Dear David,

You wrote,

—snip—

However, I too am curious about the notion that a PhD is the licence to teach other PhDs in a self perpetuating system. This seems to me to be a rather out of date view of the benefit of a solid research training. 

—snip—

When you ask this way, it seems puzzling. But it’s not what I meant. Gunnar Swanson was critical to that notion, and I am, too.  

Several people asked me privately if what I meant was that every PhD graduate should take up a career of research and teaching. I did not. What I argue is that following graduation with a PhD, graduates should have the skill to go on to supervise people in doctoral programs if they should choose to work at universities.

It was formerly the case at German universities that the PhD degree was not a license to teach. This required a specific thesis, the Habilitation, sometimes called the post-doctoral dissertation. You can see the distinction on the web site of the University of Postdam: 

https://www.uni-potsdam.de/en/wiso/research/post-doctoral-dissertation.html

In universities that preserve this tradition, someone one who wishes to teach writes a second thesis called the habilitation that is intended to demonstrate whether one is capable of teaching research students. I am not sure whether this is still the case in all German universities following the Bologna treaty.

For most of the world, no one issues a PhD that states “This degree specifically does not qualify the person who holds it to teach research students at a university.” No one takes such a degree, either. Given the development and history of universities, therefore, the default position is that one must gain the skills for what will frequently be a career choice.   

In my earlier note on the list, I made the allowance for choosing to work at a university or not. The PhD thesis is the journeyman piece for admission to the guild of research, science, and scholarship. This is the research university, defined by the original meaning of the term university (universitas) as the corporation (collegiate body, or guild) of masters and scholars.   

To be a full senior member of any guild, field, or profession requires the ability to transmit knowledge of the field to the next generation. The full senior members in any guild, field, or profession embody the knowledge of the field. 

If any member chooses not to share that knowledge and chooses not to take apprentices, that is a personal choice. Those who do choose to take students must be able to teach them.

Those people must be able to transmit the knowledge of the field to the next generation. That applies to those who prefer to work in the context of the university. Those who work exclusively in a laboratory or in private practice probably won’t transit their knowledge. If, however, they do want to teach people to do research, one purpose of the PhD is to demonstrate that they have the skills to do so.

One does not need to choose to work at a university, but one must have the skills that would permit one to do so. Since the PhD thesis is the journeyman’s piece, it demonstrates the same set of skills.

The reality today is that very few people who graduate with a PhD will ever hold full time, tenured university jobs. The number of these jobs is shrinking in all advanced industrial nations, and more and more university positions are filled by part-time and adjunct staff. I would not suggest that anyone get a PhD today in the hope of a university teaching job.

Perhaps this means changing the previous default position. I was describing the system as it has been until now.

Yours,

Ken

Ken Friedman | Editor-in-Chief | 设计 She Ji. The Journal of Design, Economics, and Innovation | Published by Tongji University in Cooperation with Elsevier | URL: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/she-ji-the-journal-of-design-economics-and-innovation/

Chair Professor of Design Innovation Studies | College of Design and Innovation | Tongji University | Shanghai, China ||| Email [log in to unmask] | Academia http://swinburne.academia.edu/KenFriedman | D&I http://tjdi.tongji.edu.cn 


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