Doctoral Student Learning and Development: A Shared Responsibility

Abstract

Historically, student affairs professionals focused their work almost exclusively on undergraduate students. Doctoral faculty remained focused on the comprehensive needs of doctoral students. However, this situation is changing. Due largely to growth in numbers and diversity of graduate students, student affairs professionals at colleges and universities across the country are increasingly redefining their visions and their roles to include graduate students, including doctoral students. This research study focuses on the roles currently held by faculty in four fields of doctoral study (clinical psychology, nursing, educational administration, and electrical and computer engineering) at 12 universities in order to illuminate the comprehensive nature of the work currently being done by doctoral faculty. Interviews were conducted with 128 doctoral faculty, students, administrators, alumni, and employers. Findings detail the roles and responsibilities of faculty in four thematic areas: (1) scholarly activity and research productivity, (2) advising and mentoring, (3) selection and retention of students, and (4)defining and shaping of program culture. The findings from this study provide information that may be useful to student affairs professionals who plan to include doctoral students in their purview and who seek to better understand the work of doctoral faculty as they move in that direction.