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Seguimiento - PD en Ingeniería Mecatrónica

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SUPERVISOR ("TUTOR")

Royal Decree 99/2011 introduces the requirement to assign a supervisor ("Tutor") to the doctoral student. As stated in the "Salzburg Principles," the supervision of doctoral students plays a crucial role. Supervision should be a collective effort involving not only the supervisor but also the thesis advisor, the Academic Committee, the doctoral student, the research group, and the institution (graduate school, center, university, etc.). Therefore, once enrollment is completed, the Academic Committee of the Doctoral Program will assign a supervisor, who will guide the doctoral student throughout the duration of their doctoral training. In general, as outlined in the Doctoral Regulations of the University of Malaga and in the Good Practice Guide for Doctoral Programs at the University of Malaga, the Academic Committees will assign a supervisor immediately, although they have a maximum period of three months from the student's formal enrollment. The supervisor, apart from introducing the doctoral student to all the initial procedures to be carried out, will help them identify a potential thesis advisor. The Academic Committee of the Doctoral Program must assign an advisor before the first six months.

The Academic Committees of the Doctoral Programs will be responsible for assigning supervisors. The procedure to do so is as follows:

a) If the student suggests an advisor for their thesis at the time of enrollment in the program, and that advisor agrees and is able to accept doctoral students that academic year, the Committee will assign that person as both the supervisor and advisor for the doctoral student. (As a general rule, a faculty member of a Doctoral Program should not supervise more than two new doctoral students per academic year.)

b) If the student suggests an advisor for their thesis at the time of enrollment in the program, but that person cannot accept them for some reason, they may be appointed as the supervisor to help the doctoral student find the most suitable advisor for their thesis project.

c) If the student suggests an external advisor and a supervisor from the program, and both agree, the Committee will proceed to appoint them if the program supervisor can accept new doctoral students under their supervision (as a general rule, a faculty member of a Doctoral Program at the University of Malaga should not supervise more than 10 doctoral students simultaneously).

d) In other cases, the Academic Committee will select a faculty member from the Doctoral Program whose research line is most appropriate to supervise the doctoral student, and who is able to serve as a supervisor.

SUPERVISION DOCUMENT COMMITMENT ("COMPROMISO DOCUMENTAL DE SUPERVISIÓN")

As soon as the student has a supervisor and an advisor, the Supervisory Document Commitment (CDS) will be signed. This document seals the commitment between all parties and establishes, among other things, the rights and duties of supervisors, advisors, and doctoral students, the procedures for conflict resolution, aspects related to intellectual or industrial property rights that may arise from the theses, and the criteria that will be used to evaluate the doctoral student. UPDATE: Currently, the CDS must be managed through the software application provided by the University of Malaga, which registers the document electronically.

THE RESEARCH PLAN AND THESIS PROJECT

All doctoral students must prepare a Research Plan before the end of the first year, which must be endorsed by the supervisor and the thesis advisor and approved by the Academic Committee of the program. UPDATE: To this end, the Research Plan document is requested from the doctoral student during the online procedure for the mandatory annual evaluation via the website.

The Research Plan for this Doctoral Program must include the following sections:

The objectives to be achieved in the research work.
The methodology.
The competencies to be developed.
The necessary resources and estimated timeline for the work.
A Thesis Project.

The Thesis Project is a document that allows evaluation of whether the student has a concrete work plan for the completion of the thesis. The project is carried out under the supervision of the thesis advisor and must contain at least the following contents:

The definition of a clear research problem to be addressed in the thesis work or a question to be resolved.
A hypothesis or objective contribution proposed to try to solve the problem.
A brief study on the state of the art in the thesis topic demonstrating sufficient knowledge of the relevant literature to begin the thesis work.
A work plan and timeline aimed at successfully conducting the research, along with a dissemination plan for the results (publications, conferences, etc.).
A list of the expected results upon concluding the thesis, including both scientific and academic (for example, developed competencies).

The Research Plan must be approved by the Academic Committee of the Doctoral Program, which will incorporate it into the Activities Document of the doctoral student.

THE ACTIVITIES DOCUMENT ("DAD: DOCUMENTO DE ACTIVIDADES DEL DOCTORANDO")

The Activities Document (DAD) will include the individualized control record defined in Article 2.5 of R.D. 90/2011 for each doctoral student. It will record all activities of interest for the development and evaluation of the doctoral student. The records made by the doctoral student will be authorized and certified by the supervisor and the thesis advisor. Annual reports from the supervisor and thesis advisor, as well as the annual evaluations carried out by the Academic Committee, will also be recorded. The Activities Document for all doctoral students will be created, updated, and maintained electronically, using the software application provided by the University of Malaga. This application will be available to all doctoral students from the website and accessible via personal security credentials.

MONITORING OF TRAINING AND THESIS DEVELOPMENT

The Academic Committee of the Doctoral Program in MECHATRONICS ENGINEERING will periodically appoint a committee to monitor the doctoral students. This committee will be composed of three professors from the Doctoral Program, one of whom will act as President and another as Secretary. Substitutes will be appointed for them.

Unless the Academic Committee of a Doctoral Program stipulates otherwise, the committee will initially consist of the researcher with the most six-year research periods in the doctoral program, who will act as president; the one who has directed the most theses, who will act as a member; and the youngest, who will act as secretary. In the case of a tie between two potential members, a draw will be conducted. The substitutes will be selected from the members of the committee who were part of its previous composition.

If any of the roles coincide (for example, if the person with the most six-year periods also directed the most theses), the next in line according to the established order (number of six-year periods, number of theses, and age) will be chosen. In the event of a tie between two candidates, a draw will be conducted.

The committees will be appointed for a period of three years, after which they will be completely renewed, and outgoing members will be excluded from the selection process for the next committee.

The committee will hold two evaluation sessions per year, approximately every six months, during which students can present themselves for evaluation. Committee members may not evaluate students they supervise or advise; a corresponding substitute will act for those students.

The evaluation criteria used by the committee will be defined by the Academic Committee of the MECHATRONICS ENGINEERING Doctoral Program for each of the three years of thesis development, and must also be approved by the Graduate Committee of the University of Malaga. Information about these criteria will be public, will be available on the Program's website, and will be part of the documentation commitment signed by the student upon enrollment.

These criteria must ensure that doctoral students progress adequately to meet the requirements for thesis defense in each Doctoral Program.

The committee will evaluate, based on each doctoral student’s Activities Document and the reports that the supervisor and thesis advisor must issue for this purpose, at least the following aspects:

Progress of the thesis concerning the proposed Research Plan.
Scientific production to date (results, publications, etc.).
Stays completed, visits to other centers, attendance at conferences, meetings, etc.
Completion of activities and training supplements.
Any other activity or subject deemed relevant.
General assessment.

In the evaluation of the first year, the Research Plan and Thesis Project presented by the doctoral student will also be assessed and approved if appropriate. If the committee rejects the project, the student has a second opportunity to modify it and present it within six months. If the project is rejected a second time, the student must reapply for admission to the program.

Positive evaluation by the committee will be a prerequisite to continue in the program. In the case of a negative evaluation, which will be duly justified, the doctoral student must be reevaluated within six months, for which they will prepare a new Research Plan. In the event of a second negative evaluation, the doctoral student will be definitively dismissed from the program, which can be appealed to the Graduate Committee of the University of Malaga.

The committee’s mission, in addition to judging the progress of the doctoral student and the development of the research plan, will be to make recommendations and suggestions to improve the thesis work and the evolution of the doctoral student.

The committee will prepare a report with the evaluation, which will be recorded in the Doctoral Activities Report (DAD).

MOBILITY AND DOCTORAL STAYS

Mobility and doctoral stays at international universities and research centers are part of the University of Malaga's strategy for doctoral training. For this reason, all Doctoral Programs must encourage and promote such mobility actions, particularly those aimed at obtaining a thesis with an International Doctor mention or those developed under joint supervision.

The University of Malaga, through its Own Research Plan, provides a set of annual grants for stays of varying durations at foreign centers, precisely to incentivize this type of action. Likewise, the University of Malaga participates and collaborates with various institutions and organizations to promote mobility and internationalization, such as AUIP, Universia, etc. Finally, the Own Research Plan of the University of Malaga offers a series of grants for attending conferences and seminars, aimed at encouraging and promoting these types of activities among doctoral students at the University of Malaga.

Updated information about the different calls will be maintained on the Doctoral School's website. Likewise, Doctoral Programs can obtain and offer different types of aid for mobility, stays, or conference attendance, based on agreements they may have signed with their collaborating entities or with other universities in the case of interuniversity Doctoral Programs.

In the case of the Doctoral Program in MECHATRONICS ENGINEERING, efforts will be made, within the available resources, to ensure that all full-time doctoral students carry out at least one continuous stay of 3 months at a foreign center, and that part-time doctoral students complete at least 2 stays of between one month and one and a half months in foreign research centers.

In the case of the Doctoral Program in MECHATRONICS ENGINEERING, depending on the available funding, efforts will be made to ensure that doctoral students carry out stays at a prestigious research center in another country, developing research topics related to their doctoral thesis.

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