Overview of the Consequences of PhD Students as Teachers

Abstract

PhD students in Sweden have a long tradition of teaching as part of their PhD education, whether or not they have received pedagogical training. In this paper, we discuss the benefits and problems associated with teaching as an obligatory task for PhD students in Sweden. It is believed that teaching-related activities can be beneficial at different levels from PhD students, departments, universities, and future working environments. For PhD students, the added value from teaching includes different transferable skills such as public speaking, multi-tasking, and leadership in both personal and professional development. It has also been proven that the shared teaching responsibility increases the level of personal trust between new undergraduate students, graduate students, and professors, which further improves microculture at the division and the university. However, as teaching is a time-consuming task, it may cause various problems. Not all PhD students will stay in academia, nor does everyone like teaching. Therefore, the achieved experience and skills from teaching may be less beneficial, especially when sometimes, teaching can be a very hectic activity among many other activities. Even more time and energy will be taken when PhD students are asked to teach a non-relevant topic.