10 minute read
Switzerland
So close and yet so different! Our labs are located about 60 KM away from each other, in Geneva and Lausanne, respectively, both in the French-speaking region of Switzerland. Our research activities in both labs address learning technologies, they share a strong experimental flavor and yet, we’ll see that the PhD processes are very different. This fact won’t surprise those who know that this country of 8 million inhabitants counts no less than 26 ministers of education, which reveals how deeply local differences are rooted in the Swiss culture. The University of Geneva (UNIGE) is a comprehensive university with about 17,000 students, while Ecole Polytechnique Federal in Lausanne (EPFL) is a science and technology university with 12,000 students. Each university counts more than 2,000 PhD students. Our PhD processes do, of course, share some similarities: the duration is 4 to 5 years; the final jury is generally composed of 3 to 5 persons, including one from a different lab at the same school and one from another university; students are expected to have published
2-3 papers in acceptable venues before defending. We do, however, have to disclose the fact that, although we do similar research, Bétrancourt’s lab belongs to the School of Psychology and Educational Sciences while Dillenbourg’s lab is located in the School of Computer & Communication Sciences, which may explain some of the following differences. Status
Despite these similarities, the doctoral models are quite different, Geneva being closer to the European model of lab affiliation, but the EPFL model being inspired by the US doctoral school. At UNIGE, a PhD student is firstly a lab member who joins in contributing to all lab duties, devoting sometimes up to 50% to teaching. At EPFL, PhD students are more viewed as students who come to complete their studies, with about 20% of their time devoted to teaching duties. Some doctoral programs at EPFL even include a first-year fellowship: students who obtain this fellowship are allowed to do projects in two different labs before becoming affiliated with one of them. The courses where these PhD students are teaching assistants are not necessarily related to the lab the student belongs to; they can be, for instance, the large undergraduate introductory classes. This difference in students’ status between UNIGE and EPFL is important, but it does not necessarily impact how the doctoral students feel integrated in the lab, which depends more on the professor’s leadership style than on the institution.
Recruiting
There is an admission committee for each of the 21 EPFL doctoral programs. In the CS doctoral program, for instance, the committee is composed of 23 professors or senior scientists, representing all research areas in CS, for a school that has fewer than 50 professors. The school administrator first filters the approximately 700 applications. Then, each committee member reviews about 50 applications. Finally, the committee meets during a full day for selecting admissible candidates; this happens twice per year. This huge time investment illustrates how critical it is for the school to maximize the quality of PhD recruitment. Once students are declared “admissible” by the program committee, they can be interviewed by the professor(s) interested in hiring them. About 90% of them do not come from EPFL. About 50 of the selected students receive a fellowship that provides them a salary for the first year, whatever lab they choose. As most of them receive offers from other universities, the school organizes a physical visit on campus, meetings with the faculty and other students, and of course, a cheese fondue and a tour of the lake or of the mountains.
In comparison, Geneva applicants directly contact their future supervisor, often because they previously interacted with her or with an acquaintance. It is up to the supervisor to accept the applicant, on the basis of the match between the student’s background and interest on one hand and the supervisor’s research areas on the other hand. When a special profile is required, generally for externally funded scientific projects, Geneva PhD students are recruited through a competitive ad hoc search. Most PhD students are hired as research assistants with or without teaching, but some are just enrolled as students without a salary from the university or a fellowship. This is the case in Education for teacher trainers who want to move up in their career to a professor position in their institution.
Doctoral school
The EPFL doctoral path includes between 12 and 30 credits of courses; it is indeed a “school.” At UNIGE, doctoral schools are facultative and vary in format across disciplines, even within the same faculty. In the faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, students in education can enroll in the Western Switzerland doctoral school in education, where they can choose to attend thematic or methodological sessions of their choice. No minimum amount of credits is required. In Affective Sciences, students who enroll in the doctoral school have to attend seminars to acquire a certain number of credits.
Interestingly, the EPFL doctoral scheme was optional for the first few years. At one point in time, half of the students were enrolled in a doctoral program and the other half in labs following the traditional European model. A survey comparing their experience revealed that taking doctoral courses with students and professors from other labs triggered interactions beyond the lab walls and resulted in a lower percentage of students feeling isolated.
Lab life
The culture of our respective labs is quite different. Typically, Dillenbourg’s lab is made of 8-12 PhDs plus some postdocs, all of them leaving the lab after 4-5 years and having no permanent position. After completing their PhD, students may briefly stay for finishing a project, but they have to leave soon. The lab includes mainly students who come from abroad without their family, and for some of them, the lab becomes some kind of substitute family, with its own tradition, stories, and so forth. For instance, the lab being too large for celebrating birthdays with
After his public defense, Louis Faucon was told the only pen available to sign his diploma was in the wooden box with a number code. He had to solve 4 enigma to get those numbers, as in an escape game.
cakes, lab members prepare some munitions and, at a signal given by the lab “happiness officer,” we bomb the beneficiary with objects reflecting her personality: chocolates, socks, chips, … We sing for 20 seconds and then go back to work! This does not happen in every EPFL lab, though. At UNIGE, the average number of PhD students per lab is smaller (4 to 5) and they do not constitute the bulk of the lab, but this may reflect more the difference in schools (psychology and education versus CS) than the difference in universities. Consequently, birthdays in Educational Technologies are still celebrated with cakes and sparkling drinks, but no more candles because of sensitive smoke alarms.
PhD process
At UNIGE, the first formal step is the submission of a thesis project to the thesis committee, composed of the supervisor(s), and two to three experts in the field, of which one is from the same faculty and discipline. The project is a 15-page paper presenting the theoretical rationale, some preliminary findings and the roadmap for the next studies. It has to be submitted within the first two years of PhD work. If the committee agrees, the project is then defended before a “doctors’ college” in which all the PhD holders of the department can participate. After the presentation, the doctors’ college decides if the PhD candidate can continue for the next two years or so. In education and psychology, a typical completed PhD thesis consists of 3 to 4 experimental studies, but could only be one empirical study if a longitudinal or ethnographic methodology is used. Students are expected to have submitted one or two journal papers when they defend, and to have another two or so in preparation.
There are similar publications requirements at EPFL. The main difference is that the EPFL doctoral path includes a candidacy exam after one year. Each doctoral program has different practices, some focusing questions on the PhD project while other focus on the deep understanding of relevant scientific papers. This is a prognostic assessment: does the jury believe, given what has been achieved so far by the student or given the quality of answers, that the candidate will be able to complete a good thesis? If this is not the case, it’s tough to stop the candidate, but fairer to stop him/her after one year than later on. In case of failure, the candidate has a second chance (a first failure is also a way to wake up students who do not perceive that 4 years is not so long). The few students (1% out of 2200) who fail again have to leave EPFL within a short time. The candidacy exam committee is made up of the supervisor(s) plus two colleagues; in that way, the responsibility for failing a student is shared by 3 or 4 colleagues.
The defense
Let’s now get to traditions about the way defenses are organized, namely, in one event at UNIGE and two events at EPFL. At EPFL, first the jury joins the candidate in a private defense without any audience. The jury is composed of a chair (who does not ask any questions but oversees the procedure), the supervisor (who usually does not ask questions), one internal and two external members. We tend to invite externals with high scientific reputations, often from one from the USA and one from Europe. The exam is tough but informal. I once chaired a defense in which the barefoot student wore shorts and did everything on the blackboard. After a 30-40 minute presentation by the student, the jury asks questions for about 90 minutes, in rounds of 2-3 questions each. In case of success, the student has one more month to finalize minor aspects of his or her manuscript and to organize the public defense attended by the other lab members plus the candidate’s family and friends.
At the end of his public defense, Lorenzo Lucignano receives his diploma from Pierre Dillenbourg, shaking hands as long as it takes for all to take a picture. The public defense is more of a show than a defense; the student gives a talk and the supervisor and doctors in the audience ask some light questions. The candidate has to play the tricky game of being understandable by her family and friends, while showing off her scientific excellence. There is often an old uncle or so who wants to show off.
At UNIGE, when the supervisor and the committee consider that the PhD is ready to be defended, they appoint a jury that is composed of the thesis committee (the three to four persons who already acted to accept the thesis project) and additional members who act as external experts on the topic. The jury is minimally four persons, but it can reach 7 to 8 members in some
cases. The jury has to read the PhD manuscript and agree that it will pass for the defense to be organized, so that no PhD that is publicly defended can fail. There is therefore only one public defense, with the jury plus the family and friends. The defense consists of a 30-minute presentation by the student and a two-hour formal scientific debate hardly understandable and probably quite boring for family and friends, except for the few anecdotes that some members may tell to liven things up (or not). In both cases, the public event is followed by food and drinks, often with some presentation about the past years of the new doctor. The team of students sometimes set up fancy events: Ayberk had to ski through the Rolex Learning Center, Khaled was welcomed back to the lab by “Men in Black” (see picture). The new doctor often receives gifts that kindly make fun of their peculiar habits or related to their PhD topic, like Sunny, who is a kayaker, receiving a paddle made with a 3D printer and laser woodcutter.
“Men in Black”: After the public defense by Khaled Bachour, his teammates placed a red carpet and two bodyguards, Hamed Alavi (right) and Pierre Dillenbourg (left), protected Khaled from the crowds of media and fans waiting for him after his doctoral triumph.
