PhD's and Teaching

If I ever finish a doctorate perhaps then I'll know. But now I wonder why a PhD qualifies one to teach.

Were one wishing to teach English in public secondary school then he/she would be required to have (usually) a BA with a major in English. But additionally, that one would have to complete (drawing now on my experience in Calif and Oregon) also a major in "Education"- HOW to teach! This would include practice in actually teaching! Yet unless I am missing something were one wishing to teach English in college then she/he could acquire the PhD in that subject and with no coursework or experience be hired because the subject obviously is known. But has the ability to convey that knowledge been gained?

Should doctorates intended for teaching not have such a componant ?

 

Doctorate holders are not qualified to teach at university because of their teaching abilities. Rather, they're qualified to teach because they are experts in their respective fields.

The university is a collection of scholars: teachers and students. The teachers are at the pinnacle while the students are climbing the mountain to join them. (Well, some of them, the doctoral candidates anyway.)

The the university's oldest, most central function: research and preparing new researchers to research. Of course, the vast majority of students leave university long before becoming doctoral candidates. We tend to think of universities as places for classroom learning. Who else to teach but the experts? ("Teaching Assistants" is what some people will say, and they are right. TA's tend to be students a little farther up that mountain.) Teaching undergraduates is almost a sideline, even though it takes up the most resources.

Your point is well taken, though. If we have Ph.D.'s teaching, why don't we emphasize teaching ability? Because of the reasons I've offered.

The argument in favor of teaching professors education methodology is reasonable, but that's not what they're rewarded for. They're rewarded for research and prestige and funding brought in by research. Again, teaching becomes a sideline. Many professors are bothered by the need to teach at all. And many undergraduates go a long time between classes held by full professors (or even assistant professors). Now, this is surely an overstatement, and the condition varies widely from school to school, but you get the point.

Rich Douglas

 

Most contact universities state that their PhD programs require a combination of research, teaching and service. This was certainly the case in my own experience.

The graduate students, of course, believe that this is merely to require them to take care of many of the undergraduate teaching duties etc without reasonable pay.

 

A book that discusses this dilemma in detail, called "Academic Duty" by Donald Kennedy.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0674002229/qid=1017346741/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/103-1316500-9598251

Amazon doesn't show a paperback version, but I assure you: it is available in paperback (I have a copy).

Gary

 

I haven't read the book, but Don Kennedy was President of the university I alluded to when I mentioned "my own experience" above. So I am sure this is relevant. I shall have to look it up.

 

Rich:

Your answer was helpful . Yet while my experience is limited (or maybe I,m just being humble) I have taken from 30-75 sem hours in each 4-5 schools. I THINK only one prof did not have a doctorate. But I was a TA at OSU so I know it is true re TAs teaching for profs. My question is whether when PhDs DO teach they might do so more effectively were they to have instruction in the area of how to teach. If one gets a degree which allows him to , say, pastor a church, then one is not only taught Bible studies but also how to communicate (homiletics) what he knows. Still I gain insight from your explanation.

 

Wasn't the Doctor of Arts created as a doctorate with a teaching as opposed to research emphasis?

Nosborne

 

Of the 190 units I took at UCR for the Ph.D. program in English (1986-91) probably 100 were in "The Teaching of English" and "Teaching Practicum." As I recall, all of the TAs, and there were quite a few, met once weekly, with the professor in charge of composition, to review and discuss issues and problems associated with our section of Eng 1A, B, or C. Our teaching was evaluated both by students and faculty. The answer to your question is that, traditionally, future university professors learned to teach during their five or so years as a TA. I remember my TAing as being a pretty enriching experience. In my experience, the graduate TAship is at least as good a training ground as a the student teaching internship employed in most education and credentialing programs. In other words I had, in general, much better teachers in college than in high school (and I went to a JESUIT high school).

Cheers

Thinking of my h/s reminded me of an old joke:

"Denominations mean nothing to me."
---GOD, S.J.

 

Three have detailed how residential PhD programs include experiences to make the participants in these better teachers. Giving this full credit, then, I ask my same question over-now limiting it to DL doctorates.

Do such qualify one to teach?

 

The richness of a traditional contact degree at the graduate level is simply different--not better--than the kind of richness one finds in a distance degree. The relationships one builds with other grad students, and the TAship itself, was for me the real core of my experience at UCR. In my distance program at Louisiana Baptist the core was a much closer (albeit e-mail, phone, and letter) relationship with my mentors. I still find it ironic that there was vastly more teacher/student interaction in the distance degree. Another aspect of DL that I enjoyed was the amount of input I had into course direction, content, and outcomes. The dissertation experience was great--much more satisfying than at UCR. (That might have been a function simply of the personalities involved.) But I don't see how the DL program could address teaching skills unless it were to contain some kind of teaching internship. If they are going to evolve to a point where they are seen as being on equal footing with residential Ph.D. programs, distance degree plans are going to have to include some component of local teaching experience. One way to get it is to get an MA and then teach at a CC while you do a distance Ph.D.

Craig

 

One of the reasons I started this thread was the inconsequential and ineffective probing on 6-8 papers I submitted to a nonaccred DL school. The papers were evaluated by profs with RA docs. Yet research shows (at public school level) that asking higher order questions and probing student responses stimulates learning. It would seem at the grad level the value of such interaction would be even greater, but I got little of it!

Perhaps a PhD done RA for the purpose of teaching should require some experience in the classroom at some institution at the student's locale and a modicum of course work in how to teach.

 

Dumb Professors

There is a held belief that:

1. PhD's learn more and more about less and less until they know everything about almost nothing - most of us have met these people.

2. The qualification to teach at university requires the following abilities:

* to mumble incoherently
* to use overheads upside down and/or back to front
* to write illegibly or to write small enough for only the front rom to be able to read what is written
[and most of us have also met these people]

Long live those with superintelligence and the inability to ineffectively communicate.

 

Re: Dumb Professors

That is the fault of the present education system that the funding is allocated according to the research outcomes rather than teaching excellence.

 

You are correct, this is what the D.A. is for. A quick write-up can be found at http://www.mtsu.edu/~chem/da.html

All of the member institutions, history, etc. of the D.A. are provided by the National Docotr of Arts Association at http://www.isu.edu/departments/graduate/ndaa/index.html

Overall I would like to see the D.A. expanded whereby it is encouraged for teaching faculty and the Ph.D. for research faculty. Nonetheless, the Ph.D. is typically considered the highest academic award and Ph.D.'s would not want to be excluded from teaching in academia.

John

 

Just out of curiosity, which school was this?

 

Bill - I've always been of the impression that as one progresses from elementary to secondary to undergraduate to graduate education, the balance of knowing how to teach and knowing the subject changes. First grade teachers have to be very aware of their teaching method and the development of their pupils. The material itself is pretty basic. Undergrad college teaching requires some knowledge of adolescents - but knowledge of the material is probably more critical. At the graduate level you're past most of the development issues - and the subject knowledge is critical.

In saying this, I do agree that knowing how to teach is very important for faculty. As a result some doctoral programs include teaching seminars as part of their program. Most B&M schools have their PhD students teaching as well. University of Toledo, for example, requires all PhD students to teach three terms. As a full-time faculty member I'm encouraged to attend teaching seminars.

Thanks - Andy

 

hfc:

That school was Trinity BC/Seminary

 

Hi Andy:

I suppose that as degrees are awarded in adult ed that the view persists that those who teach in College should know how to communicate their subject as well as what to communicate. I'm glad you hold also that college teachers should know teaching techniques. Recently on this forum Brown shared a site (Teaching Tips) which was, I think, provided by the Univ of Hawaii for its faculty. Someone there must also have seen some need.

Thanks,

 

Teaching Tips

Here it is again:

http://www.hcc.hawaii.edu/intranet/committees/FacDevCom/guidebk/teachtip/teachtip.htm

Gary

 

teaching tips

Thanks,