What Role Should Advisers Play in Leaving?

I stumbled across this great article about advising grad students who won't finish.  In it, Cassuto (2010) argues that faculty should do a better job talking to students about the possibility that they might not want to finish.  The academy needs to make clear to students that leaving is an option, and one that shouldn't be shameful. He writes:

"Not every graduate student will finish a dissertation. We know that truth to be self-evident. Nor should every graduate student finish. Some would be better off doing other things with their lives. Others simply can't complete the project."

My adviser and I have never discussed my leaving as a real possibility. I told her last spring that I was offered a job, and decided to turn it down, but only after I spent weeks interviewing, discussing details, and ruminating over my options.  As I've posted, I have had several breakdowns in which I openly question whether I should stay.  Despite all of this talk, we've never had a conversation about whether I should.

I'm not sure such a conversation would be helpful.  A relationship with an adviser is by definition unequal in power.  Graduate students are already insecure in their role as an apprentice, it would be hard to take discussions of leaving as anything other than an adviser signalling that they no longer believe in their student.  When I first was admitted to my department, the graduate adviser challenged me after a long admit weekend on whether I should even come to the program. I can't recall the exact language he used, but it was shocking at the time when he said he didn't see me here, and had a hard time seeing how I fit.  The fact that he questioned whether I even wanted this might have been prescient, but I wasn't ready to hear it.  It made me work harder, to prove him wrong.

Instead, the emphasis needs to be on what graduate students hope to get out of life, and whether graduate school and the Ph.D. will move them toward that.  This is what Cassuto (2010) means when he suggests advising the student and not just the dissertation.  We all need to do a better job trying to see the big picture.