Comprehensively Canada

Comments

# Tama said on August 30, 2007 1:08 PM:

Personally, I quite like the idea of comprehensives, but imagine it would be hard to 'sell' the concept since it implicitly adds a whole year to candidature, doesn't it?  

# Karen.Hall said on August 30, 2007 5:21 PM:

I like the idea of comprehensives as well - it is a good way to recognise the need for and enable postgrads to get a general as well as specific critical understanding of their discipline. It might also help bridge the Honours-PhD gap that many students face. It is also a good argument for retaining comprehsive teaching coverage within each discipline.

The downside, as Tama points out, would be the extension of candidature time or increased time and funding pressure in the thesis phase. I'm also wondering where the staffing for the comprehensive units might come from, and how it might tie into Australian ideas of the supervision process.

# Gordon Royle said on September 4, 2007 12:52 PM:

Comprehensives are great.. absolutely my biggest regret about doing a PhD in the UK/Aust system is that I have whole areas that I don't know much about, but which are too daunting to start learning from scratch.

My US/Canadian colleagues/friends always have at least that one grad level course in the area as a springboard - so they can look up their old textbook and at least have some idea of how it fits together.

My 2c

Gordon

# Kamel said on December 21, 2007 12:30 AM:

Hi

I am a joint phd between France and UWA. In my own country students have to valid some modules during the 3 years of PhD. A list of modules is proposed by the research school but you can also choose something by your own and try to make it validated by the research school . If the required number of module is not validated before the end of yhe PhD, students are not allowed to submit the thesis. These courses are very interesting and are devided in two classes : professional  and scientific courses. The socioprofessional ones intend to make students aware of their future,  their carrier and also to be confident in their environment. For example, you can choice to take part of meeting with seniors to ask about professional opportunities after a PhD or some marketing courses, using some softwares or social modules. The scientific ones are lectures given by scientists not only in your special area but more generally in your major. This is done to enlarge your view in what the others do. For example, my discipline is molecular biology and biochemistry but I would choice some neurology, virology courses because I have some backgrounds in these domains but I am not a specialist. These modules increase your enrichment, your own culture, and give you a view of what it is done in the other laboratories.

Sometimes, we have also "mini congress" in our university with all the PhD students of your school. During this congress we discuss between each other, we exchange ideas, we present some talks, posters and this is very very interesting because even if we are from the same school the disciplines are different but there are mixed during this day and you learn a lot. You can also discuss with the third, second years of PhD...

All this, is globaly the trend in France but yes because there is a BUT it really also depends of your university. If you study in a famous University (a big one generally in big cities) the research school is bigger and have more money and if not the research school will not propose you a large variety of modules.

I am from ULP Strasbourg and it is I think really a good one in sciences and especially in Life Sciences.  

I started university in my birth city, a small one and after two years I mooved to Strasbourg and I can ensure you that I felt the difference. The level was really highest and the student did more pratical works compare to me because my home university didn't have enough money and was too small.(not enough laboratories involving teachers/researchers...

This problem of disparity between french universities is now tried to be resolved by the government but it's quiet difficult.

Concerning the joint phd I think that both universities have to be more flexible with students involved in.

For example ,a french joint PhD student doesn't have to valid all the required modules like the others during his PhD but logically just half.

It's hard to think that a joint PhD student can satisfy all the requests of both university in the same time. First, because he will not have enough time and second because it 's hard to switch from one to an other eductional system...

I think that both universities have to find an agreement together and to make some concessions.

Nevertheless, being enrolled in a joint PhD have many advantages, you take the best of both and it proves that you are able to adapt yourself to a new environment;

I don't want to make the promotion of my university ,:) but if you want more informations about doctoral studies in France you can visit the websites of the graduate research schools of ULP Strasbourg. (each school has is own graduate research schoo in Francel)

The general website of ULP

http://www-ulp.u-strasbg.fr/en/bienvenue/

The links of the different research schools

http://www-ulp.u-strasbg.fr/article.php/1/23/1-080-127-870/doctoral-schools

The link of the life and physical sciences research school , my prefered ,:)

http://www-ed-sdvs.u-strasbg.fr/Anglais/presentation/missions.php

If someone wants more informations about something concerning joint PhD (between our both universities) you can contact me on my research blog.

Cheers

Kamel

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