alt_with_a_question

I'd never considered most of those factors about a new hire, but they make a lot of sense. Looking back, the new hire I saw up close as a student member of the search committee did indeed delay his start date by a year. For me the new hire at school A would mostly be a bonus—or, I guess, an escape hatch if things blow up spectacularly with the initial POI. But that POI is the main reason why, even despite the issues, school A remains in consideration, so if I do go I would definitely do what I could to work with him.

My professor here got a response from the school A POI: there aren't too many details, but the POI did say that he thinks a lot of the tension came from a specific appointment this year and will dissipate after that. Hopefully so, though I will still try and Skype with him. That is definitely good to hear. It makes sense that, considering he has already said he would be willing to work with me, even if he does retire, he probably won't vanish in a puff of smoke.

Not requiring a 100% overlap makes sense, though I unfortunately still don't think that anyone else at school A would qualify. They are planning to hire a new person in my subfield to replace a retiree, but the person won't be in place till the year after next, and I obviously have no idea who it will be or how their interests will fit in with mine. Your point about a flight risk definitely makes sense, though in his email to me he said that he had no plans to leave. Disregarding the general placement rate makes sense. I do then worry that the numbers then become so small that the predictive value falls off. Still, viewed that way one of the two main potential advisors has placed 2/4 students in a tenure track position, the other has done 4/5, though that prof might be near retiring. If he does retire, though, it would be less of a disaster than if the school A prof left, as I would still have the other school B prof to work with. The two most advisor-likely profs at school B both impressed me. It's hard to know too much from just a twenty minute meeting, but I have since been in contact with a few students from B who work with those professors and have been told that they are good to work with. One of the professors has also been emailing me in a pretty clear attempt at recruitment but has also provided some admirably frank opinions about another school I was visiting (frank in a positive, "it's a place worth considering, and here are some ways that they differ from us that could, depending on what you want, push you in either direction" type way) that makes me think he lives up to his self-description as a "straight shooter." If I don't get into A, I think I'll be happy going into B. It's turning down the placement and POI at A if I do get an offer that would be a hard call. Talking to the present students is a good idea. I know! For all I know his anger against his colleagues is perfectly justified, but his actions seem to hurt the potential students a lot more than his colleagues.

That makes sense. I guess it would be silly to try and schedule a Skype session if I got off the waitlist on the fifteenth, as it would be such short notice. I'll get in touch with him about it. The visit weekend was for the short list candidates; I was wait listed after it.

@display name, thank you for your advice on advisors. I think I am fortunate in that my potential advisors at both institutions have been spoken very highly of by their present students, both those starting their degrees and those on the threshold of completion. That being said, the placement rate of the POI at university A not only matches but possibly even exceeds the department's already impressive baseline: his students have not only generally performed well, so far as I can see, but have even at times landed positions at top ten institutions. There is also something of a development: I have finally gotten to speak to one of the professors at my home institution, the sort of grizzled academic veteran who at this point seems to know everything about the field and everyone in it. Considering the differences in prestige and placement rate, and his high opinion of the POI's work, he advised going to department A if it was at all functional—toward which end he helpfully offered to email the relevant faculty, as he knows them decently well, and see if he can figure out what is going on. So I hope to have some more definite answers soon. Also, I should have made clear earlier that I am first on the wait list of school A rather than admitted; school B, by contrast, is my top choice of the ones I have thus far been admitted to. I posted the topic now, however, because if the wait list response comes on the fifteenth itself, as seems possible, I would like to already know how I want to respond. Your suggestion of a Skype meeting, @fuzzylogician, is a good one, but one that I am hesitant to do unless admitted. Though I suppose that, between my own email and now my professor's, I have been taking up a fair bit of the POI's time already and should perhaps just go for it. I have actually met the fellow once before, though, when he gave a talk at my school. We got along well then.

Thanks for responding everyone. The placement rate is lifetime and for tenure track jobs. University A, and the advisor there, place both more frequently and in higher level institutions. I requested to meet with him and was denied.

That makes sense, though most of the programs I have looked at have only had one or maybe two faculty I could see as an advisor. School B is the only one to have three, which definitely is a point in their favor.

Presently, I am deciding between two PhD programs in the humanities and want an academic career. The options are: School A is a top ten program in the field with a very respectable placement rate. My potential advisor here is highly respected and, in the broad swath of his research interests, includes most of my favorite topics. But on the visit weekend, this advisor, because of a squabble with his colleagues over who was and was not on the admissions committee, declined to meet with any of the visiting students. I have heard that this advisor is a very kind person who cares about his students and, when I briefly met him last year, had that impression of him. I emailed him recently, and he was friendly over email and said that he has no plans to leave the department. But it's hard to shake the fact that he didn't bother meeting with me after I flew halfway across the country, and it seems like quite a red flag. The other professors would be interesting to take classes with and could be on my committee, but none would work as an advisor. School B is a good school but on the border of top ten and not top ten. Its placement rate is 50%, 20% lower than school A, which worries me quite a bit. There is also no one individual there who is as good a fit for me as the advisor at A. But there are several professors who share my interests, and between them I feel like the fit is quite good. If the visit weekend at A had gone differently, the decision would have been obvious. But I am having a great deal of trouble deciding how much weight to accord such a red flag. Any input from those who are more experienced with grad school would be greatly welcome.