DUE friday 02/22/2019

Qualitative Research

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Qualitative research

Universities have been focusing much on undergraduate level without giving distinct objectives on providing future scholars with the right resources to pursue doctoral degree. It is imperative for universities to focus attention the factors affecting persistence of doctoral students. Doctoral students are defined as adults which makes them have obligations including families, work and loan payments (Greene, 2015). The increase of doctoral student’s population continues to widen the gap of obtaining finances to accomplish this degree. This makes many doctoral students pass through hurdles which they must defeat and without the universities or relevant bodies help, some of them might find themselves dropping out. The introduction of online doctoral courses also faces many challenges. Doctoral students rely on the collective support of stakeholders involved to develop positive social change through persistence (Rockinson-Szapkiw et al., 2014). Students retention especially for the Doctoral students, is becoming an important issue because of the decrease in university enrollment.

Research Question: what factors affect the persistence of doctoral students in achieving their degree focus?

I intend to interview the freshly graduated doctoral students and doctoral students who did not manage to graduate in their final year. The freshly graduated doctoral students will be able to focus and give the challenges they faced while taking their doctoral education. The factors which rendered them successfully will be important in answering the research question. The doctoral students who did not graduate will be asked to give their input on why they feel they did not manage to graduate in their final year of study. The freshly graduated students may attribute their success to cooperative teachers, sources of finances and family support. The ungraduated doctoral students many view lacks teachers support, cooperative loans grands and increased family responsibilities as the factors leading to their failure.

Five interview questions:

· What do you attribute your success to?

· What factor do you think increases or reduces doctoral students persistence?

· Do you think doctoral students educators plays a role in student’s persistence?

· What do you attribute failure of most doctoral students from graduating to?

· Do you think the universities can do anything to increase doctoral students persistence?

The research question focusses on establishing the factors that contribute or affect doctoral student’s persistence in their bid to achieving doctoral degrees. Doctoral persistence faces many challenges which needs to be researched. The interview questions are designed to allow the interviewee to focus on their experiences to exclusively quantify the factors that allowed them to be successful or fail. The information that will be obtained will help in carrying out a research analysis on various strategies to allow doctoral students increase persistence and be successful in attaining their doctoral degrees. If one of the factors is doctoral educators, it will be imperative for universities to establish better curriculum which enhance teacher-student interaction to facilitate easy learning. Personal experience reflection from the students provides the best avenue of obtaining primary information for the research analysis. The information will require consent from the students especially those who did not successfully graduate.

Reference

Greene, M. (2015). Come hell or high water: Doctoral students’ perceptions on support services and persistence. International Journal of Doctoral Studies, 10(1), 501-518.

Rockinson-Szapkiw, A. J., Spaulding, L. S., & Bade, B. (2014). Completion of educational doctorates: How universities can foster persistence. International Journal of Doctoral Studies, 9, 293-308.