Healthy Developments

Support for researchers' professional development is at an all-time high, two studies presented at the Vitae conference last week suggest.

The 2009 Careers in Research Online Survey of about 6,000 research staff shows that more courses are being taken than ever before, with 72 per cent of respondents participating in training activities within their universities in the past year, up from 36 per cent in 2006.

The second study, the 2009 Postgraduate Research Experience Survey of about 18,600 postgraduate research students, found that about 70 per cent of postgraduate researchers felt there were adequate opportunities available to help them further develop their research skills.

This figure was up nearly 10 per cent on last year.

The first survey was undertaken by Vitae, the second by the Higher Education Academy.