An investigation of the nature and contribution of honours programs in Australia

There is growing interest worldwide in the nature of Honours programs including those that serve the transition from undergraduate to postgraduate research courses. This is at a time when there is also intense interest in the effectiveness of research training, timely research candidate completion, and in the contribution of research students to university research status. In Australia prior to the 1980s Honours programs were primarily intended to provide the link between undergraduate and postgraduate research work, but this situation changed and Honours programs evolved into a variety of forms to meet new needs. With this diversity we have lost sight of whether or not Honours research projects prove effective in attracting future postgraduate research students and in preparing them for research. In this paper the authors report research that suggests that for PhD students who have completed their thesis, having an Honours qualification does not predict examination outcome, but another highly relevant question is whether or not preparation through Honours increases the likelihood of research degree completion. The first section of the paper provides an overview of the literature on research about Honours degrees, the second section presents data on doctoral outcomes for those who obtained Honours, and the third illustrates the type of information currently being collected to explore to what extent honours students are ‘prepared’ for the expectations associated with, and the intensity of, a research higher degree.