Flexible postgraduate research supervision in an open system

The implicit approaches and processes of the traditional system which assumed informal interaction on campus are proving insufficient to meet new circumstances for all postgraduate research students whether primarily on or offcampus.

Abstract

Introduction Current practice in research education in Australia is much more flexible than is recognised by many custodians of postgraduate educational quality. Increasingly research education is an open system where postgraduate research students move around a wider world than one campus, a world which includes the 'virtual' campus and a growing network of knowledge institutions in addition to universities. This situation is not entirely new. There has always been more flexibility and mobility than acknowledged by many institutional rules, and established attitudes. Doctoral education is heavily laden with myths (Cullen, Pearson, Saha & Spear 1994; Green & Lee 1995) which can express more about cultural norms than actual practice. Postgraduate research students have always moved around within established national and international research networks, gone on field trips, or disappeared into libraries on and off-campus. However recent changes in the higher education system and changing patterns in research activity have added to the complexity of the educational environment. Flexible conditions for postgraduate research students in the increasingly open system have become more widespread and diverse. More postgraduate research students are no longer on-campus for much of the continuous informal interaction which has provided opportunity for induction into the discipline and the culture of a research group or department. Nor are all current postgraduate research students looking primarily for induction into academia. The implicit approaches and processes of the traditional system which assumed informal interaction on campus are proving insufficient to meet new circumstances for all postgraduate research students whether primarily on or offcampus.