Johns Hopkins is proud to offer a robust array of doctoral programs — over 60 PhDs in nine divisions. Because we are constantly working to ensure that each program delivers a top-flight education to its students, our divisions regularly review and refine the doctoral degrees they award through departmental reviews. Under the traditional review model, best practices identified in these reviews have not readily translated into enhancements across the university.

In the spirit of “one university,” we are now changing that approach. This past year the Provost’s Office developed and launched a PhD program review protocol that institutionalizes scheduled, coordinated review among our divisions, so that relative strengths and weaknesses in PhD training can be observed holistically, and lessons learned for program enhancement can be applied in ways that advance all our doctoral programs. The protocol also builds in more benchmarking with outside peer programs, to challenge our divisions to do more to keep their doctoral programs at the vanguard nationally.

With the new PhD program review protocol, the university leadership can better identify PhD supports — improved pedagogical techniques, emerging learning technologies, and more — that it can implement universitywide to help its faculty provide the best graduate education possible and help its doctoral students succeed.