What earning a Ph.D. degree really means

When I was a Ph.D. student on research attachment at the University of Portsmouth over a decade ago, a friend of mine, who was then that university’s director for international recruitment, took me to a local pub for a little bit of “cultural exposure,” British style. After a few beers, he complained to me: “The trouble with having a Ph.D. is that people I think I know everything there is to know about mechanical engineering. They don’t realize that what it actually means is that I know a lot about a very specific topic…” I don’t recall exactly what he said next, except that the conversation drifted in the direction of his area of expertise, no doubt aided by the evening’s dose of alcohol. But those words have stayed with me through the years, and now, of course, I know better than to naively trust the “expertise” that is often automatically attributed to people who have the letters “Ph.D.” after their names.

So, what exactly does it mean to earn a Ph.D.? Firstly, Ph.D. work is essentially a research apprenticeship under the supervision of a thesis adviser. Ideally, the adviser should be sufficiently seasoned as a researcher to be able to guide the student toward successfully completing a thesis that documents an original contribution to the state of knowledge in his or her discipline. The details of the actual apprenticeship will vary depending on the institution (for example, in the US, Ph.D. students normally go through several semesters of coursework prior to starting their dissertation, while in the UK, students skip formal lectures entirely and jump straight into research), the adviser’s mentoring style, and the student’s level of independent mindedness. The common feature that characterizes Ph.D. work is that the student learns to do research by actually engaging in a specific line of inquiry. In the meantime, such Ph.D. students will often form the backbone of the research workforce of an academic institution; a typical arrangement in many universities involves research groups headed by a small number of faculty members, supervising (often with the assistance of postdoctoral fellows) a large group of graduate students. A well-trained Ph.D. student will go through rigorous exposure to various aspects of research — literature review, problem definition, data acquisition, and interpretation of findings. In addition, he or she will become a de facto assistant to the thesis supervisor, and may often be assigned various tasks, ranging from helping write research proposals to preparing slide presentations for lectures. The candidate will also be exposed to various means of dissemination of results used in the scientific world, including conference presentations, publication of research in peer-reviewed journals, and finally, presentation of the doctoral thesis before an evaluation committee, which then decides whether or not to grant the candidate the Ph.D. degree.

Earning the Ph.D. degree thus marks the completion of the research apprenticeship. This is rather like completing “basic training,” after which a researcher is expected to be capable of starting a career of independent research. Contrary to popular belief, earning a Ph.D. degree does not automatically confer to a person the status of an experienced researcher. In fact, it is more accurate to think of the Ph.D. as being the bare minimum requirement for a research career. It provides proof of research acumen, because the doctoral thesis itself is a piece of original research. In many countries, it is often necessary to gain even more research experience by doing a postdoctoral fellowship (which is essentially a temporary, project-based research staff position, during which a Ph.D. graduate can gain further experience before seeking a more formal academic post). The key point to make is that, ideally, a Ph.D. should be preparation for a career in research; sadly, in the Philippines, those three letters tend to take on an ornamental function, lending the bearer added prestige and credibility for jobs that may not at all be research-related.

In summary, the Ph.D. degree provides a formalized scheme of apprenticeship through which a young researcher can gain the knowledge and experience, under the mentorship of an expert, before eventually proceeding to a scientific career. This system is by no means a perfect one, and it is easy to cite the counter example of Nobel Laureate Francis Crick, who was working on his Ph.D. thesis when he figured out the structure of DNA (with his co-worker James Watson). Legend has it that Crick was frequently scolded by his Ph.D. adviser for letting his obsession with DNA get in the way of completing his dissertation, which was on an entirely different topic. Fortunately, Crick decided that DNA was more important than the Ph.D. Nevertheless, the existing system is a workable one, and has produced good results as proven by the many scientific advances of the past century or so. Which brings me to my final words to the reader: If you want to learn how to do research the right way, get a Ph.D., and once you have a Ph.D., don’t let it go to waste — do research.

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Prof. Raymond R. Tan is a university fellow and full professor of chemical engineering at De La Salle University. He is also the current director of that institution’s Center for Engineering and Sustainable Development Research (CESDR). He is the author of more than 70 process systems engineering (PSE) articles that have been published in chemical, environmental and energy engineering journals. He is member of the editorial boards of the journals Clean Technologies and Environmental Policy, Philippine Science Letters and Sustainable Technologies, Systems & Policies, and is co-editor of the forthcoming book Recent Advances in Sustainable Process Design and Optimization. He is also the recipient of multiple awards from the National Academy of Science and Technology (NAST) and the National Research Council of the Philippines (NRCP). He may be contacted via e-mail [email protected].