Supervision of Higher Degree by Research Students: Supervisor Resource Book
This is a resource book to assist supervisors of Higher Degree by Research (HDR) students to develop the quality of their supervisory practice. It is also a useful resource for anyone, who is associated with supporting HDR students and seeking to better understand the supervision role. Supervisor training in Australian universities has tended to focus on compliance and ensuring that all supervisors understand the policies, forms, resources and support services that underpin best practice research supervision. This resource book aims to go beyond compliance by providing a range of components and tools developed collaboratively in five Australian universities through interviews and workshops with HDR supervisors. The materials in this resource book thus distill the experiences and reflections of many experienced supervisors to provide tools and learning materials for all HDR supervisors. This resource book was developed to provide the knowledge that has been gained from diverse experiences of supervision in a form that can be used to accelerate supervisor development and to prepare supervisors for experiences in the future. It is hoped that this book’s tools will encourage collaborative discussion and that supervisors’ discussions of their dilemmas and ideas will build local communities of practice about HDR supervision.
This resource book provides supervisors with knowledge and tools to improve supervision practices. It can be used to:
• equip individual supervisors, who wish to improve their supervisory practice with relevant knowledge and tools,
• provide materials that explore the dilemmas of supervision practice to stimulate individual thought and collegiate discussion in Communities of Practice relating to HDR supervision,
• support formal university seminars aimed at improving the practice of supervisors and those associated with supporting HDR students, and support online courses aimed at improving the practice of supervisors.
