The doctoral defence is the oral examination of the doctoral thesis. While it is a major milestone for doctoral candidates, this event is often shrouded in mystery. In this article, I explore the doctoral defence from an international perspective. I have studied the format of the defence based on written testimonies as well as the literature on…

The diversity of modern society is often not represented in the medical workforce. This might be partly due to selection practices. We need to better understand decision-making processes by selection committees in order to improve selection procedures with regard to diversity. This paper reports on a qualitative study with a socio-constructivist…

The doctoral defense is an important step in the doctoral journey and an essential requirement for obtaining a doctoral degree. Past research on the doctoral defense has focused solely on national practices. In this work, I investigate the potential link between the doctoral defense format based on its major and minor elements and the perception…

Student evaluation committees play a crucial role in internal quality assurance processes as representatives of the student body. However, the students on these committees sometimes experience difficulty in providing constructive and structured feedback to faculty in an environment characterised by a strong power differential between student and…

In the context of the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (DESD), United Nations University (UNU) initiated the creation of a network of Regional Centres of Expertise (RCEs) for Education for Sustainable Development. This paper describes the philosophy behind the activities performed by one of those RCEs, RCE Rhine-Meuse, an RCE…