Learning or legitimacy? An investigation of the graduate student milestones within a chemistry doctoral program

A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) is defined as the highest achievable degree and represents the completion of a specialized mentored project. Concerningly, graduate programs are structured in ways that can lead to inequities that exclude graduate students based on race, class, gender, ability, and additional intersecting social locations. Drawing from Yuval-Davis' framework on the politics of belonging and Porter et al.'s institutional critique methodology, the goal of the qualitative study was to examine how a chemistry graduate program fosters the professional development of its students through the graduate student milestones (admissions, preliminary exams, coursework, candidacy exam, seminar, and dissertation defense). The data comprised of documents such as the 2019 graduate student handbook and information from the departmental website, along with interviews involving faculty (N = 5), staff (N = 3), and administrators (N = 2) who served as policy agents. Findings highlight how misalignment within the admissions, preliminary exam, and candidacy milestones can create boundaries for belonging. In contrast, the seminar milestone had alignment that contributed to belonging while the coursework and dissertation defense milestones had ambiguous alignment that contributed to belonging. After gathering and analyzing the data, I collaborated with a team at the university's Department of Chemistry to revise the preliminary exam and candidacy exam milestones, aiming to enhance their inclusivity. Overall, this study offers implications for structuring chemistry graduate programs and STEM programs broadly.