Accreditation and anticipatory socialization to doctoral education in Kosovo

• In Event: Evolving Workforce Pathways: Reconceptualizing Graduate Employment in Higher Education

Proposal

Introduction

In the Republic of Kosovo, approximately 40 students complete PhDs annually (Kosovo Accreditation Agency [KAA], 2021). This low annual graduation rate is a pipeline problem for the higher education sector, as Kosovan universities must employ three PhD-holders to legally operate any degree program (KAA, 2018; Ministry of Education Science and Technology [MESTI], 2013; National Qualification Authority, 2016) and demand for higher education among Kosovan youth is high (Author, 2022). One reason there are so few graduates is the scarcity of accredited PhD programs in Kosovo. Increasing capacity for doctoral education is thus a matter of national concern; as such, higher education institution [HEI] leaders must make strategic choices about where and how to offer and expand accredited programs.

To help leaders make strategic decisions to expand doctoral education, I inquired:

RQ1: What accreditation and legitimacy factors affect the delivery of doctoral education in Kosovo?

RQ2: How do these decisions affect doctoral student socialization?

Accreditation and Legitimacy

Despite legitimation efforts like the three-PhD accreditation rule, Kosovo HEIs face scrutiny about degree quality from supranational and national levels. At the supranational level, the European Quality Assurance Register for Higher Education (EQAR) accepted KAA as a registered agency in 2015, certifying KAA as a legitimate accreditor of degree programs in Europe. Three years later, following controversial ministerial actions affecting KAA (Limani, 2017), EQAR delisted KAA (Baliu, 2019; EQAR, 2018), leaving Kosovo’s graduates with credentials unrecognized throughout Europe. Ministry officials and university leaders have prioritized registry reentry to bolster Kosovo higher education’s standing in Europe (MESTI, 2021).
Further, the within-country legitimacy of credentials in Kosovo remains constantly debated. In 2019, nearly half the public universities lost KAA institutional accreditation (KAA, 2019), which followed disaccreditation of dozens of degree programs nationwide (Ademaj, 2019). Private universities have also seen accreditation status toggled in recent years (Weizman, 2020). When a credential’s legitimacy is questionable - such as when accreditation is in limbo - prospective students cannot accurately assess a potential program’s value.

Anticipatory Graduate Student Socialization

Foreseeing what doctoral study entails is what Weidman and colleagues (2001) term ‘anticipatory socialization’. In anticipatory socialization, newcomers develop notional and idealized understandings about what doctoral pursuits entail. Kosovo’s scarcity of terminal-degree holders means prospective doctoral students have few embodied guideposts to help them develop realistic expectations. As such, their anticipatory socialization may be idealistic, rather than well-informed.

Data Collection and Analysis

To approach the research questions, I implemented a QUAL+quan simultaneous design (Morse, 1991). This approach situates doctoral socialization within the context of national attempts to increase capacity and meet accreditation demands for a qualified professoriate. First, I implemented a basic qualitative study design (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016) using semi-structured interviews with four graduate students in Kosovo chosen through purposeful sampling. I asked why they chose to pursue doctorates, what perceptions they had of available doctoral pathways, and whether they believed their options were high-quality. Since data suggest mismatch between graduate programs and Kosovo’s national needs (Muja, 2015), I also asked how students perceived this popular discourse when deciding to seek a doctorate.

Second, several public-access digital repositories contributed quantitative data for this study. I collected labor market indicators from the Kosovo Agency of Statistics and details about HEI accreditation status and headcounts of programs at public and private HEIs from 2002-2019 (MESTI, 2019). Additionally, I used reports from the Organization for Improving the Quality of Education (ORCA), an education watchdog, to consider professors’ credentials (ORCA, 2019).

I used Saldana’s (2009) First Cycle / Second Cycle approach to analyze interview data. I generated line-by-line descriptive and in vivo codes, avoiding coding for themes, and then grouped codes and formed categories. I established trustworthiness in several ways, specifically because the number of participants might be considered low (inherent to the problem being studied). First, I held multiple sensemaking conversations with non-participant Kosovans familiar with graduate education (students, professors, rectorate staff) about concepts that may be different than my prior understanding. Second, I peer-debriefed with U.S.-based scholars working in Kosovo. Third, I kept and returned to personal reflexivity audio files and a digital journal during data analysis. Fourth, I used the quantitative data to contextualize participant claims about employment. Finally, I debriefed again with Kosovans engaged in – or considering - graduate education, discussing findings to ensure they resonated in the local context.

Findings

Findings complicate public perceptions of education-workforce mismatch when considering the role of accreditation. Related to RQ1, national and supranational accreditation and legitimacy concerns drove heightened scrutiny over doctoral program delivery and students’ publications. Participants discussed how authorities controlling financial resources affected what they could study and how to navigate roles as both students and instructors. Nina stated, “Everything how we see the system is whatever the Ministry says and whatever the municipality says.” These authorities oversee which programs are accredited to grant PhDs and which Kosovan universities are accredited to employ PhD-holders. Moreover, there are restrictions on academic freedom as doctoral thesis topics must be approved by university boards and professors beyond the student’s own academic field.

As for RQ2, doctoral socialization in Kosovo is characterized by (1) barriers to pursuing academic and professional interests and (2) overlapping pressures of internationalization, funding, and identity. Those barriers and overlapping pressures affect student decisions about pursuing a doctorate in a climate in which accreditation and legitimacy are constantly debated. As Gen described, “There’s a strong belief that PhD studies are exclusively to permit you to pursue academic careers.” However, such academic careers are difficult to obtain. Anita joked, “My professor says, ‘You have to kill the professors if you want to buy a job’.” These quotes together point to the problem of new programs rarely opening because there are not enough PhD holders in the pipeline, yet there are no perceived, open pathways to viable careers within academia.

This is the first qualitative study, to my knowledge, that considers perspectives of terminal degree seekers in Kosovo. In using a socialization framework, it provides insight for universities and public stakeholders to reshape the recruitment of the next generation of Kosovan academics.

Author

• Nicholas Stroup, University of Iowa