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Peer Review, Springr 2004
The Responsibility of Doctoral
Programs for the Career Preparation
of Future Faculty
By Chris M. Golde, senior scholar, The Carnegie
Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching |
A
As doctoral students begin graduate school and contemplate
their future careers, many, if not most, imagine
that they will become faculty members. Despite
more than a decade of reports describing the arduousness
of the path and revealing the relatively small proportion
of students who actually secure tenure-track
positions, the next generation is undaunted in their
desire to pursue a faculty career.
In many ways, that is good news. American colleges
and universities must continually be re p l e nished
with passionate, committed scholars and
re s e a rchers. The undergraduates of tomorro w
d e s e rve to be challenged and inspired by teachers
who are familiar with the latest discoveries and well
versed in contemporary pedagogical practice. But
can we be confident in this vision of the future? Are
re s e a rch universities and graduate programs pre p a ring
doctoral students who will be the engaged educators
every professor wants as a colleague and every
p a rent wants teaching their child?
In 2001 my colleague Tim Dore, a chemist now
at the University of Georgia, and I published the
results of a national survey of doctoral students.
M o re than 4,000 doctoral students in eleven disciplines
at twenty-six universities responded to a
lengthy survey that covered many aspects of their
experiences as students, as well as their perc e i v e d
p reparation for their careers, particularly for faculty
c a re e r s .*
Findings
We learned from our survey that students enter graduate
school holding idealized, and in some ways
u n realistic, views of faculty life. Perhaps unsurprisi
n g l y, the graduate school experience provides a
somewhat rude awakening to many. The lives they
see their professors leading do not match the image
in their minds. Many adjust their vision—re p l a c
i n g
the “Mr. Chips” picture of life led by the gifted
teacher who inspired them to go to graduate school
with the publication- and grant-seeking life they see
their advisors lead. Others are discouraged; they look
at the untenured re s e a rch faculty and opt away fro m
such careers. Still others find their passion for their
field undaunted.
We also found a mismatch between the aspects of
faculty roles that students re p o rted being interested in
and looking forw a rd to, and the ones for which they
re p o rted being pre p a red by their programs. These
data (see table 1) tell us two things. First, doctoral students
are interested in the variety of faculty roles; they
do not aspire solely to be re s e a rchers. In fact, taken
in the aggregate, doctoral students are interested
in—and, one can assume, understand
—the various aspects of teaching. A
substantial pro p o rtion of students are
i n t e rested in service roles. The application
of re s e a rch and expertise in broader discip
l i n a ry and public contexts has definite
appeal. And while it may not be surprising
that campus service ro l e s — h e re re p resented
by a question about committee
w o r k — a re the least enticing, the
responses to another question reveal significant
interest in campus life: 69 percent
re p o rted interest in becoming
involved in activities with underg r a d u a t e s
outside of class.
The second thing these data tell us is
that, in general, the conception of “pre p aration”
held by doctoral programs is quite
n a rro w. The pro p o rtion of students who
re p o rt that their program has helped to
p re p a re them for these various tasks and
roles is disappointingly low. For nearly
e v e ry role or task perf o rmed by a faculty
m e m b e r, there is a significant gap
between the pro p o rtion of students
re p o rting interest and the pro p o rt i o n
re p o rting preparation. The gap is small
for conducting re s e a rch, but much larg e r
for many teaching and service ro l e s .*
T h e re are those who respond to
these data by pointing out that the goal of
doctoral education is to pre p a re excellent
re s e a rchers and scholars; doctoral education
is n o t skill-based career pre p a r a t i o n .
H o w e v e r, re s e a rchers and scholars must
understand and take into account the
uses and applications of the knowledge
they create. More o v e r, they must be able
to transmit that knowledge by communicating
with others in a variety of settings: with students in classrooms, with colleagues from other fields on interdisciplinary research teams, and with policymakers. Teaching, whether in an article , classroom, or grant proposal, is an integral
part of investigation and scholarship.
Researchers must be able to contextualize
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