Advising students on grad school?

[Puget]

And I suspect that there are other fields with a similar, or narrower, spread. I wish I had saved it, can't find it now, but a few years ago there was an article in my disciplinary association's top journal that documented the same phenomenon using degree completion and placement data. N was a few hundred.

Here's the peer-reviewed article on this research: https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/1/1/e1400005

Abstract:
The faculty job market plays a fundamental role in shaping research priorities, educational outcomes, and career trajectories among scientists and institutions. However, a quantitative understanding of faculty hiring as a system is lacking. Using a simple technique to extract the institutional prestige ranking that best explains an observed faculty hiring network—who hires whose graduates as faculty—we present and analyze comprehensive placement data on nearly 19,000 regular faculty in three disparate disciplines. Across disciplines, we find that faculty hiring follows a common and steeply hierarchical structure that reflects profound social inequality. Furthermore, doctoral prestige alone better predicts ultimate placement than a U.S. News & World Report rank, women generally place worse than men, and increased institutional prestige leads to increased faculty production, better faculty placement, and a more influential position within the discipline. These results advance our ability to quantify the influence of prestige in academia and shed new light on the academic system.

Here's an overview from Slate:
https://slate.com/human-interest/2015/02/university-hiring-if-you-didn-t-get-your-ph-d-at-an-elite-university-good-luck-finding-an-academic-job.html

I would be careful with inferring that this means hiring decisions are driven by institutional prestige just because hiring committees are snooty (or aspirational). That certainly could be, and probably likely is part of the reason. But there may also be effects from student selection (the best students go to the best programs) and student productivity (the best programs enable students to built the best CVs as grad students). This is what is known as the "third variable problem" in correlational research-- there could be a third variable that causes both your predictor and outcome, rather than your predictor causing your outcome.

[Hibush]

And I suspect that there are other fields with a similar, or narrower, spread. I wish I had saved it, can't find it now, but a few years ago there was an article in my disciplinary association's top journal that documented the same phenomenon using degree completion and placement data. N was a few hundred.

Here's the peer-reviewed article on this research: https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/1/1/e1400005

Abstract:
The faculty job market plays a fundamental role in shaping research priorities, educational outcomes, and career trajectories among scientists and institutions. However, a quantitative understanding of faculty hiring as a system is lacking. Using a simple technique to extract the institutional prestige ranking that best explains an observed faculty hiring network—who hires whose graduates as faculty—we present and analyze comprehensive placement data on nearly 19,000 regular faculty in three disparate disciplines. Across disciplines, we find that faculty hiring follows a common and steeply hierarchical structure that reflects profound social inequality. Furthermore, doctoral prestige alone better predicts ultimate placement than a U.S. News & World Report rank, women generally place worse than men, and increased institutional prestige leads to increased faculty production, better faculty placement, and a more influential position within the discipline. These results advance our ability to quantify the influence of prestige in academia and shed new light on the academic system.

Here's an overview from Slate:
https://slate.com/human-interest/2015/02/university-hiring-if-you-didn-t-get-your-ph-d-at-an-elite-university-good-luck-finding-an-academic-job.html

Thanks for that link. It shows that history is the most elitist, with business being the egalitarian of the three. Or would you chose different words to desribe the variation in spread and mobility.

[Caracal]

Furthermore, doctoral prestige alone better predicts ultimate placement than a U.S. News & World Report rank

Not disagreeing with the rest, but this part doesn't really make much sense to me. Subjective judgements certainly leave lots of room for bias, but does anybody actually put any stock in those rankings for grad schools? I've never heard anyone mention them in my field.

[Wahoo Redux]

Furthermore, doctoral prestige alone better predicts ultimate placement than a U.S. News & World Report rank

Not disagreeing with the rest, but this part doesn't really make much sense to me. Subjective judgements certainly leave lots of room for bias, but does anybody actually put any stock in those rankings for grad schools? I've never heard anyone mention them in my field.

I think the US News rankings simply reflect what we already know and think.

[hmaria1609]

I looked at "US News & World Report" about library science programs when I was applying in the mid-2000s. (I went to grad school after college) There are schools that rank high consistently but I don't believe it's a deal breaker for applying for jobs.

[Parasaurolophus]

Furthermore, doctoral prestige alone better predicts ultimate placement than a U.S. News & World Report rank

Not disagreeing with the rest, but this part doesn't really make much sense to me. Subjective judgements certainly leave lots of room for bias, but does anybody actually put any stock in those rankings for grad schools? I've never heard anyone mention them in my field.

They're a bad joke in philosophy, although not as bad as in the past. We have our own official(ish) rankings, and although they're problematic in many ways, they're at least a decent guide to the discipline, especially in the US and for individual specialities.

That said, placement in our field is entirely consistent with that article. Plus, just three schools account for something like 25%-33% of all faculty at ranked PhD-granting institutions. (Getting to 50% takes a much larger pool of schools, however, because there are a  series of steep declines in the numbers.) =/

[Puget]

That said, placement in our field is entirely consistent with that article. Plus, just three schools account for something like 25%-33% of all faculty at ranked PhD-granting institutions. (Getting to 50% takes a much larger pool of schools, however, because there are a  series of steep declines in the numbers.) =/

I'd be interested in seeing this data for psychology-- my perception is that it is MUCH more spread out than that, and also that we care a lot more about lab than program. Also, top programs have very little correspondence with overall institutional "prestige" (i.e., lots of pubic R1s have very good programs, and some of the Ivies are not considered to have particularly good programs). One factor that may spread it out more is that there is a lot to go on besides program, since students are expected to have a productive track record of publications through grad school and almost always a postdoc. The most competitive candidates for R1 positions will have also had pre and or postdoctoral research fellowships (NIH or NSF). So we can judge research track record and potential directly, without relying on program prestige as an indicator.

[secundem_artem]

I'm not a PhD but in one of those "professional" doctorate fields.  Of the ~ 140 programs US Snooz lists, I graduated from a program ranked in the mid 70's and washed up at Artem U which is ranked in the mid 40's.    That said, I would hazard a guess those rankings were very different when I graduated and went on the market.
So gawd only knows what is considered prestige in my field.

I've spoken to colleagues at Artem U in the humanities who tell me the job market is so awful, and the number of applicants so high, that just cherry picking the Harvard, Stanford, Chicago types is easier than reviewing 300 applications from The University of Southern North Dakota at Hoople.

[traductio]

I've spoken to colleagues at Artem U in the humanities who tell me the job market is so awful, and the number of applicants so high, that just cherry picking the Harvard, Stanford, Chicago types is easier than reviewing 300 applications from The University of Southern North Dakota at Hoople.

Unless, of course, their PhD is in music, and their supervisor was Peter Schickele.

[Wahoo Redux]

I've spoken to colleagues at Artem U in the humanities who tell me the job market is so awful, and the number of applicants so high, that just cherry picking the Harvard, Stanford, Chicago types is easier than reviewing 300 applications from The University of Southern North Dakota at Hoople.

Unless, of course, their PhD is in music, and their supervisor was Peter Schickele.

Or a PhD in quirky comedy.

[bio-nonymous]

One snippet of wisdom I heard at a postdoc association meeting that I went to a few years ago was that there were 7 postdocs for every available tenure track position (no delineation between R1, R2, research focused vs. teaching focus, etc.). Those are tough odds. It takes normally a few years (3-5) in a postdoc to become competitive with enough quality publications, and hopefully grant money, to even have your CV looked at by a search committee; with the huge pool of appliciants credential inflation is rampant. Those years are spent with 60-70 hour work weeks full of desperation, knowing that your time could be up if you don't get a K99 or F32 to keep paying yourself. The endless postdoc cycle is Biomed's version of the adjunct crisis on steroids, because if you don't find a job within 5 years (the cutoff now for many institutions) you can no longer be employed as a postdoc--go find something else to do with you life. Regardless of what some say, industry can only absorb so many people, and often only those with a narrow set of skills and focus that not everyone gets--so that is not some magic bullet solution. The currency for future employment in Biomed as a professor is grant money and (to a slightly lesser extent) publications--even so, without impeccable credentials from mentors with stellar reputations at the top schools, some Nature papers and a K99, all of your effort as a postdoc and PhD student may come down to the blind luck of being the right person for the right job at the right moment. This is the reality that people considering grad school in the life sciences with the thought of entering academia should be told before they take the plunge. Know that blind luck may decide your fate because everyone works hard, everyone is super smart, everyone has lots of great publications, etc.-->being fantastic at your job is not enough!

[mamselle]

In a way, the post-doc structure extends the "adolescent" phase of pre-professional life for the science world in a form that the humanities infrequently aspire to.

Having seen both up close, I suppose each has its values but each also has its downsides.

Humanities scholars are left to "sink or swim" sooner, so perhaps the agony is less protracted; perhaps the angst is attenuated in other ways, though.

Hmmm....

M.

[Caracal]

In a way, the post-doc structure extends the "adolescent" phase of pre-professional life for the science world in a form that the humanities infrequently aspire to.

Having seen both up close, I suppose each has its values but each also has its downsides.

Humanities scholars are left to "sink or swim" sooner, so perhaps the agony is less protracted; perhaps the angst is attenuated in other ways, though.

Hmmm....

M.

Increasingly visitor positions fulfill the same roll, however. On one hand, these do pay better than adjuncting, and they are a better path to a long term position, but there are no guarantees.

[mamselle]

That's true, the VAP provides a transitional phase in a way, but it doesn't usually help as much with research progress or job preparation.

M.

[apl68]

I looked at "US News & World Report" about library science programs when I was applying in the mid-2000s. (I went to grad school after college) There are schools that rank high consistently but I don't believe it's a deal breaker for applying for jobs.

Yes, it matters less where the degree comes from than whether one has an accredited degree in the first place.  In our state there are no MLS programs.  Most degree-holding librarians here gotten into library work first and THEN got their degree via distance education with a program in a neighboring state.  Which program doesn't matter one bit, as long as it's accredited. 

I and many other librarians around the state earned our degrees while on the job with the help of scholarships from the State Library.  It's a wonderful program.  You still have to take the first couple of semesters at your own expense, to prove you're serious about it.