“Most important is that they figure out how to solve the problem”: how do advisors conceptualize and develop research autonomy in chemistry doctoral students?

Barnard, Rachel A.; Shultz, Ginger V.

doi:10.1007/s10734-019-00451-y

Cited by 16 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…The relationship between a doctoral student and their advisor is the foundation of the student's success in completing a Ph.D. (Bair & Haworth, 2004;Barnard & Shultz, 2020;Barnes & Austin, 2009;Burt et al, 2016;Devos et al, 2016;Gardner, 2010;Hilmer & Hilmer, 2007;McCray & Joseph-Richard, 2020;Noy & Ray, 2012;Schlosser & Gelso, 2001;Zhao et al, 2007). Few studies, however, have focused on how these relationships form and, specifically, the facilitation role that doctoral programs play in this process.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Doctoral advisor selection processes in science, math, and engineering programs in the United States

2023

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Although advising relationships are key for doctoral student success, little research has addressed how they form. Understanding the formation of advising relationships can help contextualize their later development and ultimately support a student’s decision to persist in the doctorate. To understand relationship formation, the purpose of this qualitative study is to identify and describe the types of advisor–advisee selection processes that exist in engineering, science, and math doctoral programs and examine patterns across disciplines within those fields. We conducted interviews with doctoral program directors and engaged in document analysis of graduate student handbooks from 55 doctoral programs in the aforementioned fields in high research institutions across the United States. Using principal–agent theory as a theoretical lens, our findings showed that engineering programs tend to decentralize the advisor selection process by funding students across different funding sources upon enrollment. Contrariwise, science and math programs tended to fund all students in a cohort from a common funding source, which allowed students to have more time to gather information, meet, and select an advisor. These findings also show important nuances when comparing graduate education in these programs that directly impact the doctoral student experience and reiterates the necessity to study these fields separately.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Doctoral advisor selection processes in science, math, and engineering programs in the United States

2023

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“…Lab rotation is a period where students interact with advisors, postdocs, and other graduate students in several laboratories for defined periods of time and decide on which laboratories to join. , While only a third of the programs studied implement them, LR received the greatest proportion of chemistry departments that state learning goals (Figure ). Six unique learning goals were identified for lab rotations , the most common of which was for a student to select a formal research advisor followed by conducting research (Figure S2), consistent with previous reports showing increases in lab rotations .…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Learning Goals and Priorities Identified by an Examination of Chemistry Graduate Handbooks

Donkor,

Harshman

2023

J. Chem. Educ.

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The commonly accepted goal of doctoral education is to train students to be independent researchers and scientists. The backward design framework was used to model how graduate handbooks should be developed; by setting measurable outcomes and working backward to design programmatic elements that will meet those desired goals. Under the backward design framework, each of the programmatic elements of doctoral programs is based on learning goals designed to help to progress students to accomplish this overarching goal. Because the graduate student handbook represents the primary documentation of programmatic elements, it is possibly the only place where learning goals are explicitly written out. In this qualitative study, publicly available graduate handbooks from 60 chemistry departments were investigated for the learning goals of the programmatic elements to know how these contribute to the overarching goal of graduate education and compared to a literature-based model of the goals of each major programmatic element. Through document and thematic analysis, we found that most handbooks did not explicitly state the learning goals of the programmatic elements, indicating that backward design was not likely implemented fully during the crafting of these documents. Considering the prior success of backward design, this study implies that graduate handbooks written with an explicit alignment with backward design could better prepare students for the workforce and more broadly meet the desired goals of doctorate-level chemistry education.

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“…In particular, experiences with advisors may be a crucial site in the cultivation of unequal socialization outcomes, including research skill development. Advising relationships play a powerful role in doctoral student experiences and supporting emerging scholarly identities (Barnard, and Shultz, 2020;Curtin et al, 2016;Lechuga, 2011;Wofford et al, 2021), and prior research demonstrates that gender and race mediate doctoral student advising relationships (Griffin, 2020;Noy and Ray, 2012).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Beyond technical mastery: inequality in doctoral research skill development in the biological sciences

McCain

Roksa

2023

SGPE

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Purpose The purpose of this study is to examine how doctoral students in the biological sciences understand their research skill development and explore potential racial/ethnic and gender inequalities in the scientific learning process. Design/methodology/approach Based on interviews with 87 doctoral students in the biological sciences, this study explores how doctoral students describe development of their research skills. More specifically, a constructivist grounded theory approach is employed to understand how doctoral students make meaning of their research skill development process and how that may vary by gender and race/ethnicity. Findings The findings reveal two emergent groups, “technicians” who focus on discrete tasks and data collection, and “interpreters” who combine technical expertise with attention to the larger scientific field. Although both groups are developing important skills, “interpreters” have a broader range of skills that support successful scholarly careers in science. Notably, white men are overrepresented among the “interpreters,” whereas white women and students from minoritized racial/ethnic groups are concentrated among the “technicians.” Originality/value While prior literature provides valuable insights into the inequalities across various aspects of doctoral socialization, scholars have rarely attended to examining inequalities in research skill development. This study provides new insights into the process of scientific learning in graduate school. Findings reveal that research skill development is not a uniform experience, and that doctoral education fosters different kinds of learning that vary by gender and race/ethnicity.

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“Most important is that they figure out how to solve the problem”: how do advisors conceptualize and develop research autonomy in chemistry doctoral students?

Cited by 16 publications

References 32 publications

Doctoral advisor selection processes in science, math, and engineering programs in the United States

Doctoral advisor selection processes in science, math, and engineering programs in the United States

Learning Goals and Priorities Identified by an Examination of Chemistry Graduate Handbooks

Beyond technical mastery: inequality in doctoral research skill development in the biological sciences

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