“It’s Hidden, After All:” A Modified Delphi Study Exploring Faculty and Students’ Perceptions of a Graduate Professional Seminar in Communication

Graduate student socialization has been studied in multiple disciplines, including communication. As their career trajectories change, faculty must consider how to socialize students into the field and their subsequent careers. Using a modified Delphi survey, we examined the differences in faculty and students’ perceptions regarding the content of a graduate professional seminar in communication. Results indicate that students would prefer a focus on implicit norms and the hidden curriculum, while faculty would prefer to focus on disciplinary content. We offer recommendations for developing a course that addresses both needs and, thus, simultaneously attends to the changing job market.

Identifying Faculty and Peer Interaction Patterns of First-Year Biology Doctoral Students: A Latent Class Analysis

Faculty and peer interactions play a key role in shaping graduate student socialization. Yet, within the literature on graduate student socialization, researchers have primarily focused on understanding the nature and impact of faculty alone, and much less is known about how peer interactions also contribute to graduate student outcomes. Using a national sample of first-year biology doctoral students, this study reveals distinct categories that classify patterns of faculty and peer interaction. Further, we document inequities such that certain groups (e.g., underrepresented minority students) report constrained types of interactions with faculty and peers. Finally, we connect faculty and peer interaction patterns to student outcomes. Our findings reveal that, while the classification of faculty and peer interactions predicted affective and experiential outcomes (e.g., sense of belonging, satisfaction with academic development), it was not a consistent predictor of more central outcomes of the doctoral socialization process (e.g., research skills, commitment to degree). These and other findings are discussed, focusing on implications for future research, theory, and practice related to graduate training.

Reconciliatory socialization: Conceptualizing the experiences of Evangelical Christian doctoral students in secular higher education

Weidman, Twale and Stein’s (2001) model of graduate student socialization has served as a theoretical starting point for understanding the experiences of doctoral students. Although a number of scholars have critiqued the model for failing to account for the unique experiences of different student groups, none has specifically approached the model with Evangelical Christian doctoral students in mind. Building on the literature on Evangelical Christian students in secular higher education, this article offers a reconceptualization of Weidman et al.’s (2001) model that accounts for the unique experiences of Evangelical Christian doctoral students in secular higher education. This revised model, called reconciliatory socialization, serves as a conceptual framework by which to conduct empirical research on the experiences of Evangelical Christian doctoral students in secular settings.

Expanding Support for Graduate Students: Library Workshops on Research Funding Opportunities

This case study describes the development, implementation, and assessment of a series of grants research workshops for graduate students, which were implemented to fill a gap in graduate student support. We assessed the workshops through a series of focus groups, and findings show overall satisfaction with the grants tools and workshop. However, participants noted areas of improvement around outreach and promotion and general communication with graduate students. Additional themes emerged related to graduate student socialization and research behaviors, which suggests that librarians have an important role to serve in these areas.

Expanding Support for Graduate Students: Library Workshops on Research Funding Opportunities

This case study describes the development, implementation, and assessment of a series of grants research workshops for graduate students, which were implemented to fill a gap in graduate student support. We assessed the workshops through a series of focus groups, and findings show overall satisfaction with the grants tools and workshop. However, participants noted areas of improvement around outreach and promotion and general communication with graduate students. Additional themes emerged related to graduate student socialization and research behaviors, which suggests that librarians have an important role to serve in these areas.