Book Review — The New PhD: How to Build a Better Graduate Education

In “The New PhD: How to Build a Better Graduate Education,” Cassuto and Weisbuch describe the present model of doctoral education in the United States. Idiomatically speaking, the PhD is the “holy grail” of higher education — something of great significance, highly desired, but has become, at times, impossible to find, i.e., complete. The authors provide us with an overview of the problem, which is pre-pandemic, and suggest ways to make doctoral education more student-centered, career-diverse, and socially engaged to broaden a student’s potential to benefit society. They insist that change is vital to academia in our post-pandemic world, which is experiencing increasing economic concerns, shifting job markets, and public distrust of its overall value.

Cassuto and Weisbuch provide a clear and structured overview of key graduate educational reforms from 1990 to 2006. Certain reforms designed by major foundations (Andrew W. Mellon and Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship) had a national scope, while other reforms where specific to institutions (for example, the University of Texas Intellectual Entrepreneurship Program). They reviewed eight programs based on their strategic goals, results, key publications, and lessons learned from the process. According to the authors, these early reforms get mixed reviews. Reforms from 2011 to the present appear to be more fruitful to the authors, because they focus more on diversity. This diversity goes beyond race, gender, and ethnicity, because it includes career diversity and the doctoral students’ ability to see the transferrable potential of their skill sets.

Focusing on the successes of the more recent reform models, the authors provide ideas about how to enhance graduate programs using the backward design process. This process rethinks traditional curriculum/program development by identifying the goals/outcomes, continuous assessing for the desired goals/outcomes, and making sure that the students actively participate in the process. Cassuto and Weisbuch describe and illustrate the major challenges of reconstructing programs to advance career diversity while broadening student interest and opportunities. These include:

• Fostering admission standards to create student cohorts that are diverse in their demographic structure and intellectual interests.
• Expanding career options for doctoral students to include non-academic opportunities and internships designed to see life “beyond the campus.”
• Reducing the traditional academic progression timeline for the doctorate using more direct program expectations, increasing faculty guidance, and providing financial incentives for timely degree completion.
• Rethinking curriculum development around salient student outcomes and developing viable alternatives to traditional comprehensive exams.
• Creating a collaborative culture model of faculty advising that will expose the student to more options for career development.
• Encouraging social engagement through public scholarship, which involves the ability to communicate to all citizenry, on and beyond the campus, for the benefit of society.

The pandemic has taught us important lessons over the last two years. Large numbers of the existing industries, organizations, and institutions are beginning to see a need for altering their operational models for conducting business. We see these changes in our daily lives. In their book, Cassuto and Weisbuch are suggesting that it is time for change in higher education. This is necessary reading for administrators, faculty, and students, because the authors provide specific examples and case studies to illustrate where change is necessary. In the authors’ view, higher education is myopic in their graduate program development. Reforms might serve to broaden perspectives and desired outcomes for both the institutions and the students they serve.