Background
Research education undergoes considerable changes all the time as it touches upon a number of economic, technological, and social aspects that are constantly developing. Research supervision is the concept with a properly improved efficiency and effectiveness, this is why any possible method that can be used to provide supervisors with a required portion of knowledge and practice should be taken into account and developed accordingly.
Present paper
Current paper aims at investigating and analysing research supervision as a process, the necessity of supervisor development itself, the duties of supervisors, their roles of mentors and masters in regards to students and the educational system, and defining an outline of a program that can be applied in the system to help supervisors improve their professional skills and meet all types of expectations. Nowadays, almost in any country, research education turns out to be a crucial point that depends on national economic growth, technological innovations, and even politics (Pearson & Brew, 2002). In spite of the fact that the majority of terms has been changed or improved, the idea remains the same: in order to conduct research successfully, a professional supervisor that is usually under pressure of the necessity to improve his/her practice is required. The article under consideration proves the necessity of a professional support obligatory for students and introduces a powerful framework according to which it is possible to improve supervisor development by explaining the supervisor’s obligations and expectations. The project is motivated by the fact that the authors believe in the necessity to have a program that can go deep into the details of research training and investigate a true nature of the educative process from a students’ point of view and from a supervisors’ perspective. The authors of the article want the reader to learn better what a supervisor should do and why in order to comprehend why supervisor development is important and what this development can mean. A number of theoretical ideas have to find their practical application within the frames of the chosen article.
The authors introduce the list of skills, which are crucial for a good supervisor and prove that good manufacturing practice, communication skills, skills in experimental design, etc. are worth recognising (Pearson & Brew, 2002). They also perfectly define what is expected from supervisors and underline the attributes like an ability to address the students with a necessary portion of information, organise work in class and evaluate students’ possibilities, talk about the results expected and achieved in fact, etc. Such evaluation helps to realise what supervisors have to do to perform their main functions to be mentors and masters for their students.
In general, the authors conclude from their discussion that the necessity of a professional supervisor development programme is crucial indeed. They introduce the beginning part of the programme and underline the most important aspects like the awareness of institutional requirements and ethics for supervisors, knowledge of the required literature, or abilities to evaluate personal efficacy and competency (Pearson & Brew, 2002). Anyway, supervisor development cannot be neglected and research training should be considered as well.
Relevance to our project
Regarding our project, it is very important to know what supervisors have to do with students and how they can develop their professional skills. The authors prove that it is not a problem to evaluate the already known facts, analyse their connection, and develop a programme according to which supervisors can learn their duties better.
Reference
Pearson, M., & Brew, A. (2002). Research training and supervision development. Studies in Higher Education, 27(2), 135-150.