Review of 'Advising PhD Candidates', Peggy Nightingale: 2005 Milperra, NSW, Higher Education Research and Development Society of Australasia (HERDSA)

Penny Nightingale's short guide for advisors of Ph.D. candidates builds upon the previous HERDSA guide, 'Supervising postgraduates' (Moses, 1985). Nightingale’s rationale for restricting the guide to Ph.D.s recognizes that postgraduate education, and doctoral education in particular, has moved on considerably in the past two decades. Thus the guide has a strong focus and this is a strength. At the same time her advice is more broadly useful for all would-be advisors of postgraduate research. Nightingale is very aware of the different research traditions in the sciences, social sciences and the creative arts, as well as interdisciplinary studies, and traverses this territory well. Nightingale is not dictatorial. She provides a wealth of advice tempered with a wide range of suggestions.