First experiences in lecturing Research Methods in Tirana

Z. Budimac, M. Ivanović, G. Rakić

Research Methods - History

● Introduced to our (joint) master studies during the Tempus project.

● Started 2007 (before that existed in Leicester).

● As a crash course held also in Skopje and Linz

● The need: more master students, more PhD students (people we do not know in advance), supervisor does not have time to cover issues individually

Structure of the course• Research, science, research methods• Structure of papers, theses• On presentations and conferences• On supervising, exams, …

• Subset of applicable statistics• Subset of project management

• Short workshops on different topics (invited lecturers)

ExamAssignments

1. Executive summary (how to write)2. Review (how to read)3. Presentation on 2 (how to talk)

4. Statistical assignment5. Project management (?)

Tirana, 2014• Master students • Motivation: they can earn points

during master studies on publishing papers

• 51 enrolled• Lectures over five days, all parts, less

discussion, no workshops • Changed from the original plan where

three lecturers where planned to lecture over the whole semester – in three “waves”

• 3 assignments (no PM, no presentation)

• Review did not have to contain (too much) references

• 28 solve all three assignments in the first examination period

305065 80 90 970

20

40

60

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120

Points

Points

Experiences• Results are in the expected area• Two students highest marks (or four)• One failed

• (experience: the course is “easy to pass” but also hard to achieve highest marks)

Interesting• In reviews, many students complained

how authors did not follow the rules for references – while not following the same rules in their own reviews

• One student complained that the paper he reviewed should be written in two columns format

• There were several similar pairs of solutions, but not to similar to take any measures.