Doctoral Student Resources

Please visit the Trident Tuition and Financial Aid information for more detaisl.

To date, Trident University does not offer scholarships or fellowships for doctoral students. However, we have written recommendations for students supporting scholarships or fellowships that may apply to doctoral studies.

The Ed.D. program is designed for educational professionals who work in non-traditional educational settings and aspire to lead complex learning organizations. The content and expectations focus on knowledge skills and dispositions needed by practicing leaders to foster and sustain conditions within organizations that support continuous improvement.

The Ph.D. program is designed to help students prepare to become researchers, scholars, and professors. Students will work to acquire skills to ethically address the complex problems within educational practice using data-driven decision-making and other theoretical frames linking systematic inquiry with innovative, research-based solutions.

The Ed.D. and Ph.D. EL are generally designed to help students prepare to pursue academic career paths, either in leadership positions or research or both. The Ed.D. degree is based on research in addition to its application in professional practice and is designed to provide an alternative to traditional research-based Ph.D. programs. The Ed.D. program is designed for practicing professionals, who already have established themselves as leaders in their field. The Ed.D. program emphasizes the completion of research that is practitioner-oriented. Students work to develop skills needed to lead and implement improvements at their work site through the application of their findings. The Ph.D. program emphasizes the development of educational theory through research designed to generate new, or reformulates existing, knowledge. It is a traditional research-based degree, to help students establish themselves as leaders in the field of education.

The DBA and Ph.D. BA are generally designed to help students prepare for academic career paths, either in teaching or research or both. Both entail rigorous courses of study with a heavy emphasis on research. The main difference between the two degree programs is the DBA focuses on the application of theory and the Ph.D. BA focuses on the development of new theory in business fields.

The DHA program is designed to help healthcare leaders prepare to critically evaluate research and the political, social, and legal climates in which healthcare functions. In turn, they can use this information to help lead ethically, socially, and culturally responsible organizations that are responsive to market and regulatory demands while serving diverse stakeholders.

The Ph.D. HS program is designed to provide information and skills needed to construct and conduct independent scientific investigation for dissertation. The program encourages and guides students toward discovery and innovation to expand and improve the knowledge of students’ professional interests, which requires vigorous literature review of current knowns and developments in the area of interest.

All Ed.D. and DBA students will complete a doctoral study.  The completed study is published at ProQuest.

Trident highly recommends that you publish your Ph.D. dissertation in peer-reviewed journals and/or conferences; although you are not required to. Sometimes there are cases where students want to publish their work but due to propriety issues they are not allowed to. While these cases are relatively rare, we recommend that you find out if there are any limitations on publication once you start your research.

Trident University International Career Services Center provides assistance in career planning, job search, self-assessment, and career transition assistance to enable our diverse student body to employ the skills and knowledge gained through the education experience at Trident.

1. Trident programs are 100% online and do not require residency. Most of our students are full-time working professionals who need flexibility to work on their doctoral degree simultaneously.
2. Trident University International is a member of the American InterContinental University System. The System is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission (hlcommission.org), an institutional accreditation agency recognized by the U.S. Department of Education.
3. We are proud of our faculty. We select qualified, devoted professors to offer quality educational programs. Our students' success is of the utmost importance, which is why we strive to provide compassionate commitment and academic excellence.
4. We provide personalized support. Students are aligned with a doctoral faculty member who can provide personalized guidance during the research phase of the program.
5. We have an extensive collection of resources available for research. Our virtual library allows access to a large variety of journals, website links, electronic books and several business targeted databases.