Supervision: the key relationship to get right as a doctoral writer and researcher

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Researcher identity, supervisor feedback, talking about writing, Writing as social identity; the reader as significant other

By Ian Brailsford.  Ian is Postgraduate Learning Adviser in the Libraries and Learning Services at the University of Auckland in New Zealand. With doctoral advising as his core work, Ian has an insightful approach to doctoral writing and the personal context that supports it.

Postgraduate research marks a transition from structured teaching and learning, with the lecturer deciding the course content, learning outcomes, assignment tasks and schedule, to fully fledged academic independence. To manage this in-between space, universities have for decades adopted an academic apprenticeship model where the less experienced researcher works under the supervision of a ‘master’. When it works well, as it does in most cases, postgraduate supervision is ‘win win’: the emerging early-career researcher is guided through the project to completion and the supervisor, as one experienced academic, Professor Robin Kearns, once put it, gains a new colleague. In an ideal world the balance of power shifts towards the end of the project; the postgraduate researcher becomes the expert and teaches the supervisor about their new-found knowledge.

However, we’re all human.

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But what about creativity?

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Creativity in doctoral writing

Today’s guest blogger is Steven Thurlow, who is undertaking a doctorate at The University of Melbourne. As part of his studies, he has written about the perceptions of creativity held by PhD candidates in the Arts (see Thurlow, Morton & Choi in The Journal of Second Language Writing). He is currently investigating how Arts academics understand the notion of creativity in doctoral writing, both what it is and where it is found.

By Steven Thurlow

It was the last class of our 6-week “creative” writing circle for Arts doctoral writers at the Australian research-intensive university where I work. We had spent each 2-hour class looking at one aspect of creativity – both practical examinations of creativity at the textual/product level and more esoteric discussions about how creativity might be present in doctoral writing processes and practices. The mood was buoyant as the students began taking their leave and heading back to their various disciplinary nooks and crannies.

As she was heading for the door, one of the more enthusiastic participants turned to me. “Gee, Steven, that was a really interesting course and I learned so much.” Then came the body blow:

When research moves too close: Maintaining awareness of boundaries

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Research writing and emotion

By Susan Carter

Some doctoral students find their study overwhelming for more reasons that all the usual ones. Sure, they face the same challenges as others do: the study is vast; there is so much to read and to write; and almost inevitably difficulties occur with the research itself—it’s hard to find participants, experiments don’t work, or data fails to make sense. But beyond all this, some students find that their research topic winds so intensely into other people’s lives it involves something of a meltdown. How can such crises be handled?

Survival and solidarity: Virtual shut up and write, parents’ edition

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Parenting during the PhD, Parenting PhDers, Virtual 'Shut up and Write'

This guest post is written by Katrina McChesney from the Virtual Shut Up and Write – Parents’ Edition Facebook group. Katrina has just finished her PhD through Curtin University’s School of Education (Western Australia), researching teachers’ experiences of professional development within education reform.

There’s no easy way to get a PhD, but many doctoral students have learned the power of community for easing the journey in important ways – motivation, accountability, encouragement, celebration of milestones, support with questions that arise along the way.

Previous posts in this group and elsewhere have described various ways this community can look – bootcamps, AcWriMo, retreats, writing accountability meetups and hands-on ‘Shut up and write’ gatherings, either in person or online via social media or web conferencing.

For a large number of doctoral students, though, the tight time frames involved in many of the above activities are problematic. I am a survivor of that highly-frazzled, multi-tasking, socially-absent, time-poor, no-longer-master-of-our-own-time experience: parenting while PhD-ing. PhD parenting was described this way in a recent blog post:

“Whether it is a ‘solid’ work day squeezed into school hours, an important paragraph stopped in its tracks by the needs of a small person, or carefully laid fieldwork or lab plans scuppered by an unexpected dash to the doctor with a sick child, interruptions to schedules are the norm, not the exception. The flexibility of PhD time can be both a blessing as well a curse. Most parents would do anything to avoid having to drag a small child along to a medical appointment or grocery shopping. For a PhD parent fitting these things into your day becomes a breeze. A breeze that is, until you realize that school pick-up is only 45 minutes away and you haven’t written a sentence since 10am.”

In this context, it can be almost impossible to carve out a whole weekend for a bootcamp, or turn up on Twitter at just the right time for #SUAWTues. Instead, we PhD parents need a ‘tribe’ with a whole lot more flexibility and understanding – a place where we can access support, encouragement and accountability whenever we happen to have a few minutes available (without necessarily knowing in advance when this will be!).

Mental health, doctoral study and supervision: Can ‘troubles with writing’ mask other problems?

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Mental health and doctoral writing, mental health and supervision

By Claire Aitchison

Corridor conversations often reflect problems more widely felt. Recently a friend, just back from dealing with a particularly difficult student-supervisor issue, revealed how concerned she was about the mental health of both parties. She had been called in to help because the student reportedly was having ‘trouble with her writing’.

For those of us who regularly work in the space between supervisor and student, being called in to help is likely to expose us to a disproportionate number of ‘troubles’. Whether identified by supervisors, research committees or students, I have come to expect a relatively predictable range of ‘troubles with writing’. These ‘troubles’ can often be sheeted back to the following:

• unhelpful feedback (typically inconsistent, contradictory, incorrect, uninformative, inappropriately delivered);
• neglect (typically little or no feedback, no formative feedback, feedback too late to be developmental);
• student resistance to taking advice;
• writers’ block.

As a literacy adviser and/or academic developer across different institutions over many years, I have also learned that such ‘writing troubles’ often coexist with intensified emotional states. Writing is a deeply personal and emotional activity – and doctoral writing is particularly fraught because the stakes are so high. For supervisors and students alike, much is riding on the ability to explain one’s work eloquently and to argue convincingly for significance. The research has to be sound, but so does the medium for conveying this good work: the writing.

But I am interested here in the co-existence of ‘writing problems’ and mental health.

Doctoral writing and supervisor feedback: What’s the game plan?

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Emotion & writing, supervisor feedback, talking about writing, Writing as social identity; the reader as significant other

By Susan Carter

Last week’s post and its comments provide an entry point to this one. Last week I drew on Peter Arthur’s thoughts on how to teach metacognition, which takes the teacher further than just teaching material, to teaching students how to manage their own learning. Reflection on this topic took me to the fact that, in practice, supervisors are learners too when it comes to the cycles of feedback and revision in doctoral writing.