A PhD student registered at ED3C must be supervised or co-supervised by an HDR affiliated exclusively with ED3C at the time of registration.

The thesis director is responsible for the scientific direction of the doctoral project. This responsibility can be assumed jointly by the thesis director and a co-director (holding an HDR), provided that the director and the co-director belong to two separate research teams.

Co-supervisors can participate in the supervision of the thesis, whether or not they hold an HDR. In this case, the respective responsibilities and missions of each must be determined with the doctoral student and specified in the training agreement.

The maximum number of PhD students supervised simultaneously must not exceed 3 (3x100% supervision). A co-direction (with an HDR)  counts for 50% for each co-director.

An HDR cannot recruit more than 2 PhD students in the same year.

A young team leader who does not hold an HDR, winner of an ERC, ATIP/Avenir, or ANR young researcher grant may request an exemption to recruit a doctoral student, under certain conditions. This request must be made to the doctoral school, which will forward it to the establishment to which the team belongs. Applicants must pass their HDR as soon as possible. No other thesis registration can take place until the HDR has been obtained.

These exemptions are rare, and ED3C’s policy is to grant them to junior colleagues when they are establishing their own teams.
For colleagues who are part of a team with other HDR holders, the team leader is responsible for managing the recruitment of PhD students, enabling junior colleagues to act as co-supervisors alongside an HDR holder from their team as the principal supervisor. Having a CV and research proposal that would qualify for a grant does not guarantee that the applicant has the necessary experience to supervise a PhD student. The HDR ensures that its holder has experience of co-supervision before taking full responsibility for a PhD student. Consequently, obtaining the HDR should be the norm, and exemptions should remain highly exceptional.