Training¶
To Reiterate… This is a traditional Doctoral programme which has been designed to be completed in three years. The aim of any PGR on the 3-year programme is to complete the research and the writing up within three years. The planning must take this into account from the outset. The University regulations allow for one additional year beyond the third for completing the thesis, called Submission Pending. However, most funding schemes for 3-year Doctoral programmes will end after three years, and will not fund 3-year PGRs during Submission Pending.
There is every incentive to complete this programme within the allotted three years while the funding lasts. It is an absolute requirement that you finish within three years and six months.
Therefore, the great majority time will be devoted to the main task, which is doing research and completing the thesis within three years. However there are other activities that three year PGRs are required to engage in, and yet others that they have the option of engaging in. The courses listed below are designed to help all PGRs in their endeavours. Activities such as laboratory demonstrating, mentoring and public engagement are optional though they encouraged as being conducive to the general experience of being a successful PGR and preparing for wider roles when PGRs take up their chosen careers.
Mandatory Training¶
In this section we list as a collection of things we require you do in order to be considered to be making satisfactory progress as a PGR. Of course, we cannot say that if you do these things, you will get a Doctorate. Ultimately, to achieve a Doctorate, you have to create and carry out a novel piece of research, write it up as a dissertation, and defend that work in front of a panel of examiners.
Further, a PhD is supposed to deliver a researcher as well as a thesis and so you also need to take the units we provide and engage with researchh culture here ate Manchester.
What is being said here is a list of things which if you don’t do, you won’t get a doctorate (or at least will put your ability to get a doctorate at risk).
Scientific Methods Courses (COMP81020, COMP82020, COMP83020, and COMP84020)¶
All PGR are required to take this sequence of four training units spaced over the three years and an aditional one to help you through submission pending if things aren’t going to plan. These start in semester two. Timetables for these courses can be found CS PGR information 2
The titles of these three courses are as follows:
‘Starting Your Postgraduate Research’ (COMP81020) 20 hours contact time / 50 hours total: Give the PGR the skills to be able to get started on performing quality research, including an understanding of research integrity and statutory compliance.
The unit is intended to give students an introduction to working on their PhD. It covers statutory compliance, interactions with, and expectations of, their supervisor. It prepares students for academic writing include Background Reading, Critical Analysis, Doctoral Consortiums, and Report Writing in the format expected from the Research Progress Review and End of Year Progression. The assessment of this unit is via pass or fail and it is assessed ‘off unit’ as a condition of first year progression.
‘Preparing Papers and Presentations’ (COMP82020) 20 hours contact time / 50 hours total: Give the PGR the skills to be able to write a ‘REF Aware’ Journal and Conference paper and then present it.
The unit is intended to give students an introduction to writing Computer Science centric papers while taking into account REF as an example of good practice when writing journal or conference papers. And then give them the ability to present their work at conference either in person or remotely. The assessment of this unit is via pass or fail and it is assessed ‘off unit’ as a condition of first year progression.
‘Preparing for your Final Year’ (COMP83020) 20 hours contact time / 50 hours total: Give the PGR the skills to be able to Understand the work they have left, effectively plan their time, prepare their thesis, and undertake their viva.
The unit is intended to get students ready for thesis submission and oral examination. It also provides the PGRs with the tools to be able to interact with a non-technical audience. The assessment of this unit is via pass or fail and it is assessed ‘off unit’ as a condition of first year progression.
‘Surviving Submission Pending’ (COMP84020) 10 hours contact time / 50 hours total: Give the PGR the skills to be able to Understand the work they have left, effectively plan their time, understand the consequences of being late.
The unit is intended to remind PGRs that their thesis submission and oral examination are close, and enable them to discuss barriers to them submitting in a timely fashion and to convey risk analysis and formal methods for prioritisation such as the MoSCoW method or similar.
Introduction to Research — Essentials¶
The University of Manchester Library offers training and resources to support you in your research.
Training for academic skills is available all year round, either online or via workshops. Full details can be found via the Library’s My Learning Essentials training site:
My Research Essentials (MRE) is the programme of workshops, information sessions, and online resources designed to support development for researchers at all career stages. Topics covered include resources to use during the research process, dissemination of research and raising your research profile. To help researchers navigate the programme we have created a pathway for Postgraduate Research students.
University and CS Health and Safety Courses¶
All PGRs are required by the University to pass a Health and Safety on-line course. If you want to be in the Kilburn build extended hours (outside the hours of 6pm to 8am), you will also need to pass the Department of Computer Science Health and Safety test. These tests can be found on Blackboard, which can be found at your MyManchester 6 page. Below are the instructions to take both tests.
Log into Blackboard.
Look for the “My Communities” block:
PGRs: you need to click on the “CS-PGR-Welcome” community space.
Now click on the “Health and Safety Course and Out-of-Hours Pass Information” folder.
Complete the test called “Part 1: University of Manchester Health & Safety”: you need to score 100% to successfully complete it.
Complete the test called “Part 2: Health & Safety within the Department of Computer Science”: you need to score 100% to successfully complete it.
When you have scored 100% ON BOTH TESTS the “Extended Hours Access” folder will appear.
Click on the “Extended Hours Access” folder.
Read through the guidance document, and complete the “Out-Of-Hours-Pass Test”: you need to score 100% to successfully complete it.
When you have scored 100% on the Out-of-Hours Pass Test, a link called “Out-of-Hours Completion Confirmation” will appear.
Click on this “Out-of-Hours Completion Confirmation” link, and a confirmation page will appear.
Take this confirmation page (either print it out, or show it on an electronic device) and your University of Manchester ID card to SSO (Located in the Faculty of Science and Engineering South Campus hub - based in Engineering Building A) who will issue you with an Out-of-Hours Pass for the Kilburn Building.
Out-of-Hours access is only available during the times shown on the back of your Out-of-Hours Pass. You must have both your University of Manchester ID card and your Out-of-Hours Pass with you to be allowed to work in the Kilburn Building outside normal hours.
Plagiarism Course¶
All PGRs are required to complete a short course on plagiarism. See the Section on Plagiarism and Academic Malpractice. This test is also found on Blackboard.
Research Integrity¶
The University expects the highest standards of research integrity from its PGRs. These standards are set out in its Code of Good Research Conduct 3.
All PGRs must complete the University’s Research Integrity 4 on-line training.
Those with concerns regarding Research Misconduct 5 can follow the process for reporting them.
Research Data Management¶
Research Data Management is part of good research practice, improving the efficiency of the research process and making your research more reproducible. The University of Manchester Library has a designated Research Data Management team who can provide you with support on information security, data protection policies and regulations, how to organise data, where to store research data and what to do if you need to increase storage capacity. Please find out more on the Managing Research Data webpages.
Planning: The data management plan (DMP) outlines how a research project will manage data both during the research and after the project is completed. The University’s RDM Policy requires researchers to prepare a DMP for every research project whether it is funded or not.
To write your DMP please use the University’s data management tool: DMPonline
Storing: Research Data Storage is available from Research IT services, providing 8TB of replicated storage per project, free at the point of use for funded projects (excluding commercial funders). NB: currently only staff can apply for storage space so ask your supervisor to apply on your behalf.
Sharing: Where possible we recommend using the University’s supported institutional research data repository, Figshare, an easy to use cloud-based platform that can securely store and organise your research data and publish selected datasets that support your research, making these discoverable and citable. You can then use the Research Data Gateway to record your research data in Pure
If you would prefer a discipline-specific data repository, you can find one for your subject via Re3data.org.
Training: The University of Manchester Library offers an introduction to Research Data Management workshops through the My Research Essentials programme. There are also online modules as part of My Research Essentials if you cannot make it to one of our workshops.
Support: The Research Data Management service offers a range of support. Please contact the RDM team if you have further questions: Email: researchdata@manchester.ac.uk
Other Training¶
There are a number of short courses which are available to you.
Managing and sharing research data from human participants¶
This course is delivered via the My Research Essentials researcher development programme. The course is delivered using a ‘flipped learning’ approach. Working together in groups, attendees explore the issues and risks, and present back their mitigation strategies for wider discussion to formulate optimum solutions. Expert facilitators are available to offer practical guidance and support. They are drawn from: Information Governance Office; Research Governance, Ethics and Integrity; Centre for Epidemiology Versus Arthritis; and Research IT. You should also complete the online unit Data Protection & Information Security online training.
ReproducibiliTea¶
ReproducibiliTea (https://reproducibilitea.org) are a grassroots journal club initiative that helps researchers create local Open Science journal clubs at their universities to discuss diverse issues, papers and ideas about improving science, reproducibility and the Open Science movement. Started in early 2018 at the University of Oxford, ReproducibiliTea has now spread to 109 institutions in 25 different countries. We are completely volunteer run, and provide a unique and supportive community for our members, who are predominantly Early Career Researchers. Manchester’s ReproducibiliTea is the university’s Open Research journal club.
Academic Phrasebank¶
The Academic Phrasebank is a general resource for academic writers. It aims to provide you with examples of some of the phraseological ‘nuts and bolts’ of writing organised according to the main sections of a research paper or dissertation (see the top menu ). Other phrases are listed under the more general communicative functions of academic writing (see the menu on the left). The resource should be particularly useful for writers who need to report their research work.The phrases, and the headings under which they are listed, can be used simply to assist you in thinking about the content and organisation of your own writing, or the phrases can be incorporated into your writing where this is appropriate. In most cases, a certain amount of creativity and adaptation will be necessary when a phrase is used.The items in the Academic Phrasebank are mostly content neutral and generic in nature; in using them, therefore, you are not stealing other people’s ideas and this does not constitute plagiarism. For some of the entries, specific content words have been included for illustrative purposes, and these should be substituted when the phrases are used.The resource was designed primarily for academic and scientific writers who are non-native speakers of English. However, native speaker writers may still find much of the material helpful. In fact, recent data suggest that the majority of users are native speakers of English. The Phrasebank is at: http://www.phrasebank.manchester.ac.uk/.
Research Seminars¶
The Department runs a seminar series, which runs typically on Wednesdays at 2pm in Kilburn 1.4, but it does not run every week. Upcoming seminars are announced over the seminar-distribution mailing list. They can
also be seen at the Department Seminar 7 webpage. All PGRs are strongly encouraged to attend. And if you are presenting here or in a research conference you may want to first read ‘Tell me a story! A plea for more compelling conference presentations’ https://bioone.org/journals/The-Condor/volume-119/issue-2/CONDOR-16-209.1/Tell-me-a-story-A-plea-for-more-compelling-conference/10.1650/CONDOR-16-209.1.pdf.
During the first semester, Science in Practice (SIP) seminars will take place in Weeks 1.1 to 1.12 (1 hour per week) on Wednesdays, 5pm – 6pm. These will inform PGRs of the variety research activity within the Research Groups within the Department. They will be delivered either by the heads of the research groups themselves, or by suitably-qualified representatives. All PGRs are cordially invited.
Central Research Training¶
A research degree is a challenging and rewarding experience combining core research skills and knowledge and the opportunity to develop a much wider range of personal and professional skills. As a postgraduate researcher you will be expected to take responsibility for your research degree – from defining your subject area, to planning your workload, mastering the techniques required to conduct your research, developing your relationship with your Supervisor, and effectively communicating your research expertise to others. This is your chance to contribute to scientific advances that excite and challenge you, and to develop the skills, attributes and competencies of a professional researcher.
To help you meet this objective, Researcher Development, within the Faculty of Science and Engineering, offers you a range of support, training and development opportunities that you can choose to engage with as and when you need to. Built around individual personal development plans, skills audits and self-reflection, our face-to-face and online training enables you to gain and enhance those skills that best meet your development needs.
There is more information in the Postgraduate Researcher Handbook: https://www.researcherdevelopment.manchester.ac.uk/pgr-training/.
Research Computing¶
The Research Computing is a part of the University’s IT Services, which offers computing services to researchers. They offer courses which are sometimes appropriate to PGRs. Some of these courses may cost the Department money, so you will need to get permission before you take them. Talk to your supervisor.
Manchester Enterprise¶
The Manchester Enterprise Centre offers a course in Innovation and the Commercialisation of Research, which may be available to PGRs. This costs the Department money, so, as above, talk with your supervisor.
The Graduate and Researcher Development¶
The GRD unit runs a number of short courses (one-day, half-day, two-hour) which are relevant to the final stages of the Doctorate, including: “Planning Your Final Year”, “Writing Up Your Thesis”, and “Viva Survivor”.
Public Engagement and STEM ambassadors¶
The Department is very involved in “public engagement”, which means promoting science and computer science to the general public. Our Department is particularly involved in two areas. The first is promoting computing in schools. The second is working with the Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI) to promote science in science fairs and events. MOSI provides training to scientists and science PGRs in public engagement by qualifying them as “STEM ambassadors” (STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics). As a PGR, you should take the opportunity to get trained as a STEM ambassador and to participate in public engagement events. The School’s public engagement are run by Dr. Giles Reger 1.