As student loan debt affects a growing share of students and makes up a larger and larger portion of total American household debt, U.S. institutions are rising to the challenge by recognizing the need to prepare their students with a broad set of financial skills.

In addition to providing enhanced financial education programs, many are seeking to provide students with better information about the variety of loan and non-loan options for supporting themselves financially as students. Institutions are also striving for greater transparency about the costs and value of their degrees so students can make wise decisions about their investments in an undergraduate or graduate degree.

The presentation below illustrates six core areas of institutional action informed by the Request for Proposals for the CGS/TIAA initiative Enhancing Student Financial Education: student engagement; ensuring relevance; institutional responsibility; partnerships; research, evaluation and improvement; and best practice exchange.

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Read more: Resources

In addition to understanding how to manage debt, U.S. college and graduate students need a well-rounded financial education to understand all of their options for financing their education and paving their pathways to their chosen careers. Students who manage debt wisely and have a broad understanding of the financial issues they are likely to face as students and graduates from American higher education are best positioned to pursue their dreams in industry, academe, the non-profit and service sectors, or the arts.

The following presentation presents a brief, though by no means comprehensive, overview of the issues students typically face, and the skills they will need to make healthy choices as students and graduates of U.S. undergraduate and graduate programs.

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Read more: What Can Institutions Do?

Student success in higher education, whether in college or graduate school, depends upon appropriate financial support and good financial decisions. Financial support can come in many forms, including fellowships, scholarships, teaching and research assistantships (for graduate students), and federal and private loans.

Student loans are only one part of the financial picture for today’s students. But the growing number of students and families taking on debt to pay for higher education and the growing amount of that debt suggest that debt management skills must be a vital part of the education provided to U.S. undergraduate and graduate students.

The presentation below includes information about the current financial situation of today’s undergraduate and graduate students. The facts assembled here highlight the magnitude of the student debt problem and show the ways in which this debt affects students differently. Trend data illustrate the increasing American reliance on student loan debt to finance higher education and they demonstrate the essential need to enhance student financial education to protect the U.S. economy and society, the research and scholarly enterprise, as well as the lives of individual students and their families.

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Read more: What Do Students Need to Know?

2012 Annual Meeting Program
Selected PowerPoint presentations from the 2012 CGS 52nd Annual Meeting are below. Presentations are in chronological order by each category. Presentations are offered as Adobe Acrobat PDF files. The file size is indicated after the name of each presenter.

Pre-Meeting Workshop Presentations

Fundraising as a Critical Instrument for Improving Graduate Education
Steven Matson (1 MB)
Lisa Tedesco (733 KB)

Assessment and Review of Graduate Programs - Doctoral
Henning Schroeder (598 KB)

Assessment and Review of Graduate Programs - Master's
Robert Augustine (1.97 MB)
Robert Roer (398 KB)

Technology Solutions for Tracking Student Progress
George Justice (1.09 MB)
Nancy Marcus (1.22 MB)

How to Be an Effective Consultant in Graduate Education
Diana Carlin, Deirdre Mageean, and William Wiener (164 KB)

Graduate Schools' Role in Financial Aid
Charles Caramello (1.55 MB)
Paul Gemperline (164 KB)
Brian Lee Sang (1.55 MB)

Legal Issues
Anne Bowden (196 KB)
Ada Meloy (188 KB)

Mentoring through the Back Door: Creating Campus Buy-In for Graduate Student Career and Professional Development by Offering Diverse Opportunities
Henry Campa and Judith Stoddart (1.73 MB)

Promising Strategies and Techniques for Broadening Participation in Graduate Education
David A. Francko (530 KB)
Karen Jackson-Weaver (76 KB)
Dwight McBride (459 KB)

Professional Science Master's (PSM) Affiliation
David King (1.53 MB)

Assessing Learning Outcomes in Online Graduate Education
Michael Barr and Charles McClintock (1.52 MB)

Plenary Sessions Presentations

Creativity on the Benchtop: What Can We Learn from Student Researchers on the Frontiers of Science?
Nancy Nersessian (1.25 MB)

Advancing U.S. Competitiveness in Scientific Research and Education: Innovations at NSF
Subra Suresh (1.63 MB)

Career Outcomes for Graduate Degree Holders: How Do We Track?
Iain Cameron (1.41 MB)
Karen Klomparens (81 KB)
William Russel (772 KB)
Andrew Szeri (562 KB)

Concurrent Sessions Presentations

Advances in Models Supporting Graduate Students and Excellence in Graduate Education
Karen Butler-Purry (1.07 MB)
Joan Ferrini-Mundy (842 KB)

Initial Impacts of CGS's Project on Completion and Attrition in STEM Master's Programs
Samuel Attoh (355 KB)
Andrew Hsu (1.50 MB)
M.J.T. Smith (680 KB)

Dynamic Graduate School Leadership
Robert Augustine (1.87 MB)
Zlatko Skrbis (188 KB)

DIMAC: Promising Practices to Promote Success of Underrepresented Minorities in STEM PhD Programs
Kim E. Barrett (562 KB)
John C. Keller (128 KB)
Karen Liller (562 KB)
Janet Rutledge (128 KB)

Recent Research on the Biomedical Workforce: Implications for Designing Graduate Programs
H. Dele Davies (680 KB)
Allen Rawitch (631 KB)

Financial Support for Master's Students
George Newkome (478 KB)
Mary Osirim (141 KB)

Perceptions of Deans and Students about Graduate Education and Career Opportunities: A Further Analysis of Pathways Through Graduate School and Into Careers
Deirdre Mageean and Cathy Wendler (1.81 MB)

Innovations in Master's Education
Edelma Huntley, Kathleen Long, and Gerald Pogatshnik (99 KB)
Edelma Huntley (108 KB)
Kathleen Long (70 KB)
Case Study (45 KB)

Graduate Student Debt: Issues and Implications
Ramona Mellott (257 KB)

Professional Development Programs
Sinaia Nathanson, Lynne Pepall, and John Stevenson (714 KB)

Preparing Graduate Students for a Global Workforce
Graham Carr (974 KB)
John Wood (1.88 MB)

New Frontiers in Interdisciplinary Education
Maria Allison (636 KB)
Anselm Fremmer (278 KB)

Building Community at Master's Focused Institutions
Jennifer Keane-Dawes (537 KB)
Margaret McManus (1.5 MB)

Creative Solutions to Budgetary Challenges
Introduction (257 KB)
Philip Cohen (207 KB)
Maureen Grasso (286 KB)
Pamela Stacks (167 KB)

Joint and Dual Degree Programs: Planning for Success
Arnaud Chevallier (605 KB)
Dick Strugnell (278 KB)

Sponsored Breakfast Presentations

Presentation from Educational Testing Service Breakfast
David Payne and Eileen Tyson (1.17 MB)

Presentation from ProQuest UMI Breakfast
John Roberts (1.67 MB)

Contact:
Julia Kent
jkent@cgs.nche.edu
(202) 223-3791

Washington, DC — Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) President Debra W. Stewart today released the following statement in response to President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address on February 12, 2013. CGS is the only national organization dedicated solely to the advancement of graduate education and research. The organization draws its institutional members from colleges and universities significantly engaged in graduate education, research, and scholarship culminating in the award of the master's or doctoral degree.

The Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) applauds President Obama’s continued focus on increasing American competitiveness in the world economy and appreciates the recognition that access to higher education will play a major role in that effort.

CGS stands strongly behind the President’s commitment to strengthen our economy through investments in research and innovation, expanded access to advanced education opportunities, and increased support for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) training. To summarize the President’s point, “To grow our middle class, our citizens must have access to the education and training that today’s jobs require.”

While calling for investments in these critical areas, the President also warned of the impact of looming sequester cuts on our recovering economy and on our ability to compete globally. CGS shares the President’s concerns when he said, “These sudden, harsh, arbitrary cuts would … devastate priorities like education, energy, and medical research. They would certainly slow our recovery, and cost us hundreds of thousands of jobs.”

CGS also supports the President’s call for immigration reform and urges the Administration and Congress to recognize the importance of retaining talented international students and their role in keeping our economy competitive. To harness this talent and maximize our economy’s dynamism, CGS calls on the Administration and Congress to reduce visa barriers that discourage the most talented international students from attending U.S. graduate schools and creating jobs and businesses after they graduate.

With bipartisan talks on Capitol Hill already underway, President Obama spoke of the broader support for reform by stating, “Our economy is stronger when we harness the talents and ingenuity of striving, hopeful immigrants. And right now, leaders from the business, labor, law enforcement, and faith communities all agree that the time has come to pass comprehensive immigration reform.”

Recent research on skilled immigration and innovation shows that domestic as well as international students make a significant, positive impact on U.S. university research productivity (Stuen et. al). Research from the fall of 2011, the most recent year for which data are available, indicate that domestic enrollment is now in a second year of decline, with decreases of first-time domestic enrollment in fields key to U.S. innovation: Engineering, Biological Sciences, Mathematics and Computer Science. With that in mind, CGS urges the President to support policies that seek to bolster enrollment for graduate education for both foreign and domestic talent. As other countries have already recognized through their investments in graduate education, innovation will require highly trained US citizens as well as foreign talent. Shrinking university budgets and rising student debt loads conspire to deny US employers access to this domestic talent.

As President Obama seeks to realize his most ambitious goals for our nation in his second term, CGS looks forward to playing a vital role in ensuring U.S. graduate schools are promoting a creative, innovative workforce that helps ready our country to meet the challenges of the 21st century global economy.

Deadline:  March 1, 2013

Eligibility: Eligible candidates will need to have received the doctoral degree by June 1, 2013.

Duration: 12-18 months

The Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) invites applications from social sciences and humanities scholars who have been awarded the PhD in the past two to three years. The fellowship is designed to provide a highly accomplished early career professional with research and communications experience in the area of graduate education. Specific responsibilities and opportunities will be tailored to the field expertise and the career ambitions of the successful candidate, but will be divided across at least two of the following CGS activities:

• Advancement/Development
• Global Engagement
• CGS Best Practice Research

The postdoc will have opportunities to attend meetings and conferences relevant to his or her work at CGS. Salary will be competitive for the Washington, DC area.

The Council of Graduate Schools, the national voice for the graduate dean community, is the only organization in the United States that is dedicated solely to the advancement of graduate education and research. CGS accomplishes its mission through advocacy in the policy arena, innovative research, and the development and dissemination of best practices. CGS also acts as a convening authority, organizing major events that bring together graduate deans and other stakeholders to discuss and take action on a broad range of issues affecting graduate education today. CGS membership includes over 500 universities in the United States and Canada, and 25 universities outside the U.S. and Canada. Collectively, CGS institutions annually award more than 92 percent of all U.S. doctorates and over 81 percent of all U.S. master's degrees.

Application and Nomination Process

Applications must be e-mailed to Keith Peregonov at kperegonov@cgs.nche.edu or submitted through the CGS Career Portal. Please include a letter of interest, a resume or c.v., and three references with an e-mail address and telephone numbers. Electronic submissions (MS Word or Adobe PDF) are strongly preferred. For full consideration, please ensure that your application is received by March 1, 2013. To learn more about CGS, please visit www.cgsnet.org. 

CGS prepares publications on issues of fundamental importance to graduate education. These reports and policy statements are made available to CGS members and non-members.

Online Access

Digital versions of all CGS publications are available through the member library at no cost to members.* Any student, faculty or staff member of a CGS member institution may access our publications in PDF format** (login required). Take advantage of this benefit by viewing, downloading, printing, or sharing PDFs of your favorite titles with other individuals at your member institution.

Ordering

Hardcopies of CGS publications are available for purchase using our Online Store. Members receive discounted pricing, including bulk discounts on most publications. CGS publications are shipped via UPS; please provide a physical street address when placing your order. For international shipping (e.g. outside of US and Canada), please contact the CGS office to request pricing options.

Note: The Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) has implemented a credit card usage convenience fee effective as of January 1, 2020 in the amount of 4% of the transaction price when paying obligations to the Council. Although this fee is designed to defray the increasing costs of accepting credit cards for payments of dues, meeting registrations, sponsorships, publications and other items, our desire is not to charge the fee at all, but to change member and non-member behavior to employ different payment methods such as ACH, Wire transfer and good old fashioned checks when they conduct business with CGS. CGS does not intend to record revenue from this change, but instead, be able to re-deploy the member dues funds previously used for credit card acceptance towards additional graduate education programming needs. The Council thanks you for your ongoing support for the enterprise of graduate education.

Contact Us

For questions about CGS publications, please contact us at publications@cgs.nche.edu.

* This service is provided for institutional members (US, Canada and International) and sustaining members.

** Copyright restrictions apply. See Terms of Use, Electronic Publications. Please do not distribute copies outside of your member institution.

The Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) established its Dean-in-Residence (DIR) Program in 1983. The program offers an opportunity for graduate or associate deans to spend an academic year at the Council's Washington D.C. office. Each year one dean is selected from CGS member institutions to work with the CGS staff and participate in the ongoing work of the Council.

Application for the Dean-in-Residence position is made by submitting a letter of interest, including mention of a specific project or projects that the applicant is interested in pursuing, and a curriculum vitae to the Council’s president.

CGS provides a stipend to assist with relocation costs. Benefits are not included. CGS funding for this position is based on the assumption that the individual’s institution will provide additional support either through sabbatical or administrative leave.

Applications are accepted at all times, but to ensure the applicant’s institution adequate time to coordinate sabbatical and administrative leaves, CGS encourages early submission. Applications can be submitted one year in advance of the year in which the applicant seeks to serve in the DIR role. Applications from associate deans should be accompanied by letters of support from their graduate dean.

Applications may be sent to:

Suzanne Ortega
President
Council of Graduate Schools
One Dupont Circle, NW, Suite 230

Washington, DC  20036

The Council of Graduate Schools is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate against any employee or job applicant because of race, color, religion, sex, age, national origin, sexual orientation, disability, or for any other reason.

Harvard’s project will leverage the strength of existing groups and organizations within the university to:  1) create a multi-disciplinary, multi-school working group focused on learning assessment; 2) to develop assessment metrics for use in both undergraduate and graduate gateway curriculum in the Life and Physical Sciences, and 3) to develop a course for all GSAS students as well as post-doctoral fellows that provides them with the skills required to pursue research in and learning assessment of curricula.

Project Plan and Activities:

The multi-disciplinary, multi-school working group will consist of the following existing groups: The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, Harvard College, Harvard Graduate School of Education, Harvard Medical School, Harvard School of Public Health, Derek Bok Center for Teaching and Learning, and Post-Doctoral Fellow Teaching Programs including College Fellows and Curriculum Fellows.

A committee will be established comprised of undergraduate and graduate Educators and Directors from across the Institution who are leaders in pedagogical innovation, learning and assessment. The goals of the working group will be to 1) Discuss pedagogical issues and practices across disciplines, 2) Identify/learn about assessment metrics currently being used, 3) Explore differences in pedagogical issues and practices for undergraduate and graduate gateway courses, 4) Define skill sets needed for training graduate students and post-doctoral fellows in learning assessment.

Activities of the Committee:

• Annual Conference/Retreat: A one day conference, the first of which will bring invitees from the Harvard Community and 17 committed project participants. Presentations by participants will include the Pedagogical Practice in Gateway and Foundational Undergraduate and Graduate Courses, the Science of Learning, Assessment Metrics Currently Used, and Models Being Used to Prepare Graduate Students as Future Educators.  The second year will also include presentations from one or two outside speakers.
   
• Seminar Series: Three seminars held each semester including speakers who are experts in undergraduate learning, or are developing novel approaches in undergraduate teaching or pedagogical training for graduate students.
   
• Development of Assessment Metrics: A sub-set of the committee will work to examine and further develop the assessment metrics in place for three STEM “Gateway” courses

-- Life Sciences 1A An Introduction to the Life Sciences: Chemistry, Molecular Biology and Cell Biology

-- Applied Physics 50 Physics as a Foundation for Science and Engineering; and,

-- BCMP 200: Molecular Biology, 

as well as to explore the assessment metrics used in humanities courses.

• Development of a Learning Assessment and Educational Research Course: Anticipated content includes Statistical Methods and Tools, Development of Surveys, Science of Learning, Methods and Tools Used in Learning Assessment, etc.

Needs assessment data will be collected from the Graduate Teaching Fellows in the gateway courses and the graduate students and post-doctoral fellows participating in the Learning Assessment and Education Research Skills course. Graduate student participants will be tracked at least three years beyond the end of the grant.

The University of North Carolina, Greensboro (UNCG) and North Carolina A&T State University (NC A&T) offer a joint program to prepare future leaders (PFL). The two track program addresses the preparation of future faculty and future professionals. Their collaborative project will include a new component in the PFL program dedicated to preparing future faculty for their role in assessment. 

Project Plan and Activities:

The assessment program in PFL will identify:

1. Student learning outcomes
2. Activities for achieving student learning outcomes
3. Measureable performance indicators
4. How to collect and analyze evidence
5. How to develop actions to improve learning
6. Practices to evaluate and improve the assessment process itself.

• Program participants will create electronic portfolios through iWebfolio to document their progress and attainment of goals in the PFL program. The PFL program is made up of twelve folios. Students will upload examples of their work in each folio, as well as comments from faculty and mentors. Each student will also produce a summative electronic iWebfolio which will contain their finished products to be shared with potential employers.

• The assessment component of the PFL program will consist of an expanded folio:  1) a face-to-face workshop containing exercises in developing student learning outcomes and 2) a series of three online interactive modules addressing the level of assessment. The online modules will be available to students in other professional opportunity programs and the CGS Clearinghouse. The modules will focus on:

-- Course and Co-curricular assessment through direct and proxy measures

-- Mapping student learning outcomes to program expectations

-- Closing the loop on improving the process
 

• A reward system will be developed within the PFL program. Once students enter the assessment portion of their program, they will be able to apply for small grants of $500 to field test new approaches to assessment. A culminating award of $1500 will be given to the student at each university who develops the best innovation in assessment as determined by an advisory committee.
   

• Special emphasis will be placed on Nano-Science/Nano-Engineering, Mathematics, and English, programmatic areas representing STEM disciplines and the Humanities respectively. The progress of student in these disciplines will be carefully monitored through their e-portfolios. 
   

• Nanochemistry and Nanomaterials in the Joint Nano School, College Algebra and Precalculus in Math, and College Writing and Introduction to Narrative in English will be used as common courses to engage teaching assistants on both campuses. A limited number of teaching assistants from each campus will teach classes at the other campus.
   
• A pre-test and post-test will assess changes in attitude among PFF students and understanding of assessment.