1. Research Student Development Programme and the ePortfolio
Dr. Richy Hetherington
This is not a lecture and the presentation is just meant to facilitate discussion so please feel free to stop me. I hope we will be able to agree that the development programme and ePortfolio are of benefit to the research degrees. These provisions are flexible and are continually developing so your input is always considered. I’ll give some background as to how and why the development programme and ePortfolio have come into place. I’ll then give an outline of postgraduate research student development and how we hope that the process of using ePortfolio and engaging with the development programme should be fully complementary to the students research and by no means impact negatively on the time they have available.

2. Training and Development - history
For quite some time the faculty has had mechanisms for students to monitor their progress and development initially in the form of a paper based Research training portfolio, this was converted into a electronic information (ePortfolio q. A less formal training programme largely revolved around research students attending undergrad and masters modules predated a national agenda focusing on transferable skills.

3. National Changes Number of research students has increased
HEI full time
Academic staff
99/00 113,790
15/16 135,015
% Doctoral Graduates work in HE research 6 months after graduation,19% after 3.5 years
An international policy of investing in Education and research meant a large increase in the number of research students. So the employment market has become much more competitive. Almost tripling of Doctoral Graduates in the last 17 years.
There has not been the same relative increase in the number of academic positions so more research students would be taking up other employment roles. Thus the role of the supervisor and student has become less of the master and apprentice and more, the supervisor providing a framework for the student to develop their skills as a researcher.
Number of research students has increased
Full time academic positions have not
Data from & Vitae

4. A changing employer environment
Competency Frameworks
Appraisal and feedback
Performance Management
Self Assessment
A knowledge economy dictated that companies have a greater focus on the human capital of their staff than equipment or facilities. The lack of recording of professional and skills development in academia was stifling the progress of researchers leaving academia. But also the skills required within academia being recognised as needed a broader understanding of the development of interpersonal skills and management. On the job research training as a PhD student provides excellent professional development opportunity but it was frequently a problem for researchers to articulate their wider skills.

5. Roberts Report 2002
“Many employers do not initially pay those with PhDs any more than they would a new graduate, viewing the training (particularly in transferable skills) that PhD students receive as inadequate preparation for careers in business R&D.”
“Institutions are not adapting quickly enough to the needs of industry”
The Government commissioned Sir Garth Roberts’ to produce the SET for Europe report. This has become known as the Roberts’ report and ‘Roberts’ has become byword for transferable skills training and development.
The report found that postgrads and Postdocs were not meeting the requirements of industry and as such weren’t being valued. I think the second quote highlights an important point, I don’t think there has been a significant change in the quality of postgrads or Postdocs over the years, but industry has changed. There is a much greater requirement for recording and evidencing your skills.
Newcastle’s training programme predates the Roberts report but with the Robert’s funding allowed it to develop and become embedded, the funding has now stopped but the programmes of support for researcher development are built into research student fees at around £200pA. We have also been able to introduce ePortfolio which is allows research students to record catalogue and reflect on the skills they are picking up.

6. Research council Joint Skills statement
Research Skills and Techniques: validate problems, critical thinking, a knowledge of recent advances
(B) Research Environment: broad understanding of context,. confidentiality, ethics commercial exploitation of research
(C) Research Management: effective project management
(D) Personal Effectiveness: self-discipline, motivation, and thoroughness
(E) Communication Skills: promoting the public understanding
(F) Networking and Teamworking: In the institution and the wider research community
(G) Career Management: Commitment to continued professional development
The initial reaction of the research councils was to produce the joint skills statement, and the joint skills headings. The headings reflecting the skills which students should be developing while studying towards a research degree.
Significantly the vast majority of items should be automatic for most research students. It has not always been automatic for research students, or academics at any level to recognise the skills they are developing. There has not traditionally been support for the continued development of these skills. To make sure the institutions took the Roberts agenda seriously and were able to affect a change the higher education institutions were awarded funding to support Research council students, this resource being known as Roberts funding, the funding was primarily intended to support skills headings D-G. As it is expected that skills A-C would be an automatic part of the research degree process.

7. Researcher Development Framework
RDF Headings
A1 Knowledge base
A2 Cognitive abilities
A3 Creativity
B1 Personal qualities
B2 Self management
B3 Professional & career development
C1 Professional conduct
C2 Research management
C3 Finance, funding & resources
D1 Working with others
D2 Communication & dissemination
D3 Engagement & impact
In 2011 the RDF was introduced to act as a mechanism for all researchers, so whatever stage a researcher is at they have a tool to consider their professional development. The full framework has a lot of depth but the Researcher Development Statement spells out more succinctly the areas researchers are expected to be developing in. These are split into 12 domains that forms a reasonably accessible areas for individuals to consider their development.

8. Now a Requirement
Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) requirement for all UK research degrees
Funders BBSRC, MRC have skills requirements
National and International competition to provide good quality training (part of the prospectus)
The professional development of researchers has now be come an expectation. The QAA adopted the joint skills statement. The research councils have their own specific requirements of what students should have, the BBSRC Doctoral Training Centre may make further specific requirements on studnets. This is also important for the University to be competitive, other institutions are now providing training and development opportunities so for Newcastle to remain an attractive option it is important we are able to offer this support for our research students, this can be important in attracting overseas students.

9. Development Programme Goals
Helping researchers be more effective
Aiding timely progression
Thesis completion
Improving research outcomes
Better academic career prospects
Develop researchers’ range of skills
Increase employability outside of academia
Improve confidence in skills gained and their use in a variety of roles
Recognizing that researchers do pick up numerous skills and good working attributes through their research is essential but it is also important to note that learning on the job can be supported with training and advice. The goals of the programme are to make it researchers efficient in their research. Help them know and understand the degree procedures and support them getting outputs from their research work.
Also key is that they recognize and reflect positively on the broader skills they are gaining and are able to confidently articulate these skills.

10. Research Student Development Programme
In medical sciences for the beginning of each academic year a programme of training and development material is provided to all students and lead supervisors Booklet containing a timetable The booklet a guide for the years activities and items are added that are not in the booklet. All events are booked online at the graduate school website. This allows events to be added and changes to be made throughout the year. Postgrads are ed about these changes.

11. Electronic booking system
Appropriate staffing
Monitoring
Evaluation
Accommodate Changes
Additions
The booking process allows us to electronically evaluate the sessions make sure we have enough provision available, and update the student’s ePortfolio to show which events they have attended.

12. Development Programme Timetable
In total over 300 hours of training development offered each year
Excluding safety training first year Phd has 5 compulsory sessions totalling 7.5 hours
There is one compulsory sessions per year, a professional approach is expected
A wide range of subjects are covered and over 100 hours of training are available each year, we don’t expect or want each student to take up these hours. The research councils expect students to spend approximately 2 weeks each year in transferable skills development and reflection, so this will include time completing ePortfolio as well attending workshops and other activities that help with their professional development.

13. Selection of Evaluation Results
Academic Year
Average good/very good
Average poor/very poor
Overall average (out of 5)
Total sessions run
Total attended sessions each year
Total evaluations
11/12
85% 3%
4.3 85
2814
1111
12/13
84% 1% 99
2604
1094
13/14
90% 2%
4.4
167
3743
1985
14/15 (March 15)
92% 0%
137
2712
1571
15/16
91%
190
2411
837
16/17 (April 17)
88%
213
2023
667
Mandatory
As you can see most of the material offered is information research students should be aware of including basic health & safety, Governance, ethics and Integrity (plagiarism) which students should understand before they embark upon their projects. Many of the other parts of the programme are aimed at helping the students work more effectively as a researcher. Helping them with statistics, information management and producing documents quickly and effectively.

14. New Workshop Booking System for 2016/17
To supports 3 Faculty Training programmes
-single sign on from ePortfolio / PGR CoP
can support other programmes & sharing between programmes
Student’s View (after log in):
Planned Developments include
-display training transcript in PGR CoP (aka ePortfolio) for APR panels & supervisors

15. Wider View
The faculties development programme is just a small part of what is available to help students with their development. It is important that as supervisors you encourage students to take part in other events that will help them develop. We are looking at ways to keep students informed about the opportunities to teach and to make sure the training for teaching is appropriate. Some of the feedback from the PRES (postgraduate research experience survey) indicates that some supervisors aren’t keen for students to take the opportunity to teach. This is very much at odds with what we would like, the graduate school is very keen that any research student who would like to teach is given that opportunity
National programmes such as researchers in residence and Famelab will give the students greater opportunities to explain their science to a broader audience. The benefits of this are not just for the students development but can also help supervisors when applying for future grants. The research councils support many of these schemes and expect researchers to reach out to the public. The same is true for Enterprise and Entrepreneurship, researchers who enter the Biotech YES competition will gain in a variety of areas not just a knowledge of commercialisation but the ability to manage a different type of project and work in a different type of team.

16. Faculty Travel Grant

17. Teaching PhD students opportunities to teach
Biomedical Sciences demonstrating
IT or Statistics demonstrating
Psychology & Biology demonstrating
Informal tutoring of project students
There are a number of opportunities that research students can get involved in teaching. This is great experience whether they are thinking of an academic career, it is paid work so may help with financial constraints. Comes with training and in teaching that can be built up to a national qualification through the ILTHE onto fellowship of the HEA.

18. Informal Masters & UG Tutoring
PhD students are not project supervisors
Project design and progress review is by the academic project supervisors
PhD students involvement should be with good notice and optional (no pressure)
Responsibility for wellbeing of all lies with the supervisor
Training is available for PhD students & postdocs
1. The Academic has ultimate responsibility for the UG or Masters student 2. PhD students may become involved in monitoring UG or Masters student progress but only informally (are things going OK) 3. PhD students may be involved in training of techniques but only if they want to do this, they shouldn't be assessing if the project student understands the process.
4. The design of the project should be done by the Academic, the PhD student may have input but the supervisor must take responsibility.
5. Formal meeting must involve the Academic supervisors and must take place regularly, this is not the same as a group meeting. - PhD students can be invited to take part but should not feel obliged to.
6. PhD students should be given adequate warning that a project student will be joining the group (as soon as the academic knows ~2 months?+) 7. Expectations around the PhD students involvement in providing guidance for the project student should be agreed.
8. PhD students will need to acknowledge the project student's contribution if incorporating data from their experiments or their ideas but it is not unusual that the data will be used.
9. No one in the group should discriminate or act inappropriately, the academic must oversee the groups behaviour to make sure everyone treated appropriately.
10. The safety and wellbeing of students is the Academic's responsibility, vigilance is important, the academic supervisors should ensure that correct training has been provided.

19. The ePortfolio
The ePortfolio has been created as a mechanism for research students to record and reflect upon their progress. Last year the ePortfolio was developed to align with the Vitae researcher development framework.

20. eProgression instructions

21. Blog integrated with “My Skills”
Students

22. Students add attendees
Record meetings
Students add attendees
An important function of the ePortfolio is the ability to record meetings, it is the responsibility of the student to put in these notes of meetings either adding them directly or uploading documents and these records will be shared with the supervisory team

23. Self Assessment/PDP Level description Unaware
At this stage you think that a skill/ technique might be of use to you but you don't know anything about it.
Aware
At this point you are learning about the skill/ technique, perhaps by going on a training course, reading a book on it or informally from your supervisor or research colleagues.
Informed
Now you are ready to look for suitable opportunities, where appropriate, to put this into practice, but it will take conscious effort to use the new skill/ technique.
Capable
You are now using the new skill/ technique routinely, and are consciously aiming to improve by other methods.
Recognised
The people around you recognise the change in skill level and you are now so practised that the skill has moved from your conscious level to the subconscious.

24. PRES Results for FMS students
How important are opportunities available for me to further develop my research skills
1% not important, 94% important
How important are opportunities to develop a range of transferable skills
3% not important, 82% important
Predictably the vast majority of students consider opportunities to develop their research skills as important. A large majority also consider the opportunity to develop research skills important too. One area we felt the faculty like the university and the sector did not do too well on was the opportunities for teaching. Not everyone can get these opportunities but as the quote here show some are being denied by there supervisor, that is not good practice.

25. Development programme Impacts
Timely progression and degree completion
Good research outcomes (fewer thesis corrections, more publications)
More public engagement and publicity for the research
Building confidence: 97% said ‘Recording your Research’ session improved their awareness in project & time management
So we have evaluated some of the impacts of the development programme. We found students attending session such as Managing your research degree and first year reports and literature reviews were more likely to get better results in their annual assessment and complete their thesis on time. Though difficult to show significance there is correlations between attending sessions on the use of Endnote and academic writing sessions and less chance of corrections being required.
Students attending sessions such as science and the media and poster presentation guidance have been successful in getting their research message out into a wide arena. Google famous Graciela Rocha or Cory Gellaty.

26. Good News

27. More Good News
The good news is across the sector it seems to be working

28. Summary
Supervisors have a responsibility to support their research student’s development
Development programme and ePortfolio are there to help with this and to support student’s research activity
Benefits are for supervisors and the institution as well as the research students
Now most studentship grant applications ask what is done to develop students transferable skills and what outreach activities will take place. The development programme and ePortfolio provide ways that these requirements are met so engagement with them is not only important for the current students but also if you want to be able to get research grants in the future.