Consider applying for grad school
80000hours.org
Consider applying for grad school
1–10 of 165 posts
Re: Consider applying for grad school
#2I'd like to. Do graduate programs accept devs who have been working the last decade?
There are areas I feel I could be helpful with, e.g. creating reproducible experiments or ensuring a codebase could be open sourced in relation to a paper. It's a lot of grunt work that nobody really has time to do.
If that were possible, I'm not quite sure where to start with executing that plan. (Chicago area, FWIW.)
Re: Consider applying for grad school
#3I'd like to. Do graduate programs accept devs who have been working the last decade? There are areas I feel I could be helpful with, e.g. creating reproducible experiments or ensuring a codebase could be open sourced in relation to a paper. It's a lot of grunt work that nobody really has time to do. If that were possible, I'm not quite sure where to start with executing that plan. (Chicago area, FWIW.)
Yup, there are a number of well regarded CS professors who recruit burnt out industry programmers as students. Check out Peter Alvaro at UCSC for one.
Re: Consider applying for grad school
#4Interesting contrast to the recent wave of posts about how you should absolutely not go for academia in the current market of having 1 job spot for every 3 PhDs. What's one to make of this?
Re: Consider applying for grad school
#5I was expecting reasons why now is a better climate to apply then in previous years. That would be interesting, but instead it's a list of generic reasons to apply for a phd. Yes, I know that phd's can open doors.
Re: Consider applying for grad school
#6I'd like to. Do graduate programs accept devs who have been working the last decade? There are areas I feel I could be helpful with, e.g. creating reproducible experiments or ensuring a codebase could be open sourced in relation to a paper. It's a lot of grunt work that nobody really has time to do. If that were possible, I'm not quite sure where to start with executing that plan. (Chicago area, FWIW.)
I'm in the same boat - The PhD admissions proces over-indexes on Letters of Recommendation from other academics. I don't think I can get those because I have not actively stayed in touch with my professors.
I went through the existing process once and promised myself I would never waste that much time again. But if there's a program that genuinely values industry experience, and is willing to look past recommendation letters from academics, I'd jump at it.
Re: Consider applying for grad school
#7Interesting contrast to the recent wave of posts about how you should absolutely not go for academia in the current market of having 1 job spot for every 3 PhDs. What's one to make of this?
80,000 Hours is a website made by members of a very particular subculture. The “prototypical” PhD they’re imagining is in computer science, probably with a focus on machine learning, probably at a highly-ranked school, by someone who went to a highly-ranked undergrad.
Job prospects are relatively good. Pay is bad but industry internships during summer can compensate. Academic jobs are not quite as scarce, and R&D jobs in industry are plentiful. There is not an air of failure or taboo about moving on from academia after the degree.
The calculation on a PhD is very different compared to most other fields, and certainly compared to humanities PhDs (which actually charge money to attend!)
Re: Consider applying for grad school
#8I'd like to. Do graduate programs accept devs who have been working the last decade? There are areas I feel I could be helpful with, e.g. creating reproducible experiments or ensuring a codebase could be open sourced in relation to a paper. It's a lot of grunt work that nobody really has time to do. If that were possible, I'm not quite sure where to start with executing that plan. (Chicago area, FWIW.)
I think your best option is to apply to a masters degree. These are easier to get into, especially for someone out of school for a few years. This is also an opportunity to find professors doing research in topics of your interest.
Re: Consider applying for grad school
#9I was expecting reasons why now is a better climate to apply then in previous years. That would be interesting, but instead it's a list of generic reasons to apply for a phd. Yes, I know that phd's can open doors.
I read the whole article, including the "why not to get a PhD part." I still thought it was way too kind to the "get a PhD" side of the equation. PhDs represent a tremendous opportunity cost, and I have not seen good evidence that they causally improve outcomes in the vast majority of cases.
Re: Consider applying for grad school
#10I'm very interested in (applied) AI research positions but wasn't quite prepared to commit 5-8 years to a PhD program. In order to validate my interest in research, I've enrolled in a two year Computer Science Master's program at Tsinghua University. This program has a thesis component, allowing me to participate in research and potentially get a publication. Depending on how much I enjoy the content, I plan on applying to AI fellowships, a PhD program, or Machine Learning Engineering positions after graduation.
Thought the program hasn't started yet, I hope that this is an alternative path for those interested in research but not quite ready for a full PhD.