Canadian Report on the Labour Market Transition of PhD Graduates

[marshwiggle]

I can see having a faculty where all are teaching, but a specialized subset is producing top PhDs in an area for which they are famous. That provides enough activity to be in the game, but a low overall reproduction rate. It has potential. How much would faculty feel like they had a two-tier system, one tier teaching undergraduates and some graduate students, but not training graduate students?

Socially that seems pretty good also, so many schools are recognized as training excellent PhDs, but in different subfields. There is not so much stratification among schools. Fewer comprehensive schools though. Would Toronto willingly give up epistemology training in order to spread the wealth?

That still ignores whether the number of graduates in that subfield are likely to get jobs.

That said, it is wholly reasonable for professional organizations to play hardball with PhD granting depts, restricting or ultimately removing accreditation from those depts that do not have a reasonable record of putting their new grads into tt jobs.

This sounds like a good idea, but I imagine few professional organizations having the guts to do this.

[Kron3007]

I can see having a faculty where all are teaching, but a specialized subset is producing top PhDs in an area for which they are famous. That provides enough activity to be in the game, but a low overall reproduction rate. It has potential. How much would faculty feel like they had a two-tier system, one tier teaching undergraduates and some graduate students, but not training graduate students?

Socially that seems pretty good also, so many schools are recognized as training excellent PhDs, but in different subfields. There is not so much stratification among schools. Fewer comprehensive schools though. Would Toronto willingly give up epistemology training in order to spread the wealth?

That still ignores whether the number of graduates in that subfield are likely to get jobs.

That said, it is wholly reasonable for professional organizations to play hardball with PhD granting depts, restricting or ultimately removing accreditation from those depts that do not have a reasonable record of putting their new grads into tt jobs.

This sounds like a good idea, but I imagine few professional organizations having the guts to do this.

That would make sense if we were talking about vocational training, but we are not.  A PhD is not meant to train you to be a TT professor.  If it is, it is structured all wrong... 

[Hibush]

I can see having a faculty where all are teaching, but a specialized subset is producing top PhDs in an area for which they are famous. That provides enough activity to be in the game, but a low overall reproduction rate. It has potential. How much would faculty feel like they had a two-tier system, one tier teaching undergraduates and some graduate students, but not training graduate students?

Socially that seems pretty good also, so many schools are recognized as training excellent PhDs, but in different subfields. There is not so much stratification among schools. Fewer comprehensive schools though. Would Toronto willingly give up epistemology training in order to spread the wealth?

That still ignores whether the number of graduates in that subfield are likely to get jobs.

It does not ignore it, but doesn't lock the two parameters. Still, lets say you have 10 subfields, and only 10% of the graduate programs in the field are producing PhDs in the subfield, the oversupply will be cut a lot. Presumably those programs would also be more selective.

[marshwiggle]

That still ignores whether the number of graduates in that subfield are likely to get jobs.

That said, it is wholly reasonable for professional organizations to play hardball with PhD granting depts, restricting or ultimately removing accreditation from those depts that do not have a reasonable record of putting their new grads into tt jobs.

This sounds like a good idea, but I imagine few professional organizations having the guts to do this.

That would make sense if we were talking about vocational training, but we are not.  A PhD is not meant to train you to be a TT professor.  If it is, it is structured all wrong...

The fact that so many graduates of those programs are disappointed with their vocational prospects after graduation means that they believe it was supposed to be job training.

[Kron3007]

That still ignores whether the number of graduates in that subfield are likely to get jobs.

That said, it is wholly reasonable for professional organizations to play hardball with PhD granting depts, restricting or ultimately removing accreditation from those depts that do not have a reasonable record of putting their new grads into tt jobs.

This sounds like a good idea, but I imagine few professional organizations having the guts to do this.

That would make sense if we were talking about vocational training, but we are not.  A PhD is not meant to train you to be a TT professor.  If it is, it is structured all wrong...

The fact that so many graduates of those programs are disappointed with their vocational prospects after graduation means that they believe it was supposed to be job training.

Then is the answer to change the whole system, or make sure potential students are better informed about job prospects?

Would you join a baseball camp expecting to become a professional baseball player?  Should they limit admission to the number of people who will become professional players?  Or should people recognize that they will likely not become professional players and only participate in the camp if they enjoy the game?   

[marshwiggle]

That would make sense if we were talking about vocational training, but we are not.  A PhD is not meant to train you to be a TT professor.  If it is, it is structured all wrong...

The fact that so many graduates of those programs are disappointed with their vocational prospects after graduation means that they believe it was supposed to be job training.

Then is the answer to change the whole system, or make sure potential students are better informed about job prospects?

Would you join a baseball camp expecting to become a professional baseball player?  Should they limit admission to the number of people who will become professional players?  Or should people recognize that they will likely not become professional players and only participate in the camp if they enjoy the game?

If this problem were equally distributed across disciplines, we wouldn't be having this conversation, OR it would be very different. The glaring fact that it is much more common in certain disciplines indicates that some disciplines are much worse than others at either giving students the "job training" they need OR making it clear to them what their expectations ought to be post-graduation so they aren't disillusioned. Either one would be reasonable, but doing neither is irresponsible.

[Caracal]

That still ignores whether the number of graduates in that subfield are likely to get jobs.

That said, it is wholly reasonable for professional organizations to play hardball with PhD granting depts, restricting or ultimately removing accreditation from those depts that do not have a reasonable record of putting their new grads into tt jobs.

This sounds like a good idea, but I imagine few professional organizations having the guts to do this.

That would make sense if we were talking about vocational training, but we are not.  A PhD is not meant to train you to be a TT professor.  If it is, it is structured all wrong...

The fact that so many graduates of those programs are disappointed with their vocational prospects after graduation means that they believe it was supposed to be job training.

Then is the answer to change the whole system, or make sure potential students are better informed about job prospects?

Would you join a baseball camp expecting to become a professional baseball player?  Should they limit admission to the number of people who will become professional players?  Or should people recognize that they will likely not become professional players and only participate in the camp if they enjoy the game?

The better parallel is minor league baseball. I assume the vast majority of people who sign a minor league contract hope to play in the majors. The pay is pretty crummy unless you are an elite prospect (the average salary for a AAA player is about what my stipend was 15 years ago) The average grad student in the humanities has a much better chance of getting a tenure track job than the average minor leaguer does of getting to the majors, however.

[Caracal]

That would make sense if we were talking about vocational training, but we are not.  A PhD is not meant to train you to be a TT professor.  If it is, it is structured all wrong...

The fact that so many graduates of those programs are disappointed with their vocational prospects after graduation means that they believe it was supposed to be job training.

Then is the answer to change the whole system, or make sure potential students are better informed about job prospects?

Would you join a baseball camp expecting to become a professional baseball player?  Should they limit admission to the number of people who will become professional players?  Or should people recognize that they will likely not become professional players and only participate in the camp if they enjoy the game?

If this problem were equally distributed across disciplines, we wouldn't be having this conversation, OR it would be very different. The glaring fact that it is much more common in certain disciplines indicates that some disciplines are much worse than others at either giving students the "job training" they need OR making it clear to them what their expectations ought to be post-graduation so they aren't disillusioned. Either one would be reasonable, but doing neither is irresponsible.

I can only speak based on my own experience, but in my grad program most of us were acutely aware of the realities of the job market, as were our advisors. My program had a decent placement rate, but we all talked a lot about the difficulties of the market and the reality that we might not get tenure track jobs.

[marshwiggle]

That would make sense if we were talking about vocational training, but we are not.  A PhD is not meant to train you to be a TT professor.  If it is, it is structured all wrong...

The fact that so many graduates of those programs are disappointed with their vocational prospects after graduation means that they believe it was supposed to be job training.

Then is the answer to change the whole system, or make sure potential students are better informed about job prospects?

Would you join a baseball camp expecting to become a professional baseball player?  Should they limit admission to the number of people who will become professional players?  Or should people recognize that they will likely not become professional players and only participate in the camp if they enjoy the game?

If this problem were equally distributed across disciplines, we wouldn't be having this conversation, OR it would be very different. The glaring fact that it is much more common in certain disciplines indicates that some disciplines are much worse than others at either giving students the "job training" they need OR making it clear to them what their expectations ought to be post-graduation so they aren't disillusioned. Either one would be reasonable, but doing neither is irresponsible.

I can only speak based on my own experience, but in my grad program most of us were acutely aware of the realities of the job market, as were our advisors. My program had a decent placement rate, but we all talked a lot about the difficulties of the market and the reality that we might not get tenure track jobs.

How many applicants do you think you'd get if you sent them this:

The better parallel is minor league baseball. I assume the vast majority of people who sign a minor league contract hope to play in the majors. The pay is pretty crummy unless you are an elite prospect (the average salary for a AAA player is about what my stipend was 15 years ago) The average grad student in the humanities has a much better chance of getting a tenure track job than the average minor leaguer does of getting to the majors, however.

I think that comparison would give many people pause who right now would naively optimistically forge ahead.

[apl68]

That would make sense if we were talking about vocational training, but we are not.  A PhD is not meant to train you to be a TT professor.  If it is, it is structured all wrong...

The fact that so many graduates of those programs are disappointed with their vocational prospects after graduation means that they believe it was supposed to be job training.

Then is the answer to change the whole system, or make sure potential students are better informed about job prospects?

Would you join a baseball camp expecting to become a professional baseball player?  Should they limit admission to the number of people who will become professional players?  Or should people recognize that they will likely not become professional players and only participate in the camp if they enjoy the game?

If this problem were equally distributed across disciplines, we wouldn't be having this conversation, OR it would be very different. The glaring fact that it is much more common in certain disciplines indicates that some disciplines are much worse than others at either giving students the "job training" they need OR making it clear to them what their expectations ought to be post-graduation so they aren't disillusioned. Either one would be reasonable, but doing neither is irresponsible.

I can only speak based on my own experience, but in my grad program most of us were acutely aware of the realities of the job market, as were our advisors. My program had a decent placement rate, but we all talked a lot about the difficulties of the market and the reality that we might not get tenure track jobs.

Not the case for many of us as recently as the early 1990s.  It's surely much less that way now.  I'd like to think that the affected disciplines are in the process of making the various necessary adjustments, and that most of the complaining we've hearing has been people for whom it's already too late.

[Stockmann]

Then is the answer to change the whole system, or make sure potential students are better informed about job prospects?

Would you join a baseball camp expecting to become a professional baseball player?  Should they limit admission to the number of people who will become professional players?  Or should people recognize that they will likely not become professional players and only participate in the camp if they enjoy the game?

The costs, not least the opportunity cost for the student, is rather different in both cases. So, in your view, the PhD is basically a program for aristocrats who don't have to worry about job prospects and can spend years on a program that doesn't help prepare you for a job? Should only retirees and the independently wealthy apply?

[Kron3007]

Then is the answer to change the whole system, or make sure potential students are better informed about job prospects?

Would you join a baseball camp expecting to become a professional baseball player?  Should they limit admission to the number of people who will become professional players?  Or should people recognize that they will likely not become professional players and only participate in the camp if they enjoy the game?

The costs, not least the opportunity cost for the student, is rather different in both cases. So, in your view, the PhD is basically a program for aristocrats who don't have to worry about job prospects and can spend years on a program that doesn't help prepare you for a job? Should only retirees and the independently wealthy apply?

Well, I have to agree that Caracal's suggestion of minor league players is a much better analogy and is in many ways similar, with people spending years on it when most will never become professionals. 

I think this is very similar.  Ultimately, you need to calculate the costs/benefits of any decision and make it accordingly.  The information is all out there, and it should not be news to anyone.  If you want to spend years studying an obscure poet, that's great, but you need to decide if that is a wise decision recognizing that you are unlikely to make a career out of it.   


 

[Stockmann]

It's not just about the decisions that prospective students make, though - if it's an "aristocratic" degree, then should the taxpayer contribute to fund it in any way? This would include indirect funding, such as studentships from grants from publicly funded bodies, or tuition discounts at public universities. To use the same analogy, should minor league be taxpayer-subsidized?

[Kron3007]

It's not just about the decisions that prospective students make, though - if it's an "aristocratic" degree, then should the taxpayer contribute to fund it in any way? This would include indirect funding, such as studentships from grants from publicly funded bodies, or tuition discounts at public universities. To use the same analogy, should minor league be taxpayer-subsidized?

I think so, but I suppose that comes down to your political leanings.   

[kaysixteen]

Would-be major league jocks, rock stars, and movie/ tv stars are perhaps somewhat comparable to would-be tt humanities profs, with the stunning exception that *none of these former positions* require post-secondary education (and some hs dropouts, like the famous metal star that was a hs classmate of mine, before dropping out in his junior year to pursue his music career, succeed wildly without even a hs diploma).   Thus, the opportunity costs for failure to achieve are much less than for the failed tt aspirant.  And there is no analog in any of these former callings to the grad school professoriate, which has an incentive to keep students in the pipeline, and, like it or not, a disincentive to tell them the truth (except, perhaps, for certain scumbag agents and promoters).