So an E-Thesis It Will Be

By the time I get ready to defend my own doctoral thesis in a few years (if all goes according to plan!), the e-thesis will be mandatory at all Canadian universities, and e-defenses will be common here on Memorial’s campus. The School of Graduate Studies (SGS) is leading the way in utilizing technology to the fullest degree, changing theses from paper-based to electronic; increasing the number of e-defenses. The switch to e-theses will cut down on printing and shipping costs, and also get research into the public domain a lot faster, according to C. Dean Barnes, programs coordinator with SGS. E-thesis development is to start in the fall of this year, and go live in winter 2012. By 2014, e-theses will be mandatory at all Canadian universities. It is also expected that by May 2011, the majority of oral defenses will be conducted via webcast, with examiners off campus being able to e-attend as opposed to being flown in from out-of-province. More information on these initiatives can be found here.

Sociologists Find Fault with NRC’s Doctoral Rankings

According to an article on today’s Inside Higher Ed, sociologists are not happy with the National Research Council’s (NRC) doctoral rankings. Six months ago, the NRC released it’s much-anticipated and much delayed doctoral rankings report (see an earlier post here), but critique quickly followed suit. Much of the criticism pertained to the methodology and/or the data. Now the American Sociological Association (ASA) has released an analysis of the assessment. Among a number of concerns that were raised, fault was found with issues such as the exclusion of books and book citations as methods for evaluating faculty productivity in the social sciences, disregard for the quality of journal article publications, the lack of distinction between single-authored and co-authored papers, and the judging of admissions quality by GRE scores alone, ignoring verbal scores, which are a significant measure for American sociology departments. There is a concern that these rankings could have a negative influence on people’s perceptions of departments ranked lower than their actual quality and may lead to pressure to change programs to improve their rankings. The ASA’s report can be found here.

Doctoral Student Satisfaction

A recent article, entitled "Doctoral Student Satisfaction: An Examination of Disciplinary, Enrollment, and Institutional Differences", published in the journal, Research in Higher Education, examines data from the 2000 National Doctoral Program Survey (NDPS) to gain insight into the differences in satisfaction levels of doctoral students across academic disciplines and institutional types. Interestingly, no significant differences were found in the overall satisfaction of students across disciplines or institutional types (research extensive and intensive universities). Students were less satisfied with the support they received to pursue careers outside of academia, as well as the amount of information (or lack thereof) they received at the start of their program on time-to-degree and post-graduation placement assistance. Education and humanities students in particular were less satisfied than expected with regards to issues related to financial resources, support, and information; students at research intensive universities were less satisfied than expected with training preparation or guidance for academic careers. Not surprisingly, former students were generally less satisfied with their advisor and doctoral experience; students who had been formerly enrolled in humanities, physical science, social sciences, and life sciences programs were even more dissatisfied.

The findings of this study emphasizes the importance of institutional and departmental support for doctoral students, the need for graduate program assessments, further research into the factors that contribute to doctoral student attrition, and the experiences of students enrolled at less prestigious institutions.