Professor Gina Wisker, Professor of Contemporary Literature and Higher Education at the University of Brighton, has explored how PhD students and other postgraduates gain a new sense of achievement and identity as their research unfolds.
Professor Wisker, Head of the University’s Centre for Learning and Teaching, is a keynote speaker with Dr Gillian Robinson, Reader Emerita at Anglia Ruskin University, at the biennial ‘Quality in Postgraduate Research’ conference in Adelaide in April.
Under the title ‘The Purpose and Impact of Postgraduate Knowledge’ the two will detail how UK and international PhD and postgraduate respondents emphasised changes in their sense of personal, academic and professional identities.
Impact on their professional practice also led to job changes, status changes, and changes in others’ practice. And there were long-term developments in professional practice, some international in reach.
Professor Wisker said: “We construct several short case studies from the data to explore identified outcomes focusing on the issues of the purpose and impact of postgraduate knowledge for the graduates, and the impact of their work in terms of affecting or changing understanding and practices.”