The P resentation of Self and the Professional Doctorate in E veryday L ife

1. The Presentation of Self and the Professional Doctorate in Everyday Life

2. The Presentation of Self and the Professional Doctorate in Everyday Life Dr Sue Dyson: Reader in Nurse Education, De Montfort University, UK Dr Patricia Maitland: Principal Lecturer,Course LeaderProfessional Doctorate, University of Westminster, UK Dr Nick Pratt: Professional Doctorate Programme Leader, University of Plymouth, UK

3. Professional Doctorates: when, where, and why does it matter • The genesis of doctoral degrees has been traced to the University in Paris in the middle of the 12th Century (Noble, 1994) • Thereafter adopted in universities across Europe • For six centuries, doctorates in theology, law and medicine were pre-eminent. These were the precursors of the `professional doctorate` • The modern PhD or DPhil originated in Germany (Berlin) in the 19th Century • In the USA, the first PhD was conferred at Yale in 1861 • 60 years on the PhD arrived in England, awarded by University of Oxford in 1920 (Simpson 1983, Winfield 1987) • The first `modern` professional doctorate (EdD) awarded at Harvard in 1921

4. knowing our history: professional doctorates and the PhD (rivals or bedfellows) • England introduced the professional doctorate 60 years after the USA, again the EdD, which arrived in 1992 at the University of Bristol (Westcott, 1997) • The Doctor of Engineering (EngD) followed at University of Warwick, University of Manchester and the University of Wales, again in 1992 • The 1990s saw many other professional doctorates offered in English Universities ` • “History enables us to put contemporary thoughts and actions into longer-term contexts which make them more understandable. History involves not only the reconstruction and interpretation of the past, but the development of the critical skills necessary to unlocking its secrets and explaining them to others; the ability to construct, evaluate and criticise arguments, so that we can challenge assumptions and prejudices wherever we encounter them” (Queen’s University Belfast, 2012)

5. assumptions and prejudices • The `modern` professional doctorate has been available for 20 years in the UK, for 80 years in the US. • Debate as to whether professional doctorates should sit alongside the more traditional PhD, as a valid mode of study for the highest award a university can confer • Questions about the status of the professional doctorate i.e. legitimacy, about the title, structure, assessment and quality assurance • Concern appears rooted in the nature of professional doctorates, which are invariably part taught and part independent research and not in the nature of knowledge, for example empirical, personal, ethical, aesthetic (Carper, 1978), and whether any hierarchy can reasonably be said to exist

6. Some Important Questions • How do students think about doctoral programmes and why do they choose the Professional Doctorate as opposed to the PhD • Are students making informed decisions regarding the choice of doctoral programme • Anecdotal evidence suggests this is not the case, with students often referring to themselves as PhD students once on the `Prof Doc` programme • Do students prefer to think of themselves as PhD students, and by implication think the PhD preferable to the Professional Doctorate • Do students lack understanding of the difference between the two routes to doctoral study

7. the study • Small scale - Qualitative in-depth interviews with 20 students at DMU, Westminster , and Plymouth universities from a range of disciplines, including nursing, midwifery, education, biomedical science, social work, and health visiting • Ethical approval granted, consent sought and confidentiality assured • Interviews recorded and transcribed verbatim • Thematic analysis of data • Goffman’s (1959) concept of presentation of self in everyday life (Goffman 1959) informed the notion of presentation of `educated`self in everyday life to frame the data analysis

8. what did i ask and what did students say Key questions - your journey towards applying for and undertaking the professional doctorate, your experience on the Professional Doctorate Sub questions - understanding of the professional doctorate before commencing the programme, understanding of the difference between the Prof Doc and the PhD, what made you choose the Prof Doc, how do you think and refer to your programme of study (yourself, and to others) Key Themes:- • Opportunism (marketing, conversations with others, website, right place, right time) • Lack of Academic confidence • Funding • Promotion/career change (moving from practice to HE, up the ladder) • Programme structure (time, modular, taught, communities of practice, feedback)

9. students voiceswhy the professional doctorate as opposed to the PhD? Opportunistic: marketing materials, direct approach “ so I was looking around thinking what can I do, what shall I do it in, and amazingly internally we had the advert from….telling us about the Professional Doctorate and it was just being set up…” (DHSci student) “I was sort of asked to think about doing the Professional Doctorate, when it was explained to me I thought well I can see the usefulness of it , sort of doing bits and then not having such as big piece of work at the end” (DHSci student) “It was suggested to me by my manager. I was talking to him about carrying on and doing my masters modules and he said he thought it would be a better use of my time to apply for the Education Doctorate, which they would support me to do” (EdD student)

10. Lack of Academic Confidence “and that is I’ve never been confident in myself as an academic if you like because of my lack of effort really when I was younger so I’ve constantly gone through this thing of I need to prove myself. So nobody else in my family, I’m the first one, I was the first one in my whole family to get to degree level, the first to get to masters level..(EdD student) “And though my vocational qualifications are very strong, I have a diploma in marketing, which is equivalent to a postgraduate qualification, and other significant business qualifications I felt I was looked down on I think in academic circles because I didn’t have a degree…it was something (a doctorate) that I never imagined I would be able to do” (EdD student) “I would probably choose the Prof Doc in that support is really helpful if you haven’t done any type of research degree before” (PD Health and Social care student)

11. Funding “I had the opportunity to do a post graduate qualification before they would consider funding me, so that was factored into the equation” (PD health and Social Care Student) “and also it was funded by the …., which is another added bonus, so I decided to send for the literature” ( DHSci student) “My ethos is if somebody pays my fees I am going to …. well do my best to put the time in and do it and I was lucky enough” (EdD student)

12. Promotion/career change “and she said do you know anybody with experience of disability and equality, who wants some teaching. I had just been made redundant, so I said..well me. So of course everything changed because I was surrounded by colleagues who were doctors. It wasn’t a matter then that my masters degree was actually very very good and absolutely brilliant and out paced the majority of colleagues I was working with, but all of a sudden I felt like the baby at the back of the pile again” (EdD student) “I felt that my experience to date although I have got a masters in …, my research knowledge and experience wasn’t sufficient enough for me to really excel in this new role and the four core functions of a ….. I felt like I wasn’t fulfilling one of them..the research (DHSci student)

13. Programme structure “I suppose if I know that there is either a lecture to go to or a time constraint that I have to hand something in, I will work to that deadline, I’m one of those people that needs to have a deadline and to see a point where it finishes” (DHSci student) “I like the thought of having the two years in university with taught modules to almost get you up to the level of writing at doctorate level rather than going straight in there” (DHSci student) “It was the taught element and the support that was offered through that, with self-directed learning and self directed research on its own, its not a learning style that would suit me and its not something that would lend itself to the way in which I work. So I needed the structure and this course offered that “ (PD Health and Social Care Student) “ I think in the end even though there were these things that appealed to me from the PhD range of interests it was the opportunity to be more social and to work with others that ultimately won me over I think, and actually the design of the programme (EdD student)

14. How do you refer to yourself and your studies “I had to explain, pretty much to everybody and I've kept it very simple, just said it’s a research degree but its done with some elements which are modular and they accept that, you know and they're happy, I don’t correct people, it’s not worth the pain” (EdD student) “I just say PhD I don’t correct them. I have made a conscious decision about that but I think that I have never called it a PhD. People in the family when they say how is your PhD going, I don’t say no its an education doctorate” (EdD student) “You have to make clear that there are… it is different to a PhD and people, when you talk to them about doing a doctorate, I suppose if they have experience of doing a PhD themselves will know what it is about. Automatically well they still call it a PhD, but I don’t call it that no”” (PD Health and Social Care student) “No they didn't want to explore how it was different to a traditional doctorate, they didn't want to look into the programme, or look at what my thesis might be about. They didn’t even ask, it was just the word PhD doctorate” (EdD student) “No, they didn’t want to know in detail. No I say I’m doing a doctorate, and they say what's that and I will say it’s a bit like a PhD but is a different route” (DHSci student)

15. Goffman (1959): presentation of self : a tentative analysis • When an individual plays a part he implicitly requests his observers take seriously the impression that is fostered before them • They are asked to believe that the character they see actually possesses the attributes he appears to possess, the task he performs will have the consequences that are implicitly claimed for it, in general, matters are what they appear to be • Two possible explanations. (1) the individual, ` the performer` can be fully taken in by his own act; he can be fully convinced that the impression of reality he stages is the real reality. (2) `the performer` may not be taken in at all by his own routine.

16. The Presentation of Self and the Professional Doctorate in Everyday Life • These opposing positions allow for an interesting examination of the professional doctorate students’ `performance` so to speak, once enrolled on the programme • Position (1) - the individual believes in their own performance - the professional doctorate student who refers to their programme as a PhD believes this to be the case and by implication does not know the difference between the PhD and the professional doctorate • Implications - no need for a different route for doctoral study as students not making a distinction between programmes. This begs the question of the clarity of marketing of and recruitment to the professional doctorate programme.

17. Position (2)- student does understand the distinction between the professional doctorate and the PhD but often allows others to think of them as a PhD student, i.e. not dissuading or disabusing • This begs the question of the value the student places on one programme, as opposed to the other • Both positions require thorough investigation if assumptions are to be avoided, valid conclusions reached, and informed recommendations made to relevant stakeholders.

18. Discussion • Students choose professional doctorates for reasons that a structured programme, i.e. modular, deadlines, and immediate feedback meets their needs when lacking academic confidence • Professional doctorates are often funded i.e. staff development or local arrangements • Promotion or career change required further study to gain legitimacy in new environment - to keep up • Access to information about the Professional Doctorate was often opportunistic • Students did understand the two programmes but others didn’t, students’ often don't correct misunderstandings • Goffman (1959) position (2) appears a `best fit` in that students DO KNOW the difference between the two routes to a doctorate but, while not referring to themselves directly as PhD students, often do not `correct` others when they do so

19. Conclusions • Marketing and recruitment to professional doctorate programmes is clear and candidates self evidently understand the difference between the prof doc and the PhD • Candidates do make informed decisions about choice of programme usually for reasons of availability of funding and programme structure • A lack of academic confidence makes the professional doctorate a favoured option • Once on the professional doctorate, students are happy with their choice • Students have neither the time or inclination to explain the difference between the two doctoral programmes to others (colleagues, family, friends) • A lost opportunity for enthusiastic `Prof Doc` students to promote these programmes to a wide audience

20. References • Carper (1978), "Fundamental Patterns of Knowing in Nursing", Advances in Nursing Science1(1), 13–24. • Goffman E (1959) Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. Penguin Books. London. • Noble, K. (1994) Changing Doctoral degrees: an international perspective. Buckingham, Society for Research into Higher Education and Open University press. • Queen’s University, Belfast (2012) why Study History? http://www.qub.ac.uk/schools/SchoolofHistoryandAnthropology//ProspectiveStudents/UndergraduateStudies/WhyStudyHistory/ accessed 10.23am, 27/03/12. • Simpson, R (1983) How the PhD Came to Britain: a century of struggle for postgraduate education. Guildford, Society for Research into Higher Education. • Westcott, E (1997) A professional in the dock. Times Higher Education Supplement, 16th may, p.111 • Winfield, G (1987) The Social Science PhD; the ESCR inquiry on submission rates. Economic and Social Research Council. London.

21. thank you