yellowjackets

<a name="aa2">Completion Rates (Source: NRC, 2006) ? Fraction of students completing a doctorate in 8 years 31% Ouch!

That's exactly what I'm talking about. Some of the PhD requirements are pointless, but you're forced to jump through the hoops to prove yourself again and again. Yes, it can be unpleasant, or in some cases, miserable. For example, a PhD student already with an MA from another school might be asked to take a teaching comp course even though s/he took the same course at the other school and already have years of teaching experience. They set up these hoops specifically to weed out the people they don't want in their program for whatever reason. Remember the completion rate of a top English PhD program is around 50%, much lower, as low as 20% at some programs that don't offer a multiple-year guaranteed funding package but make their PhD students compete for funding each year. What I'm trying to say is there are many ways to knock you out of the program over the course of several years. They set up this system. The most successful people (I've seen so far) in English PhD programs are not the "original" genius types but the spineless suckups who will do anything to please their professors and defend their program, often at the expense of their fellow graduate students.

Hoorah, rat brains rule the world these days!

I think this attitude is not what the English grad programs want to see. I've heard so many English PhD students complaining that they're treated like little kids by their professors or supervisors. Applicants already with an MA may indicate that they have already been molded into a certain literary position, so it's hard to tailor their research interests to those of their supervisors, on which a large part of their success in an English PhD program depends on. Some complain that it's like writing a dissertation to meet the interests of their supervisors. Some people can't do this and so leave. Some are better at this, who often turn out to be young students who enter the program with only BAs. Well, this is just my theory.

Not all but many. Only a few as in any other disciplines will land such a coveted job. That sounds like one of those Research I or mid-tier universities, if that's a beginning assistant professor's salary. And also it depends on where you end up. $60000 a year is not much in California or NY.

Generally, public or state schools which heavily depend on graduate students for undergraduate teaching will look at you favorably, but you won't impress any top schools (the Ivy league & others like Stanford), especially with your community college teaching experience. The tops schools often hire lecturers with PhDs. They won't let their graduate students teach until they pass the prelims or become ABDs.

Most comp/rhet courses are taught by graduate students like you these days, which is often called modern-day slavery in the US.

I hear many say here rhetoric/comp is for rat brains. It's not intellectually stimulating at all. That's why lit people look down on rhetoric/comp folks. FYI Purdue's lit program isn't strong at all, I think, it ranks in the bottom tier. The rhetoric/comp PhD is for people who are very enthusiastic about teaching, above all else. If you have years of teaching experience at a high school or community college and loved it (which is very rare), the rhetoric/comp PhD is the way to go. The reason the job market looks better for rhet/comp PhDs is there are a lot of community colleges and small universities in the middle of nowhere where you have to teach 4/4 comp sections or more every year with a low salary. Yes, these are TT positions, and you have to teach like that for the rest of your life. These schools don't usually look for PhDs from prestigious schools (Harvard, Yale, Berkeley) because it's all about teaching, I mean, teaching often mentally challenged kids at a crappy school.

I agree it's hard to find any UK PhDs at American universities, but it seems that many Canadian universities hire UK PhDs.

Why don't you call them and ask where you're on the waitlist?

When he got that "decent" job, you were probably not even born yet. So look at the recent years. And average Joes like us getting that kind of job he has now is like a camel going through the eye of a needle these days.

Nope. I don't know if it's a good program with "bright" students but it seems its graduates don't get any real jobs. I'm done with Rochester. The main reason I applied there was that there was no application fee. All the Ph.D. programs in humanities at Rochester are no good, I mean, in terms of job placement.

I'd choose #4. The reputation of a school doesn't matter in rhetoric/comp. It's more about what you can do.

This is like an annual event. There was a same thread like this a week ago: You can find more threads.

You can't even read my relatively short post correctly. I said, "[funded MA programs] are easy to get in [compared to getting into funded Ph.D. programs], and "an unfunded MA doesn't look good when you apply to PhD programs [compared to students with a funded MA, with all other things being equal]." You say, "many people do a pay-your-way MA and go on to be very successful," and what does that mean "very successful"? Get into top programs? That's probably less than 1% of the entire unfunded MAs every year, although I admit Buffalo is an exception. FYI, Chicago's Ph.D. program hasn't admitted anyone from their MAPH program for years. In fact I haven't heard of anyone in their MAPH program getting into their Ph.D. program.