The January 2003 meeting of the American Astronomical Society, in Seattle, included a special session on Innovations in Graduate Education in Astronomy. One of us (JRP) was invited to give a presentation on the situation in Canada. Together, we prepared a joint paper. We first surveyed graduate departments of astronomy across the country; there are at least 16. About 80 per cent (including the largest ones) replied; we thank them for their help.
In our presentation, we began by outlining the federal and provincial roles in funding and carrying out research and graduate education in Canada, and by stressing the differences between Canada and the USA. We noted that funding for both research and for universities has decreased over the past three decades. In recent years, it has begun to increase, but some of the increase has been targeted for specific purposes. The federal government has set aside a billion dollars for "Canada Research Chairs" to hire both "the global research stars of today" and "the future research stars of tomorrow". This has had some positive effect in hiring first-class astronomers, but the CRC holders often have reduced teaching loads, so the program does not completely address the problem of dealing with university enrolments which are increasing due to increases in population, and in participation rate. The Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) is an independent foundation whose purpose is to strengthen the infrastructure for research; it has had some positive effect on buildings and facilities. Some provinces have developed programs to support research innovation, especially if there is some chance that it would have economic benefit.
According to a recent survey, Canadian astronomy ranks first in the world in impact per unit of funding (probably because we have to do things on the cheap!).
We also noted the role of CASCA, especially regarding graduate education. It has an active Education Committee, a Graduate Student Committee (GSC), and a Job Registry. Among other things, it awards graduate student travel grants, prizes for the best graduate student oral and poster presentation at the meeting, and (with the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada) the Plaskett Medal for the best PhD thesis in astronomy each year. There are presently about 100 graduate student members of CASCA, but the total number of graduate students would be larger than this.
There is also a move to form an organization, tentatively called ACURA: Association of Canadian Universities for Research in Astronomy, which would play a role similar to that of AURA in the US.
We also noted the observational and theoretical facilities available to Canadian astronomers and their graduate students. There are Facilities Access Funds available to support students’ use of these, but these funds are not widely known. Canada is actually facility-rich, especially with Gemini, CITA, and CADC, and the NGST, and the North American Partnership for Radio Astronomy (including ALMA and the EVLA) and other initiatives on the horizon. The shortage of university and HIA positions, and of operating funds, presents a substantial challenge.
A large fraction of the astronomers in Canada were hired between 1965 and 1975, when the university enrolments were expanding. These astronomers are now retiring, and this creates opportunities for employment, and for changes in research directions. Throughout the 1990’s, however, there were fewer replacements than retirements; the job situation stagnated, and this had multiple effects on research and graduate studies. In the last 2-3 years, however, many new positions have been filled.
The participation rate of 18 to 22-year-olds in post-secondary education is increasing, which would create more employment opportunities if governments would fund them. There is also the possibility that astronomers may be hired into positions which were previously held by "mainstream" physicists.
Women have traditionally been under-represented in physics and astronomy in Canada. The situation has gradually improved in the past two decades, and especially in the last year or two. A substantial fraction of astronomy graduate students are women, and the fraction seems to be increasing; at least one astronomy department reports that hiring a woman faculty member has attracted more female graduate students. Graduate students in one department suggested the need for "sensitivity training" for new graduate students, to deal with gender and diversity issues.
Parts of Canada are ethnically very diverse, and this diversity is beginning to be represented in astronomy departments—partly due to the more diverse Canadian population, and partly because graduate students are attracted from a variety of different countries across the world.
The density of astronomers in Canada is, of course, very low, and this makes it difficult for astronomers or graduate students to come together for meeting, workshops etc. The annual meeting of CASCA provides the most obvious opportunity.
Graduate students in Canada are funded by a combination of (i) federal, provincial, university, and department scholarships; (ii) teaching assistantships, and (iii) research assistantships from the supervisor’s research grant; the latter are usually intended to support the student’s graduate research project—not always the case in the USA. In some universities, most or all students are funded by a combination of (i) and (ii). Most departments offer a "package" of a minimum level of support, typically $16-22K, depending on local cost of living, and on what the department can afford. Where possible, departments offer larger packages to attract the best students. Because of the decline in provincial support for universities, tuition fees have risen rapidly and substantially, and this has required departments to increase their packages as much as possible. Some universities have undertaken major campaigns to raise funds for undergraduate and graduate scholarships.
As elsewhere, there are several models for graduate programs: MSc programs as pre-requisites for PhD programs (not consolation prizes); transfer from MSc to PhD programs after one year, for able students; and direct-entry PhD programs (recently adopted at Toronto). At least one department stresses the importance of the MSc year as a chance for the student to decide on career and research directions. When astronomy is part of a Physics department, it may be autonomous (with no specific Physics course requirements), or astronomy students may have to pass the same hurdles as Physics students. MSc programs take 1.5 to 2.5 years (some departments report a trend to reduce this); PhD programs last 3 to 5 years.
There are ongoing discussions about the balance between depth and breadth, with no concensus emerging.
Students typically take 7 to 10 one-term graduate courses in their MSc and PhD program, though some departments are consciously reducing this number, and replacing courses by research projects and/or self-study and/or mini-courses or special-topic courses. This is partly to reduce the time to degree, and partly because most departments have too few faculty to offer a wide range of graduate astronomy courses. The Graduate Student Committee (GSC) of the Canadian Astronomical Society (CASCA) has proposed summer institutes. They also organize annual one-day workshops at CASCA meetings, especially on important topics which are seldom on the curriculum; the topic for 2003 is writing successful research grant and telescope observing proposals.
The comprehensive exam ranges from a 1-day written exam, followed a few days later by an oral, to an exam which centers on the student’s PhD project proposal. One university uses the GRE as the equivalent to this hurdle; another uses a specific Physics course. There may also be qualifying exams, early in the student’s career, and these may have more or less physics, depending on the department.
In principle, the progress of each student can be planned and monitored by a committee working with the student’s supervisor; in practice, this system does not always function effectively.
Graduate students’ fields of interests have been influenced by recent research developments; on the other hand, the lack of hiring in the last two decades has (until recently) made it difficult to hire potential supervisors in these areas. CITA, and the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research (CIAR) Cosmology and Gravitation Program has led to hiring, and has promoted student interest in these areas. Generally, astronomical research has diversified in Canada in recent years, but there are still fields such as planetary astronomy, and high-energy astrophysics, which are under-represented.
Graduate students serve as paid teaching assistants, and sometimes as hosts for public nights at campus observatories. They also spontaneously and voluntarily organize public lectures and open houses, and visit schools through programs such as the award-winning Let’s Talk Science. At the 2002 meeting of CASCA, the Graduate Student Committee organized a one-day workshop, for graduate students, on education and outreach.
Undoubtedly, the job situation is the #1 concern of graduate students everywhere. In Canada, there are relatively fewer astronomy positions outside universities and government labs, and there are fewer paid positions in educationn and outreach (as a result of the lack of education funding through the equivalent of NSF and NASA). Between 50 and 90 per cent of graduate students continue in astronomy; the rest go into fields such as computing, remote sensing, financial services, and schoolteaching. We are not aware of any concern, on the part of Canadian departments, about this situation, or about preparing astronomy students for non-astronomical careers.
There is a tendency (specifically mentioned by one department) for astronomy groups to be cohesive "happy families"—perhaps because of the special nature of astronomy, and the lack of competition and politics which are found in more high-powered, lucrative fields such as medicine, where the departmental atmosphere can be quite hostile.
The purpose of this committee is to lobby CASCA, HIA, and other relevant bodies on matters related to graduate studies and students. The annual GSC one-day workshop, the proposed summer institutes, and wider usage of the Facilities Access Grants mentioned above, are topics of particular current interest. The summer institutes would require funding, both for operation, and for student travel.
This session was prompted in part by a series of meetings of chairs of graduate departments in the USA. Steve Strom reported on these meetings, and their follow-up. Their goals/consequences were: to bring this important issue to the AAS; to highlight graduate education; and to prod departments to communicate more information to prospective graduate students. The recommendations of the meetings were: to continue focussing graduate programs on the training of future astronomers; but to also experiment a bit on graduate curricula which train for a wider variety of other careers.
There were two presentations on MSc programs which prepared for a wider range of careers, one a "professional" MSc program, and one a joint program with Computer Science. The professional program provided extra training in tools, management skills, and included a practicum in industry. To me, both programs seemed interesting, and contained some useful ideas, but weren’t high-impact.
There were two presentations—one by a faculty member (Chris Impey) and one by a graduate student (Chien Pang) -- from the University of Arizona, which has been experimenting with several changes in their graduate curriculum. I was particularly impressed by Chien Pang’s presentation. He emphasized the value of a "mentoring committee" for each student (that’s what PhD committees should do!). He mentioned the value of "career seminars" on topics such as teaching, and proposal writing; in Canada, the CASCA graduate student committee is organizing these. Also dealing (at both ends) with the undergraduate-graduate transition. And tracking PhD students after graduation—maybe to get feedback? There’s also the issue of preparing students to move from the traditional supervisor-apprentice mode to one which recognizes the importance of team projects in modern astronomy.
On the basis of my survey, and my participation in this session, I was struck by the variety of models which are used in Canada and the USA: direct-entry PhD vs. programs in which the MSc continues to play a key role; physics-rich programs vs. astronomy-rich ones; programs with more or less coursework; different models for the qualifying and comprehensive exams. I got the sense that the effectiveness of the graduate program depended less on its exact structure, and more on how well it was executed: good teaching and learning, good supervision by supervisor and committee. One appealing thought was that, at the beginning of a graduate student’s program, the committee and the student should sit down to create a "custom" program of content and skill courses (not just in astronomy), projects and other learning experiences which were tailored to the student’s particular background and needs. It is also important, at the beginning of a graduate student’s career, to provide effective orientation to the graduate department, and to graduate study. This is especially important for international students. In this way, we can nurture our graduate students, and ensure that they are broadly trained for their professional life—whetever it might be.
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John R. Percy, PhDProfessor: Astronomy & Astrophysics jpercy@utm.utoronto.ca
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