Building research supervision and training across Australian universities

Introduction

Research and innovation are increasingly being seen as central to the development of Australia’s competitiveness in a global economy. Much of our success in this area is dependent on a cohort of well-trained researchers. The need for well-trained researchers has been recognised through the establishment of the Research Training Scheme, a performance-based funding scheme for research training. This scheme, combined with other incentives and inducements for research, including the conducting of AUQA reviews and the introduction of the Excellence in Research in Australia (ERA), have motivated universities to improve their research training performance.

Efforts to improve research training performance have emphasised the achievement of timely, quality research degree completions in areas of research strength aligned to national priorities. They have also included efforts to improve research supervision, largely through a more effective approach to supervisor training and development.

Therefore, this project seeks to build on the existing resources within the Consortium for Improving Research Supervision and Training (fIRST) to support post-graduate and higher degree pedagogy across Australian and New Zealand Universities by developing new strategies and techniques of research supervision training. This will achieved by undertaking by scoping research supervision across Australian and New Zealand universities, introducing new components on the fIRST web site and disseminating the results to key stakeholders.

Support for this project has been provided by The Australian Learning and Teaching Council, an initiative of the Australian Government Department of Education, Science and Training.

The views expressed in this project do not necessarily reflect the view of The Australian Learning and Teaching Council.