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131/03/2006 Centrale doctoraatsbegeleiding
Developing awareness of skills
Mark Runacres & Gunter LauwersVrije Universiteit BrusselEUPIDE - 12 June 2008
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Why skills?
In general– rapidly changing world– increasing mobility (international and
intersectorial)– the knowledge economy (Lisbon
agenda)– continuing education
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After the PhD
• Belgium: ~ 10% of PhDs finds permanent position inside academia
• The others don’t necessarily end up in research
• Need to convince industry that PhDs are employable, that research degree is an asset
• Need for skills that can be transferred to other sectors➔ Generic skills
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What skills?
Vocational skills– technical– sector-specific– also transferable
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What skills?
Generic skills– communication, management,
teamworking, interpersonal, career management, ...
– also useful for research
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Developing skills
Acquiring skills– may be present at entry – may be explicitly taught– may be acquired during (research)
activities– may be acquired outside degree
programme or research
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Awareness of skills
Who needs to be aware?– early-stage researchers– advisers and academic staff– the university leaders– industry
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Skills needed by PhD students
SUBJECT important
[English for Academic and Research Purposes: WRITING ] 75%
[English for Academic and Research Purposes: PRESENTATION SKILLS]
70%
[Statistics for research purposes] 62%
[Software for statistical analysis] 51%
[Software for the management of bibliographic references] 44%
[Research management] 43%
[Qualitative research techniques and methodology] 41%
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Skills rated by (ex-)researchers in industry
(schaal van 1 tot 7, S’Jegers & Braeckman, 2002)
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Electronic tools
Portfolio– structured record– personal development planner
(reflection) – training needs analysis– linked to annual reports– some kind of certified output– empowers early-stage researcher
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Portfolio at Vrije Universiteit Brussel
– convincing and implementing has proved to be much, much more difficult than we had anticipated...
– skills-based education is gradually being adopted at the Ba-Ma level
– most advisers and academic staff still tend to think of skills as “extra”
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Explicit training VUB
• vocational (sector) skills and generic (transferable) skills
• not compulsory• mostly free for registered PhD students• professional record
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Explicit training VUBscientific training in research skills
• research methodology and techniques; awareness of scientific ethics
• scientific writing and publishing; academic writing in English; presentation skills
• intellectual property rights (patents, copyright, …)
• research management• how to get funded• scientific typesetting
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Explicit training VUBtraining in transferable (generic) skills
• writing and communication skills;
• networking and team-working;
• material/human resources and financial management;
• leadership skills;
• time management; project management
• career management including job-seeking techniques;
• ethics and philosophy
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Remarks/Questions
• We are training people for managerial tasks in industry by putting them in a lab and making them write lots of papers, preferably in Nature
• How many PhDs does industry really need?
• How to convince advisers that completing the dissertation on time is not all that counts?
• The role of central agencies such as QAA, research councils, etc