Transcript xxxxxx - The National Tempus Office of Lebanon | National

SEMINAR FOR BOLOGNA AND HIGHER
EDUCATION REFORM EXPERTS
Organisation and Profile of Doctoral Studies
Salzburg Principles
Chafic Mokbel, University of Balamand, Research Council, HER Expert Lebanon
Mazen El Khatib, HER Expert Lebanon, Pierre Gedeon, HER Expert Lebanon,
Amer Helwani, NTO Lebanon, Aref Soufi, NTO Lebanon
Holy Spirit University of Kaslik, USEK, 11-12 March 2013
Outline
> History, Context and Motivation
> Some Challenges Facing Doctoral Studies
> Salzburg Principles and Excellence in
Doctoral Studies
> Discussions and Perspectives
History, Context and Motivation
> March 2005: The European Charter for Researchers – The Code of
Conduct for the Recruitment of Researchers
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Defines general principles and requirements to specify the roles, responsibilities and
entitlements of researchers as well as of employers and research funders
> February 2005: Bologna Seminar yields to the Salzburg Principles
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Seminar set to discuss the new action line “EHEA and ERA two pillars of Knowledgebased Society”
Organizers
Austrian federal ministry of education. Science and culture
German federal ministry of education and research
European University Association
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300 participants, 48 universities and 25 countries => Large interest to contribute to
policy debate
Seminar discussed the European Charter for Researchers
> June 2010: Salzburg II Recommendations
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EUA-CDE (Council for Doctoral Education) annual meeting
Free University in Berlin
Intensive Consultation
220 participants, 165 institutions and 36 countries
Recommendations in 3 categories
Research as the basis and the difference
Cues for success
Clearing the obstacles
> June 2011: Report of Mapping Exercise on Doctoral Training in
Europe: “Towards a Common Approach”
History, Context and Motivation
> Few Numbers (2008)
● 1.5 Millions FTE researchers in Europe
● Researchers share of the total labour market: 6‰ in
Europe, 9‰ in USA and, 11‰ in Japan
● Share of Researchers in Business Sector: 46% in
Europe, 68% in Japan, 79% in USA
● R&D intensity (percentage of GDP): 1.9% in Europe,
2.8% in USA, 3.4% in Japan
● 600,000 doctoral candidates in Europe; 110,000
graduating every year
> Need for more researchers and therefore
to further develop the high quality
doctoral studies and training
History, Context and Motivation
> This reflected in the Europe 2020 flagship
● 1. By the end of 2011, Member States should have strategies in place to train
enough researchers to meet their national R&D targets and to promote
attractive employment conditions in public research institutions. Gender and
dual career considerations should be fully taken into account in these
strategies
● 4. In 2012, the Commission will propose [on the basis of the provisions on
ERA in the New Lisbon Treaty] a European Research Area framework and
supporting measures to remove obstacles to mobility and cross-border
cooperation, aiming for them to be in force by end 2014. They will notably
seek to ensure through a common approach:
- quality of doctoral training, attractive employment conditions and gender balance in research
careers;
- mobility of researchers across countries and sectors, including through open recruitment in
public research institutions and comparable research career structures and by facilitating the
creation of European supplementary pension funds;
History, Context and Motivation
> Key stakeholders working on Doctoral
Studies and Training
● EUA - CDE
● LERE (League of European Research Universities)
● Coimbra group
● Thematic Inititiatives
> The ten Salzburg principles are set to
guide the development of relevant and
high quality doctoral studies and training
Outline
> History, Context and Motivation
> Some Challenges Facing Doctoral Studies
> Salzburg Principles and Excellence in
Doctoral Studies
> Discussions and Perspectives
Some Challenges Facing Doctoral Studies
> Rapid Development of Science and Technology
Duration of PhD preparation
and originality?
What to include
in the 3rd cycle?
Where to place
the boundaries?
Third Cycle
Second Cycle
First Cycle
Development of
Science and Technology
Three Cycle System
Some Challenges Facing Doctoral Studies
> Knowledge based society (economy)
●
Central role to higher education and especially Doctoral Studies
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Balance to find between long-term and short-term research
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Demand for more PhD holders
Applied Research
Short-term Research
Theoretical Research
Long-term Research
Number of Researchers?
Bandwidth of doctoral programmes?
Some Challenges Facing Doctoral Studies
> Globalisation
● Originality and competitiveness to be shown at wider scale
● Relevance to be sought at the international level
● Recognition a more crucial issue
● PhD candidates and researchers to be more dynamic
> Other Challenges
● Local levels of knowledge and skills
● Socioeconomic levels
● Resources allocated to research
● …
Outline
> History, Context and Motivation
> Some Challenges Facing Doctoral Studies
> Salzburg Principles and Excellence in
Doctoral Studies
> Discussions and Perspectives
Salzburg Principles
> i/ The core component of doctoral training is the
advancement of knowledge through original research
● However, meet the increasing needs of employment market
● Training by research
Provide candidates with core skills
– problem solving; innovative, creative and critical thinking; analyzing and synthesizing knowledge;
developing strategies
● Training in transferable, “generic” skills and competences should become
an integral part of all doctoral programmes in order to meet the challenges
of the global labour market
> ii/ Embedding in institutional strategies and policies
● The university is responsible for design, structure and organisation of its
doctoral programmes with regulations covering: recruitment, supervision,
exams, evaluations and monitoring, and defence of the thesis throughout
the university
● Orientation
● Tutoring and Advising
Salzburg Principles
> iii/ The importance of diversity
Diversity at all levels throughout the European space should be
seen as a strength
Diversity needs transparency and quality
Discipline differences require more different approaches than
institutional or system differences
> iv/ Doctoral candidates as early stage
researchers
● In the European Charter for Researchers: “Early stage
researchers are professionals who are trained through
research in the conception or creation of new knowledge,
products, processes, methods and systems, and in the
management of the projects concerned”
● Doctoral stage should be recognised as the first part in a
professional career
● Doctoral candidates to participate at all levels in the
University governance process
Salzburg Principles
> v/ The crucial role of supervision and
assessment
● Arrangements for supervision and assessment should
be based on a transparent contractual framework of
shared responsibilities between doctoral candidates,
supervisors and the institution
● Who can be a supervisor?
● How often she/he meets with the candidate?
● How many candidates the supervisor can manage and
how the research progress is monitored?
> vi/ Achieving critical mass
● Crucial to have an impact
● Bilateral and multilateral collaboration at local, national
and international levels
● Virtual research networks
Salzburg Principles
> vii/ Duration
● Between 3 to 4 years
● Flexibility in the duration is needed: for discipline differences,
gender issues, …
● Full-time and part-time doctoral studies?
> viii/ The promotion of innovative structures
● To meet the challenge of interdisciplinary training and the
development of transferable skills
● Transferable (“generic” professional and personal) skills and
competences to ensure wider employability of doctoral candidates
in different sectors of the economy and society: communication and
presentation skills, writing skills, project and time management,
human resources management, financial resources management,
teamwork, risk and failure management, etc
● Transferable skills and competences facilitate multidisciplinarity
● ECTS to be used in structured course-part of doctoral programmes
and not for measuring research progress
Salzburg Principles
> ix/ Increasing mobility
● Doctoral programmes should seek to offer geographical as
well as interdisciplinary and intersectoral mobility and
international collaboration within an integrated framework of
cooperation between universities and other partners
● Several support programmes exist: Marie-Curie, Joint
doctoral programmes, Co-tutelle
● Classical obstacles exist
● Inter-diciplinary and inter-sectoral mobility exist
● No consensus on doctoral label
> x/ Ensuring appropriate funding
● The development of quality doctoral programmes and the
successful completion by doctoral candidates requires
appropriate and sustainable funding
Outline
> History, Context and Motivation
> Some Challenges Facing Doctoral Studies
> Salzburg Principles and Excellence in
Doctoral Studies
> Discussions and Perspectives
Discussions and perspectives
> The Salzburg ten Principles aim at fostering
[formal and recognized](ii) doctoral training
models and their [well defined supervision and
assessment processes](v) that prepare [good
young researchers](i) [formally recognized as
such](iv) with [transferable skills and
competences](viii) in an [appropriate period of
time](vii) and with an [adequate financial support
scheme](x) in fields with recognized [critical
mass](vi) while making good use of [mobility](ix)
and preserving [diversity](iii)
Discussions and perspectives
Discussions and perspectives
> This copes with nearly all the challenges
and clearly point out that, with the
present socioeconomic context and with
the fast development of science and
technology, although research is first an
individual effort, a formal and well
thought setting is needed to make the
best out of the doctoral studies
Discussions and perspectives
> The optimal balance is to be found
between the Salzburg principles
Duration
Relevance
Support
And
Supervision
Discussions and perspectives
Core R&D
Skills
Transferable
competences
Discussions and perspectives
> While the 10 Salzburg principles are
suitable, the good balance is still to be
found
● Depending on the context: system, institution
● But also sector, discipline
> Is it relevant and appropriate to
integrate the postgraduate within the
third cycle?
● Is it the good timing?