The Office of the Vice Provost for Graduate Education (VPGE) is launching a new program series, “Empowering Your Journey,” in the fall to enhance mentorship and professional development for doctoral students.

“Ultimately, we want to actively support the academic and scholarly well-being of our graduate students across the university,” said Vice President for Graduate Education and Postdoctoral Affairs Ken Goodson. “And we’ve learned that a great way to do this is to address specific pivotal moments during their time here at Stanford.”

First, the Thrive Program provides a supportive community for first-year PhD students through peer mentorship, curriculum, and professional development. Thrive emphasizes growth as a researcher, personal well-being, and career exploration. Fellows participate in workshops, faculty seminars, and cohort-based programs to ensure a smooth transition to their Stanford PhD journey.

Next, the Emerging Scholars Network is a three-quarter program for mid-stage PhD students who have advanced to candidacy, designed to support the transition from structured coursework to independent scholarship. The program helps students sustain research progress, navigate advisor relationships, and build the skills needed for timely degree completion and career success. It includes targeted workshops, guided advising, peer accountability and mutual support, and opportunities to connect with alumni and campus resources.

A third program, the Dissertation Completion Fellowship, will support final-year doctoral students with a structured, cohort-based experience that helps them progress toward graduation and career goals. The fellowship provides dissertation writing guidance, career opportunity exploration, and a three-quarter stipend, as well as terminal graduate registration (TGR) tuition, to outstanding doctoral candidates who commit to graduate by the end of the fellowship period.

“Completion of the dissertation can be a particularly challenging and stressful phase as our students are balancing multiple big life events simultaneously: completing the dissertation, preparing for a career transition, and considering how to balance both with their personal goals,” Goodson said.

The program series, he added, aims to smooth each of those transitions and help students move toward graduation and career goals with more support behind them.

Moments of transition

Last year, VPGE conducted a strategic planning exercise that gathered input from students, alumni, faculty, and staff on VPGE’s most important goals and contributions to the university community.

Drawing on this input, VPGE began developing programs to address graduate students’ needs. The effort included research into students’ wants, facilitated brainstorming, and a study of peer universities’ offerings.

“It was great to review this information and input and spend so much time thinking about the needs of our students, and the product was this series of programs that target specific critical moments in the doctoral student experience as they move towards their degrees,” Goodson said.

Associate Vice Provost for Graduate Education Chris Gonzalez Clarke is leading the Thrive Program with associate director Chad O. Coates. In designing Thrive, they collected input from students, faculty, staff, and alumni of previous VPGE programs.

One of the most valuable components of Thrive is peer mentorship, which can help new doctoral students navigate the expectations they face as PhD students, build their support networks, and more, Clarke said. Thrive fellows will be mentored by trained senior PhD students who will typically be in their same departments, as well as by alumni.

“This is a profound moment of transition, uncertainty, and something that can undermine people’s sense of belonging,” Clarke said. “Having a student who’s just been there maybe one or two years ago to reflect on that experience can be very powerful.”

Approximately 150 students are expected to participate in Thrive’s inaugural year. Incoming first-year students can self-nominate to Thrive, which Clarke said is expected to help the program grow and increase accessibility.

Thrive will include regular workshops on subjects such as grant writing and project management. There will also be university-wide social opportunities to help people expand their circles and support interdisciplinary work. “Grad students want to build a broader identity than their lab or research groups,” Clarke said. “We’re thinking intentionally about how we support students’ desire to really build community with other students across the university.”

Goodson noted that these shared experiences and mutual accountability among students can be incredibly effective in supporting their academic success. After the program series launches in the fall, VPGE will solicit feedback from participants, faculty advisors, and staff to better understand what works well and where to make improvements as needed.

“Ultimately, all of these programs aim to help students move more fluidly towards completion of their degrees, and to increase their learning and enjoyment along the way,” Goodson said. “For the long term, we will be trying to understand whether we are helping our students reduce the time it is taking them to complete their degrees.”

VPGE is already working with schools and departments across the university on Thrive and the Dissertation Completion Fellowship. For Thrive, VPGE will reach out to admitted doctoral students in the coming weeks with application and program information. For the Dissertation Completion Fellowships, VPGE has already launched a nomination process for schools, each of which has its own processes for faculty and departments to nominate candidates.

Applications for the Emerging Scholars Network open April 1, and applications for Thrive open April 27. Visit the Empowering Your Journey page for more information.