A Message from Program Officer Stacy Hartman and Program Manager Treviene Harris

It is a strange time to be running a program called “Doctoral Futures.” The recent attacks on higher education and on graduate education in particular, through the defunding of federal agencies, have raised the question of what the future of doctoral education – or, indeed, knowledge production writ large – can or will look like in the United States. If rigorous humanistic inquiry and scholarship is to have any future – much less many futures – then it must not only survive but transform itself to meet the moment. 

Doctoral Futures was not conceived in response to the current crisis. It is a three-year initiative that was in motion well before the recent attacks on research and teaching. It responds to a long-standing need for reform in doctoral education, and it builds upon 30+ years of meaningful work, much of which was funded by the Mellon Foundation. That work has led us toward a vision of doctoral education that is more student-centered and humane, more interdisciplinary, more collaborative, more focused on questions and problems than disciplines, and more public-facing and socially engaged. 

We recognize that it is difficult to think creatively in moments of crisis. However, we feel that the greatest danger right now is that we emerge from this most recent crisis as a diminished version of what we have been, with weaker departments, smaller graduate cohorts, fewer programs, and very few interested undergraduates. 

Doctoral Futures imagines that there is an alternative to this, in which programs and graduate cohorts are both larger and more interdisciplinary, allowing for greater strength in numbers. Programs vary from one institution to another, depending on the research strengths of the faculty. Students work collaboratively and intergenerationally on wickedly complex problems – such as health, democracy, technology, and climate – that do not respect the borders of existing fields. Undergraduates are drawn to programs that address these pressing issues and teach them how to be nimble and creative thinkers. 

Now is not the time to freeze in fear. Now is the time to build on the work that has been done to create many futures for doctoral education that we can all, collectively, believe in. 

We hope that you will join us in this endeavor. Over the next three years, we will work backward from this affirmative vision to bring forward the best models, practices, and innovations. The three Doctoral Futures committees — led by the Society of Biblical Literature, the Modern Language Association, and the American Historical Association — will be working throughout 2026 to gather what we already know (or believe we know). From this research will emerge a plurality of concrete recommendations that reflect myriad ways of approaching doctoral reform. In 2027 and beyond, we will take up the work of persuading faculty, deans, provosts, and presidents to adopt, adapt, and implement these recommendations. 

The work will, of course, extend far beyond the life of the grant – but we are committed to making this project a leap forward that takes us beyond the current crisis, and into an exciting multitude of futures. 

Stacy M. Hartman

Program Officer, Higher Education Initiatives, ACLS

Treviene Harris

Program Manager, Doctoral Futures, ACLS