On 3 and 4 May 2023 I attended a couple of workshops that introduced a professional recognition scheme for doctoral supervisors, which is run by the UK Council of Graduate Education, which is abbreviated to UKCGE. I attended these workshops since the OU is running an accreditation pilot scheme through the OU graduate school. It’s aim is to help to guide a cohort of participants through the accreditation process through workshops, sharing of resources, and providing mutual support, with an intention of making a submission in October 2023.

This blog post summarises what I considered to be some of the key points or highlights from the workshops. Very many of the words shared in this post come from points made by the presenter, and are also reflected within the UKCGE recognition scheme which is clearly referenced. Towards the end of the blog, I have offered some reflections and have shared some accompanying resources.

A further note is that the terms ‘student’ and ‘candidate’ are used interchangeably.

Introduction

The pilot was opened by Lindsey O’Dell, Director of the OU Graduate School. She offered a summary of the pilot scheme, and emphasised that doctoral supervision is an important part of the academic role, and it is important to both recognise and celebrate it.

Both workshops were facilitated by Stan Taylor who is an Honorary Professor from the School of Education, University of Durham. Stan said that he originally learnt ‘on the job’ as a supervisor, and later moved to the area of professional academic development. He is the author of UKCGE Framework for Good Supervisory Practice and led the development of supervisor’s recognition scheme. 

Stan also mentioned some books he has had an involvement with: a handbook for doctoral supervisors, a book that referred to the making of doctoral supervisors, and publications that examines the ways in which doctoral examinations take place and how supervisors are supported in different countries.

The changing landscape of doctoral education

The first day of the workshop began with a bit of history.

Historically, doctoral supervision was “an adjunct of the research function of academics” and underpinned by the master-apprentice model. Constant change within the higher education sector has, of course, led to changes to doctoral supervision. Key changes has included increasing formalisation and diversification of doctoral programmes, the commodification of higher education and increasing movement towards competition between institutions, and an increased emphasis on the welfare of candidates.

This perspective on welfare is important. Historically, if things went wrong, it was the fault of the student rather than the supervisor or the university. The movement towards thinking of a student as a consumer has, arguably, led to a change of power balance between student and supervisor. If students are not provided with effective supervision, there has been a precedent of students seeking compensation. It is now clear that institutions and individual supervisors have more direct responsibilities towards their students.

There was a historical perspective which can be phrased as: if students paid their fees “no one worried too much about how long they took” (Taylor, citing Simpson, 2009, p.458). A review of completion rates led to the introduction of tougher measures: candidates are now typically required to complete within a 4 year period, but there are exceptions to this, such as if they are carrying out research part-time.

A term that was introduced which I was unfamiliar with was: structuration. I understand this term to refer to the extent to which structures have been created to support doctoral students and supervision. This has partly arisen due to an increase in regulation. In the UK, there is the QAA, the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education. Countries now typically have their own national quality assurance systems for higher education and external monitoring. In response, universities have developed their own internal systems to ensure the quality of doctoral education, which can take place within supervision teams. This has necessarily led to the creation of graduate schools and accompanying units and roles. Doctoral supervisors need to understand what these units are within their own institutions and what services and support they offer. Graduate schools may also play a part in setting up of doctoral training and development alliances.

Diversity was emphasised from two different perspectives. Firstly, there has been increase in diversity of different types of doctoral programmes. In addition to a full time PhD, there are now different types of EdD programmes. There is also the possibility of a doctorate through submission, or carrying out research with an industrial partner.

The second perspective relates to the diversity of doctoral candidates. Historically, candidates were young, white, male, middle class, and studied full time. The demographics of candidates have changed: 48% of doctoral students are now women, but there has been less progress for candidates with other protected characteristics. Significantly, there is a significant underrepresentation of black candidates, which needs to be addressed.

There has been a change of perspective when it comes to the obligations that institutions and supervisors have to doctoral students. Historically, students were perceived as being responsible for their own mental health, which can present significant and ongoing challenges to students. There many be a number of issues for this, such as financial challenges, the limited number of opportunities in the higher education sector post-completion, and loneliness. Institutions are now seen as having a duty of care for students. This means that supervisors have a responsibility, but they may often lack confidence in terms of how to provide support.

Other changes include digitalisation and increasing interdisciplinarity. Whilst digital technologies can enable candidates to carry out their research at a distance, they also can present challenges too; candidates need to learn and work with digital tools and systems.

Interdisciplinarity can also lead to the emergence of barriers. Supervisors from different disciplines can communicate using different academic languages. This leads to the important question of: how do examiners from different disciplines understand what is meant by an effective contribution to a field?

Given that there are more doctoral students than full time academic posts, supervisors and graduate schools have a responsibility to offer help and guidance to candidates, to make them aware of what opportunities might be available to them after they finish their research.

This leads us to a wider question, which is: what is doctoral research for if its purpose isn’t to train academics? One answer be connected to the word capitalisation. In other words, doctoral research can have economic value as well as academic value. There is a link here to the notions of human capital and knowledge economies, and this can be linked to whatever is meant by economic growth. It could more directly argued the doctoral research helps to develop the skills and abilities of researchers. This release to the Vitae researcher development framework https://www.vitae.ac.uk/   which describes skills that researchers should acquire and develop over the course of their studies.

The UKCGE framework

Supervision has changed from an adjunct activity that takes place within a private space to a more demanding complex set of roles which are carried out and supported by supervisors and organisational units. 

What follows is a summary of the UKCGE framework. Stan was Invited in 2019 invited by UKCGE to define good supervision practice. These were combined into a draft framework which was then streamlined into 10 domains which aimed to describe the core elements of good practice. To become a recognised supervisor, applicants to the UKCGE scheme must provide evidence under each element.

What follows is a summary that has been made following the workshop presentation. The official description of these criteria can be found by through the Good Supervisor Practice Framework summary. 

1. Recruitment and selection

This element relates to the very start of the doctoral journey. Recruitment involves reaching out to diverse candidate populations, developing a research proposal with a potential candidate, and offering feedback to candidates.

Supervisors should publicise the areas of research that they can offer. They should also participate in campaigns to recruit from underrepresented groups, assess whether applications from candidates that are likely to make the transition to independent researchers, and assess whether a research project is realisable, and candidates have the knowledge and skills. Key tasks will include interviewing applicants, making a final decision and giving useful feedback. An important question to ask is: how do you make the decision about whether someone has the skills for independent research, and what is the evidence for this?

2. Relationships with candidates

This criterion relates to having an awareness of diversity of candidates, negotiating expectations between student and supervisor, monitoring of activities, and understanding of issues. Supervisors should be conscious of different supervisory styles and their relationship to student needs and be aware of how student needs change over time.

3. Relationships with co-supervisors

Supervision now typically takes place within teams. Supervisors need to be aware of the benefits of team supervision and issues that may arise whilst working within a team. It is important to clarify the roles of co-supervisors, important to set expectations of the project, and regularly review relationship with co-supervisors and candidates. This criterion relates to the importance and necessity of working well with others.

4. Supporting candidates’ research projects

This relates to “inducting candidates into research, advising them about how to go about it, advising on skills and issues”. In other words, helping them to become familiar with what research entails within a field of study. The involves “discussing conceptions and misconception of research, looking at threshold concepts”, discussing issues of academic integrity, choosing topics, advising on notions of theory, methodology and methods. Other aspects of support includes helping candidates to navigate through the necessity of gaining ethical approval (if appropriate to their project), and developing research skills.

5. Encouraging candidates to write and giving appropriate feedback

Encourage candidates to write “throughout their studies, not at the end of research, giving effective feedback”. Writing is something that can be practised. Although a lot of writing is typically done towards the end of a doctoral project, it is helpful to encourage candidates to write from the start of their studies to assisting their development of academic writing skills. Key points includes: create opportunities for writing, give timely, constructive and actionable feedback, and consider the suggestion and use of research diaries and writing of blogs. A point I noted down from the discussions were: ask students what they understand by the feedback they have received. Supervisors can benefit from getting feedback from their students.

6. Supporting candidates’ personal, professional and career development

This criterion links back to the earlier point that there are more doctoral candidates than there are academic posts. To help candidates with their personal and professional development, it may be helpful to offer advice and guidance about possibilities within the domain in which they are carrying out research. It is also important to be a good role model in terms of work-life balance, it would be useful to introduce candidates into disciplinary networks and activities, and supporting their development as teachers. Where possible, advice about academic careers and post-doctoral work (and challenges that accompany these roles) is helpful.

7. Supporting progress and monitoring progression

A point that was highlighted earlier was: candidates have to complete within a 3 or 4 year period. A question is: what might a supervisor do to motivate their students during this time? Also, how might a supervisor or supervision team actively monitor progress? Two suggestions could be: encouraging students to attend conferences (which can also help them to develop their writing skills and contribute to departmental seminars. From a pragmatic and administrative perspective, supervisors must help students to participate in formal progression events (in the OU context, this is called upgrade reports). This might mean the reviewing of documents before sent onto graduate schools.

8. Supporting candidate through completion and final examination

This point strikes me as being very practical. Supervisors should offer advice on submissions and examinations, and should work closely with a candidate to finalise their submissions. Some direct advice was shared at this point: encourage students to look at exemplar submission so students understand what is meant by, and what should go into a thesis. A thesis should, of course, present an argument, with accompanying evidence. Supervisors can offer some really practical help: they can help students to prepare for the viva by describing the procedures, and running a mock viva. Different supervisors from a supervision team can take on different roles. It doesn’t end with the exam: supervisors also have a responsibility to support candidates after the viva, especially if some corrections have to be made.

9. Supporting candidates to disseminate their research

This point links to some of the earlier points, which related to encouraging students to attend conferences and workshops, and thus help to develop their writing skills. Essentially, this point is all about “making work available within the community” and sharing findings with a wider audience. A useful point was: “set expectations at the start of the candidacy” about what is expected, role model the process of publication to show how its down, encourage candidates to publish as they go, and explain what is meant by co-publishing or co-authoring, and set up a post-doctoral publication plan. In some cases, it might also be helpful to consider dissemination and publication alongside the concept of research impact, which is something that postdoctoral researchers need to include into research bids and plans.

10. Reflecting upon and enhancing practice

Reflection is a cornerstone of education, and it feels right that those involved in providing supervision should not only reflect on their practice, but regularly “undertake appropriate professional development and disseminate”. A bit of advice to accompany this point was: use an appropriate mix of methods for evaluating supervision, undertake initial and continuing professional development, and contribute to the professional development of other supervisors. A further point was: professional development isn’t just about workshops; it can also be keeping up to date with reading. There is, of course, also a considerable literature about supervision. Finally, professional development opportunities may be provided by your university’s graduate school, or equivalent unit.

Writing an application

During the workshops we were offered some advice and guidance about the application procedure and the process of writing an application.

A submission is a reflective account of your supervisory practice which addresses each of the 10 headings. Applications should be 5k words in length, with a permitted 10% leeway. Two referees are required, one of which should be from a former doctoral candidate. The second referee should be a colleague who knows about your practice, but need not necessarily be someone who is involved with supervision.

Applications are read by two reviewers who are recognised supervisors themselves; all applicants receive constructive feedback. The reviewers are recognised supervisors who have completed a training programme about how to evaluate submissions. If recommendation is acceptance, you become a UKCGE recognised supervisor.

Preparing a submission

To help to prepare a submission, the UKCGE have prepared a workbook, in the form of a detailed Word document. The workbook is a template, which offers some guidance and spaces to allow candidate to comment on each of the criteria of the framework. A practical suggestion is to provide two examples to evidence your understanding and experience.

Begin with an introduction

A useful bit of advice was to begin with an introduction. Do describe your educational background, summarise the number of research students supervised and in what capacity including the number of students who have completed. Also provide other relevant information, such as whether you have experience of an examiner of research degrees, and whether you have been an internal or external examiner.

Evidence of scholarship

A question that was asked was: “are we expected to use academic references in our application, like we did for an Advance HE SFHEA submission?” The answer is: yes. Evidence of scholarship, and awareness of scholarship that relates to supervision is necessary. A practical suggestion is to provide between 8 and 12 references. A good place to look is the bibliography documents which are provided by the UKCGE. A couple of links have been provided in the resources section of this blog.

Points to bear in mind

Do include evidence that relates to all the criteria. If this is not possible, offer an explanation why not. Examples should be drawn from recent practice.

Application should relate to you, and should have a reflective quality. Write about why you did something.

As suggested above, you should show engagement with research, scholarship and professional practice, and links with professional bodies and wider communities.

You must demonstrate real and practical commitment to reflection about supervision practice.

Making a submission

In this pilot, the OU will be making what is called a group submission. The UKCGE does, of course, accepts individual submissions, which must be accompanied by a processing fee.

Reflections

Things have changed since I was a doctoral candidate. There is more structure and formality than there used to be. 

Reflecting on the framework, I’ve come to the conclusion that I had a pretty good doctoral experience. My supervisor gently introduced me to many of the principles and ideas that are embedded within Stan’s framework. There were regular meetings, I was encouraged to write and publish early, to join academic communities, and there were discussions about the role of theory in research, and what is meant by co-authoring. There was also some discussion about post-doctoral planning too, but it was done in quite an informal way.

Thinking back, it took me quite a few years to publish the final article from my doctoral research. Curiously, it wasn’t the main research that had the biggest impact. A small paper that I wrote along the way grabbed the attention of fellow software engineering researchers. This goes to show the importance of “getting things out there”. 

Two noticeable differences come to mind: I don’t remember there being a graduate school when I was a doctoral student, and there wasn’t a supervision team. 

I also remember struggling too. At the time, I was trying to do too much: I was working part time whilst I was studying full time. I should have made more time to have more fun, and to relax; that could have potentially helped me to be a bit more creative.

I’m currently a supervisor on two different doctoral programmes; a doctorate in Education programme, and a disciplinary doctorate. I’m also something called a third-party monitor for candidates on both programmes.

I like the framework since I feel that it solidifies and clarifies many of the important responsibilities of supervisors. It also implicitly connect with another (optional) aspect of my day job, which is supporting undergraduate students. With all these different perspectives, I’m definitely going to make a submission.

Resources

I have written some other blogs about doctoral study and supervision, as well as summarising some of the continuing professional development that I have participated in:

• Blog: Doctoral research: a short introduction
• Blog: Components of the EdD Professional Doctorate Programme
• Blog: Supporting EdD/PhD students through the thesis and the viva

The following resources from the UKCHE are likely to be useful when it comes to making a submission:

• UKCHE: Good Supervisor Practice Framework
• UKCHE: example applications and resources
• UKCHE: Resource Library

For supervisors making submissions, the following two resources may be especially useful, depending on the context:

• UKCHE: The Research Supervisor’s Bibliography
• UKCHE: Research Supervision at a Distance: A Bibliography

Supervisors should, of course, be aware of the following framework:

• Vitae Researcher Development Framework

During these workshops, the QAA, the UK Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education was mentioned. The following link offers a summary of the characteristics of doctoral degrees:

• QAA Doctoral Degrees Characteristics Statement

Acknowledgements

A substantial acknowledgement goes to Stan Taylor who designed, delivered and facilitated the workshops, with help from Soraya Tate from the OU graduate school. Acknowledgements are also given to Linsdey O’Dell, director of the graduate school, and fellow workshop delegates.

This blog is about doctoral research, a little bit of what it entails, and the different routes that are available to students who are studying in the UK. This post might also be useful for international students too.

This post begins by asking the question: “what is a doctorate?” It then goes onto describe two different routes to doctoral study: a disciplinary route and a professional route. This is followed by a very broad sketch of what doctoral research involves. 

The post concludes by sharing some of my own experiences, and offers a summary, which includes some links to some useful resources.

One thing I should add is that I don’t work for the university graduate school, but I do supervise some doctoral students. Do always check with the OU graduate school if you need further information, or the equivalent unit that is likely to exist within your own institution.

The fundamental questions

What is a doctorate and why would I want one?

A doctorate says that you have done, and are capable of carrying out original research. It also says that you have been trained to carry out research, and you are capable of advanced critical thinking. 

A doctorate is also something that can be useful if you would like to have a career in academia. Whilst it can be considered to be useful, you can, of course, still be a lecturer, and still carry out substantial research without having a doctorate. 

A related question is: will it get me a higher salary? My answer is: don’t do it for the money; do it for your subject, and also do it for yourself. 

Another answer to this question is: it all depends. It depends on the discipline, and also depends on the job opportunities that are available. Academia is notoriously and brutally competitive, and there are never any guarantees.  

Another question to ask is: would you be prepared to work for at least 4 years on a low income? During that time, your peers may well become established in parallel careers, and have spent that time continually increasing their earning potential. As mentioned above: do it for the subject, not for the money.

Do you need a masters?

For the OU professional doctorates, applicants should “normally hold, or be expecting to obtain before the start of the degree”. I’ll say something more about professional doctorate a bit later. For disciplinary doctorates, you don’t necessarily need have to have one, but they can certainly help. It may depend on the subject and the institution that you're applying to.

Do you need to be super smart?

I used to think of people who held doctorates as being a whole other species of human. I remember my chemistry teacher at school. He had an air of cleverness about him. He regularly wore a white chemist’s coat. I assumed that everyone who was called doctor was super smart. After a fortuitous sequence circumstances, I found myself having “done some stuff” and “having discovered” some things that were deemed to be suitably original enough to be given a doctorate. 

The thing is, I’m not super smart. 

What I would say is that I was passionate and interested in what I was doing to be able to find sufficient determination (and time) to really focus on a narrow area of study. Being smart is important (as is being humble), but determination matters more. You must be motivated, and maintaining motivation over an extended period of time isn’t easy.

How big is a contribution?

Doctoral research is all about carrying out original research, which broadly means discovering something new that no one had ever discovered before. This sounds like a big deal. Another fallacy that I had when I was a kid was the view that these “doctors” must have discovered something huge during their studies; something that could change the world or the course of history.

The reality is, conversely, a lot more mundane. 

One way to think of academia is to think of it as a community in which the academics contribute to a huge set of on-going debates. Everything is mostly very polite since the academics argue with each other, through the medium of academic articles and formal presentations. Academics might, for example, argue about the role and importance of the topics that make up their discipline. Doctoral students learn how to contribute to that massive debate; they’re elbowing their way in, to say: “hey, have you thought about, looked at, or seen this?”

The contribution to one of these debates can, in fact, be really small, but it can still represent a contribution.

I am a big fan of social science methods, particularly ethnography. Ethnography is all about writing about people and communities. Ethnographers write about what people do, and how their communities operate. A doctorate in the social sciences which applies ethnography might study what happens in a particular community over a period of time. Communities (and cultures) come and go, and are influenced by the events and circumstances that surround them. The very act of writing and describing a potentially short lived community represents a contribution, which other academics can look to, study and examine. In sharing your contribution, you contribute to wider debates about societies and how they work.

In computing, my home discipline, researchers might go about building software, or combining new bits of software in a unique way to demonstrate a new concept or idea. A new software tool might be a very modest contribution, but someone else might pick it up and take it into a whole new creative direction. 

Although the phrase “making an original contribution to human knowledge” sounds pretty intimidating and very grand, the contributions that doctoral researchers make can be modest. This said, some doctoral students can also be fundamental in facilitating breakthroughs. Also, it isn’t just the output from a doctorate that is important; the process is important too.

Types of doctorates

Within the OU (and other institutions) there are, broadly, two types of doctorates: disciplinary doctorates, and professional doctorates. I’ll begin with disciplinary doctorates.

Disciplinary doctorates

Disciplinary doctorates, simply, are doctorates that take place within a discipline! There are a number of routes to a disciplinary doctorate. These differ in terms of how the research question, or problem. A disciplinary doctorate might begin with a specific problem that needs to be solved, or it might begin with a research question from a student.

Doctoral research roles

Some doctoral students may carry out research as a part of an established funded research project or programme. In some ways, gaining a doctorate this way is a bit like having a job. Programmes of this kind are usually full-time, where students get paid a modest salary (or stipend), rather than having to pay the university for registration and supervision fees.

The funding for these opportunities might come from a funding council (or research funding body), which has decided to fund a project that has been proposed by a professor or a team of academics. 

Alternatively, the funding for some doctoral jobs may come from industry. In these cases, a company or business might have a very particular research and development problem that may have never been solved before, and one way to solve it would be to set up a project which may involve doctoral students. The outcomes from the project would give the business an insight into how to solve a problem, and give a doctoral student experience of carrying out research into a technical domain, and writing a thesis.

In the UK context many of these research opportunities are advertised on a well-known academic jobs board (Jobs.ac.uk). It is quite interesting and useful to have a look at some of these to see what kinds of qualifications, experience and characteristics research groups are looking for. This board also sometimes advertises opportunities in other countries too. When I last had a look I saw positions available in Sweden, Germany and Hong Kong. For an even broader international perspective, another site that is worth visiting is Find a PhD (website). 

Doctoral scholarships

Some of the roles that you may see on those PhD job board may be quite varied. You might see positions that address a very specific research problem. On the other hand, you might sometimes see scholarships which are more loosely to a subject or a topic area.

The school in which I am affiliated with advertises a couple of PhD scholarships per year. Whilst some of these scholarships might be connected to certain industrially funded projects, the school also advertises a list of research topics (OU School of Computing and Communications). 

It is also worth looking at how a university structures their doctoral research programmes. Through wider funding schemes, which are aimed at certain subject areas and facilitating collaboration, there is also something called doctoral training partnerships (OU website) which is also worth looking at.

Choosing your own research path

Sometimes you might have a disciplinary research idea or an interest that is entirely legitimate, but doesn’t immediately fit with any advertised funded PhD role or scholarship that is currently being advertised. If this is the case, you still may well be able to become a doctoral student, but you may have to handle the financial bit from your side. 

The way I understand things, there are two broad approaches: you can either find a source of funding yourself, or you can pay your own registration fees from your own pocket, or through a doctoral loan (GOV.UK website).

I’ve recently heard of something called Commonwealth PhD Scholarships for those looking to study at UK universities. Also, individual universities, such as the OU, Kings and UCL sometimes offer scholarships for students from minority backgrounds.

Gaining funding is only a part of the story. The other part is, of course, developing an idea. A suggestion is to draft a short proposal, and then look for a supervisor: someone who shares similar research interests.

Begin with the research questions, and ask yourself: what is it that you would like to find out. Also, start to find out, using any academic library you may have access to, whether anyone has tried to answer this question before. Doing this might, potentially, lead you towards an institution and a supervisor.

If you do decide to go down this route, there are other questions that you need to answer. Are you looking to do it full time, or part time? 

In the OU context, there is a bit of advice about part-time doctoral study (OU website). Also, do have a look at the fees, and ask the questions: can I really afford this, and am I really in a place where I can generate the determination required to just focus on one thing for anything between 3 and 6 years (depending on the doctoral programme, and the intensity of your research)?

Professional doctorates

Professional doctorates are slightly different to disciplinary doctorates. The OU supports the delivery of two professional doctorates: a doctorate in Education (EdD), and a doctorate in Health and Social Care (DHSC) (OU website).

These are described as follows: “a professional doctorate provides the opportunity for you to develop your own practice-based research in a structured and supportive environment. A professional doctorate differs from a PhD in that one of its key aims is to make a contribution to practice or policy, as well as to theory.” A big difference to the disciplinary doctorate is that you’re already likely to be working in the setting that will play an influence in guiding and informing your research. In other words, “they offer you the chance to enhance your career at doctoral level, enabling you to make a unique contribution to your profession or area of practice while continuing to work and progress in your field.” (EdD/DHSC website).

The EdD programme is described as being appropriate for “professionals in education, including school leaders, teachers and trainers, but also other professionals working in any educational context in formal and non-formal settings including the public, voluntary and private sectors.”

Working within a particular setting is important, since it provides you with a context which can be explored and studied. Every educational situation is different, and this means that there is an opportunity for EdD students to find out something about it, and how it works, and the kind of educational activities which might, potentially, make a positive difference to learners or those involved in delivering education. Finding out something about your own context in a systematic and rigorous, and academically respected way enables researchers to contribute to educational academic practice and debate.

In the OU, there is quite a difference between what happens within a disciplinary PhD and an EdD. Within a PhD, students are left at the mercy of their supervisors, in the sense that they will help them to gain an understanding of what needs to be done to learn about how to do research within their particular discipline. 

The EdD, on the other hand, has a structured taught component, which helps students become aware of the different stages of academic research. This component will introduce students to the importance of research questions, the literature review, and introduce important terms, such as epistemology, ontology, and methodology. For a detailed description of what is entailed in EdD study and research, the blog post about the Components of the EdD Professional Doctorate Programme may be useful. It is also typically expected that students should have completed an MA in Education, which may have helped to explore some early research questions.

As a brief aside, the university employs associate lecturers (who are, arguably, the most important people in the university) who deliver tutorials and provide correspondence teaching. The university provides something called a module fee waiver scheme for associate lecturers, which could be used on doctoral programmes, such as the EdD. If you are an associate lecturer, and are reading this blog, and have sometimes wondered about doctoral study, do have a chat with your friendly staff tutor.

One point that is common between a disciplinary doctorate and a professional doctorate is that you need to have a clear research idea, ideally presented in the form of one or more research questions. The more specific they are, the better. It isn’t enough to say that you’re interested in doing research into a particular area: you need to be specific about what you’re going to be looking at, and have some beginning of an idea about how you might do that.

To get onto the EdD programme, you need to write a short proposal, which will then be scrutinised by a small group of potential supervisors. Those students who have written proposals that look promising will then be invited to take place in a short interview. Typically, this will be with one of the potential supervisors.

When it comes to doctorates, students find their supervisors, but on other occasions, supervisors find their students. What everyone has in common is interests in the subject, and the process of carrying out research.

PhD by Published Work

There is a final route to gaining a doctorate, and one that isn’t as common: gaining a doctorate through publication. 

This is sometimes appropriate in cases for academic staff who may have already carried out considerable amount of research over an extended period of time, and just never been in a position to enrol to a doctoral programme. 

Through this path, a body of work may be collated together, and submitted, along with a narrative that presents each of the publications (or constituent) papers as a cohesive whole. 

The act of getting published, and engaging completely with the research process can serve as significant evidence of having worked at a doctoral level. Like with other forms of doctorate, candidates who choose this approach also have go through the viva process.

In my own experience, I don’t personally know of anyone who has gone through this route, but I do know that it exists! There is a bit more information about this approach on Find a PhD.

Doing a PhD

What everyone does on a day-to-day basis is, of course, different. 

There’s going to be reading, attending of seminars (to get an idea of how everything in the academy works), perhaps doing some lab work, maybe doing some field work, perhaps even interviewing people and collecting data. In other context, you might be writing some computer code or managing data files. Essentially, you’ll be applying whatever tools you have in your own discipline to answer your research questions.

In all of this, you’ll gain skills: you’ll develop your critical thinking skills, your writing skills, and your presentation skills. 

Posters and presentations

A lot of sharing takes place at disciplinary conferences or workshops. These are great opportunities to share your work with an interested audience and to meet with academics and students who are studying a similar subject. When you’re a PhD or EdD student, there might only be a couple of people studying the same subject that you are studying. Conferences and workshops are a useful opportunity to seek those people out and network with them. If you’re looking towards a career in academic, conferences and workshops are a really good place to find potential future collaborators.

Before you get to a point where you share your results, doctoral students are sometimes able to submit what is known as a poster. A poster is exactly what you imagine it to be: it is a poster that summarises your research aims and intention. During the breaks during a conference, delegates may wander up to your poster to find out more. This is a great opportunity to share an elevator pitch about your research. 

Publishing

I’ve heard it said that a very good master’s degree project should be at a level that a version of it could be theoretically published as an academic article. The difference between a master’s and a doctorate is that of originality. When it comes to doctoral research it is a good idea to always have one eye on publication, in terms of what you might publish, and where you might publish it. After having carried out a literature review, you should have some idea about where you might be able to share your research findings.

Going through the experience of writing, submitting, and reviewing a formal article, and being able to contribute to the ongoing academic debates within your area is a part of the doctoral training experience. Although it is possible to gain a doctorate without publishing a journal article, publications certainly help. It tells the examiners that other experts (through the peer review process) have assessed the quality of your work.

Writing your thesis

The thesis is one of the most important products of doctoral research. The thesis summarises the aims of your research, the reading you have done, the methodological approaches you have adopted, and is used to present your results, and should be no longer than 100k words. In contrast, my MA dissertation was limited to 12k words.

The OU has something called a ‘writing up’ year which some students may use, during which students may pay a reduced fee. Students must submit their thesis on time. When a submission has been made, the university graduate school will organise a viva.

Viva

A viva is an oral exam. It is a bit like a really intense interview, where the subject of the interview is the research that you have carried out. There are likely to be two external examiners, and a chair. One of your supervisors is likely to be present. You’re likely to know, in advance, who the examiners are, and may well have referenced some of their work in their thesis. There is a nice article in Prospects Magazine: Five tips for passing your PhD viva.

There are a number of outcomes following the Viva, ranging from passing without changes, through to different amounts of changes that may be necessary. A supervisor will only let a student get to the viva stage if they are confident about a positive outcome.

After the doctorate

Assuming that you’ve passed, and you’ve graduated, what next?

As mentioned earlier, academia is notoriously competitive. A doctorate is an indication that you’re capable of carrying out original research. To gain experience, and to secure an academic job, doctoral researchers sometimes look for post-doctoral research posts. These are often connected to specific research projects or programmes, which may have been set up by professors or lecturers with funding gained from research councils or funding bodies.

A personal perspective

My doctorate is in an area which could be loosely called The Psychology of Computer Programming. 

Whilst I was an undergraduate, I was really interested in how come some people found computer programming easy, and others found it difficult. To learn more about this, I managed to find a MSc course which had modules from both computing and psychology.

A chance job application to the University of Manchester (which I found in Prospects Magazine) led me to meeting my future supervisor. My research interests were combined with my future supervisor’s research interests. Subsequently, my thesis topic, studying the maintenance of object-oriented software, was born.

My original contributions have been modest. After spending considerable time finding my way through cognitive psychology papers, and learning how research was done and discussed, I noticed that there were some interesting cross-overs with research that was emerging from researchers who were studying software engineering. I realised that there was a gap. 

After doing a bit of empirical work, my contribution was a new model of software code comprehension (ResearchGate). Working on this model, also led me to a small side project, where I worked on a set of software metrics (ResearchGate), which were inspired by the psychology (and neuroscience) papers that I spent a lot of time reading. This points to one of the interesting thing about doctoral research: sometimes there are surprises along the way.

All this work was compressed into quite a short period of time since I had limited amount of funding. I didn’t return to my subject until quite a few years after graduating since I later realised that I had burnt myself out. 

There’s another aspect that is important too: I found it a very lonely experience. Other doctoral students, however, might have a very different experience, especially if they work within an established community of researchers. To counteract this potential of isolation of loneliness, my advice would always be: make sure you seek out a community within the institution in which your research is situated. I do know that the School of Computing and Communications at the OU tries to create a strong research community, so students don't feel disconnected or isolated. Also, make sure you have a break from the study and research; fun stuff is important!

After working in industry for a few years, I picked up a post-doctoral post, working on an EU funded project. Although this wasn’t in the exact area that I had studied as a doctoral researcher, I was pleased I could get stuck into something interesting that would make use of some of the skills I had acquired.

Summary

A doctorate isn’t only about discovering something new in the world. It is also about developing skills, and becoming familiar with what it means to carry out research. It also means that you become a trained researcher and communicator. It can be something that is hugely rewarding, but it is also hugely demanding. It requires commitment and determination.

This blog represents a summary of different bits of information about doctoral study that I’ve picked up over the last few years whilst starting to work as a doctoral supervisor. 

There are a lot of other resources available which might be helpful. A good place to go to is the Vitae website.

Just as teaching is a skill which can be enhanced through professional development, Vitae is described as a “global leader in supporting the professional development of researchers”. To help researchers, there is something called the Vitae Researcher Development Framework (Vitae website). One article that might be of specific interest is: Are you thinking of doctoral research? (Vitae website). A further article, which can be found within Prospects Magazine: PhD Study.

Finally, if you're looking for more information about how research degrees work within the OU, you can also visit the Research Degrees website, which contains a wealth of information.

Acknowledgements

Many thanks are extended to Marian Petre, who has suggested some really helpful changes to this blog. Marion also runs a blog about PhD research: Pragmatic PhD, which has the subtitle "craft skills for students and supervisors". She has also written a book, with Gordon Rugg, entitled "The Unwritten Rules Of Phd Research" which I thoroughly recommend. I might have had an easier, and less confused journey if I had read it whilst I was studying for my own doctorate.