This paper aims to describe how to support the development of expertise in a multi-disciplinary setting in one technical university in Finland. The aim of this paper is to improve the understanding of what expertise is and how to promote such expertise through doctoral education. There is a need to create interdisciplinary skills for complex global environments in engineering education. Therefore, a multidisciplinary doctoral programme combining both humanities and engineering disciplines, specifically in industrial engineering, provides a great opportunity to study scientific expertise. The implications of this paper provide a greater understanding of how university departments can support doctoral students during their journey to becoming professional scientists and experts. The review shows that the scholarly community plays an important role in fostering new experts through doctoral education. Earlier, doctors were seen as wise men in a factual sense; today's doctors and those of the future are seen as having skills and knowledge to work within communities that build up expertise in collaboration. Expertise is not one man's property but is developed in a network of actors in social environments. The structures of doctoral education support the earlier view of expertise. However, these structures should be changed in order better to promote the development of expertise as understood today. In order to promote the development of the scientific expertise of doctoral students, more collaborative approaches should be adopted during doctoral education. Doctoral students should be encouraged to take on the role of an active agent in the scholarly community in its broad sense. Students should participate actively in scientific conferences and other professional meetings from the early stages of their studies.
Author Keywords
Index Keywords
