Getting a PhD in the Cotutelle Style

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Getting a PhD in the Co-tutelle Style

• Pawel Mazur
• Macquarie University
• mpawel_at_ics.mq.edu.au

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Agenda

• Who I am
• The co-tutelle framework
• What you can expect in practice weighting pros
  and cons
• Real life examples
• Conclusion

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Me

• I am doing a PhD course at
• Wroclaw University of Technology (Poland)
• Macquarie University (Sydney)

• This is possible because of

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Co-tutelle

• Origin an opportunity/solution for French
  students participating in projects developed at
  two collaborating universities.
• Now for any students who want to get a PhD
  degree from two universities in two countries.
• You can transform into co-tutelle at ANY time of
  the PhD course.
• Usually universities look forward to this scheme.

5
Is It Worth (student perspective)?
6
Anika from Germany

• I can continue to be enrolled at my German home
  uni and also be enrolled here, so I have
  supervisors with different backgrounds and
  perspectives, which is very interesting and
  helpful.
• I have the chance to study in a different
  country, with a different language and different
  people and I even get a scholarship for that.
  That is really great.
• There are no administrative problems . So now
  I'm just studying here as everyone else.
• I can hand in the thesis in English at both unis,
  and it will be examined separately. So no
  coordination, supervisor travel etc. necessary in
  my case.
• I'm really satisfied because my supervisors don't
  interfere with each others' work, and the ones
  here at Macquarie are very helpful and
  supporting. I guess it's more complicated in
  other cases where supervisors don't agree, or you
  have to travel back and forth, or where there is
  one examination process. But in my case it's
  separate, and I can take full advantage of
  everything.

7
Veronique from France

• Pros
• An improvement in English
• A chance to discover a new country, new culture
• An opportunity to get to know a new lab, see if
  you can integrate with a team that is different
  to the one you used to work with.
• An opportunity to see if you like living abroad
  (useful before going abroad for a longer post-doc
  position and then getting homesick/depressed)
• Cons
• Lots of time wasted in administrative processes
  and paperwork
• Need to change the country
• Double requirements for the PhD thesis (now I
  have to reorganize my manuscript according to
  Macquarie requirements)

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Conclusion

• Co-tutelle is an interesting proposal
• It has clear advantages
• If you can cope with disadvantages (challenges)
  it brings

DO IT!!!