Social Work and Personal Social Services

Each doctoral student individually develops a research project, the results of which are presented in the doctoral thesis. Depending on the provisions of the call for places in the individual cycles, the research project may concern a topic of free choice (in the context of one or more research areas of the Doctorate) or it may be on a restricted topic.

At the same time as the call for applications, or in any case during the first year of the programme, the Academic Board assigns to each PhD student a tutor/supervisor, chosen from within the Board itself and, if it deems it appropriate, also a second tutor (co-tutor), not necessarily a member of the Board.

The tutor and co-tutor are assigned taking into account: (a) the research interests expressed by the PhD student and the project he/she intends to present and (b) the distribution of assignments and workload among the members of the Board.

The assignment of the tutor and the co-tutor may be modified by the Board, on the proposal of the Coordinator or at the request of the interested parties, for supervening organizational needs or for scientific reasons, linked, for example, to changes in the research project.

The tutor and the co-tutor accompany the PhD student with functions mainly based on supervision: this means that in principle they do not give precise ex-ante indications with respect to the work to be done, while they are available to offer feedback and discuss the student's proposals, in order to support him/her to:

• define the research design and address any obstacles/doubts in carrying it out;
• structure the overall structure of the thesis text;
• articulate the analysis, proposing in-depth analysis, or highlighting particularly relevant issues, or suggesting further interpretations for interpreting the data.