INTEGRATING RESEARCH IN DEVELOPMENT OF MASTER TEACHINGS: CHALLENGES AND PERSPECTIVES FROM EHEA

According the decree 1393/2007 of Spanish Government, master teachings are oriented to acquire a specialized or multidisciplinary advanced training by students. It must guarantee either academic or professional specialization, or abilities to develop research tasks. In fact writing and public discussion of a dissertation must mark the end of these teachings. That dissertation could suppose between 6 to 30 ECTS. Obtaining a master degree, any student is also qualified to begin doctorate education.
The official postgraduate master on Pharmaceutical Care and Welfare Pharmacy in University CEU Cardenal Herrera serve as example of integration of research through a student’s work that must be supervised by one or more professors, all of them PhD. This work must be developed according scientific method and it must be placed into any research line related with modules integrating master teachings. The result of work is a dissertation that must be stated before an examining board made up of three professors with PhD degree.
In accordance with changes that have been stipulated by the aforementioned decree, a master teachings syllabus could be offered if it has been verified by the assessment agency. Any master must be represented by a person responsible and designed by a commission. Formative aims must emanate from research lines. These research lines are the focus of convergence between research management and administration of teaching regulation. Because research lines constitute the framework in order to develop master dissertation, we can guarantee and solve these matters:

1. Supervisor of master dissertation is a professor with PhD degree.
2. The kind of research is consolidated and guarantees developments and technical uses from the experience of expert researchers.
3. There is funding to carry out research tasks related with dissertation.

Our case study derive not only from the own research lines of University CEU Cardenal Herrera but also from the integration of other lines that are developing the University of Valencia, the University of Navarra, the Institute for Biodiversity and Evolutionary Biology “Cavanilles” (a research institute at University of Valencia), SEPLAN (a service of laboratories), the Platform for Research in Food Safety (a civil service ), etc. This circumstance allows the master student to acquire a high quality experience on research.