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Ph.D. Completion Project

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The PhD Completion Project was a seven-year, grant-funded project addressing the issues surrounding PhD completion and attrition. Reports and findings are now available.

The Council of Graduate Schools sponsored the project, which was supported by Pfizer, Inc., and the Ford Foundation. Funding was awarded to 29 major U.S. and Canadian research universities to create intervention strategies, to pilot projects, and to evaluate the impact of these projects on doctoral completion rates and attrition patterns.

Ohio State was selected to participate in phase 2 of the project, which lasted for three years, and finished in 2010. The following eight graduate programs participated in the project.

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Department	Contact	Interventions
Electrical and Computer Engineering	Roberto Rojas-Teran	"Direct BS to PhD" program Terminal non-thesis MS program Database system to monitor graduate student progress
English	Nan Johnson	Mentoring for Graduate School fellows Box lunches for quarterly meetings with fellows
History	Paula Baker	Summer funding for research Conference travel fund
Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology	David Bisaro	Identification of academically at-risk students and those changing career plans Tutors for academically at-risk students
Neuroscience	Randy Nelson	Comprehensive recruitment plan Comprehensive orientation program
Physics	John Pelz	Recruitment strategy to enroll more women
Psychology	Randy Nelson	Develop survey for applicants Data analysis for survey, student activity reports, and exit survey
Political Science	Kathleen McGraw	Two-week math workshop (pre-autumn quarter) Conference travel fund for post-candidacy students