Impressive international evaluation for Health's Graduate School

The international evaluation contains many plaudits for Health's graduate school. Among the areas highlighted in the report are good onboarding programmes and clear communication, while the school also has a good balance between quality control and the administrative tasks that students and their supervisors must undertake.

The evaluation, which must be completed every five years in accordance with the provisions of the Danish University Act, was carried out in the autumn. The basis for the report is a self-evaluation together with a visit by an international expert panel consisting of a chair from another Danish university and two or three senior researchers from universities abroad.

Head of Graduate School Helene Nørrelund is pleased with the report's positive assessment.
"Overall we’re extremely pleased and proud of the conclusion – excellent is a very good starting point. But it also means that we must be careful not to ruin something that’s already working when we look to further develop our PhD degree programme in the future."

The panel paid a visit to Health at the end of September, and during their visit they assessed whether the graduate school lives up to the ministry's requirements for the education and development of PhD students and the dissemination of new knowledge within their fields.

Is big brother too big?

However, the report also highlights areas where the graduate school should have extra focus. This includes the fact that the vast majority of the approx. 640 PhD students at Health come from the Department of Clinical Medicine. A predominance that may risk pressurising the smaller programmes.

"The report's most radical proposal is that we take a closer look at the structure and distribution of our PhD programmes. But first, we need to find out whether there’s a real problem with the majority of our PhD students being affiliated with the Department of Clinical Medicine, or whether the way things are structured today actually works well," says Helene Nørrelund.

The report also points out that there are some cases in which Danish students communicate with international students in Danish. A problem the management of the graduate school is aware of, but cannot always control, according to Helene Nørrelund.

"It’s primarily in connection with activities that take place off campus that international students experience Danish being used. Of course, we need to be aware of this in so far as we can do something about it. But it’s difficult to require that English should be spoken at a hospital department. Otherwise I don’t think it’s an issue in the areas we’re able to control.”

According to the report, a requirement for 150 hours of teaching may also be stressful for some of the busy PhD students. One recommendation is therefore to make it possible to relax the teaching hours requirement while also supporting the PhD students by better preparing them to stand in front of a class. And this is an area that the graduate school is already working on, says Helene Nørrelund.

"We need to become better at supporting both the supervisors and the students. We’re therefore continuously working on our supervisor training programme, so that our supervisors are equipped to guide and support the students in the best possible way. We also need to be better at guiding the PhD students towards the courses that already exist – preferably earlier in their PhD degree," explains Helene Nørrelund.

The report has been discussed by the PhD management and by the PhD Committee. During January, the management will prepare a proposal for an action plan.

FACTS: How the evaluation was carried out

The international evaluation panel visited the PhD school on 27-28 September 2021.
The panel prepares a statement on the organisation of the graduate school and the quality assurance of the PhD degree programme on the basis of

• the graduate school’s self-evaluation report
• examples of PhD dissertations, course programmes and evaluations
• a multi-day visit to the graduate school
• interviews with, among others, PhD students and heads of graduate schools.

The panel comprised:

• Doctor Janet Carton, Graduate Educational Development Manager, University College, Dublin
• Matti Nikkola, Head of Education and Director of Doctoral Studies in Cell and Molecular Biology, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm
• Professor John Creemers, Director of the Doctoral School of Biomedical Sciences, KU Leuven, Belgium
• Professor Hans Bräuner-Osborne, Professor, Head of Graduate School, Faculty of Health and Medical Science, The University of Copenhagen.

Read the complete evaluation report here

Contact

Head of Graduate School
Helene Nørrelund