Dear All,
Let me add a couple of comments to this interesting thread.
I agree with much of what has been said, but at the risk of tripping
over myself, I respond to Jacques Giard's and Glenn Johnson's
responses.
The key issue is that the PhD is a research degree. It is an advanced
degree in the professional practice of research rather than an
advanced degree in professional practice of design.
As a research degree, the PhD is required for positions that entail
research responsibility. Jacques noted that many funding agencies
require the PhD as a qualification for grants. There are two other
areas of research responsibility internal to the university.
One area of research responsibility is PhD supervision. Those who
teach in fields of professional practice are required to have learned
and mastered the practice they teach to share their skills and
knowledge with others. This is the case for design, medicine, cooking
-- in fact, it is the case for nearly all fields anchored in
practice. Research is a specific practice. The PhD education is a
training program in the professional practice of research. It is an
education in research skills and research methods as well as an
opportunity for advanced learning and individual research in the
specific subject field of the PhD. Surgeons or chefs study and
practice at the highest level to develop the knowledge and skills
required for teaching and supervising the next generation of surgeons
and chefs. Developing the skills and knowledge to supervise and teach
research students requires the same kind of background. This is
particularly the case for those aspects of PhD supervision involving
skills and knowledge remote from the supervisor's own field. A solid,
well-rounded research degree provides the basis for knowing how to
help our doctoral students develop skills we do not use in our own
work. The breadth requirements and courses in comparative research
methodology required in every good PhD program are more than a basis
of personal knowledge. They are a foundation course for those who
will go on to teach and supervise research students.
The other area is curriculum development. It is difficult to take
responsibility for a university-level research program without a
thorough background in research. The PhD is normally the beginning of
that background.
It is possible to be a lecturer or a even a professor without a PhD.
One does not need a PhD to be a good studio professor. The problem
arises when professors are asked to supervise research degrees or
plan research programs by virtue of the fact that they sit in the
professor's chair. I won't go into the horror problems that I've
witnessed over the years when excellent studio professors take on
research responsibilities for which they are not suited. Many people
mistakenly believe that they suddenly develop research skills when
they acquire the title "professor." The worst problems I have seen
involve excellent practitioners hired as professors who find
themselves required to deal with research. There are other ways to
reach the same unhappy state. Some lecturers and even professors with
a PhD have slipped through questionable programs to earn a degree.
They don't have the skills they need, even though they hold a PhD
degree.
There are professors without a PhD who have made it their business to
master the required skills. Chris Rust is an exemplar here.
For the most part, preparing for a career in research involves
serious people doing a solid PhD degree in a good program by
mastering research skills with skilled and responsible supervisors.
The role of those supervisors is to ensure that the new PhD graduates
have the background they need to develop into good supervisors and
research teachers.
Developing research skills and the ability to teach and supervise
research students is why we might "need" a PhD.
Tao Huang, Chris Rust, and Catherine Harper explained beautifully why
we might "want" a PhD, whether or not we need it.
If your goal is lecturing or teaching design practice, there is no
need for a PhD. If you wish to do research and to supervise and teach
research students, a PhD (and what you learn while earning it) is
useful. You can become a professor coming up through either track.
--
Prof. [Dr.] Ken Friedman
Institute for Communication, Culture, and Language
Norwegian School of Management
Oslo
Center for Design Research
Denmark's Design School
Copenhagen
+47 46.41.06.76 Tlf NSM
+47 33.40.10.95 Tlf Privat
email: [log in to unmask]
|