Building research supervision and training across Australian universities |
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Approach and design of project
The project has three stages: a scoping exercise which will be undertaken in 2007/08 to gauge the issues on research supervision by key stakeholder groups; an action stage in 2008 to develop new resources for the fIRST web site based on the outcomes of the scoping exercise and a dissemination stage in 2008/09 to ensure the key stakeholders are aware of the outcomes of the project.
Scoping exercise (2007/2008)
The scoping exercise will address the following:
- information from those responsible for research education about training needs of supervisors;
- identification of existing training provisions in each university and the resources they utilise
- information from supervisors about the kinds of development opportunities they would like and that they would realistically utilise.
The methodology of the scoping exercise will include a meeting of key academics who have been involved in development of supervision pedagogy and/or who have been working on projects related to supervision will occur. The purpose of the symposium will be to identify best current supervision practices and future directions for supervision pedagogy. The symposium will provide the context where supervision pedagogy can be analysed in the broader context of future developments in research education.
The symposium will be followed be the identification of existing supervision practices, the resources used, and the perceived needs in terms of supervision pedagogy in Australian and New Zealand universities. Information will be sought using a survey of Australian and New Zealnad universities and interviews from those responsible for research education in Universities (eg PVC Research) as well as Associate Deans of Research at faculty levels. The identification of supervision practices from the perspective of representative groups of supervisors from diverse faculties in universities, and supervisors’ perceptions of current and future needs in terms of supervision pedagogy will also be undertaken.
The dissemination of outcomes from the scoping stage of the project will be via relevant conference presentation, reports and publications. This will include presentation of a paper at the Quality in Postgraduate research conference.
Redesigning the web site (2009)
A redesign of the fIRST web site will build on outcomes of the scoping exercise, to maximise the pedagogical usefulness and appeal of the web site. The redesign of the web site will need to be innovative and will need to make good use of recent interactive technology. This will enable the inclusion of more professional development activities to extend use of the resources. Thus, for example, the redesign will enable inclusion of models to illustrate a range of possible ways of embedding resources in supervision training within member universities.
Dissemination and embedding of the project (2009/ 2010)
The dissemination strategy will include the following activities: - establishing state based networks to promote and support the effective use of fIRST resources, and to encourage the on-going submission of new resources for inclusion on the web site; - running workshops in conjunction with state networks to assist institutions to adopt relevant models of embedding - establishing links with relevant professional organizations (such as Quality in Postgraduate Research conference) - linking workshops on fIRST resources and their uses with annual conferences held by such professional organizations.