Dean's Desktop

Dean, Sara Rosen

Events and Programming for Graduate Students
2009-2010

Sara Rosen
September, 2009

Each fall, KU welcomes a new class of freshmen extravagantly with the varied activities of Hawk Week. We welcome graduate students more quietly; graduate students, research assistants, and teaching assistants transition to their new roles with little fanfare.

Becoming a graduate student means embarking on a transformative journey. Undergraduates primarily attend school to gain knowledge. Graduate Students add two more roles—creating knowledge as researchers, and disseminating knowledge as teachers.

The journey to the doctoral degree requires both determination and guidance. Yet, even with both of these ingredients in sufficient quantities, the “recipe” for forming doctoral candidates turns out to be a bit more complicated than the recipe for making a chocolate layer cake or a lemon meringue pie. The chef creating a cake or pie knows the outcome, given quality ingredients in the proper quantities, baked at the right temperature. However, the outcome of an individual graduate student is less sure - will the result be a researcher, teacher, or administrator? Complexity in doctoral education is the norm.

Precisely because new graduate students have not yet chosen their paths1, doctoral education allows for multiple opportunities to learn about a variety of directions. In order to help departments prepare doctoral students beyond research, we have set up a series of workshops and brown bag lunches aimed at informing students about the academic job application process, fellowship and postdoctoral opportunities, and providing opportunities for students to share their research results with the wider University audience. Students have been signing up in unprecedented numbers.

Here is a brief preview of some of the activities that we hope will complement the efforts of the graduate faculty this year:

  • The 2009 Jayhawk Welcome and Information Fair for Graduate Students

  • The First Annual Preparing Future Faculty Conference: Transitioning to an Academic Career

The transition from student to faculty or post-doc is not an easy one to make. The student must navigate the job search, including preparing the dossier, writing the cover letter for applications, going to those interviews, the job talk, accepting and negotiating the offer. And then, this brand new Ph.D. has to transition from being a student to being a colleague, a researcher, a faculty member. We will bring ideas, tips and suggestions that will help make that transition from student to faculty.

  • The Fall Friday Fellowship Brownbag Series

In addition to helping to fund the student’s graduate education, applying for fellowships and grants is a critical learning experience. It takes clear thinking, good writing skills, an excellent research plan, and an ability to write about research for all kinds of audiences. Good grant-writing skills are critical to post-graduate careers. In response, we set up a series of brown bag lunch sessions; each will focus on how to apply for a specific fellowship program.

  • Coffee with the Dean: Conversations with Graduate Student Organizations

A set of informal meetings will bring the Dean of Graduate Studies together with graduate student leaders to discuss issues that students face in their graduate careers.

  • The Annual Graduate Research Competition, hosted by the Graduate & Professional Association

A day-long poster and presentation session in the Kansas Union where students present their research and faculty judge for various cash prizes.

  • The Annual Graduate Research Summit, co-hosted by The University of Kansas, Kansas State University, and Wichita State University at the Capitol in Topeka

This annual event brings research pertinent to the State of Kansas to the Capitol where students get to discuss their research with Kansas legislators.

For a list of activities and events for graduate students, see our website: http://www.graduate.ku.edu/08-03_events.shtml.

Come and learn with us.

1 Research shows that new faculty actually spend a relatively small proportion of their time doing research and rather large amount of their time on teaching and service (Chris M. Golde and Timothy M. Dore. 2001. “At Cross Purposes:  What the experiences of doctoral students reveal about doctoral education.”  A report prepared for The Pew Charitable Trusts, Philadelphia, PA. www.phd-survey.org).