Accordingly, it is advantageous to use research experience as a means of achieving and maintaining high technical value and relevance. Ph.D.- granting institutions that graduate very small numbers of Ph.D. students every year. This lack of a research tradition is an example of a problem that Ph.D.-granting institutions do not have, but that manifests itself, for example, in evaluating faculty for promotion at NPhD schools. The issues covered here are also generally applicable to universities that have recently established Ph.D. programs. Chief among these is the substantial teaching load that is characteristic of NPhD institutions.
Teaching is a time-consuming activity.
This is a critical problem for ECSE faculty, given the large investment of time and intellectual resources required to create or experiment with an artifact. No school can, in fairness, expect significant research from ECSE faculty in the presence of extensive teaching obligations. As noted in Chapter 2, Ph.D. graduate students are essential to creating artifacts, the medium in which ECSE research is conducted. By definition, there are no doctoral students at NPhD schools. The alternative is to engage advanced undergraduates and master's degree students in constructing artifacts, but the nature of their participation will differ from that of doctoral students.