Kelly Jordan-Sciutto on advancing graduate education through Penn Forward

Tell me about your journey to Penn.

Doing my Ph.D. and researching neurodegenerative disorders, I realized I loved graduate education. It was a faculty member who changed my life, so I wanted to create that for the next generation. When I came to Penn in 2001, I got very involved in graduate education, from both a Faculty Senate role and working in various graduate group roles, and those aligned with my interest in increasing access to education. I was especially interested in enhancing access to graduate education for people who would traditionally not consider careers in STEM. 

Next thing I knew, I was directing the graduate program in biomedical graduate studies and about six months ago someone said, ‘Hey, you should think about applying for this role [as a vice provost for education],’ which aligned with my experiences, my interests, and what I hope to bring to Penn.

It’s interesting that you and [Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education] Russell Composto are both first-gen college students. Do you think that informs your work?

My dad was in a rock-and-roll band as his career, and my mom was a hairdresser. That was the world I understood, and you’ll notice I did not pick either of those as a career. I was fortunate that my mom believed education would change the world and she wanted me to have that access. She was very adamant that I think about going to college even when many of my peers around me weren’t. 

So, when I look at education, the first thing I think of is, ‘What are the systems and structures here, and what and who do they support, and what would I have thought when I walked into this path?’ I think first-gen students today are way more savvy than I was. It is important that I talk to our current students and learn about their experiences and needs, which serve as a touchstone for designing what’s next for graduate education. 

Education seems like a driving force for you.

Yeah, it was huge.

You’re leading this Penn Forward working group. How would you describe the charge of the group? What is the group aiming to do?

It’s about what graduate education needs to be in 2035 to be at the cutting edge. What can Penn do now to be the best place for graduate education in 2035? We’re looking at what we’re doing well, and what we need to rethink.

Of course, an important component of what we do is holding to our rigorous standards. But the question remains, what does teaching to those standards look like in today’s world? The information economy has changed significantly. Information is free, right? What [is graduate education] offering, whether it’s someone in a master’s program or someone who spends years in a Ph.D. program? I would argue what we offer, in some ways, continues to be the same: It’s a way of thinking, a way of approaching and solving a problem, and most importantly a way of generating new knowledge. We really want our students to come out of here able to generate new knowledge and advance it further. I think this generation has what I’d call an ‘information burden,’ in that there’s tons of information, but how do you know what you need to know in your discipline and what is not relevant? 

We need to streamline the process that establishes foundational knowledge so the student can take things forward from there. I think of it as, ‘They don’t need to climb the mountains our generation has already climbed. They need to climb their own mountains.’ How do we get them to that point most efficiently and prepare them with the cutting-edge tools to make the next big advances in understanding their field?

What is the mix of people in your working group?

Our working group is interesting because graduate education is really heterogenous here. We have master’s students who are in research programs, master’s students who are in professional master’s programs, we have Ph.D. programs that span everything from arts & humanities to natural sciences, and then we have all the professional degrees. I have faculty and staff in the working group representing all those areas.

Critically, there are also graduate students in the working group. We went to our student leadership to recommend folks, and we looked for students who had cross-school or cross-degree experiences, to be able to cover these different constituencies.

Something that helps our medical students be the most successful doctors may also be valuable for someone who is studying to be an artist and vice versa. So we thought having people on this group with varying approaches and perspectives would be valuable. This group has provided a really good community-wide perspective on next steps.

Has the discussion gotten to a place where the ideas feel coherent and there is a common thread to serve this large group?

There are definitely a few common threads that have come out. No matter which of the various projects we decide to coalesce around for Penn Forward, there are great ideas that can be transferred to other areas that I think will be valuable to our students writ large.

What do you think Penn already does exceptionally well with graduate studies?

We have incredibly eminent scholars who are training the next generation of eminent scholars, so that’s one thing we do really well.

Interdisciplinarity is our superpower. You can come to Penn thinking, ‘I’m going to work in this area’ and be able to add other pieces into the mix that make what you’re doing unique and unlike any experience you can get elsewhere. If you come in with one specific focus, and you know you need something else for your career to be successful, we’re good at creating interdisciplinary opportunities. I think it will be important to leverage this strength of our community and find new tools, structures and paradigms to facilitate this.

Where are you in this process now, for the working group?

We are through the ideation phase, and we’ve now focused on a handful of ideas to make more robust, to decide which we might propose moving forward with.

What excites you about Penn Forward?

I’m always energized. I came to this role because I want to make graduate education a positive, life-changing experience for our students. I don’t want students to walk uphill both ways in the snow just because I had to. I want them to have, and be prepared for, their own challenges. The challenges for them are totally different, but just as daunting, and I want to prepare them to face them and continue to build our knowledge and understanding of the many facets of our world and even our universe. I’m energized by the idea that Penn Forward is going to deliver the best tools and practices to approach that.