Suggestions to Improve Graduate Education

I was on the golf course a few weeks ago philosophizing with a dear friend of mine and our conversation starting wandering the way of reminiscing about our PhD experiences, which differed greatly.

You see, I was spoiled in my PhD and was given complete freedom over almost every aspect of the program. I should explain that I am not one for bosses and I do not particularly care to follow the norm, so this was perfect for me.  However, while teeing off on the 9th at Tamarack I realized in talking to my friend that this may not be an ideal situation for most.

In many cases, students like an organized graduate program to be oriented with as soon as they set foot into their chosen place of learning. I can completely understand this because there are so many hurdles that we have to endure in a PhD program – finding an advisor, obtaining funding, passing qualifiers, selecting a research topic, etc.. It makes me dizzy just thinking about it.

The point my friend offered up was that the rate of people leaving a PhD program early is quite high. Incredibly, some of the departments he investigated lost more than 60% of their new students. His theory is that if there was a welcome mat or, in other words, a more nurturing environment at least through the first year, people may become situated faster and have a higher probability of completing the PhD. As this idea rolled around in my mind, I thought about the various challenges facing new students.  I also considered potential policy changes that a department could enact to make the transition to grad school a happier, more relaxed experience.

To help new students, programs could:

1. Provide a faculty funding metric. Based on the funding record for each professor, the metric would estimate the probability of maintaining funding for your entire graduate career in a given lab.
2. Provide a faculty publication metric. Based on the average number and quality of papers per student, the metric would estimate the probability of publishing various numbers of papers in a given lab
3. Establish a collaborative network. Even if it’s just five people going out each week to a bar, this is simply a necessity.
4. Get rid of qualifiers. I know some departments use this as a filter to weed out students who should not be in a PhD program. This is just a waste of time for everyone and introduces another form of anxiety. Do away with it. The students who shouldn’t be in a PhD program usually weed themselves out.
5. Provide an academic advisor that helps students pick their electives. It is often the electives that provide exposure to diverse sets of topics and techniques, any one of which may prove useful in your own project. Thus, if you are aligned with electives that interest you, the probability of doing a killer research project only increases.
6. Make a faculty member beat the idea of getting fellowships into students’ heads. That way people can avoid the hell that is TAing. You can only grade papers and listen to undergrads grovel for points for so long…(Sorry, I know there are a few people out there that found being a TA rewarding).

To me, these seem like fairly easy fixes. Hopefully, departments will take a gander at this and consider what changes they can make to improve their own graduate programs.

Tim

Tim Maguire is currently pursing his passion for scientific gab, contributing to numerous scientific blogs. He is also engaged in setting up social network sites and integrative communities for both non-profit organizations as well as universities. In his day job, Tim is pursuing in vitro microfluidic systems incorporating human hepatocytes for toxicology and drug metabolism studies. You can find additional writings and commentary from Tim on his blog at ScienceUnveiled.