victorydance

Columbia, Harvard, Stanford, NYU, Rochester, Michigan, and Princeton.

I think 8-10 is the sweet spot.

They're all pretty much the same.

Most profs that I know don't actually keep track of your hours. It's more the amount of work done well that they are going to keep track of. I wasn't even in the country for most of my two assistant-ships. Depending on what you are doing, there really isn't much of a reason you can't do the work remotely.

Possible, but fairly unrealistic. You would virtually have to finish your coursework + comps + write a dissertation very quickly. Also, I doubt this would be that beneficial anyways because it doesn't leave much time for preparing for the market and/or publishing anything.

Yeah, but you were coming from law were you not? Like I said if you are coming from a political science program and you were studying IR, there's no reason you shouldn't have more than one LOR from an IR prof.

I think anywhere from 20-40% (perhaps even higher but not sure) of admitted students of Ph.D. programs come straight from undergrad. So it shouldn't be a concern if you have a strong application. The only thing that worries me is that you say you are interested in going into IR, but yet only one of your LORs will come from IR profs and your writing sample may or may not be in IR. Ideally, you want all three of your LORs coming from IR profs if you are currently studying IR and want to continue studying IR. Of course, you don't need all three that's just the ideal situation but having one from an adjunct theorist and one from a separate discipline is kind of alarming. If I were you I would definitely try to do the honours thesis with a IR prof different from your RA prof. This means that not only can you use a section of your thesis as your writing sample but you will also get another solid letter from someone from IR instead of the political theory prof. Having two letters from profs you have been an RA for + honours thesis adviser is solid.

"The thing is that I don't feel like individuals who decide to have children despite the inability to really provide for them should be supported any more than someone who decides not to have children. If an individual is incapable of working due to disability or whatever, then fine, but that's not the case here. I don't think having children while being in grad school is a good life decision. It can be done and if they can make it work all the power to them but that doesn't mean they should be supported anymore than someone who doesn't make that decision." This is my exact statement. I don't see how I have really changed anything. Perhaps added more nuance to it but nothing contradictory to what I stated before. Crafter > the point of my previous post was to point out (and the fact that you ignored the actual question leads to me believe you agree) is there are certain times when having a child is not necessarily in the person's best interests or more particularly the interests of that future child. The main difference is we may have different perceptions on when that situation is. As in, I don't think grad school is a good time to have a child. You don't necessarily agree with that and that's fine; people have different opinions.

Well for occupations that require postdocs I don't see anything wrong with having a kid then. And it also entirely depends on what the (if there is one) spouse is doing as well. I mean, it doesn't necessarily mean that he/she couldn't have a perfectly stable job and provide support. In that situation it could actually be beneficial because a grad student has a lot of downtime and ability to work from home more than typical occupations. And like I said before, I don't actually care if people do, if they want to have children all the power to them. I am not the official decider over who has children or not. I am not sure why you guys are taking this so personally.

So let's disentangle this a bit. If there is some family (or perhaps single parent) that is working minimum wage or something marginally better than that, do you think it is a good choice to have a child on purpose? And I am not talking about political correct, "sure! it's their choice I won't judge" I am talking about what you actually feel here. Because I don't think it is the right choice and I am not afraid to state that. Raising a child in this economic environment is a serious decision not to be taken lightly. If I was to want to have a child I would make sure I have a stable and decent paying occupation in order to start a family. And that isn't what academia is unless you are in TT territory. And I am not singling out academia either, this applies to any occupation or field where making money and job security is scarce.

But that doesn't make sense if there is not a market force related to funding. Because funding structure is very similar for humanities vs. social sciences. So why is there a pay gap between this spectrum of disciplines? On average, a social science grad student has a higher stipend than a humanities one. If they have very similar funding structures why is this the case? It's one thing to argue that the pay structures of natural science students are different than others, but then why is the same pay gaps represented between the social sciences and humanities? You can even see the differences within social sciences. With economics and political science majors getting higher stipends than say anthropology or criminology majors.

I mean, yes, you held a RA position for two semesters for a prof, that is sufficient right there. Plus a handful of other research assistant positions, whether those are totally relevant to your research interests is not clear but they certainly don't hurt. Honours thesis. Plus a few internal grants for research. This is very solid and fairly close to my personal research experience as well. The important thing is to leverage those LORs (preferably only from professors) and tie in your experience into your research interests so it's cohesive to an admission committee. The wording is a bit confusing, but did you get authorship credit on the paper, or just help him/her get it published? Because a publication at this stage of the game is a major boon to your application.

Thank you, now I understand. Although my experience with social sciences is that professors do often get grants for their research, but it definitely is dispersed more sporadically in terms of isolated RA positions for students. There are also a lot of internal fellowships available outside of typical TA positions as well. But this comes back to what I was saying before? That because certain fields pull in more money from funding either federal or private sources that students in those departments get paid more? So wouldn't that mean it's not necessarily a funding structure thing, it's more to do with the available funds in the department?

I find it a logical leap to state that natural sciences stipends are solely higher because funding goes through a PI than through a department.

Two things: - Don't get lost in your past achievements. While you have a good record of accomplishments, many of the ones on the list really have no bearing on whether you get admitted or not. For example, most of the stuff listed under 'activities' is completely irrelevant to grad admissions. What matters above all is research experience. Only focus on the most relevant things related to your research interests out of the list of past achievements to highlight in your CV and SOP. - Just focus on the things you can control: writing sample, SOP, and GRE scores.

You didn't state any details. This is an assumption based on insufficient information. Do you have the statistics that show the admission rates by discipline? Secondly, admission rates can be determined by many factors, particularly internal matters within the department. For one, natural sciences may be more constrained by lab space than other disciplines that don't require it. Secondly, STEM majors are more likely to have paid masters programs, so that shouldn't be excluded from the equation here like you seem to be doing. So you are arguing that this is the root cause of as much of a $10,000 difference in funding compared to STEM vs. social science/humanities funding?

I agree that East Asia is a bit of a messy region for comparativists as opposed to placed like Western Europe, MENA, East Europe, or Latin America. However, I have seen a lot of studies that compare Taiwan, South Korea, and Japan, or any combination thereof. There is also quite a few studies that compare East Asian countries with SE Asia which is technically cross-region but not significantly so. However most comparative studies on East Asia are single case studies, which points to it's lack of comparative qualities.

I'm sorry but this is simply not true. Theory building and small N studies are predominantly done on a regional basis. If your are using the most similar method of comparison, it's a lot easier to compare say Chile and Argentina rather than Chile and South Africa. Only with large N studies does comparative politics really start to cut across regions. There are some overlaps on either side of the spectrum but for the most part that's how it works. There are countless comparativists that are regional focused and a look through any department will show this.

^ I also don't think Stanford is the best place to study IR/theory as well.

You haven't outlined anything. What does funding structures even mean exactly? Competitive admissions has nothing to do with it really. I have explained in detail how market forces affect academia and their pay gaps. Academia trains many private sector employees > disciplines that the market deems more valuable get more funding and influx of money > graduate students in these disciplines get paid more. What have you provided? Erk, funding structures and admissions! Could you be any more vague?

You don't think academia is affected by market forces? Academia is one of the chief trainers of highly technical employees, especially in the present and recent past. It also acts as a think tank for research that is funneled into corporations to increase their efficiency and effectiveness. I mean look at the discipline of computer science. With the introduction and importance of computers in the recent two decades it has turned the discipline into an financial juggernaut.

This is correct. But a distinction, I didn't make a dichotomy. Many humanities and social sciences disciplines are completely reliant on public funds. Many STEM fields are more mixed, with a lot of funds coming from the private sector. I would say as a general rule, a lot of academia in general is supported by the public sector. But there are some disciplines out there (mostly hard science or STEM) that are getting a lot of additional funding from industry. All this is to say is that there is a lot more money being poured into certain departments in universities than others which could definitely contribute to pay gaps.

It's a collective action problem. People aren't necessarily going to put in the effort and time to gain benefits for something they have nothing to do with. I know I wouldn't and a lot of people wouldn't either. It's also compounded by the system of university students. It's not a stagnant landscape like an occupation where a union can organize around generations of people. Universities are too fluid, students don't spend that much time there and there is always a new stock of students entering.

I completely agree with this and I didn't think I needed to make this distinction (thought it would be obvious to others, but I guess not).

Saying things like this is condescending: "There is literally nothing I can say except that you're wrong and you need to gain some experience outside of what you already "know". You have literally no idea what experience I have. None. For the record, I have taken multiple natural science courses (I once considered being a chemistry major for what it is worth) and am currently enrolled in an interdisciplinary program. I have plenty of experience with other disciplines, including the discipline you study, history. How is stating facts like society values quantitative and technical skills and certain disciplines don't have these bashing a discipline exactly? Let's look at the facts: Certain disciplines are getting downsized and are not hiring new academics at high rates. Certain disciplines are completely reliant on public funding for grants. Can you guess which disciplines these are? Certain disciplines pay their academics much higher salaries and certain disciplines have a more seamless transition to the private workforce. Can you guess which disciplines these are? For the record, I don't think any discipline is better than the other. But the simple matter is society as a whole values certain disciplines above others, and increasingly these disciplines are the ones that use technical and quantitative methods as a central component of their approach. When society values something, the people involved in that something get compensated more than people involved in something that is less valued. Society has a downward pressure on academia. By demand for their skills, and students trained in these skills, and the use of funding to supply these chains of professionalization. So in other words, something that is valued by society is going to get more benefits in way of money to entice people to study and/or work on these things. This is a major reason why there is a pay gap between disciplines, but perhaps not the only reason.