The Regulatory standards for UPV/EHU students’ external academic practice expressly provides for the external academic practice associated with Doctorate Teaching. These work practice experiences are aimed at activities related to the doctorate and which are clearly of interest to the company or institution receiving the student in question, such as: performing experiments in a real-life environment that are necessary for the student’s doctoral thesis; case studies in which innovative proposals can be applied and which are carried out as part of the doctoral thesis; learning and implementation of necessary techniques and/or tools to complete the doctoral thesis. These work practice experiences can take place at the University itself or at collaborating entities, such as companies, institutions and public and private organisations at a national and international level.

Furthermore, the new European doctorate teaching paradigm is the result of a recognition of the need to incorporate PhD holders into the job market, so as to promote a knowledge-based economy and society. Consequently, external work practice has been established as a tool to foster the professional integration of a highly qualified community. So, on one hand, the external work practice enables doctoral students to acquire professional experience, while on the other hand, the host companies and institutions can discover the value of integrating doctors in their workforce. All this without overlooking the fact that, albeit indirectly, this is clearly beneficial to the University-Business relationship.

In the event that an agreement is pursued between a Doctoral Programme and a specific company or institution to make it possible for students on a Doctoral programme to carry out work practice, the existing procedure regarding work placements must be respected, and said procedure must be started at least one week before the work practice is due to begin, EXCEPT IN THE CASE OF PAID WORK PRACTICE AT AN ORGANISATIONAL UNIT OF THE UPV/EHU, IN WHICH CASE IT MUST BE STARTED TWO WEEKS IN ADVANCE. Before embarking on said procedure, the following must be taken into account:

• Organisational Unit of the UPV/EHU (only for work practice carried out at the UPV/EHU itself, including UPV/EHU joint centres and bodies with no legal status of their own at the UPV/EHU): in the event that the collaborating body is an Organisational Unit of the UPV/EHU, the person responsible for said Organisational Unit must firstly agree the characteristics of the work practice agreement with the person in charge of the student’s Doctoral Programme. Once agreed, the person responsible for the aforementioned Organisational Unit of the UPV/EHU must complete the Application for prior authorisation to carry out external academic practice at an Organisational Unit of the UPV/EHU according to the current Regulatory standards for UPV/EHU students’ external academic practice (appendix III). Once the work practice in question has been authorised, the practice agreement will then be processed in line with the following procedure.
• Maximum number of hours permitted (Resolution of the Standing Council of the Doctoral School of 22 April 2024):
  • Maximum number of hours that a doctoral student can undertake educational cooperation throughout the doctoral training period: 1000 hours.
  • Maximum number of hours that a doctoral student can undertake educational cooperation in a single academic year: 450 hours. 

Procedure

1. The person responsible for the Doctoral Programme, or the member of the Doctoral Programme’s Academic Commission who has been appointed to be in charge of work practice, must send a completed form for each voluntary practice per student to doke.praktikak@ehu.eus. The dates on which the agreement starts and ends must be within the current academic year. The deadline for concluding the agreement is 30th September.
   Important:

   • In the event that the collaborating body is an Organisational Unit of the UPV/EHU, a completed and signed copy of appendix III must also be enclosed with the application.

   • In the event that the collaborating body is an Organisational Unit of the UPV/EHU, the academic practice tutor and the academic practice instructor may not be the same person. Ideally the academic practice tutor should be the doctoral thesis director, and the instructor should be a teacher from the research team.

   • In the event that the collaborating body is an Organisational Unit of the UPV/EHU and the academic practice in question IS PAID, at the indication of the UPV/EHU Work Practice Board:

     • In the event that the work practice is to be financed using research funds, authorisation must be requested from the Vice-Chancellor’s office for Research, and appendix III signed accordingly. In all other cases, the person in charge at the Organisational Unit must respect article 21. Regulatory standards for UPV/EHU students’ external academic practice.

     • To manage the students’ tax contributions, the person in charge at the Organisational Unit must apply to the UPV/EHU’s Social Security service (segsocial@ehu.eus), enclosing the Excel form provided by said service and appendix III, duly completed.

   • If the practice in question is paid, those doctoral students who already receive funding (UPV/EHU, Basque Government, Ministry…) must make sure they are not incurring in any incompatibility, and they should request the corresponding permit from the funding body, where applicable.

2. The Doctoral School will send the appendices to the corresponding Doctoral Programme secretary, who will then contact the students to notify them that they should pick up their documents from the secretary’s office (please find the contact details of the Doctoral Programme secretary’s office here).

3. The student must obtain the relevant signatures and return the signed documents in question to the Doctoral Programme’s administrative staff. 

4. The Doctoral Programme’s administrative staff will keep the original copy of appendix V with the student’s records.

Queries

• E-mail: doke.praktikak@ehu.eus