Associate Professor Allyson Holbrook, Director of the Centre for the Study of Research Training and Impact, The University of Newcastle, will present a keynote address on Thursday 2nd October on the topic of Defining the Doctorate. Associate Professor Holbrook has been a leading researcher in the field of post graduate study for a number of years. She has published widely on research and research training, including an edited publication on Doctoral Supervision through the AARE as well as a major commissioned study on the Impact of Educational Research. Currently, Allyson is leading a team of researchers from the SORTI Centre in investigations of doctoral examination reports and ARC assessor reports. Allyson is now uniquely placed to address the topic of Defining the Doctorate.
The whole process of doctoral research, as well as the attributes, qualities and outcomes of the degree are under-explored and under-theorised. Drawing on the speaker's knowledge of the field and research she has undertaken on doctoral assessment and research impact, this keynote raises some lively questions about the aims of the doctorate and those who examine it, current interest in the quality of doctoral research and also its role in the creative and performance based disciplines. The thread that weaves through the presentation, sometimes lightheartedly and sometimes critically is what is novel and indeed significant about the process and its outcomes.
Professor Sue Rowley was appointed Executive Director for the Humanities and Creative Arts at the ARC in February 2001. She is a past president of the Australian Council of University Art and Design Schools, and has been a member of the Australian Research Council's Large Grants Committee, Humanities and Social Sciences panel. Professor Rowley is the Foundation Professor of Contemporary Australian Art History at the University of New South Wales, and prior to her appointment as Executive Director was the Head of the School of Art History and Theory at the University of New South Wales College of Fine Arts. Professor Rowley has been President of Object, the Australian Centre of Craft and Design. Her research field is contemporary art, craft and design.
The paper will focus on issues to do with the integration of research and research training, including the way in which the development of creative arts doctorates have affected research in creative arts. I will also present an overview of the postgraduate and postdoctoral research funded under ARC programs. The ARC's view is that research training is best provided in contexts of research excellence, including excellent researchers as supervisors and accessible infrastructure.
The diagram and table [Link} reflect my conceptualisation of the issues raised at the Conference as well as the issues that these suggested for me. Two broad questions frame this characterisation: (i) what defines the doctorate? and (ii) where to now? My comments [Link} are brief and intended to stimulate further discussion of the issues in particular and their categorisation in general.