{"id":1060,"date":"2026-04-02T17:40:51","date_gmt":"2026-04-02T15:40:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/educationphd.fisppa.unipd.it\/?p=1060"},"modified":"2026-04-02T17:44:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T15:44:10","slug":"inhabiting-supervision-voices-from-the-first-year-of-doctoral-study","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/educationphd.fisppa.unipd.it\/en\/supervision\/inhabiting-supervision-voices-from-the-first-year-of-doctoral-study\/","title":{"rendered":"Inhabiting Supervision: Voices from the First Year of Doctoral Study"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Simone Visentin<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong>Editor: Juliana Raffaghelli<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Supervision is one of the most delicate and generative spaces within the doctoral experience: it is where research, care, guidance, and the gradual development of scholarly autonomy come together.<\/p>\n<p>During a recent meeting with first-year doctoral candidates, the discussion unfolded around lived experiences, metaphors, and desires for change, bringing to light the richness of this professional relationship.<\/p>\n<p>The reflections that follow aim to offer the doctoral forum an open dialogic space to consider how this experience might become increasingly meaningful and shared.<\/p>\n<p>The exchange and mutual exploration were developed around three guiding questions:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em>What are the aspects that qualify the doctoral experience and, more specifically, supervision?<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Imagining an ideal situation, how do I envision the doctoral and supervisory journey?<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>If I think in terms of redesign, what changes would I introduce to make the doctoral and supervisory experience more rewarding?<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Below, I outline some of the themes that emerged, with the hope that they may contribute to an ongoing dialogue about the doctoral experience itself.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>The Genesis of the Doctoral Candidate-Supervisor Relationship<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>The choice of a supervisor emerged through different pathways. Some participants described it as the continuation of a relationship already established during their Master\u2019s degree, while others identified their supervisor after a series of conversations with academics whose profile aligned with their research interests.<\/p>\n<p>Overall, after the first few months, mutual recognition and effective communication were identified as strong and already well-established elements of the doctoral candidate-supervisor relationship.<\/p>\n<p>The discussion was guided by inviting participants to represent their first meeting with their supervisor through a metaphor. Within this evocative framework, several narratives emerged, each describing the beginning of a professional bond in unique ways. One participant imagined the first encounter in the greenery of a park; another visualised the relationship as a flower bulb, a promise of growth that requires time and patience to bloom. Someone else associated the beginning with a simple yet symbolic cup of coffee, representing a dialogue that starts with warmth and informality. Finally, one participant chose to bring a cake to the first meeting, highlighting how caring for the other can also pass through small acts of conviviality.<\/p>\n<p>What emerges strongly, then, is the importance of <strong>bringing one\u2019s whole self into the relationship<\/strong>. Creating spaces for dialogue and mutual knowledge is essential to nurturing a professional bond that is meant to last for years.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Navigating Complexities: Distance and Bureaucratic Support<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>The journey is not without its complexities. Part of the relationship takes place via Zoom, often due to geographical distance and the saturated schedules of academic staff. Although technology helps reduce distance, the strong need for in-person meetings emerged as crucial for consolidating support around the research project.<\/p>\n<p>A particularly significant point concerns organisational and bureaucratic difficulties, especially those related to planning research periods abroad. These aspects can generate uncertainty. For this reason, the working group decided to bring these issues to the attention of the programme coordination and the steering committee, so that systemic solutions may be found to facilitate each doctoral candidate\u2019s international pathway.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Towards a Collective and Proactive Model of Supervision<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Several proposals emerged from the discussion and are worth relaunching across all the spaces we share within this doctoral school as a stimulus for the whole community:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Triadic Meetings and Peer Work:<\/strong> the idea is to involve several doctoral candidates supervised by the same academic in small-group discussions. This can foster collaboration, reduce feelings of isolation, and reassure group members through knowledge exchange.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Professional Shadowing:<\/strong> participants expressed the desire to spend entire days with their supervisor in order to observe their daily work in practice. Seeing how a professor manages teaching and research is an invaluable form of learning by immersion.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Inhabiting Shared Spaces:<\/strong> we encourage doctoral candidates to make greater use of university spaces in order to foster spontaneous encounters among colleagues.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Team Research and Interdisciplinarity:<\/strong> the possibility of creating interdisciplinary working groups is a key pathway for enriching one\u2019s research and feeling part of a broader scholarly community.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The invitation addressed to the doctoral candidates, but also to the entire SPEF community, is to be proactive: not to wait for supervisors to make proposals, but to take the initiative.<\/p>\n<p>In this regard, participants were reminded of the possibility of using the <strong>Supervision Toolkit<\/strong> (a self-assessment tool available in our online work and learning environment) to activate reflection and dialogue on the doctoral candidate-supervisor relationship.<\/p>\n<p>This offers a concrete way to encourage the regular planning of meetings, ensuring the continuity that is essential for a positive and productive doctoral experience.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Simone Visentin Editor: Juliana Raffaghelli Supervision is one of the most delicate and generative [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1059,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[158,157],"tags":[161,162,160],"class_list":["post-1060","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-care","category-supervision","tag-phd-care","tag-students-wellbeing","tag-supervision"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/educationphd.fisppa.unipd.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1060","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/educationphd.fisppa.unipd.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/educationphd.fisppa.unipd.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educationphd.fisppa.unipd.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educationphd.fisppa.unipd.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1060"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/educationphd.fisppa.unipd.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1060\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1062,"href":"https:\/\/educationphd.fisppa.unipd.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1060\/revisions\/1062"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educationphd.fisppa.unipd.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1059"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/educationphd.fisppa.unipd.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1060"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educationphd.fisppa.unipd.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1060"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/educationphd.fisppa.unipd.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1060"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}