Ph.D. in Higher Ed?

[MrsG]

While many here are celebrating, grieving, or waiting, I thought perhaps you could give a newbie some advice.

I graduated in 2009 with an MA in English. I was a TA in the English department and graduated a semester early. However, my GPA was pretty crappy because of some personal circumstances -- a 3.45.

I have worked for two years as a full-time Instructor of English and Foreign Languages at a public university since then. I have also worked as a Technical Editor at a Fortune 100 company. My husband recently retired from the Army, and we have moved back to our hometown, a place where there is one traffic signal in the entire county. I was lucky to find work as an Adjunct Instructor of English, and have worked at this for the past two semesters.

Obviously, working part-time doesn't cut it. I want to do important things. Teaching is VERY important, but it is not something that I want to do for the rest of my career. I have considered getting a Ph.D. in Rhetoric and Composition, and I believe I could be very successful with that, but teaching writing forever is just not what I want to do (even though I do like teaching writing). After a lot of soul searching over the past few years, I have come to the conclusion that I want to move toward Higher Ed administration, specifically something in the student services realm. I'm currently trying to get my foot in the door as a full-time academic advisor. I'm finding that changing my career focus has been difficult, but I am hopeful that with perseverance, my big break will come.

I would like to start in a full-time position before I start doctoral study, but either way, I am beginning to prepare applications for Fall 2017 admission. One very specific limitation I have is that I must choose a program within close proximity because I have two children (5 year old and 3 year old) and my husband and I just really love Kentucky <3 With that being said, the major schools in proximity include the University of Kentucky, Vanderbilt, and the University of Louisville. There are also several smaller universities that may or may not fit the bill (Bellarmine is one).

Because I want to end up in the upper tier of Higher Ed administration later in my career, I believe that UK's Ph.D. in Higher Education may be my best choice. There are a multitude of Ph.D. and Ed.D. programs available, and I'm having a hard time making sense of them in terms of my interests and experience. I have absolutely no interest whatsoever in K-12 education; I am only interested in Higher Ed, and although I have experience as a teacher and I don't mind it as a side gig, this is not what I would like to focus on.

I feel my shortcomings are that I could use more experience and I have that pesky GPA haunting me. I have to take the GRE over again, and I struggle with math. I think I have plenty of time to study for the GRE and get acceptable scores. I don't remember my scores specifically from the last time I took it, but the verbal and writing section scores were fantastic and the quantitative score was just short of abysmal. I also haven't had an opportunity to attend or present at conferences, so that's not good either. I reached out to one of the program directors in UK's graduate school of Education, and was encouraged that applicants are considered holistically and the GPA wouldn't necessarily break my chances for admission.

I guess I'm looking for advice on how to proceed from here, maybe some reassurance that I have a chance? I would love to study at Peabody, but I am afraid I'm not good enough to make the cut. UK looks like my next favorite choice. I'm not a fan of applying to a multitude of programs in hopes of getting an admission. I would rather target my applications and work on ensuring that my applications are as good as they can be. Has anyone heard anything good about UK's Ph.D. in Higher Education program?

Would anyone like to share a timeline they used in the application process? If applications are due at the beginning of February, when would be a good conservative time to submit the application? When would you think should be the last date to take the GRE and get scores in time for application?

If you've made it this far, thanks so much for reading!

[MrsG]

I should probably add that because my husband is a 100% disabled veteran, funding isn't really an issue for me because I get 100% tuition paid at most public universities.

[MrsG]

Absolutely. I think I might have been a bit vague in my intentions. Because I have some time before I begin study, I really want the job in order to get more experience and savings (which never hurts), but I understand that the job may or may not be conducive to the studying. Without going into too many details on the situation, if I studied at UK, I could possibly make it work with an outside job at the school where I am working now (although I am totally open minded to not having things go the way I planned). If I studied at Peabody, that wouldn't be possible just because of the required commute. UK's program is (from my understanding) a great chunk done online, which (I hope) may allow for strategic commuting. But again, Peabody would be an obvious first choice.

Thanks for the suggestions and realistic perspective.

[olympichopeful]

Hi! Are you interested in research and teaching or administration? If your interest is in admin, which it seems to be, I would also recommend looking at EdDs... this would also you to work while completing your degree since that seems to be something you are interested in.

[ZeChocMoose]

It doesn't sound like a PhD program would make that much sense for you.  Usually, you would enter one because you want to learn how to become a researcher or at least be able to consume the research literature. Since you talk about wanting to be an administrator -- I think it would make much more sense to get a job in higher ed first and then think about a EdD later after you have some solid experience and know more about the direction you want to go in.

Have you looked at academic advisor positions in English departments or Schools of Arts & Sciences (if they don't have professional advisors at the department level)?  You should be able to leverage your MA in English and your current teaching experience into being able to advise students quite nicely especially at the school that you are currently teaching at. 

[MrsG]

All good advice! I am also considering Ed.D. programs, and I am in the process of meeting with several professionals who are in jobs like my vision so that I can learn more about their perspectives and experiences. I have found that a few of these people have Ph.D.s in Higher Ed, so that seemed like a sensible route to go. The jobs I have been applying for lately have actually been academic advisor positions. I figured this would be the easiest way to get a foot in the door with administration.

Although working while studying is something I would like to do, it is by no means a deal breaker if I can't. I want to do whatever will make me the most marketable in the field. To be clear, I'm not looking for a job at a huge research university. My ideal school for work is actually a small private college, which is where I am working as an adjunct now. I'd like to be able to transition over from faculty to administration here or at one of the other smaller colleges and universities in our region. Not all are private; one or two are state universities.

[MrsG]

I see there's another question I didn't address -- while I am open to teaching as needed or beneficial, I do not want to be pigeon holed into teaching full time for the rest of my career. I would rather be working in a student support capacity.

[ZeChocMoose]

If you really want to pursue the PhD in higher ed - I would suggest thinking about what area(s) in higher ed you want to research since you'll have to write about it in your SOP and target faculty members in those areas to be your advisor.

[day_manderly]

Hello. I am planning to do theoretical work in the domain of Higher Ed research. Does anybody know whether Peabody, Vanderbilt has any notable professors who work in the field of higher ed, theoretical dimension, specifically?

[Levon3]

9 hours ago, day_manderly said:

Hello. I am planning to do theoretical work in the domain of Higher Ed research. Does anybody know whether Peabody, Vanderbilt has any notable professors who work in the field of higher ed, theoretical dimension, specifically?

I suggest going to the program's website, browsing the faculty pages, and reading some of their research to decide whether there are professors who work in the particular area you are interested in. 

[ZeChocMoose]

On 5/14/2016 at 8:16 AM, day_manderly said:

Hello. I am planning to do theoretical work in the domain of Higher Ed research. Does anybody know whether Peabody, Vanderbilt has any notable professors who work in the field of higher ed, theoretical dimension, specifically?

Higher ed is a field that borrows theories from other social science disciplines and applies them to help explain their empirical work.  If you are only interested in creating theories - this isn't the right field for you.

[day_manderly]

2 hours ago, ZeChocMoose said:

Higher ed is a field that borrows theories from other social science disciplines and applies them to help explain their empirical work.  If you are only interested in creating theories - this isn't the right field for you.

Being a theorist does not mean only creating theories, but also critiquing and applying them. Also, we do create theories - look at Ronald Barnett, for one. Peabody's website does not have a 'search by interest' option, hence one has to read each and every professor's profile in order to understand who is who. Ergo, the question.

Edited May 16, 2016 by day_manderly

[Levon3]

9 hours ago, day_manderly said:

Being a theorist does not mean only creating theories, but also critiquing and applying them. Also, we do create theories - look at Ronald Barnett, for one. Peabody's website does not have a 'search by interest' option, hence one has to read each and every professor's profile in order to understand who is who. Ergo, the question.

I don't know of any school's website that has a "search by interest" option. If you aren't already familiar with the notable scholars in this domain, I don't understand how you are sure you want to study this. One thing you might try is: run a google scholar search for your theoretical interests, read some articles and develop a running list of people you'd be interested in working with based on their work. Some of them may be at Peabody, but you may determine that you are a better fit with a professor elsewhere. 

[day_manderly]

1 hour ago, Levon3 said:

I don't know of any school's website that has a "search by interest" option. If you aren't already familiar with the notable scholars in this domain, I don't understand how you are sure you want to study this. One thing you might try is: run a google scholar search for your theoretical interests, read some articles and develop a running list of people you'd be interested in working with based on their work. Some of them may be at Peabody, but you may determine that you are a better fit with a professor elsewhere. 

Why, the Harvard website does, and UMich website, and UPenn's, too. As for reading and searching - yes, sure, I have done all that. I know where the professors who work in the same field mostly reside, and have contacted a few. Peabody is one of the safeties for me, as the list of schools where a person with my interest can apply is rather short, and the school has a PhD program with a possible concentration in Higher Education - not so common a thing.

Another point - sometimes a professor is not officially working in the school of education, but in, say, the department of history. That is another reason why I asked the community here whether they know someone. Also, I might have missed a professor; he or she might have been a faculty member in another place when writing a paper, and so on.

Btw, looking for different programs, I found Higher Education:  A Worldwide Inventory of Research Centers,  Academic Programs, and Journals and Publications by Boston College Center for International Higher Education immensely helpful.

https://www.bc.edu/content/dam/files/research_sites/cihe/pdf/Worldwide_Inventory_full_2015_08_11.pdf

[ZeChocMoose]

21 hours ago, day_manderly said:

Being a theorist does not mean only creating theories, but also critiquing and applying them. Also, we do create theories - look at Ronald Barnett, for one. Peabody's website does not have a 'search by interest' option, hence one has to read each and every professor's profile in order to understand who is who. Ergo, the question.

I would argue that any good social scientist critiques and applies theories - it doesn't make them a theorist though.

I should amend my statement to be if you really want to study theory, attending a Higher Ed PhD program located in the United States is not a good idea.  Most departments are training students to become higher education administrators and there are a few departments (like a handful) that are also training students to be empirical researchers.  For the most part, higher education is thought of as a practical degree with honestly little to no theory training unless you are at one of those handful of programs teaching theory because it is important in empirical research.  I know that this is different in Europe where the study of education is much more theory heavy - but it is not the case here.  There also not any academic jobs for people labeling themselves as higher education theorist in the U.S. either because once again the departments are training practitioners not theorists.