Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Program in Library and Information Science

Graduate School of Library and Information Science

University of Texas at Austin

Sánchez Building 564

Austin, Texas 78712-1276

http://www.gslis.utexas.edu

Telephone: (512) 471-3821

FAX: (512) 471-3971

Section 1 Program length

2 Doctoral seminars

3 Other coursework

4 Research tools requirements

5 Faculty advisers and the program of work

6 Qualifying examinations

7  Dissertation proposal and dissertation

8 Other considerations


PhD Program in Library and Information Science

Graduate School of Library and Information Science

UT-Austin

The following program requirements and guidelines apply to students entering the program in the Fall 2001, or subsequently.

1. PROGRAM LENGTH. The program consists of a minimum of 36 semester hours of coursework prior to the qualifying examination to admission to candidacy for the doctorate. The 36 hours do not include courses that the student may need to take in order to master research tools, or the courses (LIS 399R, 699R, 999R, 399W, 699W, and 999W) that he or she may take in connection with writing the dissertation.

2. DOCTORAL SEMINARS. The core of the program is four doctoral (topical) seminars, restricted to doctoral students, providing a total of 12 semester hours in the core.

2.1 The four doctoral seminars are organized classes, addressing topics such as those discussed below. These four seminars are referred to as the PhD Topical Seminars. The topics are offered in rotation in the long semesters over each of two academic years. These seminars are offered in time slots that move among late afternoons, evenings, and weekends during long semesters. The PhD Topical Seminars will ordinarily not be offered in summer sessions.

2.2 A fifth seminar emphasizes writing. This seminar is taken as an organized class from the UT Graduate School’s courses in Professional Development as GRS 390W, Academic and Professional Writing, for students whose native language is English. It can be taken for a grade or on a credit/no-credit basis.

2.3 Doctoral students will (a) take one of the PhD Topical Seminars in each of their first four long semesters in the GSLIS and (b) take Academic and Professional Writing during their second semester in the School. This basic pattern may be modified, if that is unavoidable, in order to accommodate other courses, but doctoral students should take the Writing Seminar before they take their third Topical Seminar.

2.4 The purpose of the PhD Topical Seminars is to explore and evaluate critically the past and present of Library and Information Science, and to try to foresee its future. The four topics of the PhD Topical Seminars are broad. The intention is that all key subject areas to Library and Information Science will be included somewhere within one or more of the four seminars. The specific topics and titles for the seminars are to be determined in conjunction with the GSLIS faculty as a whole on an ongoing basis.

In practice, each seminar will inevitably reflect the interests of the instructor and the students in the seminar in that particular semester. On the other hand, each of the four seminars is to include a basic reading list, and the four reading lists together should provide a comprehensive overview of Library and Information Science at an advanced, evaluative level. Each reading list is to be strictly limited to a reasonable number of scholarly, fundamental works.

The following list of seminar names must be understood as the result of an effort to provide a set of names that will be comprehensive although they cannot be mutually exclusive, i.e., some degree of overlap is unavoidable. The subjects mentioned are intended to be illustrative, not restrictive. The appropriateness, scope, and nature of these seminars are to be reviewed regularly and revised at least biennially. The emphasis in the seminars is on theoretical and philosophical development in each topical area.

2.4.1 Uses and Users of Information. This Topical Seminar addresses the role of information in society, societal policies for handling information, various user environments, and how people use information, i.e., in what ways and for what purposes. It includes such subjects as: cognitive studies of information use; user environments; cognitive studies of the reference process; studies of the problem-solving process; bibliometrics; public policy issues concerning information; economics of information; characteristics of individual and group users (e.g., youth, scientists, artists, students, business people, etc.) and how these characteristics relate to the uses to which users put information; and how the media and/or means by which users obtain information affect how they use it.

2.4.2 Organizing and Providing Access to Information. This Topical Seminar addresses how information is organized, stored, preserved, retrieved, disseminated, and delivered. It includes such subjects as: theories of knowledge representation; linguistic and communications studies related to the nature of information; theories of systems for controlling information; resources design and development of information systems, archival systems, and records systems; bibliographic control databases; networks; and technologies and processes relevant to organizing and providing access to information.

2.4.3 Administration of Information Resources. This Topical Seminar addresses the administration of systems of people, procedures, and technologies for organizing and providing access to information. It includes such subjects as: general theories of administration, information resource management, the roles of information professionals within diverse kinds of information environments, the impact of rapidly changing technologies and other factors in the microscopic and macroscopic environments of information systems and the measurement, evaluation, and economic aspects of information services.

2.4.4 Disciplinary and Professional Development of Library and Information Science. This Topical Seminar addresses the past, the present, and the prospective future of Library and Information Science, including archives and records management and information resource management. It includes such subjects as: the history of Library and Information Science; education for Library and Information Science, including the history of such education; international and comparative aspects of Library and Information Science; the roles of professional organizations; ethical and legal standards for the practice of Library and Information Science, including treatment of sociopolitical issues such as censorship and profit-oriented as contrasted with non-profit–oriented information services; and research in Library and Information Science, including coverage of such related areas as artificial intelligence, cognitive science, telecommunications, management information systems, epistemology, and neuroscience.

3. OTHER COURSEWORK WITHIN THE 36-SEMESTER-HOUR MINIMUM. Of the 36 semester hours of coursework required as a minimum for the PhD program, 15 are to be devoted to the PhD Topical Seminars and the Writing Seminar.

3.1 Of the remaining 21 hours, 12 semester hours are to be taken at the student’s option, with the approval of his or her faculty adviser, from among appropriate courses that are relevant to the student’s primary area of interest in his or her doctoral program. These may be courses offered by GSLIS, by other academic units at UT-Austin, or by other academic institutions. These 12 semester hours should be taken for letter grades, rather than on a credit/no-credit basis.

3.2 The remaining nine semester hours are to be devoted to a coherent, cohesive program of supportive courses offered by UT-Austin academic units other than GSLIS. One (1) of these “outside” courses may be taken on a credit/no-credit basis. This program is referred to as the student’s extra-GSLIS area of study. The extra-GSLIS courses must be ones that will broaden or supplement the student’s major area of studies. The intention is that these courses are to continue the long-standing GSLIS practice of requiring doctoral students to take appropriate courses in academic units outside GSLIS.

3.3 The recommended minimum of 36 semester hours of coursework for the GSLIS doctoral program is a minimum, not a maximum. Students may, of course, take additional courses beyond the 36-hour minimum, in order to delve deeper into their primary area, their extra-GSLIS area, and/or their research tools. Nevertheless, doctoral students are encouraged to finish their coursework soon after satisfying the 36-semester-hour minimum, so that they may move expeditiously on to the dissertation phase of the doctoral process.

4. RESEARCH TOOL REQUIREMENTS. In general, doctoral students must demonstrate competence with two of the following research tools:

·  a foreign language appropriate to the student's area of research

·  descriptive, inferential, or non-parametric statistics

·  qualitative research methods

·  historical methods

·  programming languages

·  policy research.

The research tools appropriate for each student are determined by the explicit linkage of the planned research program, including the dissertation, with the research tools. The fulfillment of the research tool requirement is usually demonstrated by completion of nine semester hours of coursework in each tool area and/or experience in research under the guidance of a faculty member. Exceptions, while unusual, can be made on a case-by-case basis, requiring Graduate Studies Committee approval. For example, some students might want to use two foreign languages for their research tools, while others might include knowledge from other areas essential to the dissertation topic, e.g., paper chemistry for a dissertation related to preservation of paper artifacts.

These are the minimum research tool requirements; if the student's planned dissertation and subsequent research program require other research tools, students must demonstrate competency in them as well.

5. FACULTY ADVISERS AND THE DEVELOPMENT AND APPROVAL OF A PhD STUDENT’S PROGRAM OF WORK.

5.1 The Faculty Adviser. The initial assignment of a faculty adviser for each doctoral student is to be made by the Graduate Adviser in conjunction with the Doctoral Studies Coordinator. As with the assignment of faculty advisers to master’s students, changes may be made later at the option of either the student or the faculty member.

5.2 Developing the Program of Work. Each doctoral student’s Program of Work is to be designed by the student and his or her faculty adviser, with final approval to be granted by the Graduate Studies Committee. If the student and/or the faculty adviser so desire, the GSC Chair may name a subcommittee of the GSC to assist in the preparation of the Program of Work.

In the proposed Program of Work, the student should identify the courses that he or she plans to take and should provide clear, succinct explanations of the choices of areas and courses, especially the research tools. The proposal for the Program of Work should also contain a concise presentation of all prior graduate-level coursework taken (at UT-Austin or elsewhere), describing how the prior courses relate to the proposed program of doctoral studies.

5.3 Presenting the Proposed Program of Work to the GSC. The proposed Program of Work is to be submitted in writing to the GSC during the semester or summer session in which students will complete nine (9) or more semester hours in the program. The student’s faculty adviser will present the Program of Work to the GSC. By majority of those present and voting, the GSC will either (a) approve the Program of Work without further changes, (b) approve it subject to the incorporation of specific changes, or (c) disapprove it.

5.4 Early Submission of the Program of Work. The requirement that each doctoral student prepare a Program of Work near the beginning of his or her doctoral studies is designed to ensure that students start planning their programs early. Without early planning, students can all too easily find themselves in the position of having taken courses that –however interesting—turn out to be peripheral to their primary goals.

5.5 Changes in a Program of Work. Any Program of Work is likely to encounter the problem that certain courses originally listed in the plan are no longer being offered when the time arrives for the student to take them; a related problem is that new courses become available that would be desirable in the student’s Program of Work. Because such problems are typical, the School recognizes that changes are likely to be needed in any Program of Work as time passes. Ordinarily, such changes will be worked out by the student and his or her faculty adviser.

As the preceding paragraph implies, changes—if any—in a student’s Program of Work should be initiated by the student, in conjunction with his or her faculty adviser. One of the reasons for establishing an approved Program of Work early is to avoid the possibility of being pressured, later on in the doctoral program, to include additional courses beyond those originally planned.

6. QUALIFYING EXAMINATIONS. The Qualifying Examination for Admission to Candidacy for the PhD takes the form described in this section in order to distribute the examination over time and over coursework. Thus there should be a lessening of the difficulty—and the potential psychological obstacle—that has typically been associated with the previous mode of administering the Qualifying Examination: viz., as a single qualifying examination that is all-important in a student’s path toward the doctorate. Also, students will be able to keep track of their progress toward Admission to Candidacy for the PhD as they proceed through the several steps in the Qualifying Examination.

6.1 The Topical Seminars as Part of the Qualifying Examination. Each of the PhD Topical Seminars provides a letter grade on the GSLIS scale (viz., A+, A, A-, B+, B, B-, etc.); they will not be available on a credit/no credit basis. Each of the four course grades from the Topical Seminars is to constitute 15% of the Qualifying Examination, so that a total of 60% of the Qualifying Examination comes from the Topical Seminars.

6.2 The Comprehensive Doctoral Examination as Part of the Qualifying Examination. The remaining 40% of the Qualifying Examination is administered as a separate exam, known as the Comprehensive Doctoral Examination (CDE). The CDE is to consist of both written and oral responses.

6.2.1 The written part of the CDE will be administered at a fixed time each semester or summer session for all students who wish to take the examination in that semester or summer session. Each semester or summer session, the Doctoral Program Coordinator will designate a particular pair of days, preferably consecutive, for the CDE. These days will ordinarily be within weeks 9-12 of a long semester, or within week 3 of a second summer term. No doctoral student may take the CDE before completing the four PhD Topical Seminars and the Writing Seminar, and no doctoral student may take the CDE earlier than the semester or summer session in which he or she will complete 36 semester hours in his or her doctoral program.