Contact Info

Contact:	Kaitlyne A. Motl, PhD
Phone:	314-935-5790
Email:	kaitlyne.motl@wustl.edu
Website:	http://sociology.wustl.edu

Doctoral Candidacy

To earn a PhD at Washington University, a student must complete all courses required by their department; maintain satisfactory academic progress; pass certain examinations; fulfill residence and Mentored Experience Requirements; write, defend, and submit a dissertation; and apply to graduate via Workday Student. For the details of doctoral degree general requirements in Arts & Sciences, including an explanation of Satisfactory Academic Progress, students should review the Doctoral Degree Academic Information page of the Arts & Sciences Bulletin.

Program Requirements

• Total Units Required: 42 (Note: Remission applies for a maximum of 72 graduate-level units.)
• Degree Length: 6 years
  • Students are expected to complete all milestones and coursework (detailed below) within six years. 
  • Note: Students must be enrolled in 9 graduate credits each semester to retain full-time status. As students complete their coursework, if enrolled in fewer than 9 graduate credits, they must enroll in a specific Arts & Sciences graduate course that will show 0 units but does count as full-time status. Students should connect with their department to ensure proper enrollment prior to Add/Drop. 
• Grade Requirement: Students must earn at least a B- in each core course listed below to count toward program credit. Additionally, students must maintain a minimum GPA of 3.3 across all required Sociology courses, as well as a minimum cumulative GPA of at least 3.0 across all courses taken. 

Required Courses

• SOC 5020 Mentored Research Collaboration in Sociology (3 semesters, 1 unit each)
  • During their first three semesters, students will engage in a required collaborative research project with an assigned faculty mentor. These research collaborations will integrate students into a faculty member’s research as to strengthen students' research and analytical skills. Students will work closely with their faculty mentor, ideally to produce a jointly-authored publication early in the student's program of study and ensure a strong foundation for the student's own research agenda. These collaborations will often continue informally past the third semester.
• SOC 6101 Central Questions and Approaches in Sociology (2 units)
• SOC 5010 Sociology Professional Development (1 unit)
• SOC 5120 Sociological Theory (3 units)
• SOC 5030 Quantitative Methods I and SOC 5031 Quantitative Methods II (two-semester sequence, 3 units each)
• SOC 5040 Qualitative Methods (3 units)
• Mentored Teaching/Professional Experience (30 MER units minimum, 0 credits each)
  • Students undertake 30-40 Mentored Experience Requirements units, usually over the course of three semesters. At least two of those Mentored Experiences will be Mentored Teaching Experiences (MTEs), and one may be a Mentored Professional Experience (MPE). Most students will engage in a Mentored Teaching Experience for three semesters. Students who wish to teach independently at Washington University must complete all three Mentored Teaching Experiences; those who do not will not be eligible for teaching assignments. Students will enroll in ASGS 8005, ASGS 8010, or ASGS 8015 Mentored Teaching Experience - Assistant in Instruction; ASGS 8020 Mentored Teaching Experience - Mentored Independent Teaching; or ASGS 8120 Mentored Professional Experience. 
• SOC 5052 Research Design (3 units)
• SOC 5301 Professional Writing (3 units)
• 15 credits of elective coursework (typically, 5 courses of 3 units each)
  • Other substantive or methods courses in sociology will be offered that reflect our faculty’s research and methodological areas of expertise. All elective coursework must be taken at the 5000-level or above. Students must take at least two elective courses (6 credits) offered within the Department of Sociology. With departmental approval, advanced methods courses and other courses pertaining directly to the student's research interests may be taken in other departments and count toward degree requirements. Coursework that has not been approved for elective use by the Graduate Committee will not count toward program requirements, but may fulfill other certificate or Arts & Sciences requisites. Students should always consult with their advisor(s) prior to course registration. 
• SOC 5251 Sociology Master's Thesis (3 units)
  • The master’s thesis/empirical paper is an important milestone and a major publication opportunity. No later than midway through the second year, students will assemble a committee of three faculty members who will detailed collective feedback on their research. By the end of the summer after their second year, students will complete a draft of their thesis/paper and submit it to their advisor for feedback. By the end of the fifth semester, students will have polished their thesis/paper in the professional writing seminar, defended it before their faculty committee, and submitted the research for publication. 
• SOC 5350 Qualifying Exam Paper Area I and SOC 5351 Qualifying Exam Paper Area II (1 unit each)
  • After completing the required coursework and the master’s thesis/empirical paper, students will write one qualifying exam paper that demonstrates their expertise in two particular subfields of the discipline. Students will develop two reading lists formed in collaboration with faculty that contains central contributions to the Department's major areas of study, such as race and ethnicity, gender and family, immigration, political sociology and social movements, work and organizations, policing and criminal justice, and community and urban sociology. Students will be encouraged to add supplemental readings that pertain to their specific emerging research interests. 
  • After reading the material on the two lists, students will write an integrative paper that identifies important areas of overlap or divergence in the two sociological subfields, that applies insights from one subfield to another, or that otherwise reviews the existing research in a novel way. This process should produce a paper with original insights and potentially be suitable for publication in one of several journals that explicitly welcomes agenda-setting or review articles. This paper will typically be completed by the end of the third year. 
• SOC 5451 Sociology Dissertation Proposal (1 unit)
  • After completing the qualifying exam paper, students should write a dissertation proposal that describes the motivation and plan for their research. They will receive feedback on drafts of the proposal from a committee they have assembled that consists of at least three faculty members. A final dissertation proposal must be defended before the committee no later than the second semester of the fourth year. 

Qualifying Examinations

Progress toward the PhD is contingent upon the student passing examinations that are variously called preliminary, qualifying, general, comprehensive, or major field exams. The qualifying process varies according to the program. In some programs, it consists of a series of incremental, sequential, and cumulative exams over a considerable time. In others, the exams are held during a relatively short period of time. Exams may be replaced by one or more papers. The program, which determines the structure and schedule of the required examinations, is responsible for notifying the Office of Graduate Studies, Arts & Sciences, of the student’s outcome, whether successful or unsuccessful.

Mentored Experience Requirements

Doctoral students at Washington University must complete a department-defined Mentored Experience. The Mentored Experience Requirement is a doctoral degree requirement that is notated on the student’s transcript when complete. Each department has an established Mentored Experience Implementation Plan in which the number of units that a student must earn through Mentored Teaching Experience(s) and/or Mentored Professional Experience(s) is defined. The Mentored Experience Implementation Plans outline how doctoral students within the discipline will be mentored to achieve competencies in teaching at basic and advanced levels. Some departments may elect to include Mentored Professional Experiences as an avenue for completing some units of the Mentored Experience Requirement. Doctoral students will enroll in ASGS 8005, 8010, or 8015 Mentored Teaching Experience - Assistant in Instruction; ASGS 8020 Mentored Teaching Experience - Mentored Independent Teaching; or ASGS 8120 Mentored Professional Experience to signify their progression toward completing the overall Mentored Experience Requirement for the degree.

The Doctoral Dissertation

A Research Advisory Committee (RAC) must be created no later than the end of the student's third year; departments may set shorter timelines (e.g., by the end of the student's second year) for this requirement. As evidence of the mastery of a specific field of knowledge and of the capacity for original scholarly work, each candidate must complete a dissertation that is approved by their RAC.

A Title, Scope & Procedure Form for the dissertation must be signed by the committee members and by the program chair. It must be submitted to the Office of Graduate Studies, Arts & Sciences, at least six months before the degree is expected to be conferred or before the beginning of the fifth year of full-time enrollment, whichever is earlier.

A Doctoral Dissertation Guide and a Dissertation Template that give instructions regarding the format of the dissertation are available on the website of the Office of Graduate Studies, Arts & Sciences. Both should be read carefully at every stage of dissertation preparation.

The Office of Graduate Studies, Arts & Sciences, requires each student to make the full text of the dissertation available to the committee members for their review at least one week before the defense. Most degree programs require two or more weeks for the review period; students should check with their faculty.

The Dissertation Defense

Approval of the written dissertation by the Research Advisory Committee (RAC) is strongly recommended before the student can orally defend the dissertation. The Doctoral Dissertation Committee that examines the student during the defense consists of at least five members. Normally, the members of the RAC also serve on the Doctoral Dissertation Committee. The dissertation committee is then additionally augmented to ensure that the following criteria are met:

1. Three of the five members (or a similar proportion of a larger committee) must be full-time Washington University in St. Louis faculty members or, for programs involving Washington University in St. Louis-affiliated partners, full-time members of a Washington University in St. Louis-affiliated partner institution. All members must be authorized to supervise PhD students and have appropriate expertise in the proposed field of study. One of these three members must be the PhD student's primary thesis advisor, and one may be a member of the emeritus faculty.
2. All other committee members must be active in research/scholarship and have appropriate expertise in the proposed field of study whether at Washington University in St. Louis, at another university, in government, or in industry.
3. At least one of the five members must bring expertise outside of the student's field of study to the committee, as judged by the relevant department/program and approved by the Office of Graduate Studies, Arts & Sciences.

The approval processes outlined in the RAC section of the Doctoral Council bylaws also apply to the doctoral dissertation committee, including approval of each dissertation committee by the Office of Graduate Studies, Arts & Sciences.

The student is responsible for making the full text of the dissertation accessible to their committee members for their review in advance of the defense according to program rules. Washington University in St. Louis community members and guests of the student who are interested in the subject of the dissertation are normally welcome to attend all or part of the defense but may ask questions only at the discretion of the committee chair. Although there is some variation among degree programs, the defense ordinarily focuses on the dissertation itself and its relation to the student's field of expertise.

Attendance by a minimum of four members of the Doctoral Dissertation Committee, including the committee chair and an outside member, is required for the defense to take place. This provision is designed to permit the student's defense to proceed in case of a situation that unexpectedly prevents one of the five members from attending. Students should not plan in advance to only have four members in attendance. If four members cannot attend, the defense must be rescheduled. The absence of all outside members or of the committee chair also requires rescheduling the defense.

Students, with the support of their Doctoral Dissertation Committee chair, may opt to hold their dissertation defense in person or by utilizing a virtual or hybrid format.

Submission of the Dissertation

After the defense, the student must submit an electronic copy of the dissertation online to the Office of Graduate Studies, Arts & Sciences. The submission website requires students to choose among publishing and copyrighting services offered by ProQuest’s ETD Administrator. Students are asked to submit the Survey of Earned Doctorates separately. The degree program is responsible for delivering the final approval form, signed by the committee members at the defense and then by the program chair or director, to the Office of Graduate Studies, Arts & Sciences. Students who defend their dissertations successfully have not yet completed their PhD requirements; they finish earning their degree only when their electronic dissertation submission has been accepted by the Office of Graduate Studies, Arts & Sciences.

Master's Degree Along the Way

The Department of Sociology does not offer a standalone Master of Arts degree. However, those who wish to earn the MA as a part of their broader doctoral study may do so. Master's degrees are not automatically granted through PhD program advancement; students must formally elect into this option.

To be eligible for the Master of Arts in Sociology, students must complete all courses required by the Department; maintain satisfactory academic progress; fulfill all academic and residence requirements; and apply to graduate via Workday Student. For the details of master's degree general requirements in Arts & Sciences, including an explanation of Satisfactory Academic Progress, students should review the Master's Degree Academic Information page of the Arts & Sciences Bulletin. Students should also refer to the latest version of the Sociology Graduate Student Handbook for more information about Department-specific items required for the MA.

In addition to the requirements listed above, students who opt to earn the Master of Arts in Sociology as a part of their PhD program must also complete a master's thesis or an original empirical research paper intended for scholarly publication.

• A Title, Scope, & Procedure form for the master's thesis must be signed by the thesis committee members and by the program chair. It must be submitted to the Office of Graduate Studies, Arts & Sciences, at least six months before the degree is expected to be conferred.
• A Master's Thesis Guide and a Thesis Template that give instructions regarding the format of the thesis are available on the website of the Office of Graduate Studies, Arts & Sciences. Both should be read carefully at every stage of thesis preparation. 

As part of their degree requirements, PhD students must complete a program-defined Mentored Experience Requirement (MER) as per these guidelines. The Mentored Experience Implementation Plan (MEIP) is the written articulation of a program-defined degree requirement for PhD students to engage in mentored teaching activities and/or mentored professional activities, collectively referred to as MERs.

Mentored Experience Requirements (MERs)

Philosophy of Teaching

We consider teaching to be a critical component of our role as sociologists, and the PhD program aims to prepare students to be effective teachers as well as scholars and researchers. Teaching also develops students’ competence and confidence in exercising the following skill areas: 

• Becoming effective public speakers
• Translating content, theory, and policy to both scholarly and public audiences
• Using classroom experiences to understand their own roles as scholars
• Becoming effective mentors to students

Sociology Phd students have varied preferences for eventual careers, including jobs at research-intensive institutions, teaching-intensive colleges or universities, or non-academic careers. Our flexible MER allows students to tailor their experience according to their eventual ideal career path. For students interested in careers that include teaching sociology, extensive teaching experience and skills are necessary to obtain faculty positions. These students would complete three Assistant in Instruction (AI) experiences and we encourage participation in the Professional Development in Teaching Program through the Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) and teach their own class (though the latter two are suggestions, and not formal MER requirements). For students who have set their sights set on research-oriented careers, the program seeks to provide numerous transferrable skills through their mentored teaching and professional experiences, and to facilitate opportunities to progressively develop and apply them.

Preparatory Engagement

Preparatory Engagement activities are those that represent an introduction to the foundational skills associated with teaching or communication. Pedagogical preparation engagement activities are normally completed before students are permitted to engage in assisting or teaching in a classroom.

We require three preparatory engagement activities prior to students’ assisting in the classroom, and a fourth activity to be completed concurrently with engagement in AI. These activities include the following:

1. Students complete the Sociology department’s one-credit Professional Development seminar.
2. Students must participate in and successfully complete the Center for Teaching and Learning Mentored Teaching Orientation, usually held in August. 
3. Prior to the beginning of each AI engagement, each student will meet with the course’s instructor to discuss the goals and needs of the class, as well as expectations that students will fulfill as a part of their course role. 
4. During the first or second AI, students will also be required to complete at least one Foundations of Teaching workshop offered by the CTL.

Mentored Teaching Experiences (MTEs)

Assistant in Instruction (AI)

An Assistant in Instruction (AI) is a PhD student who is directly engaged in the organization, instruction, and/or support of a semester-long course primarily taught by a faculty member. An AI receives mentorship from a faculty member related to best practices in classroom engagement, instruction in the field, interpersonal engagement, and other relevant skills. Students and mentors complete a mentorship plan prior to the start of each AI experience. To complete each AI assignment and to ensure that it applies toward their degree requirements, students must register for the appropriate course number for each semester of engagement. Refer to the "Required Pathways for Completion" section below for course numbers and details.

Sociology AI engagements differ depending upon the nature of the course but count for 10 MER units, which is estimated to be 10 hours per week during the semester in which they undertake the AI. Students and faculty will be expected to check in with each other (formally and informally) to discuss expectations for the AI assignment and to develop opportunities for the student to grow within the scope of their assignment. Examples of student AI engagements include the following:

• Course administration and managing/facilitating student correspondence (between students, to/from faculty)
• Attending class meetings regularly and participating in course delivery/activities as appropriate
• Student assessment (i.e., grading assignments and providing feedback)
• Delivering guest lectures within the course
• Facilitating class discussions or acting as a classroom engagement coordinator
• Maintaining online course components and resources (i.e., keeping the course's Canvas page up to date)
• Holding regular office hours/meeting with students for assistance with coursework and content
• Providing and promoting course- and department-related student enrichment and engagement opportunities
• Coordinating and supervising the activities of undergraduate teaching assistants for those assigned to an AI in a large undergraduate course.
• Leading lab skills workshops (for quantitative methods courses)

Mentored Professional Experiences (MPEs)

The MPE is an unpaid professional experience for PhD students that allows students to develop skills and experiences relevant to their intended career outcomes. Students and mentors complete a mentorship plan prior to the start of each MPE. To complete each MPE assignment and to ensure that it applies toward their degree requirements, students must submit the Mentorship Registration Request form for approval and register for the appropriate course number (ASGS 8120) for each semester of engagement. Refer to the "Required Pathways for Completion" section below for more details.

In an effort to best suit students’ personal and professional goals, the nature of approved MPE activities will vary widely. Generally, students undertaking an MPE will participate in a supervised and sociologically relevant off-campus experience at a community agency or nonprofit, private enterprise, research center, or scholarly organization. Regardless of the entity with which a student works and the roles that they will be expected to fulfill, students’ main objective within the MPE will be to utilize sociological knowledge and/or methodological skill sets within practical, applied settings. 

Students who elect to participate in an MPE will be required to identify two mentors. The first of these will be a faculty member in Sociology who will agree to be their mentor for the MPE. Students will meet regularly with their faculty mentor during the semester and complete a final project of some kind at the faculty mentor’s discretion, such as a report, reflection, and/or public presentation, that draws from the knowledge and skills gained through their MPE, to be submitted to and evaluated by the faculty mentor. 

The second mentor must be associated with the outside organization at which the student is completing the MPE. This site mentor will be asked in the Mentorship Registration Request form to identify and describe tasks to be completed as a part of the MPE assignment — as well as detail the total hours of engagement over the course of the semester — which will be communicated with both the student and their faculty mentor. The site mentor will also be asked to complete an MPE assessment of the student at the conclusion of the semester. This assessment will be shared with the faculty mentor.

Required Pathways for Completion

Students work with their faculty mentor and their Director of Graduate Studies to plan how and when they will complete their MERs. Students register during the normal registration period for courses in accordance with one of these approved pathways.

Students complete between 30 and 40 MER units. This is dependent upon if they take three AIs for 30 MER units or two AIs for 20 MER units and one MPE for 20 MER units. Students follow this timeline.

Year 1: Preparatory Engagement starts. AI assignments will be made late in the spring term, ensuring AI expectation discussions between student and their faculty mentor prior to the start of the fall AI assignment. 

Year 2: Students will enroll in ASGS 8010 for 10 MER units each in both fall and spring semesters. Students will receive informal feedback throughout their assignment from their faculty mentor, as well as a "formal" review upon completion of the term's AI assignment. Students will generate and submit reflective self-reviews in both the fall and spring terms. Students will complete at least one Foundations of Teaching workshop offered by the Center for Teaching and Learning.

Year 3: Students will enroll as an AI under ASGS 8010 for 10 MER units or as an MPE under ASGS 8120 for 20 MER units in the fall or spring term. Students interested in teaching-focused jobs and would like opportunities to apply for graduate student lecturer opportunities are encouraged to complete the Center for Teaching and Learning's Professional Development in Teaching Program. 

Years 4, 5, and 6: No MER requirements. Students interested in gaining further teaching experience are encouraged to apply to teach courses independently through the College of Arts & Sciences Summer Session or the School of Continuing & Professional Studies. However, this is not a requirement, nor is it guaranteed that every student will have the opportunity to teach as an instructor of record. Students who are hired to teach independently for compensation can only do so after they have completed their MER.

Pathway #1

UG Spanish Seminar

ASGS 8010	Take three times

Pathway #2

UG Spanish Seminar

ASGS 8010	Take two times
ASGS 8120	Take one time