Notes from the Trenches: Reflections from Recent PhD Graduates on Navigating the Academy
Other text in scientific journal, 2023

PhD planning graduates face an increasingly competitive academic job market. In this commentary, seven recent graduates provide qualitative descriptions of the complicated and ever-changing expectations graduates face. We situate this within a larger reflection on the neoliberal academy that promotes a culture of competitiveness over care and production over purpose. We emphasize how this system is seemingly antithetical to the transformative planning work needed to address the most pressing planning issues of our time and provide suggestions for meeting shifting expectations, evolving training and support needs, and opportunities for a more compassionate tenure-track market. Our commentary has implications for doctoral pedagogy, the tenure-track market, and the academy.

academia

doctoral education

job market

teaching

Author

Deidre Zoll

The University of Texas at Austin

Raksha Vasudevan

Columbia University

Bri Gauger

Chalmers, Architecture and Civil Engineering, Architectural theory and methods

Sarah Gelbard

McGill University

Carla Maria Kayanan

Maynooth University

Julie Mah

University of Toronto

Ariadna Reyes

University of Texas at Arlington

Journal of Planning Education and Research

0739-456X (ISSN) 15526577 (eISSN)

Vol. In Press

Subject Categories

Business Administration

Information Science

DOI

10.1177/0739456X231195729

More information

Latest update

9/22/2023