General rules

Credits

A minimum total credits to be obtained is set to 180 CFU on a three-year basis (these can be exceeded). It is not necessary to collect 60 CFU each year. Credits can be collected according to the following table.

  • Teaching between 12 and 30 CFU
    • PhD courses. A 20-hour module for the PhD = 3 CFU
    • PhD schools. An intensive one-week PhD school = 3 CFU
    • Other training Courses. Every 10 hours of teaching = 1.5 CFU
    • Attended seminars. Every 6 one-hour seminars = 1 CFU
  • Research activities between 100 and 160 CFU
    • This includes the actual research, either done at DIFI or elsewhere, the time to write reports, notes and papers, the preparation of talks and seminars, the attendance to conferences and the write up of the final thesis
  • Teaching done by students and events organized by students between 0 and 30 CFU
    • Teaching activities carried out by PhD students, e.g. tutoring or teaching support: every 10 hours = 1.5 CFU
    • Events organized by the PhD students, e.g. outreach, science awareness, dissemination events: N CFU to be established according to the commitment required
  • Other activities between 0 and 20 CFU 
    • Courses borrowed from the Master’s Degree Programs: N CFU as established by the various Masters Programs
  • General guidelines
    • We recommend attending 6 classes in total. 
      • One class can be replaced by a training school, and upon the approval of the School Council.
      • Classes can be chosen also from the Master’s Program in Physics.
      • Since these classes are typically 48 hours, they are equivalent to two “standard” classes.
      • Caveat: their CFU will count as «Other activities»
    • Global suggestion: 4 classes in the first year, 2 classes in the second year
    • Each student must submit an education plan to the coordinator, within 2 months of the official begin date of the PhD, by writing to phd.physics@unige.it. This plan may be modified later on, but permission must be asked for to the PhD School Council.
    • Classes are listed at https://www.difi.unige.it/en/phd/cycles/40

PhD booklet

  • Students must enter every activity in the PhD booklet (to be used as a sort of logbook)
    • Enter every activities yielding CFUs (teaching, research etc) : 
      • in the booklet students propose the number of CFUs for every item.
      • these will be approved by the tutor first, and the PhD coordinator later.
    • Also, students must list in the booklet the conferences and seminars attended, the publications that were authored etc….
    • Publications are automatically retrieved from the IRIS publication archive
      • Students must remember to check that your tutors and collaborators add the publications of which they are co-authors in IRIS, or add them by themselves.
    • At the end of the 3 years, a diploma supplement will be automatically derived from the booklet using the data entered.

Tutor/supervisor and location

  • Each student must propose at least one tutor/supervisor, within 2 months of the official PhD start date.
  • The tutor is either a Professor/Researcher of the University of Genoa, or a Researcher of the scientific institutions having a cooperation agreement with UNIGE (at present: CNR, IIT, INFN, INAF) 
  • The tutor may be changed later, and further tutors may be added. These changes must be notified to the Director, who will consult the Council for approval. 
  • Students must also communicate in which lab/office they will spend most of their time

Rules for attending conferences, trips etc

  • Participation to conferences and visits to external laboratories are encouraged.
    • Each student has a dedicated budget of around 10% of the fellowship to be used for conferences/visits or buying material.
  • Each participation to a conference or meeting, and each scientific visit to laboratories outside Genoa must be notified in advance by e-mail to the Coordinator of the School for approval (phd.physics@unige.it).
  • Students must fill a travel request using the form https://unige.u-web.cineca.it/ (always! This is for travel insurance purposes, even if the trip is paid by some other institute)
    • Please start the procedure at least 5 days in advance to allow enough time to enable the travel insurances.
  • In the first year, conferences and visits must not interfere with the attendance to classes. In any case, contact the Coordinator. 

End of year report and exam

A report on the scientific activity (~2 pages), together with a summary of the classes attended and exams given, must be submitted to the Coordinator (phd.physics@unige.it) no later than 1.5 months before the end of a given year (e.g. beginning of September for those who begin on November 1st)

The exam to be admitted to the following takes place at the end of the 11th month of the year (e.g. September/beginning of October for those who begin on November 1st) and consists of a 20-minutes seminar for the first and second year. For the third and last year, a 30-minute seminar will be given, summarizing the entire research activity of the PhD, within the end of the third year (e.g. end of October for those who start on November 1st).

Before the end of each year students will also have to fill a mandatory anonymous questionnaire

Election of a representative in the Faculty Board

Students will be asked to elect a representative in the PhD Faculty Board for every cycle. And an overall representative in the Department of Physics Board and the Department of Physics Giunta.

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