The advent of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) has been altering the Higher Education landscape in recent years. This kind of courses are penetrating in an increasing number of universities, the majority of which do not seem to have intentions to stop offering them in the short term. Such courses are generating new educational scenarios to…

Although engineering graduate programs rarely require academic writing courses, the indicators of merit in academic engineering, such as journal publications, successful grants, and doctoral milestones (e.g. theses, dissertations) are based in effective written argumentation and disciplinary discourse. Further, graduate student attrition averages…

A history of change efforts by philanthropic agencies and government organizations directed at graduate schools of education has not produced long-term or sustained changes in their form and function. The Carnegie Project on the Education Doctorate (CPED), however, has been able to demonstrate that external change efforts can result in change in…

The purpose of this study was to provide information to an online university that offers Ph.D. programs in three formats: knowledge area modules (or KAM, a type of faculty-led, self-directed doctoral study), course-based model, and mixed model (a combination of the KAM and course-based models). The investigators sought to determine why students…

The middle years of schooling (Years 5-9) has emerged as a significant field of educational research in the last two decades but investigation of specialised approaches to middle level teacher education has received little attention. The rationale for specialised programs or units is that middle level teachers require specific preparation to be…

A survey of 241 full professors in journalism and mass communication were asked their views on doctoral education. Results indicated that the expected number of publications students should generate from their dissertations was positively correlated with the number of publications professors produced from their own dissertations, supporting the…

This study explored what faculty members are recommending to counselor education master's students regarding post-master's experience when considering doctoral studies and what the current faculty hiring preferences are in reference to the amount of post-master's experience needed. Advisors in counselor education master's programs encounter these…

Statistical analysis of data gathered from 139 healthcare doctoral students revealed three key findings regarding non-cognitive factor relationships to hybrid doctoral student self-efficacy between online (web-based) and on-campus course components. First, student experiences significantly differed between online and on-campus course components…

The natural symbiotic relationship between intrinsic and extrinsic factors and how they contribute to student success is undeniable. A plethora of work including self-determination, attribution, and social cognitive theories speak about academic achievement by students having a reciprocity relationship between the extrinsic factors that underline…

This paper contributes to consideration of the role of conceptual frameworks in the doctoral research process. Through reflection on the two authors' own conceptual frameworks for their doctoral studies, a pedagogical model has been developed. The model posits the development of a conceptual framework as a core element of the doctoral…

So, you have decided to do a PhD … now what? In this essay, the author provides some advice for beginning PhD students, basically sharing what he would tell his younger self. Doing a PhD is a transformative experience, but the process is challenging, not merely on an intellectual level but also psychologically. To overcome these challenges, one…

From the researchers' perspective, the study aimed to identify factors affecting the functionality of postgraduate programs in natural sciences and engineering in a north-western Mexican state. Through the typical cases method, 25 researchers who worked in six doctorate programs in the region were selected. From the perception of these…

Interdisciplinary research teams and departments are seen by some as a way of addressing problems that cannot be understood using a traditionally narrow and uniform approach rooted in a particular discipline. This paper presents a postgraduate perspective by discussing the positive and negative impacts on Ph.D. research of this type of work and…

The purpose of this study was to determine the value that graduate students place on different types of instructional methods used by professors in educational leadership preparation programs, and to determine if master's and doctoral students place different values on different instructional methods. The participants included 87 graduate…

In 2008, the Indiana University School of Medicine, in collaboration with the School of Education, admitted its first student to a newly approved PhD program in Anatomy and Cell Biology focusing on educational research rather than biomedical research. The goal of the program is twofold: (1) to provide students with extensive training in all of the…