i have a phd, was it worth the effort?
This post is a work in progress. Publishing it now invites you into the artist-researcher’s thinking and crafting process. Even in draft form, this writing represents a valuable source of knowledge and inspiration. Check-in regularly to catch any updates.
It is estimated that between 40% and 50% of doctoral students do not finish their degrees.[1] Those that do often describe the experience as challenging but also profoundly rewarding. Whatever the experience, completing a PhD is a significant achievement.
Each PhD candidate’s story is different, revealing degrees of joy and despair. What links graduates is a significant commitment and resilience. Despite this resolve, many candidates and even some graduates challenge the value and benefits of completing a PhD. This artistic meditation explores some of the reasons behind this questioning.
As a PhD candidate, I found that despite being awarded a national scholarship and a Chancellor’s Prize nomination, I often felt undervalued and undersupported. I felt that my research lacked ‘currency’ within my faculty and institution. This is despite my arts-based research being located within an arts academy and focused on arts pedagogy. I assumed this focus was naturally aligned with the institutional and academic goals of higher arts learning. What I discovered was a raft of infuriating political, cultural and institutional barriers and prejudices, as well as counterproductive competitiveness.
Key discussions to develop:
There is significant attrition associated with PhD candidacy. Researcher Barbara Lovitts connects the root cause of this attrition to graduate education's social structure and cultural organization.[2]
Researchers Koen Geven, Jan Skopek and Moris Triventi argue that this attrition results in inefficient use of spaces, facilities and scholarships and interferes with departmental and institutional operation and success.[3]
A barrier arises for some candidates regarding the lack of currency their investigation has within their research faculty.
[1]William G. Bowen and Neil L. Rudenstine, In Pursuit of the PhD (Princeton University Press: Princeton), 1992; Yaritza Ferrer de Valero, “Departmental Factors Affecting Time-to-degree and Completion Rates of Doctoral Students at One Land-grant Research Institution,” Journal of Higher Education 72, no. 3 (2001):341–367, DOI: 10.1080/00221546.2001.11777098; Barbara E. Lovitts, Leaving the Ivory Tower: The Causes and Consequences of Departure from Doctoral Study (Rowman & Littlefield: Lanham), 2001; Scott Smallwood, “Doctor Dropout,” The Chronicle of Higher Education, published January 16, 2004, https://www.chronicle.com/article/doctor-dropout/
[2] Lovitts, Leaving the Ivory Tower, 2001.
[3]Koen Geven, Jan Skopek and Moris Triventi, “How to Increase PhD Completion Rates? An Impact Evaluation of Two Reforms in a Selective Graduate School, 1976–2012” Res High Educ 59, (2018):529–552, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11162-017-9481-z