Quantitative background on the shortage of research doctorates in CSD

1. Quantitative background on the shortage of research doctorates in CSD D. Kimbrough Oller University of Memphis With lots of help from Howard Goldstein, Cheryl Scott, Sarah Slater, Judith Cooper and the members of the Joint Ad Hoc Committee on the Doctoral Shortage

2. The well-known problem of positions and failure of recruitment • Most searches for tenure-line faculty positions in Communication Sciences and Disorders are difficult to complete • A recent survey by ASHA indicates there are only 2.3 applicants per open tenure-line position • Many positions remain unfilled yearly • Programs are in jeopardy, sometimes for survival, because of difficulties in recruitment of tenure-line faculty

3. How bad is the problem currently? • We have data from the most recent Council survey of graduate programs regarding the number of unfilled openings for doctoral faculty • These data are based on a new question in the survey, one that was not asked until the 2000-2001 cycle; the question targeted the last three years • We’ll call the number of unsuccessful tenure-line searches during these years, ‘the shortage’ • The data suggest that the shortage has nearly doubled during that period • Numbers represented in the next graph are based on figures adjusted to a 100% reporting rate, but of course the growing shortage isclear with or without adjusted figures

4. Faculty shortage 1998-2000: adjusted figures Number of searches unfilled Source: CAPCSD Survey 2000-2001

5. Magnitude of the current problem as a proportion of full-time lines • The eight-year average of Council data make it possible to estimate that there are about 2680 full-time faculty positions in Communication Sciences and Disorders nationally (adjusted to 100% sampling) • About 65% of these are doctoral lines over the same period; that’s 1723 doctoral lines • At 50 unfilled positions in the year 1998, the shortage was 2.8%, and at 98 unfilled positions in the year 2000, the shortage was 5.4% (assuming that 65% of full-time lines and a base of 1723 is an appropriate level of research doctoral faculty in the field) • At 50 the problem was already deemed a serious one by most academic participants in our field • Many had thought the shortage would begin to accumulate sometime soon, based on demographic trends (graying of the profession), and it appears that the suspected accumulating shortage is already underway

6. The role of the graying of the professorate • We have long been warned that our professorate is older than is optimal • Too many retirements could create tremendous flux and loss of research and training quality • The primary data upon which the presumed graying of the professorate have been based actually come from the ASHA Constituent Database • They indicate numbers of Ph.D. holders at various ages who are ASHA members • The data were first addressed by Bruce Tomblin in 1996 in an address to the Legislative Council of ASHA when he was Chair of the Research and Scientific Affairs Committee • In an ideal situation one might expect a relatively flat distribution

7. Distribution of Ph.D. holders by age from ASHA constituent database, 1996, work by Bruce Tomblin and Sarah Slater Mean = 53.06 Median = 51.64 ages in 5-year groupings

8. Distribution of Full-time Ph.D. Professors and Chairs by Age from ASHA constituent database, 1996, Mean = 50.50 Median = 49.68 ages

9. Distribution of Ph.D. faculty by age in Programs offering the Ph.D. from the Joint Ad Hoc Committee Survey, 2002 Mean full-time = 49.08 Median full-time = 49.46 Mean part-time = 53.81 Median part-time = 52.92 FULL-TIME N = 575 PART-TIME N = 59

10. The demographic situation suggests rapidly increasing retirements over the next few years • Several historical factors combined to produce a distribution of Ph.D.’s by age that is not at all flat; in fact it is very peaked • As years pass the number of retirements may go up rapidly as the peak in the distribution may move rightward • If we judge correctly from the distribution, the major impact of massive numbers of retirements has not yet been felt • But even now we are in a condition of shortage • The situation is already getting worse, but it may get dramatically worse, over the next 10-15 years

11. Is the field adapting appropriately to the impending decline in Ph.D. faculty? • In the most recent data there has been an increase in the production rate of new Ph.D.’s, but whether the increase will be maintained or accelerated remains to be seen – it could be merely a product of year to year fluctuation • Number of programs (Master’s and Ph.D.) is not going down, not yet at least • Over the past few years the number of faculty in the field has actually been rising fairly fast according to the Council data • In some cases Master’s faculty appear to be filling lines that could not be filled in Ph.D. tenure-line searches, but the data are inconclusive on both the amount of growth in faculty and the role of Master’s hiring in that growth

12. Production rate for new Ph.D. scholars in Communication Sciences and Disorders • Up to 1999 we see no important increase in the production rate of new Ph.D.’s based on data from the National Opinion Research Center • Through 1998 the same is true of the Council survey • The 2000-2001 data from the Council and the NORC suggest there may have been a significant upturn • It can be hoped this is not a short-term improvement, but data on enrollment patterns are among the more difficult ones to interpret in the various available surveys

13. National Opinion Research Center data on doctoral degrees granted in SLP and AUD Ph.D. degrees granted

14. Council of Academic Programs data on doctoral degrees granted in SLP and AUD Ph.D. degrees granted

15. Council of Academic Programs data on doctoral degrees granted in SLP and AUD with breakdowns

16. Council of Academic Programs data on enrolled doctoral students in SLP and AUD Ph.D. students

17. Number of all programs in the field

18. Number of programs in the field with breakdown by discipline

19. Number of Ph.D. programs in the field

20. Number of full-time faculty in Communication Sciences and Disorders

21. The challenge • We need to be proactive: the field is going to be restructured one way or the other • Organize an academically significant plan for the future, and guide it through an administrative structure with continuity – a standing committee, as was recommended by Fox, Minifie, Smit, and Hochberg in the Report of the working group on doctoral and postdoctoral education, 1997 (Council Proceedings) • The forces will change, and if the Council and ASHA do not act, the field will change very unpredictably • The question is how to maintain the academic foundations of the field in a time of enormous change • Further, how can we govern our programs with an appropriate balance of academic and clinical activities

22. FROM JUDITH COOPER, SLP APPLICATIONS AND FUNDING AT NIDCD SINCE 1995 proportion funded

23. FROM JUDITH COOPER, AUDIOLOGY APPLICATIONS AND FUNDING AT NIDCD SINCE 1995 proportion funded