How (not) to get your PhD Part 1: Why (not) to get your PhD in Mathematics Education

The more inherent you can make your motivation for getting a PhD, the happier you’ll be.

In May of 2020, in the midst of a global pandemic, I was laid off from my job at a non-profit due to COVID related “budget concerns.” It is in that context – when the world was crumbling around us, when my kids and most kids were at their unhappiest, when I was at my unhappiest – that I applied to University of Wyoming (UW) to begin my doctoral journey in mathematics education. It was something I had wanted to do for a decade. In fact, I’d enrolled and quickly dropped out of a different PhD program. That program wasn’t for me and it wasn’t worth it. The Wyoming program was more up my alley and, if I’m being honest, I didn’t have much else going on at the time (other than existential depression).

Normally, UW wouldn’t have even been accepting applications in May/June, but they had extended the deadline that year. So within a week of being laid off I applied for the program and was accepted to begin that following Fall. I can’t really say if that was an impulsive decision or one that just happened to work well given my life circumstances. Likely it was both.

Having a spouse and a nice severance package along with enhanced unemployment benefits allowed me to devote myself full time to being a PhD student nearly the entire time. Also, my increased “availability” allowed me to do a bunch of other stuff, including teaching classes in-person and remotely for UW and the local community college, designing and facilitating a rural teacher corps, authoring and co-authoring a handful of articles, and supplementing my income with the occasional side gig offering coaching, workshops, and professional development.I could only do all this with unwavering support of my spouse, who enthusiastically supported me and gave me no timetable for finishing up.

At the risk of speaking in consultant-ese, it is worth considering your “why” when it comes to applying for and beginning the PhD process. It’s also ok if your “why” changes. For me, my “why” was because I wanted to teach math and/or math methods at the University level. I’ve realized since the publication of Necessary Conditions, that that book served as sort of a corrective against my poor preparation and experience as a pre-service teacher from my undergraduate education.

As I have learned and I’ll discuss throughout this series, it’s not so simple. Math methods teaching positions are not as in-demand as I thought. It’s relatively easy to find a job teaching secondary math locally. It’s near impossible to find a job teaching math methods at the University level unless you’re willing and able to uproot your family. There are only three Universities within reasonable driving distance of my house on the Front Range in Colorado.

So then, what will you do with your Math Education PhD?

Is your “why” because you’d like to teach future math teachers? If so, do a bit of homework and consider the following:

What kind of institutions are near me that I could work for?
How often do new faculty positions come available?
Are you willing, once you have your degree, to send out 50 applications, hoping to get a call back on 10, hoping to get an interview with 5, and hopefully landing one, possibly in an area that you may or may not be thrilled about moving to?

Here is a link to open faculty positions from AERA. That’ll give you a good quick overview of the types and locations of positions you’re looking at.

Another thing regarding faculty positions and your PhD is this: you will probably earn more as a public teacher in your local school district than as a faculty member. Universities pay for shit. It’s part of the tradeoff – you get prestige, you go to conferences, you do research, you have good job security, and, if we’re being honest, teaching at the post-secondary level is just plain easier – but starting salaries, considering how much time and money you spend getting your PhD is dreadfully low. Most of the positions I’ve been looking at pay about $60,000 a year. Locally (Fort Collins, CO) a teacher with a PhD and 10 years experience gets a salary of $74,010. And Fort Collins is notorious for paying teachers poorly compared to living expenses. Weirdly, and I can’t believe I’m saying this, teaching high school is quite likely more financially lucrative with a PhD than being a University professor, at least as a starting, non-tenure track position.

Other options for post-PhD work may include educational research or curriculum development for a private company. These positions can be more financially lucrative if they are full time. I’ll talk more about jobs in Part 8 of this series.

Is your “why” a little more inherently motivated?

As I suggested, while there’s nothing wrong with having a job-oriented why, you may be happier if you get into a program because you simply want to learn about mathematics education on a deep level.

Perhaps you would like to just learn more about what makes for good mathematics curriculum and instruction. Maybe you see this as a way to challenge yourself. While I wouldn’t say these are better “whys” they are imminently more attainable than finding a faculty position fresh off your dissertation.

So what are you excited about and how can you make that central to your PhD experience? My inherent motivation came from a desire to learn about and study the use of mathematics portfolios. That eventually became the subject of my dissertation and a few manuscripts. My excitement about portfolios as a research subject helped me get through the more challenging moments.

I became excited about other subjects while in the program: rural and indigenous education, mathematical creativity, qualitative research methods, just to name a few. I was also motivated by my connection to my peers and professors. I also felt like I was doing good work while in the program and received positive feedback in a meaningful manner.

Eventually, these things (again, along with a supportive partner) replaced my initial why of M U S T F I N D A J O B.

To consider your motivation for getting a PhD in Mathematics Education, I recommend starting with the math. Let’s go back to the very discipline you’ll be investing in: what do you love about it? What do you love teaching about it? What curiosities do you have about it?

You know how you want to complain about the PD that your district forces you to sit through? And you’re like, “I wish they were addressing this instead”? This is your chance.

Consider your PhD (if that’s the route you choose to go down) your opportunity to essentially craft your own, DIY professional development for yourself to address any question you are interested in. Yes, you’ll have some mandatory coursework that doesn’t align perfectly, but you’ll have a lot of autonomy in a PhD program. So start there: you’ll have years and years to study some aspect of math education. What are you interested in?

Takeaways: