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The department is currently working on advice to the minister that will take into account these
submissions as well as work by the National Standards Panel that will feed into the standards used by
the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA).
External placements
One way of broadening the experience that a PhD program provides is to enable PhD candidates
to gain experience in different environments. For this reason there is increasing interest in students
having placements in industry, government research laboratories or other non-academic programs,
whether domestically or overseas, through the course of their program. As discussed earlier, the
context within which research takes place in business can be very different from that experienced while
in an academic environment. A good example of the use of business placements is that provided by
the Accelerate program operated by the Canadian organisation Mitacs. 108 Each year this places around
2 000 research students and post doctoral researchers into four month internships in business. The
program encompasses over 50 universities and 1 300 firms. It is interesting that while around one third
of the placements involve engineering students, the next highest category is that of the social sciences,
arts and humanities. Within Australia the AMSI intern program (funded through the Commonwealth
government’s Enterprise Connect program) offers a similar service which provides:
...postgraduate students with the opportunity to take part in paid, research-based internships, guided
by an academic mentor at their home institution. Small-to-medium enterprises seeking high-end
analytical expertise can take on an intern to address a specific research challenge or problem facing
their business. Projects can cover any research area – not just mathematics and statistics – and
typically last 4-5 months. 109
As discussed below, the Cooperative Research Centre program can also offer a broader experience
to research students by linking the research closely to end-user needs and a number of universities
have their own programs to facilitate external placements. For example, the “Research Innovation,
Translation & Commercialisation” component of the University of Queensland’s Career Advantage PhD
program includes an industry internship. 110 A move to a doctoral training centre model, as discussed
below, can also provide a broader range of research experience.
Teaching and learning environment
There is a huge variation between countries in the design, development and organisation of PhD
education that extends even between institutions and disciplines within a single country. However,
some common trends are emerging.
Providing an environment that both facilitates and encourages learning is an essential precondition
for effective PhD training. At best this will promote the open exchange and testing of ideas, support
argument and discussion across disciplines and cultures and help broaden the perspectives of students
beyond the immediate focus of their personal project. The March 2010 report of the League of
European Research Universities entitled Doctoral degrees beyond 2010 concluded:
Doctoral education must be embedded in a strong research environment and culture to ensure that
the opportunities for cross-fertilisation between disciplines can foster the necessary breadth and
108. http://www.mitacs.ca/accelerate
109. http://amsiintern.org.au/about-amsi-intern/
110. http://www.uq.edu.au/grad-school/career-advantage-phd/research-innovation-translation-commercialisation
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