I learned this core strategy from my major professor who worked very hard to provide me timely and constructive feedback on all aspects of my scholarly works. As a scholar of educational research, we know that feedback must be timely to have a stronger and more durable effect on learning outcomes. Early in the mentoring process, I explain to my doctoral students that I want to have open and candid conversations about their work without them thinking I am criticizing them personally. I explain that my feedback on their writing, research methods, idea development, and more are to expand their thinking and positively guide them to approach perfection in their scholarship. While no scholarship is perfect, this type of relationship and feedback is essential to have scholarly dialog. As my major professor would say, “you need a thick skin in this business,” speaking to the constructive feedback that is common in scholarly dialog and publishing in our profession.

I strongly believe that my role as a scholar in the field of Educational Technology is to be skeptical of ideas, innovations, and technologies in a respectful way. Over the years, we have heard many say that “X” is going to revolutionize education. I encourage my students to question everything about what they hear, read, and see, including peer-reviewed research. I also encourage my students to approach scholarship with a sense of humility. I often share the story with my doctoral students that I started my doctoral studies to learn everything we know about what works in education, but quickly discovered I learned more about what we do not know. I believe that my doctoral students should all exercise a healthy dose of skepticism, and also approach theory and research with a strong sense of humility.

One thing that really helped me become a better scholar was my major professor providing me real-world research opportunities early in my doctoral experience. I have found this strategy to be helpful in many ways. First, providing these experiences early helps the students see the connections to their coursework. Second, starting research early provides them opportunities to publish and present their works to get more feedback from others in the profession and to make real contributions. Third, as someone who has served on several search committees as a chair, I know that our students need tangible outcomes (e.g., peer-reviewed publications) on their curriculum vitae prior to graduation to get employed in this labor market. Finally, I found that if I start them early in the research process, they are more capable and independent when they move into the dissertation writing stage, which makes their life and my life easier during their doctoral journey. I am proud to report that more than 70% of my peer-reviewed publications in the past five years are with my doctoral students.

Later in my academic career, I discovered that it is helpful to group my novice doctoral students with my more experienced doctoral students to work together on research projects. Analogous to a Montessori school, my more experienced students provide additional guidance and support for my novice students, which results in my more experienced students having mentorship skills (a key skill for academics) and my more novice students learning the profession quicker. Earlier in my career, I would initiate research projects with my doctoral students one-on-one, which sometimes resulted in me being overwhelmed with research projects during those busy academic semesters. Later, when I started working as a Program Coordinator and Associate Director for the School, I started to create a small set of research projects that emerged from the cross-pollination of ideas from my current doctoral students. I found this strategy to be more manageable and also more effective since several of my doctoral students would work together collaboratively, another key skill for emerging scholars.

All of my doctoral students have my cell phone number, and likewise, I have all of my doctoral students’ cell phone numbers. We have a culture of communication in my research group in which they are comfortable with me calling to discuss matters and they are comfortable calling me. None of my students have ever abused this open communication channel, and we are always respectful of each other. Further, I have started meeting with my whole research lab weekly in meetings to set goals for the week, which are now facilitated in Zoom due to the COVID pandemic. During these meetings, we discuss our accomplishments from the previous week and our goals for the subsequent week. This process is inspired by the notion of “Management by Objective” in which the doctoral students set their goals and self-evaluate their progress. We also use these meetings to invite guest speakers on a range of relevant topics (e.g., NSF grants) or we have discussions about common readings or projects. I found this strategy to be essential right now since our students are isolated and we have no face-to-face interactions.

I have been criticized by some of my colleagues for this, but I do not require and actually encourage my doctoral students to call me by my first name. I do this because I believe my doctoral students are not just students, they are my future colleagues in which we must have respect for each other. While some still insist on calling me Dr. Ritzhaupt, I explain to them early on that this process is different than a typical teacher-student relationship. This relationship is built on mutual respect, trust, and humility. My ultimate goal is for my doctoral students to become my future colleagues and carry on excellence in all of our work.