Dijkgraaf puts an end to 'promotion student'
Want to get a PhD with a scholarship instead of a salary? After a long-term experiment, Minister Dijkgraaf is drawing a line through it. AObsector director Donald Pechler: “Even when the experiment was introduced, we and PNN called on employee participation councils not to agree to the experiment. The minister agrees with us.”
Image: Martijn Beekman / National government
The universities lobbied endlessly for a new kind of PhD student, who would not be an employee, but a student. The University of Groningen in particular was strongly in favor of this. Dijkgraaf is now putting an end to the experiment. He will not include the student-PhD student in law and draws his conclusion: he sees no added value. It will stop from 2024.
Fewer rights
That's exactly what the unions and PNN wanted. In fact, they would have preferred not to enter the entire experiment at all. Pechler: “There are no differences in the work between scholarship PhDs and PhD candidates with an employee contract: they are both writing their dissertations.”
However, scholarship PhDs have far fewer rights, according to the AObsector manager. “They do not accrue pension and do not participate in the salary development as agreed in the collective labor agreements. We have always resisted this and the minister now agrees with us.”
However, the AOb that the experiment should be abolished immediately. The current group of scholarship PhD students must receive compensation and a normal contract in which legal protection and pension accrual is guaranteed, so that the disadvantage has disappeared.
We have always opposed this and the minister now agrees with us
A controversial experiment with student PhD students started in 2016, in which Groningen participated fully with 1.500 PhD students. Furthermore, only Erasmus University Rotterdam joined with a total of fifteen PhD students.
fragile support
The PhD students themselves had all kinds of objections to the experiment, the minister explains. 'I see that support for PhD education is very fragile,' he writes. That 'weighs heavily' in his decision.
Minister Dijkgraaf: 'I see that support for PhD education is very fragile'
'PhD education' is intended as a third cycle after a bachelor's and master's degree. PhD students abroad are often students, but in the Netherlands the vast majority are employed as employees.
According to the minister, a system of student PhD candidates does not 'fit in with my aim for more peace and space in the science system and a good position for all researchers.'
He can rely on a critical final evaluation. Student PhD students feel undervalued, it says. For example, they do not accrue pension and do not receive holiday pay. The 'students' do feel more free in choosing a PhD topic than the employee PhD students, but in their daily work they experience no difference in autonomy.
Two camps
Despite all the criticism, the Groningen university is strongly in favor of the new system, especially in order to offer more students the opportunity to obtain a doctorate. According to the evaluation, two 'camps' have arisen and this situation cannot be viewed separately from the other pros and cons of PhD education.
The University of Groningen is strongly in favor of the new system
'It is my ambition to bring more peace, space and continuity to the science system and to give talent more space', writes Dijkgraaf. 'This course calls for more uniformity and good preconditions with regard to the (legal) position of all PhD students.' PhD education does not make a convincing contribution to this, he believes.
One of the aims of the experiment was to train 'more PhD students'. But according to the minister, this can also be done in a different way, now that the cabinet is going to invest in research. 'In this way, space can be created for unfettered research, for talented researchers and new PhD positions where necessary, and for strengthening the interdependence of education and research.'
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