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Educating Scholars: Doctoral Education in the Humanities
Meeting the challenges faced by today's U.S. doctoral humanities programs
Despite the worldwide prestige of America's doctoral programs in the humanities, all is not well in this area of higher education and hasn't been for some time. The content of graduate programs has undergone major changes, while high rates of student attrition, long times to degree, and financial burdens prevail. In response, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation in 1991 launched the Graduate Education Initiative (GEI), the largest effort ever undertaken to improve doctoral programs in the humanities and related social sciences. The only book to focus exclusively on the current state of doctoral education in the humanities, Educating Scholars reports on the GEI's success in reducing attrition and times to degree, the positive changes implemented by specific graduate programs, and the many challenges still to be addressed.
Over a ten-year period, the Foundation devoted almost eighty-five million dollars through the GEI to provide support for doctoral programs and student aid in fifty-four departments at ten leading universities. The authors examine data that tracked the students in these departments and in control departments, as well as information gathered from a retrospective survey of students. They reveal that completion and attrition rates depend upon financial support, the quality of advising, clarity of program requirements, and each department's expectations regarding the dissertation. The authors consider who earns doctoral degrees, what affects students' chances of finishing their programs, and how successful they are at finding academic jobs.
Answering some of the most important questions being raised about American doctoral programs today, Educating Scholars will interest all those concerned about our nation's intellectual future.
Despite the worldwide prestige of America's doctoral programs in the humanities, all is not well in this area of higher education and hasn't been for some time. The content of graduate programs has undergone major changes, while high rates of student attrition, long times to degree, and financial burdens prevail. In response, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation in 1991 launched the Graduate Education Initiative (GEI), the largest effort ever undertaken to improve doctoral programs in the humanities and related social sciences. The only book to focus exclusively on the current state of doctoral education in the humanities, Educating Scholars reports on the GEI's success in reducing attrition and times to degree, the positive changes implemented by specific graduate programs, and the many challenges still to be addressed.
Over a ten-year period, the Foundation devoted almost eighty-five million dollars through the GEI to provide support for doctoral programs and student aid in fifty-four departments at ten leading universities. The authors examine data that tracked the students in these departments and in control departments, as well as information gathered from a retrospective survey of students. They reveal that completion and attrition rates depend upon financial support, the quality of advising, clarity of program requirements, and each department's expectations regarding the dissertation. The authors consider who earns doctoral degrees, what affects students' chances of finishing their programs, and how successful they are at finding academic jobs.
Answering some of the most important questions being raised about American doctoral programs today, Educating Scholars will interest all those concerned about our nation's intellectual future.
- GenresEducation
360 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2009
13 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
November 11, 2015
A hearty study of a ten-year period of funding to decrease Time to Degree (TTD) and attrition. And very readable, to boot.
Key take aways: Seven years seems to be the magic number for getting a job and a tenure job--much less doesn't help, but much more hurts a lot (18)
Of interventions, the most important one was summer seminars for the prospectus, but it's hard to maintain when faculty get burnt out or aren't compensated.
After seminars, good advising seems to be crucial and--and this is totally free--making sure students know what the TTD should be and expectations of how to proceed.The authors are skeptical of multiyear funding because while it decreases competition between students, it may muddle the message about graduating on time. They seem to support conditional tiered funding: give them two years of funding as a TA, for example, and then when they progress to candidacy, they get another two years of fellowship--if they don't progress, they have to pay. Generous funding does help a bit--so people don't have to work concurrent jobs--but it's also good to have small cohorts, which keeps the money in and provides more individual attention. Publishing in grad school does lead to a better placement at a tenure-track job, but it often is co-indicated with a fast TTD: folks who graduate in 5 years are most likely to publish in grad school and those in school 11 or 12 years are the least likely, despite having extra time to do so. In other words, it's not worth telling people to stay in grad school longer to publish, because they probably won't.Teaching doesn't seem to devastate TTD, but too much teaching for too long does. The best interventions, over all, are concrete with clear purposes.
Here's some fun demographic findings: single men, single women and married women all do about the same in TTD, but married men get a boost, somehow.
Most of the people who do drop out aren't fated to drive taxi cabs or wait tables--they're becoming lawyers and writers and educators.
International students graduate faster and more often, and US minority students don't.
The job market 6 months after graduating--yeah, can be bad, but 3 years after graduating, if you had 3 or more publications during grad school you were 96.9% likely to have a job and 70.4% had one at a a tenure-track 4-year.
Caveat: Let me give you the names of some of the programs that participated in this study: UC Berkeley, Harvard, Penn State, Yale, Cornell, Columbia--noticing a trend? It might not be that comforting that 70% of well-published humanities PhDs from top tier schools are getting tenure-track jobs and that those who drop out are becoming judges and business executives. This might not be the most typical sample of humanities PhDs.
Key take aways: Seven years seems to be the magic number for getting a job and a tenure job--much less doesn't help, but much more hurts a lot (18)
Of interventions, the most important one was summer seminars for the prospectus, but it's hard to maintain when faculty get burnt out or aren't compensated.
After seminars, good advising seems to be crucial and--and this is totally free--making sure students know what the TTD should be and expectations of how to proceed.The authors are skeptical of multiyear funding because while it decreases competition between students, it may muddle the message about graduating on time. They seem to support conditional tiered funding: give them two years of funding as a TA, for example, and then when they progress to candidacy, they get another two years of fellowship--if they don't progress, they have to pay. Generous funding does help a bit--so people don't have to work concurrent jobs--but it's also good to have small cohorts, which keeps the money in and provides more individual attention. Publishing in grad school does lead to a better placement at a tenure-track job, but it often is co-indicated with a fast TTD: folks who graduate in 5 years are most likely to publish in grad school and those in school 11 or 12 years are the least likely, despite having extra time to do so. In other words, it's not worth telling people to stay in grad school longer to publish, because they probably won't.Teaching doesn't seem to devastate TTD, but too much teaching for too long does. The best interventions, over all, are concrete with clear purposes.
Here's some fun demographic findings: single men, single women and married women all do about the same in TTD, but married men get a boost, somehow.
Most of the people who do drop out aren't fated to drive taxi cabs or wait tables--they're becoming lawyers and writers and educators.
International students graduate faster and more often, and US minority students don't.
The job market 6 months after graduating--yeah, can be bad, but 3 years after graduating, if you had 3 or more publications during grad school you were 96.9% likely to have a job and 70.4% had one at a a tenure-track 4-year.
Caveat: Let me give you the names of some of the programs that participated in this study: UC Berkeley, Harvard, Penn State, Yale, Cornell, Columbia--noticing a trend? It might not be that comforting that 70% of well-published humanities PhDs from top tier schools are getting tenure-track jobs and that those who drop out are becoming judges and business executives. This might not be the most typical sample of humanities PhDs.
January 20, 2011
$58 million in funding, yikes!
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews