14 april 2023
Learning by Doing
In a one-year Master, the thesis trajectory is a challenge to manage for both students and teachers. It is a process with many incremental steps, both of classroom instruction and through supervisor mentorship, but also a process that needs to be tailored to individual needs of a student within a diverse group. While in-class learning activities are essential to developing necessary research skills to successfully complete a thesis, an online space for students to interact with peers, tutors and supervisors about their research skill milestones could unite the many steps and collaborators in the thesis trajectory in a central, remotely accessible location. In Learning by Doing, we aimed to design an online thesis trajectory environment, focused on 1) helping students track their own milestones in their thesis trajectory throughout the year, while 2) enabling supervisors and tutors to collaboratively guide students in research design and execution, and 3) interjecting online teaching-learning activities at appropriate moments, even when students are away from the classroom. While we made progress towards these objectives, we found some blockages and complications – both technological and bureaucratic – made the single unifying online space impossible. The Handbooks available here – about a Model Design for a thesis trajectory and Lessons Learned in the process – are intended to advise other programmes with similar goals about potential challenges and priorities for this process.