First Year of Doctoral Education in Pictures and Words: Understanding Influences on Students' Skill Development

• In Event: Roundtable Session 42
  In Roundtable Session: Graduate Student Development and Engagement

Abstract

While a number of recent studies have made inroads into describing broad doctoral student development processes, very few studies focus directly on skill acquisition. To contribute to this important area of inquiry, we rely on photo elicitation and interviews with first-year graduate students to understand significant influences on research skill acquisition. Our results reveal the importance of both programmatic and non-programmatic factors and illuminate the complexity in which similar contexts can have vastly different meanings for students. Given indication from prior research that skill acquisition follows a clear developmental trajectory, these findings regarding the first year of doctoral education encourage and advance timely and ‘actionable’ dialogue around opportunities to better support skill acquisition, especially in science disciplines.

Authors

• Stefanie Kate Benjamin, University of South Carolina - Columbia

• Michelle A. Maher, University of Missouri - Kansas City

• David F. Feldon, Utah State University

• Josipa Roksa, University of Virginia