Completing on time

This year for the first time Macquarie University has introduced a mandatory commencement program for new Doctoral and Masters research students to ensure they are aware of all the support services available to help them complete their theses on time.

Dean of Graduate Studies at the University, Professor Trevor Tansley

Dean of Graduate Studies at the University, Professor Trevor Tansley, explains that similar programs have been run in previous years with students attending on a voluntary basis. This year is the first time it has been made compulsory for all new research students.

"It is in everyone's interest for research candidates to complete on time as universities are only funded for PhD candidates for four years. After that time it is up to both the university and the candidate to provide the funding," Tansley explains.

"Years of experience has taught us why some research students drop out and why some take longer than four years to complete. This program is designed to help new students hit the ground running, telling them all they need to know about research to try to minimise the numbers who don't complete on time," he adds.

The day-long program was first held in February and again at the end of July with attendances of 130 and 96 respectively. Topics included services and resources offered by the University, the rights and responsibilities of the student and supervisor, research ethics and plagiarism, intellectual property, preparing a thesis for examination, and the completion and thesis examination process.

There have been some changes to the program since its first run in February and it is set to change with each new group. "This will be an evolving program designed to meet people's needs," says Tansley. "We provide students with an extensive opportunity for feedback through discussion and a questionnaire."

The day concludes with a very positive message, of those students who are able to persevere and hand in their thesis for examination, more than 98 per cent actually pass.

In addition to this program, all candidates also receive special training from their respective University Departments later in their first semester on discipline-specific topics such as research methodologies, current paradigms and proper use of physical resources. This training is also mandatory.

"We expect that these initiatives will help candidates to get into their work quickly, minimising the time it takes to write a thesis and overcoming some of the factors which cause students to worry about whether they should continue," Tansley says.

The University has established a special website which includes presentations from the program, digital recordings of the talks, relevant archived documents and hyperlinks to appropriate support materials.

"The site is intended as an on-going resource for all research students, as well as an introduction for new ones, and a virtual presentation day for external candidates," Tansley explains.

For more information visit http://online.mq.edu.au/pub/ROCP/home.htm - to fully access the resources on this site you need to be an enrolled Macquarie University student, however it contains some freely available information.

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