Research degree supervision: 'more mentor than master'

Introduction One can say a lot about research degree supervision, and indeed whole books have been written about it. The aspects touched on here are issues of pragmatic concern in my dual roles as a dean of graduate studies and professor of applied mathematics in a relatively new university––University of Technology, Sydney (UTS). While my own background is scientific, what strikes me most in my pan-university role are the similarities of the problems across fields of study rather than the differences. A widespread problem is “inadequate supervision; a lack of communication between supervisor and student; the student’s misperception of standards, requirements, and of the supervisor’s role and functions” (Zuber-Skerritt, 1992). One has to assume that there is some institutional and individual commitment to trying to solve such problems where they exist. Thus if there is no workload recognition for the supervisory role, then it may not be done well or it may be avoided except by the very dedicated. I have therefore decided to concentrate mainly on some practical aspects of alleviating the problem, though I recognise there may not seem to be agreement: courses for supervisors, the mentoring aspect of supervision, and various institutional structures, including graduate schools, and, even more fundamentally, what a research degree is and what it is for. The synonyms for ‘supervision’ in Roget’s Thesaurus range from ‘director’ and ‘manager’ to ‘agitator’ and ‘demagogue’. A moment’s reflection on our supervisory activities and those of our colleagues may make us feel that this is as close to an adequate definition as we can get. This is because there is a danger in trying to formalise the role of supervisor and the relationship with the candidate that we might destroy that intangible quality which makes for good supervision. Like ‘intelligence’, we think we know it when we see it even if we cannot define it. It is intangible because, even for the same supervisor, it varies, not only from topic to topic, but even more importantly with each student one guides. It is this interpersonal relationship, which can be so fragile, with its imbalance of institutional power and intellectual authority in its embryonic stages, and which defies ‘how to do it’ kits. Yet safety nets, of varying strength, are needed particularly in newer universities and emerging fields of study where the pool of experienced supervisors is limited and changing supervisor in midstream may not be feasible. Without guidelines and a framework for operation, however, candidates can be at the whim of academic idiosyncrasies. Furthermore, we now work in an era of position descriptions, performance indicators, work plans and strategic plans. Obviously not all active researchers make good supervisors, though they may be more likely to attract good students. On the other hand, it would be very rare for a person inactive in research to be even a barely adequate supervisor in mathematics and sciences. “How can a faculty that is not abreast of recent trends offer the best educational experience to the interested student?” (Merrill, 1992). The people and the personalities, the project and its purpose, can disguise the dynamics of the research degree candidature.