The DSC that's not a D.Sc.

Discussion in 'General Distance Learning Discussions' started by chrisjm18, Nov 10, 2019.

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  1. Rich Douglas

    Rich Douglas Well-Known Member

    And your doctorate is in.....?
     
  2. Neuhaus

    Neuhaus Well-Known Member

    To clarify, I was not saying that there are legions of doctorate holders out there who did it purely for vanity. I said that there are legions of people who start predominantly online doctoral programs because they want to chase the title and then drop out because it's actually hard and not worth the pursuit of vanity.

    I doubt Capella hits its quarterly numbers by awarding PhDs. It's the throngs of perpetual Capella ABDs and the larger circle of "got a few courses in before quitting" the doctoral program that fill the coffers.
     
  3. Rich Douglas

    Rich Douglas Well-Known Member

    I think we see so many dropouts from programs directed at working professionals for another reason as well: they don't have the faintest idea about what they're getting into.

    Almost all of these people enter the PhD without having done a master's thesis or any other significant form of large research project (and the writing that comes with it).

    This is exacerbated by the nature of the American-style "taught" doctorate. For the first couple of years, students are doing what they've always done: follow a curriculum, take courses, do assignments, pass tests, and get grades. But then the dissertation phase comes and WHAM! Cognitive dissonance. It's a whole new ballgame. Now the student owns every element: what to research, how to research it, and how to present it. I have to think this contributes to the ABD dropout situation. And I'm pleased to see some schools get students involved with their dissertations long before candidacy, using the coursework as a way to get it started. I think that will help...where it is applied.

    To further support Neuhaus' point, the break-even point for the University of Phoenix when I was employed there was 3 courses. If you got students past that point, the schools fixed costs were covered, and from that point the formula of Tuition-minus-variable-costs-equals-profit kicked in. That might vary from school-to-school, but not by much.
     
  4. Phdtobe

    Phdtobe Well-Known Member

    I truly don’t think an earned doctorate can ever be for vanity. I don’t think there is any vanity in the hard work and dedication to earned a doctorate. Having the money to afford the tuition is just a tiny part of the process. To me vanity is like instead of working towards the degree, one buys another boat, or another sport car.
     
    chrisjm18 likes this.
  5. AlK11

    AlK11 Active Member

    This reminds me of my freshman year communications class. It was basically a freshman seminar on how to research. The first large project of our college lives was a five page research paper in this class. The instructions were very simple: "Do a five page research project on anything you'd like". As soon as I heard this my mind began racing with thoughts of what I wanted to do this project on. At the same time, about 20 of the 25 students in the class raised their hands, all of them had the same question. "What does this project have to be on?" I thought it was such a stupid question, which it was. However, I quickly realized that it's the people that were stupid. The directions were very clear, but my classmates couldn't handle it, they needed structure. Even after my professor answered the question that it could be on anything many hands remained and asked questions such as "So can my project be on *this*?" "Yes." Next person asked "What about this? Can I do mine on this?". This was a smaller scale of the problem you mentioned with the dissertation. Some people can't live their lives without structure and once they are responsible for their learning, they can't do it.
     
  6. Kizmet

    Kizmet Moderator

    I think this is probably quite true. I've imagined that a lot of people think of a PhD program like it's a "super-Bachelors" or even a "more intense Masters" but I know that it's a lot more. There is, I think, more of a quantum leap involved and the dissertation is most often the watershed.
     

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