Future of the PhD: experience of past supervision.

The research doctorate continues to be the main qualification required by academics in the UK and USA to begin the route to research grants and university lectureships. Probably few PhD theses are ever read, although they are lodged in university libraries. Most people assume that the important elements in a PhD will be rewritten as journal publications and will thus appear in the public domain, perhaps in a more readable and concise version that is typical in the submitted PhD. Universities’ regulations often date back centuries and the precise format of the research PhD (length, also font, binding) is often determined by university regulations. Students and supervisors work differently. This paper will discuss the PhD as it works in the UK, the examination regulations, also the future of the qualification and the likely benefits of a pan-European qualification.