The supervision, monitoring and evaluation of doctoral programmes are the responsibility of the Doctoral School, through the Postgraduate Studies Committee, and the Academic Committee of the Programme. In accordance with arts. 14-16 of the REODULL, the Academic Committee of the programme shall be composed of a maximum of seven professors and/or researchers participating in it, including the academic coordinator, who shall act as its president. This position must be held by a relevant researcher and be supported by the possession of at least two periods of recognised research activity in accordance with the provisions of Royal Decree 1086/1989, of 28 August, on the remuneration of teaching staff. At least one member of each line of research that forms part of the doctoral programme shall be included in it, respecting the above limit. In the event that there are more than seven lines of research, at the end of each term the academic committee will be renewed, with professors and/or researchers from those lines that did not have representatives in the previous term being incorporated as members. In addition, representatives of entities external to the doctoral programme that collaborate in its development may be incorporated as members of the academic committee, in a number not exceeding three. In any case, they must meet the requirements established to be a thesis director, which are described in section 5.1 of this report. If necessary, a rotating system of designation of representatives by external entities will be established.
Membership of the academic committee will last for three academic years from the date of appointment, provided that the conditions for membership are maintained. Members of the research lines may replace the members appointed by them when any of the reasons contemplated in the regulations governing membership of collegiate bodies arise. Membership of the academic committee may be extended once if the members of the research line to which the member is assigned so deem it necessary.
The academic committee will have the following functions: a) Propose the admission of students, b) Establish the training supplements that, if applicable, must be taken by admitted students based on their access profile, c) Assign a tutor and director to each new student, d) Evaluate the research plan and the activity document of each student in the program within the established deadlines, e) Choose the doctors who must issue the reports on the doctoral theses that aspire to the title of Doctor with "International Mention", f) Analyze the doctoral theses that are presented in order to begin their defense process and issue the corresponding report, g) Formulate the proposal for the appointment of the doctors who will form part of the thesis committee, h) Check each academic year that the members of the doctoral program meet the established requirements to be assigned as thesis directors.
Procedure for assigning a tutor and director
As regulated by article 9 of the REODULL, once admitted, each student will be assigned a tutor by the Academic Committee. The tutor must be a doctor and meet the requirements to direct doctoral theses mentioned in article 10 of the aforementioned Regulations. The Academic Committee, after hearing the doctoral student, may modify the appointment of the assigned tutor at any time during the period of completion of the doctorate, provided there are justified reasons. If it deems it appropriate, it may request reports from the tutor and the thesis director.
Activity Record Control and Data Certification
Once the Supervision Commitment Document has been signed, the Academic Committee of the programme will enable the Personalised Activities Document (DAP) for the individualised registration of the activities carried out by the doctoral student. It will record both the training activities referred to in section 4 of this report, as well as the training supplements established by the Academic Committee based on the access profile and the recommendations of the tutor (point 3.3.1 of the report). Each activity must include identification data (type, title, place of performance), source of funding if applicable, authorisation from the tutor/director, purpose of the activity, its relation to the topic and research plan, and once completed, a summary of its content, duration in hours and date of completion, proof of its completion, incidents if any, and verification/certification by the tutor of its completion, as regulated by the programme's own CA and the ULL's Postgraduate Studies Committee or Doctoral School when it is in operation. Annually, the thesis tutor and director and the CA will incorporate into this document their reports on the fulfillment of the scheduled activities.
Annual evaluation of the Research Plan and the Activity Document
Before the end of the first year, the PhD candidate will prepare a Research Plan that will include at least: a) justification of the study, b) methodology to be used and objectives to be achieved, c) available resources and d) time planning. This plan may be improved and detailed throughout the candidate's stay in the programme and must be endorsed by the tutor and the director. The academic committee of the programme will annually evaluate the development of the Research Plan and the document of activities carried out by the PhD candidate, together with the reports that the tutor and the director must issue for this purpose. The report of the tutor and the director may be joint or independent. It must include an assessment of the degree of compliance and use of the programmed activities, a general assessment of the PhD candidate's performance, the progress made in the planned research plan, the difficulties encountered and the proposed solutions, and a summary of the results obtained, including publications and communications to conferences, if any. From the 2nd year (4th year on a part-time basis), a reasoned estimate of the time required to complete the thesis and the possibility of requesting an extension at the end of the 3rd year (5th year on a part-time basis) will be included. If the supervisor considers it unfeasible to complete the work, he or she must provide adequate justification. A positive evaluation will be an essential requirement for continuing in the programme. In the case of a negative evaluation, the academic committee will issue a report justifying it, in which appropriate corrective measures will be proposed for the next evaluation. In the case of a negative evaluation, the doctoral candidate must be evaluated again within six months, for which purpose a new Research Plan will be drawn up. In the event of a new negative evaluation, the doctoral candidate will be permanently removed from the programme.
Forecast of doctoral students' stays at other centres.
One of the priority challenges of the ULL in recent years has been the promotion of collaborations with other national and international centres for research and postgraduate training. Our geographical location conditions these relations in two ways. On the one hand, the distance makes it more difficult to maintain a direct and fluid interaction with national and European reference centres, and on the other, it makes us a strategic point for interaction with African and Latin countries. The efforts made in recent years to strengthen these relations are reflected in: a) the award of "International Campus of Excellence" in 2010 by the MINECO, b) the signing of doctoral training agreements in the area of Health Sciences with different European universities: Universität Ulm, Germany; Univeritá degli studi di Verona, Italy; Universitá degli studi di Udine, Italy; Universitá degli studi di Bari, Italy; c) the execution of two European projects that involve the mobility of pre- and postdoctoral researchers: «Exploring Marine Resources for Bioactive Compounds: From Discovery to Sustainable Production and Industrial Applications» (MAREX, FP7-KBBE-2009-3), and «Improving Biomedical Research and Innovation in the Canary Islands» (IMBRAIN, FP7-REGPOT-2012-CT2012-316137), d) agreements with different universities and research centres in Latin American and African countries in the field of Health Sciences and Public Health that include doctoral training: University of the West Indies (Jamaica) and the Technological Institute of Sonora (Mexico), University of Santiago de Chile (2011), the University of the Oriental Republic of Uruguay (2012) and the Universidad Michoacana de México (2013), the Atlantic Platform for the control and research of tropical diseases (PACIET) with the participation of other Spanish universities and research centres and of Portugal, Cape Verde, South Africa, Cameroon, Senegal, Chile and Venezuela (see the compendium of agreements and collaborations attached to point 1.4 of this report) and e) Numerous non-agreed collaborations between researchers participating in the programme and researchers from national and international reference centres (see section 1.4.1). These interactions allow us to foresee an increase in the mobility of doctoral students in the coming years.