How does your program handle "leftover" PhD students when an advisor leaves?

[ggplot2]

When a graduate advisor leaves for another institution, industry, etc., and leaves behind graduate students who cannot or choose not to follow the advisor to their new institution, how does your program handle them?

Does your program have a formal/handbook-documented process of re-matching the students with another advisor/lab? Has your program ever had problems with finding new advisors/labs for students after an advisor departure?

[Kron3007]

In my department the graduate coordinator would try to find a suitable advisor to supervise the student.  If they cannot find one, the graduate coordinator is responsible to supervise the student themself.

I assume the department would help cover the stipend etc., but I dont know for sure.

[Hibush]

Likewise, the grad coordinator tries to find a good match.

Our students cost a lot, and the advisor is responsible, so if a student has a couple years to go we are asking them to make a six-figure obligation. Nobody has that kind of money sitting around unobligated, so that's the main challenge. A teaching assistantship may be able to fill a semester or so to make it easier.

If there is no good match, and the student is excellent, a transfer to a different program (or even a different school) would be one option to pursue for the good of the student.

We don't throw anyone out on the street.

[fizzycist]

In the physical science R1s I am familiar with, there is no specific handbook process but the depts make every effort to make it work.

If it's a 1-3rd yr, the student just finds another lab. Not a big deal, usually no special intervention needed, aside from maybe giving them a TA to bridge the transition.

If it's a 4th+ yr, it really falls on the departing advisor to get the student across the finish line. This can involve transferring a grant to a collaborator who is staying so they can finish in their group, or it can involve maintaining an adjunct/research prof status to finish the students remotely, potentially even keeping a lab for a couple years so the students can finish up.

I've heard horror stories of advisors just disappearing from academia without ever communicating--dunno details of how that turned out but I'm sure the grad programs did all they could to re-place the students.

[ergative]

I don't have anything to add to this discussion, but I wanted to drop in and complement ggplot2 on their moniker.

[ggplot2]

In the physical science R1s I am familiar with, there is no specific handbook process but the depts make every effort to make it work.

Has your department ever considered/discussed making it a specific handbook-documented process? This kind of thing doesn't seem to happen too often, but describing the process in the handbook -- funding, how students are re-matched, to what extent students can remain in their department/program (e.g., would the student be moved to a different research track if no suitable advisors were available in their current track?) -- might benefit leftover students when deciding to stay versus leave with current advisor.

[Aster]

The problem with making a formal policy is that you are then obligated to follow that policy, right or wrong, correct or incorrect, appropriate or inappropriate. Policies are great things to have in some situations. Policies are not so great things when one has a custom problem (departing professor with custom funding, custom infrastructure, custom expertise, custom mentoring, custom networking), and one is basically trying to find a custom solution.

In many disciplines, graduate student training is a custom project tailored to each student's interests and training, each student's current progress, to the support network of each student's cohort (or the aggregate graduate student network), to the the mentoring professors, to the department's current status, etc... For many academic departments, these are all very fluid things. They change from year to year, often dramatically.

Do departments take care of their orphaned graduate students? Yes, they usually do. Is every situation of an orphaned graduate student treated the same? No, it generally isn't. Is this bad? No, more of the opposite actually. Every graduate student situation is more-or-less unique, and unique, custom solutions tend to work the best for that.

[Aster]

The problem with making a formal policy is that you are then obligated to follow that policy, right or wrong, correct or incorrect, appropriate or inappropriate. Policies are great things to have in some situations. Policies are not so great things when one has a custom problem (departing professor with custom funding, custom infrastructure, custom expertise, custom mentoring, custom networking), and one is basically trying to find a custom solution.

In many disciplines, graduate student training is a custom project tailored to each student's interests and training, each student's current progress, to the support network of each student's cohort (or the aggregate graduate student network), to the the mentoring professors, to the department's current status, etc... For many academic departments, these are all very fluid things. They change from year to year, often dramatically.

Do departments take care of their orphaned graduate students? Yes, they usually do. Is every situation of an orphaned graduate student treated the same? No, it generally isn't. Is this bad? No, more of the opposite actually. Every graduate student situation is more-or-less unique, and unique, custom solutions tend to work the best for that.

All that said, a basic, broad framework "policy" is not unheard of. But you want to keep something like that pretty broad and non-specific. Something more like a "policy statement" is more the mark, kind of like "blah blah the department will make a reasonable effort to blah blah blah".

[mamselle]

Are there any differences between when the advising faculty member leaves and when they die?'

As in, are there any models from the latter situation that might help craft options for the current one?

M.

[Hibush]

Are there any differences between when the advising faculty member leaves and when they die?'

As in, are there any models from the latter situation that might help craft options for the current one?

M.

The only difference is that a departed faculty member can stay on a student committee for up to a year from their new institution, where the dearly departed cannot.

[mamselle]

Got it.

M.

[polly_mer]

Are there any differences between when the advising faculty member leaves and when they die?'

As in, are there any models from the latter situation that might help craft options for the current one?

M.

The only difference is that a departed faculty member can stay on a student committee for up to a year from their new institution, where the dearly departed cannot.

There may also be a funding difference. 

NSF etc. grants go to the institution, but may transfer institutions with faculty.  Death is not going to prompt a transfer of grants elsewhere.

[jerseyjay]

My advisor left when I was a PhD candidate in history. Some of his students went to his new institution (in another country). I was not given that option, perhaps because I was living abroad (in a different country than both my university and my advisor's new university) writing up my dissertation. I got another advisor (who was in a different department but who researched a subject overlapping with mine). The main problem was that the new advisor had different conceptions of how to write up the research, and since I was about half done with the dissertation, it required going over some of it again.

There was no funding involved, and I had already used a grant to do much of the research. The dissertation came off okay. Two results of the situation is that I have very little connection to my grad department, and in terms of looking for work, I was neither really part of the circle of my old advisor or of my new advisor. Since my new advisor was in a different subject, in a different country, he was not that useful in finding jobs (although he did do his best to write letters, etc.)

I think that some of my original advisor's students never finished the doctorate, but to be fair, a certain number of these would not have finished the doctorate in any case.

[Caracal]

My advisor left when I was a PhD candidate in history. Some of his students went to his new institution (in another country). I was not given that option, perhaps because I was living abroad (in a different country than both my university and my advisor's new university) writing up my dissertation. I got another advisor (who was in a different department but who researched a subject overlapping with mine). The main problem was that the new advisor had different conceptions of how to write up the research, and since I was about half done with the dissertation, it required going over some of it again.

There was no funding involved, and I had already used a grant to do much of the research. The dissertation came off okay. Two results of the situation is that I have very little connection to my grad department, and in terms of looking for work, I was neither really part of the circle of my old advisor or of my new advisor. Since my new advisor was in a different subject, in a different country, he was not that useful in finding jobs (although he did do his best to write letters, etc.)

I think that some of my original advisor's students never finished the doctorate, but to be fair, a certain number of these would not have finished the doctorate in any case.

In my history department, people who were ABD usually just continued working with their advisor after they left. I think in some cases the person retained a nominal position allowing them to supervise students. In other cases, the arrangement might have been more informal. Technically, the main advisor was someone still in the department, but they deferred to the original advisor, who then could come back as an outside reader for the dissertation.

In the cases I witnessed, it all seemed to work fine, but it was the kind of thing that relied on everyone's good will and good behavior.

[Kron3007]

Are there any differences between when the advising faculty member leaves and when they die?'

As in, are there any models from the latter situation that might help craft options for the current one?

M.

The only difference is that a departed faculty member can stay on a student committee for up to a year from their new institution, where the dearly departed cannot.

This assumes the advisor chooses to do so.  Usually that would happen, but if someone is moving to industry, they may not really have the time/interest to contribute to any major degree.