Graduate education excels in producing graduates with advanced technical knowledge and research skills. However, these graduates have limited knowledge as to how to translate those skills into approaches highly valued by companies, such as market evaluation, project management, product development, and finance. Given that an ever-increasing number of graduate students are pursuing employment in industry, the NC State Graduate School recently piloted a module-based training approach (Accelerate to Industry) with professional development opportunities that specifically address the transition from academia to industry. Training goals include developing graduate students' career awareness and exploration, entrepreneurial skills, ability to complete real-world work experiences, and, ultimately, career success in industry. This National Science Foundation Innovations in Graduate Education (IGE) award to North Carolina State University will allow broader testing of the Accelerate to Industry approach at diverse institutions. To expand to other universities, the project created scalable, modular activities intended to allow universities to implement the components that best fit their needs and resources. In addition, this project will establish a two-day train-the-trainer event for 10 new institutional partners annually that will focus specifically on providing graduate students with an immersive, industry-intensive learning experience. By implementing Accelerate to Industry within diverse institutions, the project will test the robustness and efficacy of the overall approach, the modular platform, and the professional development content. While mixed method assessment tools will address these broader questions, the most intensive cross-institutional assessment efforts will focus on delivery of the module from the train-the-trainers workshop that provides students with a week-long, industry-intensive immersive learning experience. If successful, this approach could provide a path forward for institutions to facilitate the successful transition of graduate students from academia to industry, and the study results will add to our understanding of best practices to support diverse career pathways for the nation's graduate population.
This graduate education research project will test and validate the Accelerate to Industry (A2i) approach at 30 universities representing Research 1, Research 2, and Masters-Intensive institutions. The range of institutional types will generate the data necessary to evaluate broader implementation and customization. The research is intended to advance academic knowledge in three areas: (1) the employment success derived from training STEM graduate students, including those from underrepresented groups, across a variety of academic institutions through university-industry consortia; (2) the impact on employability through increased industry-relevant experiential learning, including interdisciplinary project-based experiences framed by Adult Learning Theory; and (3) the impact of facilitating industry workforce training through central administrative units (e.g., graduate schools), in contrast to more decentralized approaches (i.e., department or academic college level). Accordingly, this project will test four central hypotheses: (1) A2i participants will have increased employment and career success in industry tied to the skill development and interdisciplinary interactions offered by A2i as compared to those with no training; (2) given its flexibility and modular structure, A2i can be effectively developed in a range of different academic settings; (3) student participants value the programming afforded by A2i and feel more confident about their ability to succeed in industry; and (4) self-awareness of skills, interests, and values enhances A2i participants' learning and employment outcomes.
The Innovations in Graduate Education (IGE) program is focused on research in graduate education. The goals of IGE are to pilot, test and validate innovative approaches to graduate education and to generate the knowledge required to move these approaches into the broader community.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
