The Australian honours research degree plays an important role as a pre-requisite for direct entry into doctoral research programmes. The honours degree training is particularly important to health disciplines where there is a growing recognition of the importance of research training to embed evidence-based approaches to practice. This study…

In Australia, only two-thirds of doctoral students finish their degrees, with underrepresented students completing at even lower rates. Students who successfully complete still experience many challenges throughout their degrees. In this narrative literature review, we use "preparation and readiness for the doctorate" as a framework to…

The practice of students as partners can be applied to numerous facets of the university, including curriculum design, governance, and co-curricular programs. However, while scholars have also conceptualised that student partnership can occur through co-research, adoption is far from mainstream. In this paper, we seek to go 'under the hood' of…

Purpose: Little is known about the impact external Viva examiners coming from the international community of scholars have on the quality of PhD research. This study aims to argue that the encounter between local and international examiners (IEs) is subject to various complexities, raising doubts about whether IEs' participation and approval of…

The COVID-19 pandemic has posed a real -- albeit rare -- test for human and organisational resilience worldwide, including those in the higher education sector. In this paper, I reflect on my observations of the pandemic's impacts that have rippled through the university sector in Australia in the first three quarters of 2020. The pandemic has not…

Virtual mobility experiences provide a valuable option to enrich student learning and development from home. However, there is a lack of evidence of how these online experiences are leveraged in STEM and their potential positive effect on students' critical thinking capabilities. This study explores and details the design of a short-term virtual…

The article examines the experiences of Chinese PhD students doing research in China Studies as well as the experiences of their supervisors who supervise their research in Australian universities. By conducting semi-structured interviews with both PhD students and their supervisors, we aim to understand the expectations, concerns and challenges…

To be successful, junior faculty must properly manage their time in the face of expanding responsibilities. One such responsibility is supervising undergraduate research projects. Student research projects (either single or multi-student) can be undertaken as a full-time summer experience, or as a part-time academic year commitment. With many…

How can universities ensure that strategic aims to integrate research and teaching through engaging students in research-based experiences be effectively realised within institutions? This paper reports on the findings of a qualitative study exploring academics' perceptions of the challenges and barriers to implementing undergraduate research.…

The research process and associated literacy requirements are often unfamiliar and daunting obstacles for undergraduate students. The use of social media has the potential to assist research training and encourage active learning, social inclusion and student engagement. This paper documents the lessons learned from developing a blended learning…

A "knowledge society" relies on a workforce with high-level skills in Information and Communication Technology (ICT). Continuing development of ICT will arise partly from research undertaken by doctoral graduates. However, compared to other cognate disciplines, ICT has relatively few students taking up doctoral studies. This article…

While the model of students and staff working in partnership to enhance university education is well-established internationally, it is still an emerging field in Australia where most of such initiatives involve only small numbers of students. This paper examines the opportunities and challenges for students-as-co-inquirers initiatives in…

The number of international higher degree research students has grown at a significant rate in recent years, with Australia becoming a hub for attracting such students from around the world. However, research has identified that international higher degree research students often encounter a wide range of academic and socio-cultural challenges in…

Team supervision of PhDs is increasingly the norm in Australian and UK universities; while this model brings many improvements on the traditional one-on-one research supervision, it also introduces new complexities. In particular, many students find the diversity of opinions expressed in teams to be confusing. Such diversity in supervisor feedback…

The flow of international students to study in Australia increases each year. It is a challenge for students to study abroad in a different sociocultural environment, especially for postgraduate research students, as they experience numerous difficulties in an unfamiliar and vastly different study environment. A study aimed to investigate the…