Table Of ContentDoctoral Education: Research-Based Strategies
for Doctoral Students, Supervisors
and Administrators
Lynn McAlpine • Cheryl Amundsen
Editors
Doctoral Education:
Research-Based
Strategies for Doctoral
Students, Supervisors
and Administrators
1 3
Editors:
Dr. Lynn McAlpine Dr. Cheryl Amundsen
McGill University Simon Fraser University
McTavish St. 3700 Fac. Education
H3A 1Y2 Montreal Québec University Drive 8888
Canada V5A 1S6 Burnaby British
[email protected] Columbia
Canada
[email protected]
ISBN 978-94-007-0506-7 e-ISBN 978-94-007-0507-4
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0507-4
Springer Dordrecht Heidelberg London New York
Library of Congress Control Number: 2011921319
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Acknowledgements
We wish to recognize and thank members of our research team, all of whom have
contributed chapters to this book. Over the four years that we have been conducting
the research upon which this book is based, we have all worked to coordinate every
aspect of the research. We believe we now have a coherent and significant body of
evidence from which to consider policies and practices surrounding doctoral educa-
tion in the social sciences. And this would have been impossible without the ongo-
ing commitment of the research participants who have provided us not only with
information but also feedback on our work, and their own recommendations for
institutional change. Of particular note are the accomplishments of graduate student
members of our team during this time period—Marian Jazvac-Martek and Allison
Gonsalves both successfully defended their PhD dissertation; Barb Edwards suc-
cessfully defended her EdD dissertation. And Shuhua Chen completed her MA de-
gree and is well on her way to finishing her PhD research, as is Larissa Yousoubova.
We also want to acknowledge the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Coun-
cil of Canada (SSHRC) for funding this research. We are now beginning the next
iteration of the inquiry, also funded by SSHRC, taking what we have learned to
investigate more fully the experiences of doctoral students and new academics in
disciplines other than the social sciences. Finally, we wish to give a big thank you to
Tara Neufeld for her excellent and detailed attention in creating the final manuscript
of this book.
Lynn McAlpine and Cheryl Amundsen
v
Contents
1 To Be or Not to Be? The Challenges of Learning Academic Work ...... 1
Lynn McAlpine and Cheryl Amundsen
Part I Being…Becoming Academics ........................................................... 15
2 Tracking the Doctoral Student Experience over Time:
Cultivating Agency in Diverse Spaces ..................................................... 17
Marian Jazvac-Martek, Shuhua Chen and Lynn McAlpine
3 New Academics as Supervisors: A Steep Learning Curve
with Challenges, Tensions and Pleasures ................................................ 37
Cheryl Amundsen and Lynn McAlpine
Part II Writing and Speaking—Learning the Disciplinary
Language, Talking the Talk ............................................................ 57
4 Speaking of Writing: Supervisory Feedback and the Dissertation ...... 59
Anthony Paré
5 The Paradox of Writing in Doctoral Education: Student Experiences ... 75
Doreen Starke-Meyerring
6 Making Sense of the Doctoral Dissertation Defense: A
Student-Experience-Based Perspective ................................................... 97
Shuhua Chen
Part III Gender, Genre, and Disciplinary Identifying—
Negotiating Borders ....................................................................... 115
7 Gender and Doctoral Physics Education: Are We Asking the
Right Questions? ....................................................................................... 117
Allison J. Gonsalves
vii
vviiiiii Contents
8 Genre and Disciplinarity: The Challenge of Grant Writing
for New Non-Anglophone Scientists ........................................................ 133
Larissa Yousoubova
9 Disciplinary Voices: A Shifting Landscape for English
Doctoral Education in the Twenty-First Century .................................. 157
Lynn McAlpine, Anthony Paré and Doreen Starke-Meyerring
Part IV Supporting the Doctoral Process Through Research-
Based Strategies .............................................................................. 171
10 Making Meaning of Diverse Experiences: Constructing an
Identity Through Time ............................................................................. 173
Lynn McAlpine and Cheryl Amundsen
11 Challenging the Taken-For-Granted: How Research Can
Inform Doctoral Education Policy and Practice .................................... 185
Lynn McAlpine and Cheryl Amundsen
12 Moving from Evidence to Action ............................................................. 203
Cheryl Amundsen and Lynn McAlpine
Index ................................................................................................................ 213
Contributors
Cheryl Amundsen Faculty of Education, Simon Fraser University, 8888 University
Drive, Burnaby, BC V5A 1S6, Canada
e-mail: [email protected]
Shuhua Chen McGill University, 3700 McTavish Street, Montreal, QC H3A 1Y2,
Canada
e-mail: [email protected]
Allison J. Gonsalves Université de Montréal, 90, av Vincent d’Indy, Montréal,
PQ H3C 3J7, Canada
e-mail: [email protected]
University of Montreal, Montreal, QC, Canada
Marian Jazvac-Martek Department of Educational and Counselling Psychology,
3700 McTavish Street, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada
e-mail: [email protected]
Lynn McAlpine University of Oxford, 16/17 St Ebbes, Suite 4, Oxford, OX1 1PT,
UK
e-mail: [email protected]
McGill University, 3700 McTavish Street, Montreal, QC H3A 1Y2, Canada
e-mail: [email protected]
Anthony Paré Faculty of Education, McGill University, 3700 McTavish Street,
Montreal, QC H3A 1Y2, Canada
e-mail: [email protected]
Doreen Starke-Meyerring Department of Integrated Studies in Education, McGill
University, 3700 McTavish Street, Montreal, QC H3A 1Y2, Canada
e-mail: [email protected]
Larissa Yousoubova McGill University, 3700 McTavish Street, Montreal,
QC H3A 1Y2, Canada
e-mail: [email protected]
ix
About the Authors
Cheryl Amundsen I am an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Education at
Simon Fraser University. I also spent ten years as a faculty member at McGill Uni-
versity. I have a long-standing interest in academic development and my research
has focused on how academics develop pedagogical knowledge in relationship
to their subject matter and the thinking underlying instructional decisions. More
recently, I have ventured beyond the focus on classroom teaching to look at the
role of doctoral supervisor with its fascinating interplay of pedagogy and identity
construction for both student and supervisor.
Shuhua Chen I am a PhD candidate in the Department of Integrated Studies in
Education at McGill University. My research interests include the policies and prac-
tices surrounding the doctoral defense, doctoral learning experiences, and doctoral
students’ researcher/academic identity development. Before entering the doctoral
program, I completed a master’s thesis that reported how Chinese doctoral students
adapted to doctoral study in Canada. Currently, I am conducting my doctoral dis-
sertation research on doctoral students’ experiences of defending their dissertations.
Lynn McAlpine I am Professor of Higher Education Development at the Univer-
sity of Oxford and Professor Emerita at McGill University. My academic career
has always been linked to academic development, and my research interests were
originally directed at understanding how academics develop the knowledge and
principles underlying their pedagogical actions. More recently, my interest has
broadened so that now I am researching how academics, particularly those early
in their careers (doctoral students, research staff, and pre-tenure academics), make
sense of and engage in all aspects of academic work.
Anthony Paré I am a Professor in the Department of Integrated Studies in Edu-
cation at McGill University, and editor of the McGill Journal of Education. My
research examines academic and workplace writing, situated learning, school-to-
work transitions, and the development of professional literacies. I teach graduate
courses in literacy, discourse theory, writing theory, research, and practice. My pub-
lications include books, chapters, and articles on topics related to the study and
practice of academic and professional communication.
xi
xxiiii About the Authors
Doreen Starke-Meyerring I am an Associate Professor of rhetoric and writing
studies in the Department of Integrated Studies in Education at McGill Univer-
sity. Focused on discourse studies and writing development in higher education, my
research has examined changes in writing practices in increasingly digital, global-
izing, and knowledge-intensive settings. At present, I am conducting a multi-year
cross-institutional research project examining current demands on doctoral student
writing and publishing; the challenges these demands present for doctoral students,
supervisors, and administrators at Canadian research-intensive universities, and
ways of addressing current demands.
Larissa Yousoubova I am working on a doctorate at McGill University. I have
over 15 years experience in translation, teaching, and compliance management in
several countries, and have always been fascinated by the cross-cultural aspects of
communication. My research interests centre on pragmatics of discourse, especially
written communication in academic and professional settings. In my dissertation
research I focus on how new non-English academics adjust to the pressures and
challenges of the North American system of grant funding and grant writing.
Marian Jazvac-Martek My PhD dissertation inquiry into academic identity con-
struction closely followed a group of individuals who explicitly desired cultivating
academic careers. I am continuing my research interests in academic identity, doc-
toral education, and higher education pedagogy as a post-doctoral research fellow,
while also applying some of my findings to post-doctoral research work for the
Dean of Graduate and Post-Doctoral Studies at McGill University. I have also been
a lecturer at McGill University for over eight years and am currently on maternity
leave.
Allison Gonsalves I completed my PhD at McGill University where I focussed
on the gendering of physics discourses and the implications this has for students’
engagement and identity construction in the practices of the various disciplinary
sub-fields of physics. My post-doctoral work at the Université de Montréal explores
the potential of afterschool science programs to offer youth of colour from low-
income families opportunities to begin to see themselves as insiders to science.
