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PhD Student Monitoring
PhD student progress is monitored twice a
year. The reasons for monitoring progress
are:
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Students have regular occasions at
which to review and assess their
progress.
-
Students have an opportunity to present
their work to an audience. Furthermore,
newer students can learn from the
presentations of more experienced
students.
-
Regular peer feedback can be provided
to supervisors on the quality of their
supervision and on the progress of
their students.
-
Staff and students in CSL have an
opportunity to hear about the research
interests of others in the Lab.
Monitoring itself is done within research
groups. Each research group leader is
responsible for organising PhD monitoring
in that group. Monitoring takes place twice
a year, normally in March and September.
The monitoring process, involving a
programme of presentations and a meeting of
the staff in each research group, proceeds
as follows:
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One week prior to the presentations,
each student shall provide a title and abstract for their presentation.
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For beginning students (that is,
less than three months), monitoring,
while encouraged, is optional.
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One week prior to the presentations,
each student shall give a copy of their
overheads for the presentation to their
supervisor so that the student and
supervisor can discuss the details of
the presentation and make whatever
improvements seem appropriate.
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Each student shall give a 15 minute
presentation, with a further five
minutes for questions, on the progress
of their research. The talk should be
at a level that is comprehensible for
the majority of the audience, but
should also clearly indicate the
substance of the research. There then
follows a 10-minute period during which
members of the audience, both staff and
students, can provide more general
feedback about the talk, for example,
the content of the overheads, the
presentation style, the general thrust
of the research, and so on. All staff
and students in CSL are expected to
attend all student presentations. The
supervisory panel members outside CSL
are invited to attend. Anyone else
wishing to attend is encouraged to do
so. At a suitable time during the
programme of presentations, CSL shall
provide a pizza feast for all
participants.
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Soon after the presentations, all staff
members in a research group (and
members of supervisory panels, if
possible) shall meet and review the
progress of all students in that
research group. They shall also discuss
the quality of the supervision of each
student and provide constructive
feedback to the supervisors and/or
supervisory panels as is considered
appropriate. Each student in the
research group shall also meet with the
staff members. The purpose of this
meeting is for the staff to provide the
student with constructive feedback on
his/her progress. In particular, this
is an opportunity for staff members to
provide feedback on the written report.
This is also an opportunity for the
student to raise whatever issues the
student feels are relevant to the
progress of their research. Later on,
further feedback from the monitoring
process may also be provided to
students by their supervisor. Any major
problem highlighted by this meeting, or
any other part of the monitoring
process, shall be brought to the
attention of the Head of Department or,
in case the Head of Department is
directly involved, the Associate
Director.
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