Graduate Education: Then, Now, Next Session 1: Beginnings - 1890

Series Overview:
Graduate Education: Then, Now, Next focuses on the historical realities, the present pressing issues, and the future of graduate education in North America and globally. We will augment readings and discussion with a rotation of visiting speakers who will address graduate education’s past and present, as well as forward-looking and tactically-oriented discussions of how graduate students can best prepare for the futures in front of them.
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Session 8 Overview:
TBA

Session 7 Overview:

Guest Speakers:

Peter Dougherty, emeritus Director, Princeton University
Press;

Matt Rohal, Editor, Princeton University Press;

Reading: “How to Find the Right Scholarly Publisher: Imagining The Moon Under Water Press”

Series Overview:
Graduate Education: Then, Now, Next focuses on the historical realities, the present pressing issues, and the future of graduate education in North America and globally. We will augment readings and discussion with a rotation of visiting speakers who will address graduate education’s past and present, as well as forward-looking and tactically-oriented discussions of how graduate students can best prepare for the futures in front of them.
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Session 6 Overview:

Join guests including Stan Katz and Leonard Cassuto for a dinner conversation about the historical roots and current state of graduate education. We'll discuss funding, research and teaching, and other topics close to the heart of the graduate student experience.

Suggested Pre-Readings:
* The Soul of the Research University, Lemann
* 2026 Annual letter from President Christopher Eisgruber
* The Unmaking of the Research University, Lemann

Zoom link, if needed: https://princeton.zoom.us/j/8422150649

Series Overview:
Graduate Education: Then, Now, Next focuses on the historical realities, the present pressing issues, and the future of graduate education in North America and globally. We will augment readings and discussion with a rotation of visiting speakers who will address graduate education’s past and present, as well as forward-looking and tactically-oriented discussions of how graduate students can best prepare for the futures in front of them.
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This session is a makeup session, and will focus on the following readings:

Gilman’s Inaugural Address for Johns Hopkins University

What competing intellectual, practical, economic, and social aims does Gilman identify in his vision of the first American university, and how do these tensions shape its purpose?

What specific academic aims define the university, and in what ways do they align with or diverge from established global precedents of the time?

How does Gilman imagine the university as an institutional project—who builds it, who studies there, and who defines its intellectual direction—and what wider educational and social infrastructures (such as robust secondary schools, or the four “adjuncts” pg.33) does he argue are necessary to sustain it?

Flexner’s The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge

Flexner appears to be a potentially exaggerated proponent of the academic freedom described in Gilman’s address. How should we evaluate his claim that the most important discoveries arise from unrestricted curiosity, and that educational institutions should prioritize this curiosity over practical knowledge (p. 549)? To what extent is this ideal reflected in Princeton University and in our own research priorities?

Series Overview:
Graduate Education: Then, Now, Next focuses on the historical realities, the present pressing issues, and the future of graduate education in North America and globally. We will augment readings and discussion with a rotation of visiting speakers who will address graduate education’s past and present, as well as forward-looking and tactically-oriented discussions of how graduate students can best prepare for the futures in front of them.
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Session 3 Overview:

Our second session will continue to focus on the past of American graduate education, looking at perhaps the most formative period in its history as U.S. institutions adapt elements of the German model to create the beginnings of the research university ecosystem in North America.

Series Overview:
Graduate Education: Then, Now, Next focuses on the historical realities, the present pressing issues, and the future of graduate education in North America and globally. We will augment readings and discussion with a rotation of visiting speakers who will address graduate education’s past and present, as well as forward-looking and tactically-oriented discussions of how graduate students can best prepare for the futures in front of them.
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Session 2 Overview:

Our second session will continue to focus on the past of American graduate education, looking at perhaps the most formative period in its history. The Ph.D. takes the shape we recognize today in this 50 year window, and so it needs a careful survey.

Series Overview:
Graduate Education: Then, Now, Next focuses on the historical realities, the present pressing issues, and the future of graduate education in North America and globally. We will augment readings and discussion with a rotation of visiting speakers who will address graduate education’s past and present, as well as forward-looking and tactically-oriented discussions of how graduate students can best prepare for the futures in front of them.
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