In 2012, the National Research Council and the American Chemical Society criticized many U.S graduate education programs in the chemical sciences for not adequately preparing doctoral students with necessary knowledge and skills for the careers that they will occupy. These and other reports suggest that broad science knowledge and soft skills will make graduate students more competitive and better prepared for their professions. However, relatively few efforts have been made to empirically evaluate and assess specific knowledge and skills that doctoral chemists need to be successful in their workplace. Based on the results of our qualitative study, we developed an online survey, which was piloted with chemists in various chemistry-related positions. The purpose of this pilot study was to identify any limitations in the survey that need to be addressed before administrating for a full-scale research. Doctoral chemists from academia, industry and government completed the survey to evaluate the knowledge and skills that were needed in their jobs. Twenty participants were interviewed for validation in the follow-up study as they had issues with the wording of items. Problematic items were either rewritten or eliminated from the survey list. Factor analysis was used as internal evidence of validity and test-retest reliability was conducted with ten participants. Insights into the robust measurement of knowledge and skills in graduate students will be discussed.

Pilot study identifying the knowledge and skills that U.S. doctoral chemists require in the workplace

Macromolecular Chemistry: The Second Century

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ACS Spring 2020 National Meeting & Expo

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.