Developing Institutional Leadership for the Scholarship of Graduate Student Supervision: Lessons Learned in a Canadian Research-Intensive University

This chapter examines a recently launched initiative for developing institutional leadership for scholarly approaches to and the Scholarship of Graduate Student Supervision (SoGSS) at the University of British Columbia (UBC). This initiative is led by the Dean, Associate Dean, and former Associate Dean of the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies and is supported by a team of National Teaching Fellows and a graduate student. It involves a customized graduate student supervision (GSS) leaders’ cohort within the International Faculty SoTL Leadership Program at UBC. The initiative arose from institutional concerns about quality assurance and strategic supports for the enhancement of GSS in UBC’s multidisciplinary research-intensive context. The following were noted: (1) widespread discrepancies in the ways that GSS (sometimes referred to as mentoring) is being taken up and exercised across campus; (2) lack of strategic leadership for GSS within units and related professional development initiatives; and (3) inadequate faculty assessment and evaluation protocols (e.g., formative for professional development purposes or summative for tenure, promotion and reappointment purposes) for discipline-specific GSS practices.