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HEALTH: The PhD student as supervisor for undergraduate students – how and when?

Objective

As a part of their teaching responsibilities, PhD-students sometimes act as co-supervisors for undergraduate students’ bachelor projects, written assignments, master thesis, or research year assignments. In doing so, the PhD-students play an important role as a near-peer-supervisor guiding the students in their learning. This course aims to prepare PhD-students for their role as co-supervisors on undergraduate students’ assignments and/or learning processes. The course is relevant for all PhD students who wish to improve the quality of their supervision of undergraduate students.

Learning outcome

By the end of the course, the participants can:

  • Discuss and reflect on requirements and responsibilities of the different supervisor and co-supervisor roles,
  • Provide feedback to undergraduate students’ products in a way that facilitates the undergraduate students’ learning process,
  • Align expectations and interests with students and co-supervisors, and
  • Take measures to balance supervisor control and undergraduate student independence.

Content

Before the first day of the course, participants read 1-2 articles and prepare a few online learning activities about their current experiences with the supervision of undergraduate students.

Between the two course days, participants conduct an interview with a student and write a short paper about supervision. In addition, participants read 2-4 articles.

The main themes of the two course days are:

  • The roles, requirements, and responsibilities of the PhD-student as a co-supervisor.
  • The power of feedback – how to provide feedback that promotes learning?
  • Alignment of expectations and interests in supervision.
  • The art of asking questions that promote learning in the supervisory dialogue.
  • Discussions and peer-feedback on the participants’ assignments.

Recommended knowledge for participation

This course is relevant for all PhD students who wish to improve their quality of supervision. It is not crucial that the student has regular supervision with undergraduate students. However, participants will probably benefit the most if they already supervise or have supervision experience.   

Participation in the course is without cost for:

Prerequisites

Criteria for participation: University degree in medicine, dentistry, nursing, or Master’s degree in other fields and/or postgraduate research fellows (PhD students and research-year medical students).

Requirements for participation: The course is designed for participants who undertake co-supervision of undergraduate students. It is recommended that the PhD students attending this course are co-supervising undergraduate students during the course period.

Registration

For the full course description, dates and registration please see the Course Calendar of the Graduate School of Health.    

Info

  • Target group: PhD students
  • ECTS: 2
  • Language: English
  • Format: Blended
  • Span: The full workload of the course (including preparation) is expected to be 48 hours.
  • Course certificate: upon satisfactory completion
  • No. of participants: max 24

Contact

Administration

Johanne Gregor Højgaard

Course Administrator Health Administrative Centre - Health PhD Administration