PRES supervision report highlights independent routes for concerns

Updated Oct 27, 2026

A PRES supervision report announced by RSVP on 14 September 2026 highlights researchers' requests for clearer routes to raise concerns. The announcement introduces Advance HE's analysis of Postgraduate Research Experience Survey comments, commissioned by the Research England-funded Next Generation Research SuperVision Project.

What the PRES supervision report adds

The full report, dated August 2026, analyses 5,930 comments from 1,000 respondents at UK institutions. It selects 200 respondents per year from 2021 to 2025, among those who supplied substantive supervision comments. Other open-text answers from those respondents are also examined.

The sample was selected randomly within filtered data while seeking to match each year's respondent demographics. Participation in PRES was self-selecting, and the report focuses on respondents who supplied substantive supervision comments.

Alongside valued supervisory support, respondents describe gaps and request independent reporting channels, stronger oversight and clearer responsibilities.

The report used CoLoop AI software with a manually prepared discussion guide and subsequent manual checks of themes. Its theme counts refer to participants’ summaries across answers.

For doctoral schools examining their own survey responses, our PRES comment analysis service organises supervision and research-environment feedback for graduate school and faculty reports.

References

[RSVP]: "What do doctoral candidates really think about supervision?" Published: 2026-09-14

[Advance HE / RSVP]: "The Postgraduate Research Experience Survey (PRES): deep dive into supervision practices and experiences" Report dated: August 2026; publication announced: 2026-09-14