Postgraduate Education ― Form and Function

This anthology presents integrated discussions of three central themes: learning in postgraduate education, developing a curriculum for postgraduate education, and supervising postgraduate learning. These themes are vital for a close understanding of how postgraduate education can be fostered in higher education—both in facilitating learning and as students’ learning outcome. The book’s theoretical contributions address questions such as: What is the theory behind learning in postgraduate education? How is the curriculum for postgraduate programs developed? Practical contributions address questions like: What constitutes learning in postgraduate education? What are the features of curricula in postgraduate education? In practice, how do we improve students’ learning in postgraduate studies? This book is a response to concerns that policies and practices of higher education have tended to draw too much attention toward academic content and to teaching as a core discipline. Yet literature suggests that students are often ill-prepared for the changes in learning, teaching, and curriculum approaches from the undergraduate to postgraduate levels. While the dominant belief appears to be that students learn when teachers transfer knowledge to them, the students themselves expect to function more independently in postgraduate education. This anthology presents an alternative view, moving from a discipline-based view to a learning-based view on higher education. Working with quality enhancement is the art of positively matching multiple stakeholder relations and at the same time continuously innovating within existing good practice. The chapter authors reflect upon proposed strategies for managing stakeholder relations.

Claus Nygaard is a professor of management education and the director of research at the Copenhagen Business School’s Learning Lab. His work has been published in leading journals, including Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, Higher Education, International Journal of Public Sector Management, and International Studies of Management & Organization. He is the coeditor of Learning in Higher Education: Contemporary Standpoints; Simulations, Games and Role Play in University Education; Student Engagement: Identity, Motivation, and Community; and Teaching Creativity—Creativity in Teaching. Nigel Courtney is an honorary senior visiting fellow at Cass Business School at City University London. He is a chartered engineer, a certified management consultant, and a certified IT professional. His firm, Courtney Consulting, has served the European Commission, the Higher Education Academy, London Underground, Transport for London, and the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts. He is a coeditor of Teaching Creativity—Creativity in Teaching. Liezel Frick is a researcher and senior lecturer at the Centre for Higher and Adult Education in the faculty of education at Stellenbosch University in South Africa. Professor Eli Bitzer is a professor of higher education and director of the Centre for Higher and Adult Education at Stellenbosch University. He is a past president of the South African Association for Research and Development in Higher Education (SAARDHE), and a consulting editor for the South African Journal of Higher Education.