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The Disappearing American Grad Student

nytimes.com

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Re: The Disappearing American Grad Student

#71

Post by aaron-lebo »

chrisseaton wrote: post #67
aaron-lebo wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Class hours are a substantial requirement of many phd programs. You can't do independent research without knowing what's come before. :)

You learn about what's come before by reading papers and reproducing experiments. I can't imagine how a class for PhD students works - everyone has such focused research topics that how can you find something relevant to teach to more than one person at a time? When I did my PhD on optimising dynamic programming languages I would guess there were maybe ten other students in the entire world doing something vaguely si…

I could see how CS/similar degrees would be that way. I'd assume most STEM are?

For political science in at least one program it was 30-36 credit hours for a master's degree. PhD was the same thing with an additional 18+ elective hours and another 30+ combined class/dissertation hours, and then the actual dissertation. Classes with few exceptions consisted of "workshops" and "seminars" over various topics (terrorism, multinational corporations, etc), which almost all involved weekly topical readings (5-7 journal articles and book selections) and weekly/frequent writings on those readings with a substantial paper for the final, sometimes with a midterm. Independent hours were also common with 1 on 1 work with one of the professors over a chosen paper topic.

As I said, discussion in class was expected, so you couldn't really wing it, and you had to be prepared or it would be obvious in front of your professor an another 5-20 students. I'm guessing this format is semi-common in the humanities/social sciences, it was for a linguistics program I looked into. Tons of reading and writing with the intent of guiding your towards a weird unexplored niche.

Re: The Disappearing American Grad Student

#72

Post by konschubert »

sungx105 wrote: post #58
tyoma wrote: post #38

The monetary value proposition of grad school simply isn't very good if you're a US citizen. There is non-monetary value (like advancing human knowledge) that makes grad school worth it for some, but the pay is low. Imagine you just graduated from a quality undergrad with high grades and strong recommendations from your professors. Maybe you had an internship or two or spent a summer doing research. Maybe you even ha…

Your option 1 is incomplete. It should read more closely to: You go to grad school and spend ~6 years working extremely long hours at nearly minimum wage with no benefits. You then spend 2-3 years on a postdoc still with relatively low compensation. There still are far too few academic positions available. You now either become an adjunct (and get caught in that vicious cycle) or you do another postdoc. Repeat ad nau…

That is, if you are planning to stay in academia after handing in your thesis.

I think most people don't.

Re: The Disappearing American Grad Student

#73

Post by jonathankoren »

delphinius81 wrote: post #33
tomaha wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or the $500k+ you can earn. Most of the people in that region have at least a masters degree and likely more.

If you focus on computer vision / machine learning at least

The vast majority of these people are not pulling home $500k per year salaries, or even total comp.

Re: The Disappearing American Grad Student

#74

Post by zxcmx »

taurath wrote: post #57
screye wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think I should give you direct values, instead of simple speculation. I am masters student in one of the US citizens, and am being funded by my parents savings, so this is all very relevant. I grew up in an above middle class Indian household with an income of about $10,000 a year. My parents lived very frugally (I lived in possibly the highest Indian COL area) and my parents started saving early. Over about 25 yea…

It’s very sad actually that in the US my parents saved absolutely nothing for college because when my one parent that attended did it they could afford it with a summer job.

Yeah except for the tons of people who help out their parents on minimum wage jobs because family is family. And those parents "contributed nothing" (except for you know, labour and care and such).

It's nice when people have it together but you'll go crazy if you try to "add it up".

I hope I'm lucky and consistently organised enough that my children feel entitled to believe that their success was planned for them. Working on it. They'll probably hate me for it and have some point of view where it is "stifling". Still cool, get it.

Re: The Disappearing American Grad Student

#75

Post by taway_1212 »

watwut wrote: post #49
fellellor wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

800$ is a very big sum for a lot of my countrymen. Also it is true that a lot of Indian schools operate with very few resources, that would be required to appropriately educate all the students they serve. And this makes them noncompetitive in international university rankings. And to be frank it is not in our interest to pander to the rankings, because they encourage expenditure of a large amount of resources to tra…

" it is not in our interest to pander to the rankings, because they encourage expenditure of a large amount of resources to train a few people " What do you mean by that?

You need top scientists to get publications in Nature, Science etc. These scientists (and the equipment they need) cost a lot, and it's unclear whether it's actually a reasonable investment for a country where so many basic needs (ex. reliable electricity) are still unmet.

Re: The Disappearing American Grad Student

#76

Post by eternauta3k »

chrisseaton wrote: post #67
aaron-lebo wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Class hours are a substantial requirement of many phd programs. You can't do independent research without knowing what's come before. :)

You learn about what's come before by reading papers and reproducing experiments. I can't imagine how a class for PhD students works - everyone has such focused research topics that how can you find something relevant to teach to more than one person at a time? When I did my PhD on optimising dynamic programming languages I would guess there were maybe ten other students in the entire world doing something vaguely si…

It's a fact that PhD students do a few courses, at least in Physics and Electronics.

The students I've met found few classes related to their research. So they signed up for whatever sounded good.

Re: The Disappearing American Grad Student

#77

Post by trevyn »

tyoma wrote: post #38

The monetary value proposition of grad school simply isn't very good if you're a US citizen. There is non-monetary value (like advancing human knowledge) that makes grad school worth it for some, but the pay is low. Imagine you just graduated from a quality undergrad with high grades and strong recommendations from your professors. Maybe you had an internship or two or spent a summer doing research. Maybe you even ha…

If you take some initiative, you can also learn a lot working in industry. It’s important to avoid being a code monkey stuck in a cubicle, only doing what you’re told and collecting a paycheck. Instead, be curious and enthusiastic about all aspects of the business and chat up all of your colleagues in different departments. Express interest and “help out” a little on your own time for projects out of your area of responsibility that appeal to you and that you want to learn more about. Assist someone by offering to do some research or putting together a slide deck for them. Offer to present it to their team. Offer your help in meetings. Get noticed, take more responsibility, and work cross-functionally. You’ll be amazed at the doors that open to you.

Re: The Disappearing American Grad Student

#78

Post by haeffin »

eternauta3k wrote: post #76
chrisseaton wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You learn about what's come before by reading papers and reproducing experiments. I can't imagine how a class for PhD students works - everyone has such focused research topics that how can you find something relevant to teach to more than one person at a time? When I did my PhD on optimising dynamic programming languages I would guess there were maybe ten other students in the entire world doing something vaguely si…

It's a fact that PhD students do a few courses, at least in Physics and Electronics. The students I've met found few classes related to their research. So they signed up for whatever sounded good.

It varies a lot by country and field (if they do classes or not). I didn't have to do classes when I did my PhD.

Re: The Disappearing American Grad Student

#79

Post by comicjk »

chrisseaton wrote: post #67
aaron-lebo wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Class hours are a substantial requirement of many phd programs. You can't do independent research without knowing what's come before. :)

You learn about what's come before by reading papers and reproducing experiments. I can't imagine how a class for PhD students works - everyone has such focused research topics that how can you find something relevant to teach to more than one person at a time? When I did my PhD on optimising dynamic programming languages I would guess there were maybe ten other students in the entire world doing something vaguely si…

Most PhD programs involve some classes at the beginning - especially programs which don't require a master's degree first. The classes are graduate-level progressions from similar undergraduate classes. Typically, PhD research goes on more slowly during the first year or two of the program while classes are taken, and the dissertation research topic is not completely fixed. For example, a PhD student planning to research programming languages would take the most advanced language classes available, plus math and optimization classes, for at least a year while doing preliminary research before choosing a dissertation subject.

Re: The Disappearing American Grad Student

#80

Post by drewg123 »

tyoma wrote: post #38

The monetary value proposition of grad school simply isn't very good if you're a US citizen. There is non-monetary value (like advancing human knowledge) that makes grad school worth it for some, but the pay is low. Imagine you just graduated from a quality undergrad with high grades and strong recommendations from your professors. Maybe you had an internship or two or spent a summer doing research. Maybe you even ha…

There's also option 1.5: You start at a grad school in a PhD program (so that you have support and do not pile up debt), and you leave with a Masters as quickly as you can.

I managed to get my MS in CS back in the early 90s in one calendar year. I had full support via a fellowship since I was one of the top students, so I did not have to be an RA or TA, and could take additional classes. I finished all but my MS Thesis requirement in 2 semesters and owed nothing thanks to the fellowship. I then decided I was leaving with an MS, and paid for my MS Thesis credits over the summer.

This cost me only a year, and it happened immediately after undergrad when I was really good at studying anyhow. I am far enough into my career to realize that it strengthened my resume early on, and I think it has really helped my long-term career earnings.

The funny thing is that I didn't intend to be so mercenary. My original intent was to get my requirements out the way early to leave more time for research the second year. I realized part-way through the year that I was not as enamored with the topic that I wanted to study as I thought I was, and I hadn't hit it off with the only logical choice for an advisor in that topic, so I wanted to get out something totally different.

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