Making strides in doctoral-level career outcomes reporting: a review of classification and visualization methodologies in graduate education

The recent movement underscoring the importance of career taxonomies has helped usher in a new era of transparency in PhD career outcomes. The convergence of discipline-specific organizational movements, interdisciplinary collaborations, and federal initiatives has helped to increase PhD career outc...

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Main Authors: Tammy R. L. Collins, Rebekah L. Layton, Deepti Ramadoss, Jennifer MacDonald, Ryan Wheeler, Adriana Bankston, C. Abby Stayart, Yi Hao, Jacqueline N. Robinson-Hamm, Melanie Sinche, Scott Burghart, Aleshia Carlsen-Bryan, Pallavi Eswara, Heather Krasna, Hong Xu, Mackenzie Sullivan
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Frontiers Media S.A. 2025-05-01
Series:Frontiers in Education
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Online Access:https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feduc.2025.1462887/full
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author Tammy R. L. Collins
Tammy R. L. Collins
Rebekah L. Layton
Rebekah L. Layton
Deepti Ramadoss
Deepti Ramadoss
Jennifer MacDonald
Ryan Wheeler
Adriana Bankston
C. Abby Stayart
Yi Hao
Jacqueline N. Robinson-Hamm
Melanie Sinche
Scott Burghart
Aleshia Carlsen-Bryan
Pallavi Eswara
Heather Krasna
Heather Krasna
Hong Xu
Mackenzie Sullivan
author_facet Tammy R. L. Collins
Tammy R. L. Collins
Rebekah L. Layton
Rebekah L. Layton
Deepti Ramadoss
Deepti Ramadoss
Jennifer MacDonald
Ryan Wheeler
Adriana Bankston
C. Abby Stayart
Yi Hao
Jacqueline N. Robinson-Hamm
Melanie Sinche
Scott Burghart
Aleshia Carlsen-Bryan
Pallavi Eswara
Heather Krasna
Heather Krasna
Hong Xu
Mackenzie Sullivan
author_sort Tammy R. L. Collins
collection DOAJ
description The recent movement underscoring the importance of career taxonomies has helped usher in a new era of transparency in PhD career outcomes. The convergence of discipline-specific organizational movements, interdisciplinary collaborations, and federal initiatives has helped to increase PhD career outcomes tracking and reporting. Transparent and publicly available PhD career outcomes are being used by institutions to attract top applicants, as prospective graduate students are factoring in these outcomes when deciding on the program and institution in which to enroll for their PhD studies. Given the increasing trend to track PhD career outcomes, the number of institutional efforts and supporting offices for these studies have increased, as has the variety of methods being used to classify and report/visualize outcomes. This report comprehensively synthesizes existing PhD career taxonomy tools, resources, and visualization options to help catalyze and empower institutions to develop and publish their own PhD career outcomes. Similar fields between taxonomies were mapped to create a new crosswalk tool, thereby serving as an empirical review of the career outcome tracking systems available. Moreover, this work spotlights organizations, consortia, and funding agencies that are steering policy changes toward greater transparency in PhD career outcomes reporting. Such transparency not only attracts top talent to universities, but also propels research progress and technological innovation forward. Therefore, university administrators must be well-versed in government policies that may impact their PhD students. Engaging with government relations offices and establishing dialogues with policymakers are crucial steps toward staying informed about relevant legislation and advocating for more resources. For instance, much of the recent science legislation in the U.S. Congress, including the Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors (CHIPS) and Science Act, significantly impacts federal agency programs influencing universities. To ensure sustained development, it is imperative to support initiatives that enhance transparency, both in terms of legislation and resources. Increased funding for programs supporting transparency will aid legislatures and institutions in staying informed and responsive. Many efforts presented in this publication have received support from federal and state governments or philantrophic sources, underscoring the need for multifaceted support to initiate and perpetuate this level of systemic change.
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spelling doaj-art-ff66f6afa4ca4e63b0319ace484c521c2025-08-20T02:26:05ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Education2504-284X2025-05-011010.3389/feduc.2025.14628871462887Making strides in doctoral-level career outcomes reporting: a review of classification and visualization methodologies in graduate educationTammy R. L. Collins0Tammy R. L. Collins1Rebekah L. Layton2Rebekah L. Layton3Deepti Ramadoss4Deepti Ramadoss5Jennifer MacDonald6Ryan Wheeler7Adriana Bankston8C. Abby Stayart9Yi Hao10Jacqueline N. Robinson-Hamm11Melanie Sinche12Scott Burghart13Aleshia Carlsen-Bryan14Pallavi Eswara15Heather Krasna16Heather Krasna17Hong Xu18Mackenzie Sullivan19National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Durham, NC, United StatesBurroughs Wellcome Fund, Durham, NC, United StatesNational Institutes of Health, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Durham, NC, United StatesUniversity of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, United StatesNational Institutes of Health, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Durham, NC, United StatesUniversity of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, United StatesThe New School, New York, NY, United StatesThe Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA, United StatesFuture of Research, Pittsfield, MA, United StatesUniversity of Chicago, Chicago, IL, United StatesUniversity of Maryland, College Park, MD, United States0Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology, Rockville, MD, United States1University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, United States2The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, United States3Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, United States4Boston University, Boston, MA, United States5Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, New York, NY, United States6Maastricht University, Maastricht, NetherlandsNational Institutes of Health, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Durham, NC, United States7University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, United StatesThe recent movement underscoring the importance of career taxonomies has helped usher in a new era of transparency in PhD career outcomes. The convergence of discipline-specific organizational movements, interdisciplinary collaborations, and federal initiatives has helped to increase PhD career outcomes tracking and reporting. Transparent and publicly available PhD career outcomes are being used by institutions to attract top applicants, as prospective graduate students are factoring in these outcomes when deciding on the program and institution in which to enroll for their PhD studies. Given the increasing trend to track PhD career outcomes, the number of institutional efforts and supporting offices for these studies have increased, as has the variety of methods being used to classify and report/visualize outcomes. This report comprehensively synthesizes existing PhD career taxonomy tools, resources, and visualization options to help catalyze and empower institutions to develop and publish their own PhD career outcomes. Similar fields between taxonomies were mapped to create a new crosswalk tool, thereby serving as an empirical review of the career outcome tracking systems available. Moreover, this work spotlights organizations, consortia, and funding agencies that are steering policy changes toward greater transparency in PhD career outcomes reporting. Such transparency not only attracts top talent to universities, but also propels research progress and technological innovation forward. Therefore, university administrators must be well-versed in government policies that may impact their PhD students. Engaging with government relations offices and establishing dialogues with policymakers are crucial steps toward staying informed about relevant legislation and advocating for more resources. For instance, much of the recent science legislation in the U.S. Congress, including the Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors (CHIPS) and Science Act, significantly impacts federal agency programs influencing universities. To ensure sustained development, it is imperative to support initiatives that enhance transparency, both in terms of legislation and resources. Increased funding for programs supporting transparency will aid legislatures and institutions in staying informed and responsive. Many efforts presented in this publication have received support from federal and state governments or philantrophic sources, underscoring the need for multifaceted support to initiate and perpetuate this level of systemic change.https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feduc.2025.1462887/fullgraduate educationdoctoral trainingprogram evaluationcareer outcomestaxonomyPhD
spellingShingle Tammy R. L. Collins
Tammy R. L. Collins
Rebekah L. Layton
Rebekah L. Layton
Deepti Ramadoss
Deepti Ramadoss
Jennifer MacDonald
Ryan Wheeler
Adriana Bankston
C. Abby Stayart
Yi Hao
Jacqueline N. Robinson-Hamm
Melanie Sinche
Scott Burghart
Aleshia Carlsen-Bryan
Pallavi Eswara
Heather Krasna
Heather Krasna
Hong Xu
Mackenzie Sullivan
Making strides in doctoral-level career outcomes reporting: a review of classification and visualization methodologies in graduate education
Frontiers in Education
graduate education
doctoral training
program evaluation
career outcomes
taxonomy
PhD
title Making strides in doctoral-level career outcomes reporting: a review of classification and visualization methodologies in graduate education
title_full Making strides in doctoral-level career outcomes reporting: a review of classification and visualization methodologies in graduate education
title_fullStr Making strides in doctoral-level career outcomes reporting: a review of classification and visualization methodologies in graduate education
title_full_unstemmed Making strides in doctoral-level career outcomes reporting: a review of classification and visualization methodologies in graduate education
title_short Making strides in doctoral-level career outcomes reporting: a review of classification and visualization methodologies in graduate education
title_sort making strides in doctoral level career outcomes reporting a review of classification and visualization methodologies in graduate education
topic graduate education
doctoral training
program evaluation
career outcomes
taxonomy
PhD
url https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feduc.2025.1462887/full
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