On 18 Mar 2007, at 1:02 pm, Chris Rust asked:

> Are we giving students enough experience of organising and  
> presenting their work? Are they properly prepared when they go to  
> their first conference? Are we setting a good example in our own  
> practices as teachers and researchers?

Chris raises an interesting question about the experience we give our  
students at the more advanced level.

Perhaps the question further upstream from this one should be 'are we  
giving students enough experience of research'?  I know I am not  
alone in being very concerned about the quality of even basic  
research training in some of our universities.  It seems to me that  
some of it is at such a low level that the new doctors will be unable  
to conduct independent research or to adequately supervise further  
doctoral students.  Anyway, that is a contentious issue that I park  
to one side for the moment!

Organising and presenting research work has been a main concern of  
the AHRC-funded Design Advanced Research Training (DART) project  
which I lead at Middlesex with partner institutions London  
Metropolitan University and University of Hertfordshire.

The intention of the project, now in its second year, is to provide  
doctoral students from the partner institutions with experiences  
beyond their training in basic study skills or generic training in  
research methods.

We run a workshop in July on writing, arguing, and presenting.  This  
is taught by, among others, Ken Friedman supported by a number of  
excellent colleagues including Carlos Sapochnik who teaches our  
masters module 'foundations of research', and Kristina Niedderer who  
speaks of the postdoctoral experience.  Chris Smith coordinates the  
LMU students who have been especially active in our debates.  We also  
deal with argumentation, and the basics of getting your message  
across in screen presentations.

After this intensive workshop, with the students prepared, we expect  
them to develop a paper over the summer for presentation at a one-day  
closed conference held in September.  We run this just like a day  
from a real conference, with a schedule, networking coffee breaks,  
name badges, session chairs, and even a keynote speaker (Nigel Cross  
last year).  The students then present their work, the audience ask  
questions, and organisers and supervisors provide an expert panel  
offering feedback.  It is run strictly to the usual format of 20  
minutes + 10 questions/handover.  We have a washup session at the end  
to draw out main conclusions.

These have proved enjoyable events for both staff and students, and  
aim to be critical and supportive.  It works because the students  
respond well to the challenge in the training workshop, and as they  
will know few others at the one-day 'conference' it has the feel of a  
real event.  One of my students, Evandro, was due to speak at the  
Wonderground conference a few weeks later, and he was able to use our  
closed event as a dry run.  He gave a polished performance in Lisbon,  
of course.  I note that a fair number of PhD students now present  
their work in progress at conferences (I know Chris does this  
regularly with his students for example, and it is certainly common  
in Asia) and this is important in students exposing their work to  
others, as well as meeting more experienced researchers.

To facilitate students gaining experience of an actual conference,  
DART is also sponsoring students to attend real conferences.  For  
example, we have sponsored 15 student places at the Experiential  
Knowledge Conference to be held at UH this June.  These students will  
attend as full delegates including the conference dinner, and of  
course the conference theme is also pertinent to their studies in  
design especially if there are elements of design practice in their  
research.

DART will be running more workshops in future, and we see this as  
helpful in locating new doctors within the group of professional  
researchers.  From next academic year, at Middlesex we will offering  
MRes students a similar experience.

There is a website http://www.DARTevents.net but with the caveat that  
it is very new, still under construction, and has limited information  
at the moment (though Ken's writing workshop is there).  We aim to  
make all the materials public in due course, and a resources section  
is being developed.

I will be very interested in hearing what others are doing in this  
respect, and will welcome suggestions for more events or resources  
(perhaps collaboratively) that we should consider.

David

________________________________________________________________________ 
______

David Durling FDRS • Professor of Design • School of Arts &  
Education, Middlesex University,
Cat Hill, Barnet, Hertfordshire, EN4 8HT, UK • tel: 020 8411 5108 (24  
hour answering machine)
international:  + 44 20 8411 5108  •  email:  [log in to unmask]  •   
email:  [log in to unmask]
web: http://www.dartevents.net   http://www.durling.co.uk