Our approach to doctoral education can be especially powerful for students who want to stay connected to authentic engineering problems and contexts while also developing expertise in qualitative, quantitative, or mixed methods educational research. It can also create space for interdisciplinary mentorship, broader methodological training, and more varied career trajectories than many students initially imagine.
In practice, this means that you will be admitted through an traditional engineering field (e.g., chemical engineering, biomedical engineering, systems engineering), take the required courses and meet the requirements of that field, work with mentors spanning engineering and education-related expertise, and build a dissertation that investigates how engineers learn, how programs are designed, or how educational systems can better support students, faculty, and the future workforce.
Who might this pathway be a good fit for?
This pathway may appeal to students who want to ask questions about engineering learning and systems, while remaining connected to the disciplinary and professional realities of engineering itself.
This may be a good path if you:
- Care about how engineers are developed.
- Are interested in how students learn to design, reason, collaborate, communicate, and navigate complexity in engineering contexts.
- Want research with practical implications.
- Are drawn to work that can influence courses, programs, assessment practices, student support systems, or broader educational policy and innovation.
- Value engineering expertise and also want to understand people, institutions, learning environments, and systems of change.
What kinds of training might be involved?
Exact pathways will vary, but strong preparation in engineering education research often includes more than one kind of expertise. Students may build depth in engineering content while also developing educational research knowledge, methodological fluency, and experience working across disciplinary boundaries.
Research and Methods Training
- Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods research
- Interviewing, survey design, measurement, and assessment
- Research design in authentic educational settings
- Theory use in engineering education and related fields
- Scholarly writing and dissemination in EER/DBER communities
Engineering-connected Preparation
- Deep engagement with engineering disciplinary contexts
- Understanding of design, labs, teamwork, and professional formation
- Experience with authentic student and faculty learning environments
- Connections to emerging issues such as AI, workforce development, and curricular change
- Interdisciplinary collaboration across research and practice
What professional development and career opportunities may be available?
A Ph.D. pathway in engineering education research should not be framed narrowly. Students may go on to academic careers, but the skills developed through this work can also open pathways across research, innovation, policy, and organizational change.
Professional Development
Professional development may include:
- Conference participation and scholarly publishing.
- Teaching and curriculum development experience.
- Assessment, measurement, and evaluation practice.
- Partnership-building across units, institutions, and communities.
- Experience translating research into resources, programs, or implementation efforts.
Career Paths
Career paths may include tenure-track faculty positions, research scientist roles, postdoctoral appointments, discipline-based education research positions, assessment and evaluation roles, educational innovation leadership, and research-informed teaching and learning positions in higher education.
They may also extend to industry, educational technology, nonprofits, philanthropy, government, and policy contexts where expertise in learning, assessment, organizational change, and workforce development is increasingly valuable.
Current Course Offerings
CHEME 6940 Discipline-Based Education Research Methods
This graduate-level course is designed to introduce students to discipline-based education research (DBER) methods. DBER is unique from other social science traditions as it is defined by its deep integration of disciplinary content and expert knowledge. The course will include a survey of qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches, as well as their assumptions, trade-offs, and limitations, and research applications in various disciplines. Students will learn to design and critique DBER studies aligned with quality standards. The course includes readings, discussions, and projects to apply learnings.
Outcomes
After completion of this course, students should be able to:
- Engage in professional and ethical design of discipline-based education research.
- Read, reflect on, and evaluate current discipline-based education research literature.
- Develop a repertoire of research methodologies used in discipline-based education research.
CHEME 6950/SYSEN 6950 Design for Learning: Bridging STEM Education Research and Practice
This is a 3-credit course intended for graduate students (and others) interested in developing their skills as educators, mentors, and advisors as part of their future careers in engineering or related fields. It includes discussion and practice of effective learning design techniques and assessments, an overview of current education research and discussions, an introduction to assets-based approaches to designing learning experiences and opportunities to practice design-based approaches to creating learning experiences.
Outcomes
After completion of this course, students should be able to:
- Articulate a philosophy of and approach to designing learning experiences.
- Reflect on and analyze instructional approaches to effectively design learning experiences and include diverse learner needs
- Reflect on and describe the attributes of effective learning experience design in engineering or closely related fields grounded in evidence from literature
- Interpret and connect current trends and literature in STEM education research to learning experience design
- Leverage educational design principles and learning theory to design and facilitate a learning experience
Frequently Asked Questions
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Do I need prior education research experience?
Not necessarily. Many strong students come from traditional engineering backgrounds and build education research expertise during graduate training.
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Is this more like teaching than research?
No. Teaching may be part of a student’s experience, but engineering education research is a scholarly field with its own literature, methods, conferences, and research questions.
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What departments currently offer engineering education research as an option?
At present, Cornell has embedded faculty working in engineering education research across several schools departments, including the Meinig School of Biomedical Engineering, the Robert Frederick Smith School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, the School of Operations Research and Information Engineering, and the Systems Engineering program.
If none of these departments seem like a natural fit for your technical background, we still encourage you to reach out. We may be able to help you think through other possibilities and identify the most appropriate academic home for your interests.
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What should I do if I want to learn more?
We encourage prospective students who are curious about engineering education research at Cornell to explore faculty lab pages and to reach out with questions. Faculty are often happy to meet over Zoom or in person before an application is submitted, especially when you are trying to understand whether this pathway is a good fit.
These conversations can help you learn more about current research projects, explore how your technical background might connect to this work, and get a clearer picture of graduate student life at Cornell and in Ithaca.
Contact Us
Email the Duffield Engineering Education Research Institute: