Integrated disease management Vocational education Blended Learning Student-centred higher education
Not many papers have been published on exactly what supervising the development of a doctoral proposal entails. Even though the research proposal is the doorway to doctoral studies, one of the major difficulties that the doctoral candidate faces is moving from thoughts, theories and thesis statements to producing a research proposal (van Schalkwyk et al., 2016). Students need the most supervisory guidance in this phase as they test their reasoning, define a worthwhile research topic, establish an initial conceptual structure for the analysis, and make methodology choices. However, for many students, placing their ideas on paper is overwhelming as they may expose their thinking for the first time to criticism and critique (van Schalkwyk et al., 2016). It is therefore essential to have discussions with the candidate on what they have read; what they learned from their reading and how they perceive its significance. Thus, the supervisor enables the candidate to read broadly and move beyond summarizing, to examine these readings critically by allowing a deeper engagement with the theoretical positions underpinning the study. The methodological choice for the study was a qualitative method where a digital questionnaire was self-administering to academics with a PhD in Science at the Faculty of Science in a University of Technology. The digital survey was developed in Google Forms and self-administered to fifteen academics with PhDs in Science and varying levels of doctorate supervision experience. Informed consent was obtained from each participant after supplying them with the relevant background information. Each participant had the opportunity to take part in this study voluntarily, with the right to withdraw at any time. The following preliminary conclusions were compiled from the pilot study: • Experience in doctoral supervision satisfies the candidates’ need for competence and contributes to successful completion. • “To be a good supervisor of a doctorate proposal you must be a good teacher” • Doctoral supervision approaches vary amongst individual supervisors • Professional development of supervisors is essential in dealing with the “new” supervision environment. • Participants recognized the value of reflection (self- and peer) in doctoral supervision.
