notion Book Tracker Library Templates 2024

Got a lot of books to read? Losing count on what book to read? If yes is your answer to both, use a Notion book … Read more

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Notion Quotes Templates and Cover Images (Free and Paid)

Are you feeling a bit down lately? If this is you and you’re a Notion user, boosting your morale with motivational quotes can help you … Read more

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10 Best Notion Coding Templates for 2024 (Free & Paid)

Coding can be a headache for many people, especially those who aren’t techy. Aside from spending hours learning a coding language, proper implementation can be … Read more

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Newsletters keep your readers or customers updated and engaged with your business. They also build a community centered on valuable content. Hence, publishers must use … Read more

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How to Subtract Two Dates in Notion: Top Tips!

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What the First Amendment Means for Campus Protests

Encampments? Occupying buildings? Demonstrators cite their right to free expression, but the issues are thorny.

• Share full article

By Alan Blinder

Follow our live coverage of the college protests at U.C.L.A. and other universities.

Protesters on college campuses have often cited the First Amendment as shelter for their tactics, whether they were simply waving signs or taking more dramatic steps, like setting up encampments, occupying buildings or chanting slogans that critics say are antisemitic.

But many legal scholars, along with university lawyers and administrators, believe at least some of those free-speech assertions muddle, misstate, test or even flout the amendment, which is meant to guard against state suppression.

Whose interpretation and principles prevail, whether in the courts or among the administrators in charge of meting out discipline, will do much to determine whether protesters face punishments for campus turmoil.

The First Amendment doesn’t automatically apply at private schools.

Public universities, as arms of government, must yield to the First Amendment and how the courts interpret its decree that there shall be no law “abridging the freedom of speech” or “the right of the people peaceably to assemble.”

But private universities set their own standards around speech and protest.

To be sure, private universities tend to embrace free expression more than, say, private businesses. Those policies and approaches, though, are driven by principles like academic freedom and the marketplace of ideas, not constitutional law.

Columbia University, a hub through this round of campus protests and the scene of an enormous police response on Tuesday night, has not forbidden all speech. But its current policy includes a set of rules, such as permissible demonstration zones and preregistration of protests, that the university says are intended to ensure safety while promising that “all members of the university community have the right to speak, study, research, teach and express their own views.”

Legal scholars have said that while the university’s approach may anger students and faculty members, and may even curtail speech on campus, Columbia faces far less legal risk than any public school might.

‘Time, place and manner’ is a crucial standard.

Academic administrators and the courts alike often find comfort in frameworks, and the notion of “time, place and manner” is deeply embedded in case law involving free speech.

Under that doctrine, governments may sometimes regulate logistical details associated with speech. The doctrine is not a blank check for state power over speech — a government must, for example, apply regulations without discriminating against a viewpoint — but it allows for some restrictions in the pursuit of public safety and order.

For university leaders, the doctrine offers a template of sorts for protest policies that can survive legal scrutiny and withstand political backlashes.

“We always thought that time, place, manner — if applied in a fair, open and completely neutral way — was the best mechanism to both allow protest and also to ensure that protest didn’t disrupt academic programming and activities,” said Nicholas B. Dirks, a former chancellor of the University of California, Berkeley, which has one of the richest traditions of protest in higher education.

But, Dr. Dirks added, “That’s easier said than done.”

Another important test is ‘imminent lawless action.’

The Supreme Court, soon after World War I, delivered a First Amendment ruling that included the phrase “clear and present danger.” About 50 years later, the court adopted an approach focused on “imminent lawless action.”

That test is important in gauging whether, for example, the First Amendment protects an antisemitic chant. If the rhetoric is intended to provoke an “imminent lawless action” and is likely to do so, it is not considered constitutionally sound. But a chant that fails any part of that standard is protected, meaning that even some grotesquely uncomfortable, distasteful speech may not be subject to discipline by the government.

“The tricky part is when the conduct and the speech are close to the line,” said Timothy J. Heaphy, who was a United States attorney during the Obama administration and later the university counsel at the University of Virginia.

Some threatening behavior on campuses is illegal under federal civil rights law. Two men, for instance, pleaded guilty to using a threat of force to intimidate Black students and employees at the University of Mississippi after they placed a noose around a campus statue of James Meredith, the first Black student to enroll there, in 2014. One of the men was sentenced to prison.

Are encampments covered by the First Amendment?

Although some campus protesters consider their encampments to be a form of speech, the courts have held that restrictions on overnight camping and the like can meet the time, place and manner test, even on public property.

In a 7-2 ruling in 1984, for instance, the Supreme Court ruled that the National Park Service could refuse a request for protesters to spend nights in “symbolic tents” near the White House under its regulations against sleeping in places that were not classified as campgrounds.

“The regulation forbidding sleeping meets the requirements for a reasonable time, place, or manner restriction of expression,” Justice Byron White wrote in his opinion.

“The regulation is neutral with regard to the message presented, and leaves open ample alternative methods of communicating the intended message concerning the plight of the homeless,” he added.

A court would never see a building occupation like the one this week at Columbia, Mr. Heaphy predicted, as a protected First Amendment activity.

“Students occupied the building,” he said. “That’s conduct. That’s not going to last.”

Can universities change policies?

Generally, yes, but, for public universities, the First Amendment still applies.

Again, private universities have more discretion.

At the University of Chicago, the president, Paul Alivisatos, noted this week that while encampments violate school rules, administrators “may allow an encampment to remain for a short time despite the obvious violations of policy.”

Floating that possibility, he cited “the importance of the expressive rights of our students” and said that “the impact of a modest encampment does not differ so much from a conventional rally or march.”

But he signaled the university would not allow its policy to be eviscerated, and he urged students involved with the encampment “to instead embrace the multitude of other tools at their disposal.”

Alan Blinder is a national correspondent for The Times, covering education. More about Alan Blinder

Our Coverage of the U.S. Campus Protests

News and Analysis

President Biden broke days of silence to finally speak out on the unrest disrupting campuses  across the United States, denouncing violence and antisemitism even as he defended the right to peaceful dissent.

At the University of California, Los Angeles, police officers dismantled a pro-Palestinian encampment  and made arrests after a tense hourslong standoff with demonstrators.

Police officers in riot gear arrested pro-Palestinian demonstrators at Fordham University’s Manhattan campus , the third university in New York City to face mass arrests.

Choosing Anonymity:  In an online world, doxxing and other consequences have led many student protesters to obscure their identities by wearing masks and scarves. That choice has been polarizing .

Seeing Links to a Global Struggle:  In many student protesters’ eyes, the war in Gaza is linked to other issues , such as policing, mistreatment of Indigenous people, racism and climate change.

Ending the Unrest:  Across the nation, universities are looking for ways to quell the protests . Columbia has taken the spotlight after calling in the police twice , while Brown chose a different path .

A 63-Year-Old Career Activist:  Videos show Lisa Fithian, whom the police called a “professional agitator,” working alongside protesters at Columbia  who stormed Hamilton Hall.

The five best AI apps for students in 2024

Artificial intelligence in education is becoming increasingly common. So much so, that tech giants like Meta have already rolled out virtual reality headsets in some classrooms across the world. Consequently, there are already a multitude of AI apps geared towards students, helping them sail through their studies.

According to a Tyton Partners report , nearly half of college students are using AI tools. The study, sponsored by plagiarism software Turnitin, was conducted in September and included roughly 1,600 students and 1,000 faculty members across more than 600 institutions.

GenAI writing tools such as ChatGPT , Google Gemini (formerly known as Bard), Microsoft Bing Chat , or Meta Llama 2 , were among a handful of applications being used by students.

At the beginning, students showed a strong inclination toward using AI writing apps, and this trend has intensified over time. In the spring of 2023, 27 per cent of students were using these tools, a figure that surged to 49 per cent by the fall.

How can you use AI as a student?

In the age of AI, students have access to an array of tools that can transform the way they learn and produce academic work. AI serves as a tireless assistant, ready to answer questions around the clock, drawing from a vast reservoir of internet-based resources. It aids in the initial stages of writing by helping students draft ideas and organize them effectively, whether they are planning an essay or structuring a research paper.

AI can improve visual learning and presentations as it is able to generate graphics, images, and other visuals to complement and clarify any work. Aside from this, it steps in as a critical reviewer, analyzing written materials to judge their validity, ensuring that references are credible and the arguments are sound.

For non-native English speakers, AI proves invaluable in refining grammar and improving the structure of sentences, making writing clearer and more professional. It also allows students to experiment with various writing styles, adapting their tone and approach to suit different academic requirements.

Beyond writing, AI extends into technical realms, assisting in coding by generating, explaining, and debugging code, as well as optimizing it for better performance. It’s also a creative partner, helping to overcome writer's block by suggesting ideas or crafting entire paragraphs to get the creative juices flowing.

AI can also simulate the examination environment by generating formative exam-style questions, helping pupils to prepare for assessments with tailored practice opportunities. This holistic suite of capabilities makes AI an indispensable ally in navigating the complexities of student life.

What are the best AI apps for students?

Quizlet , a widely-used learning platform, provides a variety of study tools for both students and teachers. It is user-friendly and compatible with smartphones, tablets, and computers. Founded by Andrew Sutherland at the age of 15, Quizlet has grown to assist millions of learners each month. With Quizlet Live, students can also collaborate in real time during classroom sessions.

The platform offers a suite of features designed to enhance the learning experience. At the core are customizable flashcards that users can create and tailor to meet their specific study needs. Beyond simple memorization, the platform includes a wide range of study modes such as matching games and tests, which aim to make learning more engaging and effective.

Collaboration is also a fundamental aspect on the mobile app, as it enables users to share study materials and join forces with friends or classmates, fostering a group learning experience. With the new AI features, students can create magic notes, use a chatbot service called Q-Chat which functions as a tutor and study partner, and get AI practise tests in one click.

The first paid plan starts at $7.99 per month. This plan unlocks advanced features like ad-free studying, offline access, and enhanced progress tracking, giving you an edge in your studies at an affordable cost.

QuillBot is an AI tool designed for students that enables them to produce captivating and impressive written works. This tool understands text within its context and offers relevant paraphrases for single lines or entire paragraphs.

Recognized as one of the top AI tools for students, it features paraphrasing capabilities along with the ability to summarize long-form content, detect and address plagiarism, conduct grammar checks, and perform language translations. QuillBot also supports collaborative writing, positioning it as a leading AI app in the academic sphere. However, there are reports that Turnitin’s enhanced algorithms can now detect Quillbot paraphrasing – so students, make sure you’re doing the rewriting yourselves.

The software is free if students want to paraphrase up to 125 words, but beyond that it's $8.33 per month.

Edubrain.ai

Edubrain.ai is a newly introduced tool specifically crafted to assist students with their homework and study challenges. This AI assistant provides step-by-step answers to any question posed by students.

The platform boasts a diverse selection of subjects, covering over 90 areas ranging from the humanities to more precise disciplines such as mathematics, engineering, and computer science. This broad spectrum ensures that students can find help in nearly any academic area.

One of the standout features of Edubrain.ai is its ability to deliver instant responses. Students simply ask a question, specify their academic level, and receive a solution within seconds. Unlike many other services, Edubrain.ai offers unlimited queries without any subscription or usage limits. Asking it about Einstein’s famous formula “What is e=mc2,” it was able to provide a response, although it sounded rather artificial.

Currently, the service is completely free, making it an excellent opportunity for students to experience how much easier and more efficient their homework can be with the right support.

Grammarly is of course great for both workers and students alike. The AI tool is truly designed for students, offering text correction, paraphrasing, grammar improvement, and plagiarism detection. It stands out as one of the most helpful AI resources for students, proficient at eliminating grammatical errors and improving sentence structure.

With its advanced AI, Grammarly understands text contextually, helping users produce well-written documents. Highly rated among AI tools for students, Grammarly integrates with Microsoft Word and various browsers and is also available as a standalone app for convenience. It is indeed one of the top AI apps for students.

Grammarly offers a free version for basic writing assistance. For expanded capabilities, including plagiarism detection, vocabulary suggestions, and genre-specific refinements, consider the Premium plan, which starts at $30 per month.

Notion has also ventured into new technologies with Notion AI, a powerful generative tool. It specializes in summarizing notes, editing text, and generating actionable tasks after meetings. Recognized as one of the premier AI tools for students, Notion distinguishes itself by streamlining and automating tasks with intelligent suggestions and templates. It is highly recommended for students aiming to enhance efficiency and user experience. Gradually, Notion AI is revolutionizing productivity, one step at a time.

Notion provides a free plan that includes essential features. For additional storage, unlimited collaborators, and advanced permissions, you might want to upgrade to the Plus plan, which begins at $10 per member per month.

Thanks to some of these new AI apps, students have access to a vast array of tools that can do everything from content generation to language learning to make lives a little easier. These AI companions not only simplify tasks but also foster creativity.

Featured image: Canva

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