Doctor of Education

Purpose

The purpose of this qualification is to enable learners to make a significant contribution to the knowledge and understanding in the field of study related to education. It is a postgraduate qualification aimed at creating opportunities for learners to engage with research into any aspect of education. The qualification will be conferred only on those learners who have demonstrated the capacity for sustained original research that generated well-grounded new knowledge in the Education field.

Learners must show evidence of high academic standards in the content of the thesis and the ability to undertake research independently. It is also the purpose of this qualification to produce theses that should respectably stand alongside refereed and published research in the same field and have practical application in the societal context.

Rationale

The Doctor of Education by thesis is a postgraduate qualification in education, which aims to combine academic rigour with professional relevance. The qualification also extends the boundaries of knowledge production within the field of education. Potential learners are typically practitioners in the education sector. The qualification provides an opportunity for learners to pursue research on a variety of education-related issues at the doctoral level.

Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL)

The learner should draft a written application and submit this application to the Assessment and Graduation Unit. Learners will then receive assistance provided at the academic department responsible for formulating this application. Any RPL application for recognition of academic achievements will be dealt with in terms of the standing procedures for module recognition. The learner is subject to a substantive assessment by the responsible persons at the academic departments, and a report on this assessment is provided to the Assessment and Graduation Unit.

A faculty RPL committee is constituted as a Faculty Board sub-committee to evaluate each case individually and on its own merits.

Entry Requirements

The minimum admission requirement for this qualification is

• Master of Education, NQF Level 9.

This qualification consists of the following compulsory module at NQF Level 10 totalling 180 Credits.

• Thesis, 360 Credits.

1. Identify and formulate a researchable problem that will generate new knowledge.
2. Develop a research design to validly and reliably collect and analyse data relating to the identified researchable problem.
3. Select, rationalise and employ research methodologies suitable to address the researchable problem(s).
4. Design an appropriate theoretical framework within which to embed a research project.
5. Use technology to collect data and to assist with the analysis of data.
6. Respond to ethical issues involved in research.
7. Present the researchable problem, theoretical framework, the research methodologies employed, the data and its analysis, research findings, interpretations, conclusions and recommendations in a coherent text of acknowledged scholarly value 8. Organise and manage a research project.

The following Associated Assessment Criteria will assess the

• Ensure a research plan includes an astute formulation of topic and meaningful parameters, incorporate significant variables, operational objectives, hypotheses and research problems.
• Ensure a suitable, well-motivated, and scientifically acceptable methods and procedures of research, and a research approach that is theoretically well-founded and conceptualised and a systematically organised and critically accountable research design.
• Ensure a chapter division that shows appropriate range and compass of content, creativity and originality, based on well-found assumptions.
• Ensure a study of literature that testifies to balance, knowledge and sound interpretation and that is relevant, topical and recent, with an adequate selection in which primary sources have precedence over secondary sources.
• Ensure a summary in which the conclusions and deductions express the spirit of the study meaningfully and conclusively.
• Ensure the findings and recommendations that are viable, accountable and concur with the objectives/research problem hypotheses, with inducement for improvement and refinement of practice and suitable for publication.
• Recommend for further research.
• Contribute to the extension/expansion of existing knowledge through independent, original and critical thinking.

Integrated Assessment includes

A substantial and well-organised thesis which satisfies current national and international standards in the principal area of education inquiry, and in which:

• The fundamental argument and its relations with current and past streams of thinking are clear,
• The research approach is suitably specified, and justified,
• The original research findings are appropriately presented and evaluated, and
• A majority of external examiners formally assesses the implications for knowledge in and thinking about the broader area of inquiry.