IHE: "PhD Job Crisis Built Into System"

[spork]

[. . .]

Or, they're dumber than lawyers, which is hard to believe.

[. . . ]

I find this quite easy to believe, given many of my colleagues.


Edited to add: And we know from psychology that people are terrible at thinking probabilistically; there are plenty of people who believe they will become tenured professors because they think the statistics with which they are presented simply don't apply to them. 

[marshwiggle]

They want to roll the dice anyway.  There is a kernel of truth to Marshy's post----these neophytes idealize the professor lifestyle----but they are also genuinely motivated by a zeal for their discipline.  I don't know that this is necessarily true for the kids who leave high school and take on a skill or service career.  Most people just want a job they can be successful at, not pursue a passion. 

The big difference between academic careers and skill or service careers is that the sunk cost for academia builds over time so it is ultimately much bigger. Someone who takes a year or two of vocational training before working in construction can quit after a couple of years if they're unsatisfied. Someone who has spent a decade (or probably more) and 10's (if not 100's) of thousands of dollars (much of which has become debt) can't psychologically walk away nearly so easily, (even setting aside issues of how the debt will ultimately get paid.)

Most, but not all, humanities grad students have some kind of TA fellowship---at least at the more legitimate schools.  Some do not, of course.  I left my MFA / PhD program without any debt from those programs.  My debt came from earlier.

I know the topic of self-funded grad students, (including PhDs) has come up before. Anyone know what percentage that represents?

Various people have said here that going into debt for a PhD is bad, but some number of people do it every year. If institutions wouldn't accept anyone for whom they wouldn't provide *full funding, how much would that change the situation?

*Probably amounting to something at least as much as  tuition and academic fees plus about what a minimum wage job for the same number of years would provide.

[dismalist]

[. . .]

Or, they're dumber than lawyers, which is hard to believe.

[. . . ]

I find this quite easy to believe, given many of my colleagues.


Edited to add: And we know from psychology that people are terrible at thinking probabilistically; there are plenty of people who believe they will become tenured professors because they think the statistics with which they are presented simply don't apply to them.

Ah, Spork, but we cross the street!

People learn about risk when they experience risk repeatedly or are warned about it. Word gets around.

Now, we don't want to mess around with hopping off tall buildings at a single bound, but getting stuck in a low paid profession that one likes is not the fate worse than death.

Hell, if PhD students are victims, what about everybody else?

Again, there is no problem.

[marshwiggle]

Now, we don't want to mess around with hopping off tall buildings at a single bound, but getting stuck in a low paid profession that one likes is not the fate worse than death.

Hell, if PhD students are victims, what about everybody else?

Again, there is no problem.

It's more like "three card monte" than a lottery; students are misled into thinking that their cleverness is likely to help them beat the odds, when in reality the game is pretty much rigged so that graduates of the elite institutions get the jobs and others need not apply.

[Hibush]

I can only speak for the humanities.

The kids are indeed aware of the job market.  They are not clueless as so many seem to think (I suspect it is convenient to believe so).

They want to roll the dice anyway.  There is a kernel of truth to Marshy's post----these neophytes idealize the professor lifestyle----but they are also genuinely motivated by a zeal for their discipline.  I don't know that this is necessarily true for the kids who leave high school and take on a skill or service career.  Most people just want a job they can be successful at, not pursue a passion. 

Our MA program actually brings in money and provides TAs and eventually adjuncts for our classes.

I think it is entirely appropriate for schools to accept and train PhD students who "are genuinely motivated by a zeal for their discipline." independent of the job prospects. If those prospects are bad, the school should accurately  represent the situation. The student should finish their degree without thinking the school made any promises about a subsequent job.

That may be happening most of the time, and those folks pursue something they find interesting. And that we end up getting these repeat IHE columns just  from the ones who didn't get the memo. Maybe they are also the students who never read a syllabus and are surprised at the requirements?

Or are there a lot of Departments of Three Card Monte?

[Parasaurolophus]

... Another problem is attrition, which is quite high; another is that if your entering class is too small, the quality of the program suffers.

Isn't it indicative of resources being spread too thin?

Hmm, I'm not sure what you mean. Could you say a bit more?

[marshwiggle]

I can only speak for the humanities.

The kids are indeed aware of the job market.  They are not clueless as so many seem to think (I suspect it is convenient to believe so).

They want to roll the dice anyway.  There is a kernel of truth to Marshy's post----these neophytes idealize the professor lifestyle----but they are also genuinely motivated by a zeal for their discipline.  I don't know that this is necessarily true for the kids who leave high school and take on a skill or service career.  Most people just want a job they can be successful at, not pursue a passion. 

Our MA program actually brings in money and provides TAs and eventually adjuncts for our classes.

I think it is entirely appropriate for schools to accept and train PhD students who "are genuinely motivated by a zeal for their discipline." independent of the job prospects. If those prospects are bad, the school should accurately  represent the situation. The student should finish their degree without thinking the school made any promises about a subsequent job.

That may be happening most of the time, and those folks pursue something they find interesting. And that we end up getting these repeat IHE columns just  from the ones who didn't get the memo. Maybe they are also the students who never read a syllabus and are surprised at the requirements?

Or are there a lot of Departments of Three Card Monte?

If that's the case, then it should be easy to find all kinds of people who got PhDs, didn't get academic jobs, and are totally fine with it. Anyone have examples of those?

[Durchlässigkeitsbeiwert]

... Another problem is attrition, which is quite high; another is that if your entering class is too small, the quality of the program suffers.

Isn't it indicative of resources being spread too thin?

Hmm, I'm not sure what you mean. Could you say a bit more?

When faced with limited resources departments sometimes elect to bring reduce funding per student to maintain enrollment (related example on these fora). But having 10 students at 80% funding instead of 8 at 100% may drastically reduce their chances to graduate if they are forced to moonlight more to cover bills, or are deprived of that extra year of funding that makes a difference. Quite a few resources complain about prevalence of late attrition (e.g. recent Yale report), where expiring funding may be a major factor.
One can even argue that in many situations more funding is needed just to maintain the chances to graduate constant over time (kind of a red queen effect): it takes longer to graduate implying need for longer funding, accommodation costs are increasing, more conference travel needed to remain competitive etc. Continuing to spread funding over many students in such conditions means setting up most of them for failure.

[arcturus]

I can only speak for the humanities.

The kids are indeed aware of the job market.  They are not clueless as so many seem to think (I suspect it is convenient to believe so).

They want to roll the dice anyway.  There is a kernel of truth to Marshy's post----these neophytes idealize the professor lifestyle----but they are also genuinely motivated by a zeal for their discipline.  I don't know that this is necessarily true for the kids who leave high school and take on a skill or service career.  Most people just want a job they can be successful at, not pursue a passion. 

Our MA program actually brings in money and provides TAs and eventually adjuncts for our classes.

I think it is entirely appropriate for schools to accept and train PhD students who "are genuinely motivated by a zeal for their discipline." independent of the job prospects. If those prospects are bad, the school should accurately  represent the situation. The student should finish their degree without thinking the school made any promises about a subsequent job.

That may be happening most of the time, and those folks pursue something they find interesting. And that we end up getting these repeat IHE columns just  from the ones who didn't get the memo. Maybe they are also the students who never read a syllabus and are surprised at the requirements?

Or are there a lot of Departments of Three Card Monte?

If that's the case, then it should be easy to find all kinds of people who got PhDs, didn't get academic jobs, and are totally fine with it. Anyone have examples of those?

Yes. Many of our current graduate students plan to get non-academic jobs when they graduate and many of our graduates have successfully done so. We are a mid-tier STEM department. While the majority of the skills they learn to do research are field-dependent, their ability to think logically and find solutions to research problems are transferable to many other careers.

[Wahoo Redux]

I can only speak for the humanities.

The kids are indeed aware of the job market.  They are not clueless as so many seem to think (I suspect it is convenient to believe so).

They want to roll the dice anyway.  There is a kernel of truth to Marshy's post----these neophytes idealize the professor lifestyle----but they are also genuinely motivated by a zeal for their discipline.  I don't know that this is necessarily true for the kids who leave high school and take on a skill or service career.  Most people just want a job they can be successful at, not pursue a passion. 

Our MA program actually brings in money and provides TAs and eventually adjuncts for our classes.

I think it is entirely appropriate for schools to accept and train PhD students who "are genuinely motivated by a zeal for their discipline." independent of the job prospects. If those prospects are bad, the school should accurately  represent the situation. The student should finish their degree without thinking the school made any promises about a subsequent job.

That may be happening most of the time, and those folks pursue something they find interesting. And that we end up getting these repeat IHE columns just  from the ones who didn't get the memo. Maybe they are also the students who never read a syllabus and are surprised at the requirements?

Or are there a lot of Departments of Three Card Monte?

If that's the case, then it should be easy to find all kinds of people who got PhDs, didn't get academic jobs, and are totally fine with it. Anyone have examples of those?

At least two of my PhD cohorts now work in non-profit jobs.  I believe they make pretty good money but I don't know them well enough to know if they are happy or not. 

[Stockmann]

[. . .]

Or, they're dumber than lawyers, which is hard to believe.

[. . . ]

I find this quite easy to believe, given many of my colleagues.

Given many of my colleagues, and plenty of students, there are many academics and students who aren't dumb, indeed are sometimes very smart, but are irrational. PhDs are mostly an irrational choice, esp. when considering opportunity costs, so most people choosing them are being irrational, even though they might be very intelligent. I find it very easy to believe that lawyers are more rational.

I think it is entirely appropriate for schools to accept and train PhD students who "are genuinely motivated by a zeal for their discipline." independent of the job prospects. If those prospects are bad, the school should accurately  represent the situation.

Yes, and to me that means, as a minimum, publishing actual attrition rates and actual percentages of graduates of that specific program who become tenured faculty, percentage who earn a living wage, etc. Statistics like "X% of humanity graduates do Y" are important, but for prospective students they are so broad as to be irrelevant. But how many PhD programs do that? Maybe they don't know those numbers, but do they want to know?

[arcturus]

Yes, and to me that means, as a minimum, publishing actual attrition rates and actual percentages of graduates of that specific program who become tenured faculty, percentage who earn a living wage, etc. Statistics like "X% of humanity graduates do Y" are important, but for prospective students they are so broad as to be irrelevant. But how many PhD programs do that? Maybe they don't know those numbers, but do they want to know?

We publish those statistics for our graduate program. We provide percentages for both first job (recent graduates) and current job (older cohort, representative of about 10-years out). For very recent graduates, we list the specific first job they accepted on a different page. We also list median time-to-degree (under 6 years) and completion rate (above 70%). Posting these numbers has been the norm in my field for at least the past twenty years, so students know to look for them when considering different graduate programs.

[Parasaurolophus]

... Another problem is attrition, which is quite high; another is that if your entering class is too small, the quality of the program suffers.

Isn't it indicative of resources being spread too thin?

Hmm, I'm not sure what you mean. Could you say a bit more?

When faced with limited resources departments sometimes elect to bring reduce funding per student to maintain enrollment (related example on these fora). But having 10 students at 80% funding instead of 8 at 100% may drastically reduce their chances to graduate if they are forced to moonlight more to cover bills, or are deprived of that extra year of funding that makes a difference. Quite a few resources complain about prevalence of late attrition (e.g. recent Yale report), where expiring funding may be a major factor.
One can even argue that in many situations more funding is needed just to maintain the chances to graduate constant over time (kind of a red queen effect): it takes longer to graduate implying need for longer funding, accommodation costs are increasing, more conference travel needed to remain competitive etc. Continuing to spread funding over many students in such conditions means setting up most of them for failure.

Ah, I see, thanks. Yes, that can definitely be the case.

All of the reputable programs in my field in the US and Canada fully fund their doctoral students; that funding, however, is generally just barely enough to live on (elsewhere, Puget has indicated that psych grad stipends are almost twice what's normal for us!), and it does tend to run out before you have time to complete all of the program requirements. But this discipline is pretty harsh, and that definitely contributes to attrition, as do all the hoops you have to jump through before you're ABD. Usually, that's satisfying a logic requirement, sometimes quite advanced, mastering at least one other language (but often 2, and for some subfields 4-6...), in addition to qualifying papers, comps, coursework, and the prospectus. At my (relatively fancy!) PhD program, I'd say that poor-to-nonexistent supervision was a big factor, too.

Yes, and to me that means, as a minimum, publishing actual attrition rates and actual percentages of graduates of that specific program who become tenured faculty, percentage who earn a living wage, etc. Statistics like "X% of humanity graduates do Y" are important, but for prospective students they are so broad as to be irrelevant. But how many PhD programs do that? Maybe they don't know those numbers, but do they want to know?

We publish those statistics for our graduate program. We provide percentages for both first job (recent graduates) and current job (older cohort, representative of about 10-years out). For very recent graduates, we list the specific first job they accepted on a different page. We also list median time-to-degree (under 6 years) and completion rate (above 70%). Posting these numbers has been the norm in my field for at least the past twenty years, so students know to look for them when considering different graduate programs.

My PhD program does, too, and it's been the done thing in the field since ~2008-09.

[dismalist]

there are many academics and students who aren't dumb, indeed are sometimes very smart, but are irrational. PhDs are mostly an irrational choice, esp. when considering opportunity costs, so most people choosing them are being irrational, even though they might be very intelligent.

Best to be very careful bandying about the word "irrational". If descriptively correct, 'twould mean that PhD students need therapy.

The number of people graduating from humanities PhD programs is hardly declining https://www.amacad.org/humanities-indicators/higher-education/advanced-degrees-humanities#31621. Maybe, whoever they are, they just like it.

[Wahoo Redux]

there are many academics and students who aren't dumb, indeed are sometimes very smart, but are irrational. PhDs are mostly an irrational choice, esp. when considering opportunity costs, so most people choosing them are being irrational, even though they might be very intelligent.

Best to be very careful bandying about the word "irrational". If descriptively correct, 'twould mean that PhD students need therapy.

The number of people graduating from humanities PhD programs is hardly declining https://www.amacad.org/humanities-indicators/higher-education/advanced-degrees-humanities#31621. Maybe, whoever they are, they just like it.

You cannot talk people out of pursuing the degree. 

"Irrational" is a very loaded word; these are rational people, but in most cases they cannot be dissuaded from pursuing an advanced degree in a contracting field.

It might be that, as irrational as it seems, these folks would rather be adjuncts than trained corporate monkeys...and a good part of me understands this feeling.