As a sociologist and someone who has gone through my own trials and tribulations of getting a Ph.D., the question of how to improve the chances of grad students -- particularly students of color -- finishing their doctorate degrees is an academic and personal interest of mine. To try to shed some light on this question, Inside Higher Education reports on a new study conducted by the Council of Graduate Schools that delineates some of the issues that are still paramount in determining who finishes and who drops out:

The results reinforce the belief about the role of money in promoting completion. Those who finished up their doctorates ranked financial issues as the top factor in enabling them to do so. And to the extent the data show differences among disciplines in financing, those differences carry over to rates of completion (humanities students need to borrow more, and take longer to finish).

With regard to the “main factors” contributing to completion, new Ph.D.’s (who could pick more than one item that applied) ranked the following: 80 percent cited financial support, 63 percent mentoring/advising, 60 percent family support, 39 percent social environment and peer support, 39 percent program quality, and 30 percent professional and career guidance. . . .

Previous studies by various groups have found that time-to-completion rates for humanities fields lag those for others, and the Council of Graduate Schools effort provided more confirmation. In the physical and biological science and technology fields, more than half of those in entering cohorts are earning a doctorate between year six and seven of a program. In the social sciences, year seven sees only a completion rate of just over 40 percent; in the humanities the figure is 29 percent.

The article notes that the study’s authors are still analyzing all of the data, so more analysis will be forthcoming. Nonetheless, this preliminary data by academic field shows some notable differences. It is sobering to see that among Ph.D. students in the social sciences (where I got my degree), barely half who start grad school will eventually get their doctorate degree after 10 years.

I look forward to seeing the study’s results as it pertains to rates of completion by gender, social class background, and race/ethnicity.