Issue date: 5/25/06 Section: Features

Media Credit: www.brown.edu

Commencement is a rite of passage for graduating seniors, but for Ph.D. students the ceremony is the final chapter in a much longer process. Most doctoral students leave College Hill for the challenging academic job market, and many already have teaching positions or postdoctoral fellowships lined up. But whether or not their career plans are clear, doctoral students interviewed by The Herald said doing their graduate work at an undergraduate-focused institution was a positive experience.

The research and writing required of a Ph.D. student varies between disciplines, making generalizing about the process difficult.

"It's just fundamentally different to write a really huge tome the way they do in the humanities, and to write discrete, empirically based papers the way I have been doing," said ecological and evolutionary biology student Jonna Hamilton Ph.D. '06. "But as far as support, I think we've had the same trials and tribulations."

Hamilton began her advanced degree after graduating from college in Florida. She chose to come to Brown because the University has one of the largest groups of functional ornithologists in the country. Hamilton's dissertation focused on how some birds' wings allow them to move through both air and water.

"My department is awesome," Hamilton said. "It's just a big family, basically."

Though Hamilton enjoyed the community in her own department, she said the University's research efforts may be underestimated by undergraduates. "Brown is not a small research institution in many ways, but it is definitely centered on undergrads," Hamilton said.

Rather than following a traditional path into academia, Hamilton will begin work as a science adviser to a member of Congress after graduating. The program is run by the American Academy for the Advancement of Science and is specifically designed to bring Ph.D. graduates into policy.

Just as specific faculty members drew Hamilton to Brown, some of the University's lesser-known centers of study attract graduate students. The Center for Population Studies drew Mara Leichtman Ph.D. '06 to Providence. An anthropology doctoral student, she said the center's interdisciplinary approach allowed her to pursue her interests in migration and demography. Better yet, the center consistently provided generous funding.

Though funding is a perennial source of complaint for doctoral students, Brazilian native Luciano Tosta Ph.D. '06 said the support he received at Brown exceeded whatever he could have found in Brazil. "When I think about my experience in Brazil, it's hard for me to understand (graduate students' complaints)," he said. "In Brazil you don't get any support."

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