Training Master’s Thesis Supervisors within a Professional Learning Community

Abstract

Completion of a master's degree has changed significantly from being the specific responsibility of the candidate and his/her supervisor to being the responsibility of the whole educational institution. As a consequence, we have initiated an internal training course for professional development related to the supervision of master's theses. In this article, we outline the course and the participants' experiences and reflections. Further, the results are analyzed and discussed. We use the analytical framework of the concept of professional learning communities (Stoll et al., 2006), and action learning as a tool to implement ideas on professional learning. The course itself was divided into two separate phases: one combined (shared) training phase and one phase where supervisors were divided into forums to discuss authentic situations arising from forum members' supervision. The results indicate that the course as a whole was successful in promoting the professional development and collective learning of the academic staff.

Gaps and Overlaps in Supervisory Responsibilities: A Case Study of Bachelor’s and Master’s Students’ Thesis Writing in Two Departments

“…Thesis supervision styles vary between different supervisors and different students, depending on their levels of background knowledge and experience (Tapia Carlín 2013, Vehviläinen and Löfström 2016). Among supervisors, a lack of confidence in their own abilities may further complicate the relationship, while their criteria for supervision style may be primarily based on individual ideas and interpretation (Fossøy and Haara 2016). One additional challenge is that students may perceive thesis writing not only as a difficult task, but also as a useless and tedious one (Tapia Carlín 2013: 80).…”

“…We see the common framework that outlines explicit expectations for both student and supervisor as an important measure in this context and of increasing interest in how to improve supervision procedures in thesis writing. However, it is acknowledged that very little empirical research, on how supervision is offered and implemented, has been conducted Samara 2006, Fossøy andHaara 2016). Harwood and Petrić (2017) claim that there is more research on Ph.D supervision than Master´s supervision, and Anderson, Day, and McLaughlin expect more attention for Master's students in research literature due to the proliferation of Master's courses: 'The dissertation process in particular has not been investigated extensively ' (2008: 33).…”