The student/supervisor relationship: negotiating identities

1. The student/supervisor relationship: negotiating identities Joan Wardrop with Susan Leong and Janice Baker j.wardrop@curtin.edu.au

2. development of skills • problematising/conceptualising • research • writing/creating • grant applications • presentations • publication

3. Pearson and Kayrooz (2004) four roles: • Mentoring, • Sponsoring, • Progressing the candidature and • Coaching (Pearson and Kayrooz (2004) in Nulty, et al.(2009):4) .

4. the context/s increasingly, more than one supervisor : different areas and perspectives, length of project (leaving the University?), ASL/LSL

5. Contexts -2 research culture/environment: student-supervisor/s-School-Faculty-University student (supervisor/s) – discipline/s (conferences, publishing)- careers

6. student comments; qualities • enthusiasm • subject knowledge • time given to students/accessibility • capacity to give encouragement • willingness to acknowledge student’s capacities: appropriate levels of independence; student as expert

7. student comments: problems • supervisors “too busy” - even during the supervision • not good procurers of resources • feedback too slow/too minimal

8. the sinews of the relationship • meetings: formal versus casual, email • establish a schedule: recognise the variations, not always necessary to meet as often • feedback - oral/written feedback • records of meetings – reflecting/concretising • “those students more satisfied with their supervision tended to be those who interacted more frequently with supervisor or supervisors, and who spent more time per week on research”. (Harman, 2003: 330) (40-49 hours per week for f/t students) • mutually respectful

9. helpful Curtin guidelines • Guidelines for Supervision and the Supervisory Relationship: • http://research.curtin.edu.au/graduate/hdrguidelines/durcand.cfm#supervision

10. select references: • Bill Green (2005), ‘Unfinished business: subjectivity and supervision,’ Higher Education Research & Development 24, 2: 151-163. • Grant Harman (2003), ‘PhD student satisfaction with course experience and supervision in two Australian research-intensive universities’ Prometheus 21, 3: 317-333. • Catherine Manathunga (2005), ‘The development of research supervision: "Turning the light on a private space",’ International Journal for Academic Development 10, 1: 17-30. • Duncan Nulty, Margaret Kiley, and Noel Meyers (2009), ‘Promoting and recognising excellence in the supervision of research students: an evidence-based framework,’ Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education 1–15. • Eve Bendix Pearsen (2007), ‘Negotiating academicity: postgraduate research supervision as category boundary work,’ Studies in Higher Education 32:4,475 — 487.