Enhanching postgraduate learning and teaching: Postgraduate summer school in dairy science

Dairy science is a multidisciplinary area of scientific investigation and PhD students aiming to do research in the field of animal and/or veterinary sciences must be aware of this. PhD students often have vast spectra of research interests, and it is quite challenging to satisfy the expectation of all of them. Having this in mind, we have organised a Summer School program for PhD students. The aim of this proposal was to establish an international PhD training program based on research collaboration between The University of Sydney and the University of Padua. The core component of this program was a two weeks Post Graduate Summer School in Dairy Science, which was held at the University of Padua, for PhD students of both universities. Therefore we designed a program that encompassed seminars, workshops, laboratory practical sessions, and farm visits. The activities have been designed so that the PhD students would meet the following learning objectives: outline the differences in dairy production systems in Italy, Australia and around the world; identify how the various husbandry and management techniques can impact on dairy cows' welfare, health and production and recommend procedures to minimize these impacts; identify factors affecting milk characteristics and explore alternative industrial possibilities to exploit milk by-products; communicate and interact competently with fellow PhD students, scientists and producers; develop a scholarly and integrative approach to research in animal and veterinary science; widen the perspective of the PhD students about biology applied to animal and veterinary sciences.