CAREER: Characterizing Master's-Level Departure from the Engineering Doctorate through Multiple Stakeholders' Perspectives

本计画针对工程学科博士生流失的关键问题。虽然工程博士的十年完成率只有男性65%和女性56%，但这些数字对于代表性不足的群体来说要低得多。这些统计数字表明该领域人才的大量流失。这项职业生涯研究的特点和模型硕士水平离开工程博士课程通过分析出发者，研究生谁正在考虑离开的角度，和教师谁建议这些学生。这项研究支持国家行动呼吁，例如2018年国家科学院关于21世纪STEM研究生教育的报告，该报告认为，了解科学、技术、工程和数学研究生课程的保留对于维持经济和国家竞争力至关重要。 这项职业生涯研究将从系统层面的角度全面了解硕士水平的离职。为了发展这一模型，本研究将1）表征硕士层次的离职的共同叙事和模型的学生的离职决定随着时间的推移，和2）表征教师的离职的角度。建模学生离职将通过访谈，纵向调查，并利用角色认同理论，期望值理论，理想工作者理论，领导成员交换理论的纵向短信调查完成。以教师为中心的研究阶段将调查潜在的冲突的叙述关于离职/质疑研究生和教师之间的磨损和离开。了解教师和学生之间这些潜在的不和谐观点对于为任何利益相关者群体制定干预措施至关重要。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为值得通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估来支持。

This project addresses the critical issue of doctoral student attrition in engineering disciplines. While the ten-year completion rates for engineering PhDs are only 65% for men and 56% for women, these numbers are significantly lower for students from underrepresented groups. These statistics represent a significant loss of talent for the field. This CAREER research characterizes and models Master's-level departure from engineering PhD programs by analyzing the perspectives of departers, graduate students who are considering departure, and faculty who advise these students. This research supports national calls to action such as the 2018 National Academies report on Graduate STEM Education for the 21st Century, which posits that understanding retention in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics graduate programs is critical to maintaining economic and national competitiveness. This CAREER research will develop a comprehensive understanding of Master's-level departure with a systems-level perspective. In order to develop this model, the research will 1) characterize common narratives of Master's-level departure and model students' departure decisions over time, and 2) characterize faculty perspective of departure. Modeling student departure will be accomplished through interviews, a longitudinal survey, and a longitudinal text message survey that utilize role identity theory, expectancy value theory, ideal worker theory, and leader-member exchange theory. The faculty-centric research phase will investigate potentially conflicting narratives about attrition and departure between departed/questioning graduate students and faculty. Understanding these potentially dissonant perspectives between faculty and students are critical to developing interventions for either stakeholder group.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.