DiscoTech

It sounds like you've asked a bunch of people on what to do except you fiance. With the federal government hiring freeze, I would probably stay in DC since it sounds like you would get to keep you employment. I also don't understand BU offers that you even want to consider it. Is it better or would just prefer a bigger program? Also, anything your fiance's opinion should probably trump what randos on the internet say.

Your bigger problem is that a school is unlikely to grant you a deferral if your reason for seeking one is to attend another school!!!!!

Don't worry. If there's anything NYU is good at it is loading up students with debt on schedule.

Seems a little optimistic to except quality input from a post so lacking in context/effort.

On second thought, this is a really good question. I doubt that this is the case for condensed matter at UIUC (I assume they are #1 given their history), but in electrical engineering there are definitely some dumpster fires (USC, Penn) that are ranked higher by US News than they truly deserve. On the flip side, Princeton and UCSB are very well regarded in academic circles compared to where the goobers at US News have them.

UIUC is ranked higher. Cornell is more reputed. wut?

USC is a glorified diploma mill unless you're in their PhD program. They are known to push the envelope on reporting to stay up in the rankings. Here is where they got busted for goosing the number of faculty they have in the National Academy of Engineering (link). Per USNWR, their engineering school claims to have research expenditures of $200M/year. However, when they report numbers to someone who cares about whether they lie on such things, they only report $69M/year in expenditures (NSF Herd Survey). If you just want a job after your Masters, USC might do the trick. If you want a meaningful research experience, that might be trickier.

You will not want to get a PhD in robotics after you see the job offers that come after the MS.

Seems like there's blame to go around here. OP kept leading on the advisor to this point (wants to stay, top choice, yadda, yadda) while the advisor was on sabbatical. Now the advisor needs to recruit a new student to fill a void they didn't think they had. Given how late it is in the season, the advisor probably lost out on the chance to recruit someone who would have fit well. On the other hand, since OP applied to other programs, the advisor should not have been surprised that OP wanted go elsewhere. The is part of the business and you'd think the professor could be the grown up. Hopefully, the advisor gets over it.

Are you in engineering or MSW? OP, you say you are interested in academia and I assume you mean at a research university. If you are, you might want to do a little more legwork by talking to professors at you alma mater. Barring that, you might some faculty pages like this one from Andrea Armani [LINK], which offer advice on searching for a faculty position. You should definitely do more than listen to one rando on the internet like me, but here are a couple of things I would suggest. - See if the schools you are interested in have a program that purports to train future faculty. - Hiring a new engineering professor is a big investment for a research institution. Usually they pony up $300k-$1M to help the professor buy equipment, credit at a nanofabrication facility, funding for 2-4 students, etc ... If they are going to make that investment, they want to know that you can pull in grant money. A couple of proxies for ability to rope in grant money (as I've been told) are: (a) 2-3 first authored papers in high impact journals (Nature, Science, PRL), (b) high number of citations of one's work, (c) their impression of your ability to market yourself and your work. What I have told you might only be true for my sub-field, but I would be surprised if it didn't apply to yours as well. Don't fall for the prestige trap. Your advisor is going to be much more important than the name on your diploma.

I have looked at alumni. The Wisconsin PIs send people to top labs and industry. The UMich PI is a wildcard since he has only graduated one student (who will do a postdoc). But Umich PI is putting out some well cited papers. As far as brand name, I can tell you it means almost nothing for national labs. I worked for one before. If brand name matters it is only because a lot of PIs doing cutting edge work are in well ranked schools. The Wisconsin PIs are up there with anyone. However, industry is another matter. No idea how the research arms of Intel and IBM choose people.

Yeah. I mean, this is exactly where we are. Michigan is better overall for both our careers, but the kids' grandparents are much closer in Wisconsin. After a year long process, it all comes down career v. children. LOL.

Posted my decision dilemma in the Decisions forum. Wouldn't mind EEs weighing in.

Background: - Older graduate student (30+) with family - Have plenty of savings from industry experience - Desired postgraduate employment - national lab/academia/industry lab Here are the different criteria I need to consider: Quality of Project: Michigan: A little outside my area of interest, but a hot topic at the moment. Wisconsin: Has two projects with two different PIs that are great matches for me. Mentorship: Michigan: Younger professor, but has put out some highly cited papers in last couple of years. Wisconsin: One is a younger professor and the other is a member of the national academies. The senior professor has great contacts in industry and government labs. Funding: Michigan: RA for the duration of the project - 3 years Wisconsin: First year fellowship and RA thereafter *** - After factoring in fees and insurance, Michigan offers is $5k/year more. Time to Degree: Michigan: 4 years likely Wisconsin: 3-3.5 year likely *** - This is important because my spouse's career is going to take a beating in the Midwest. Spouse's Career: Michigan: Can likely get a Visiting Assistant Professor or Visiting Fellow gig. Wisconsin: Nothing as prestigious available since spouse's field of specialization is not offered here. Quality of Life: We like both cities equally, but family is half as far away from Wisconsin compared to Michigan.

No.

If OP wants academia, he/she needs to go to the school with advisors who put our research that is well cited. Unless OP has a rockstar advisor picked out at VT, Georgia Tech is the better bet for academia. Of course, if simply getting a job after graduate is the priority, take the money and go to VT.

If you have 2+ years of fellowship support, the speed dating method should be fine. However, if you're on a first year fellowship and want to be on RA support thereafter, you will probably want to identify your group sooner rather than later. The group you are interested in might have committed its RA funding to someone else by the time you make a decision. That said, the worst case is that you just end up TA-ing for a year. This is the only kind of bad experience I have heard of. Students waited till near the end of this second semester to find a group and by that time their group had already committed money to other students. Research fit, at least to me, is about more than the subject matter. It is about the style of mentorship, dynamics of the research team, etc ... My M.S. work, which I will be continuing with at a another institution for my Ph.D, was not the topic I saw myself working on initially. I found a good mentor, learned more about research in the field, and was hooked. When things go bad, there are always back up plans - (link).

The link just had the average stipend for the University of Pennsylvania. I am not surprised that your offers are below that. I don't know why you are fixated on the "national average." I don't know how much room you have to negotiate RA offers. The professor making the offer would have to be willing to boost your pay above what some his/her current and more senior students are making.

(http://profiles.asee.org/profiles/7281/screen/33?school_name=University+of+Pennsylvania) The "national average" is a meaningless. Comparison between competitor programs is what matters. I assume you've been offered a fellowship and are trying to get them to throw in a little more money?

You need to run this up the chain of command. The vice Provost of Ethics or something. Whatever they call that person that you're University. There are ways for resolving these kinds of issues. It is not uncommon.

I understand the impulse to do this and had similar concerns moving from the Midwest to a coastal city a few years ago. Here's the best advice I can offer: - You can be yourself AND be professional at the same time. What counts as appropriate attire will depend on the program, but you don't have to go all extreme makeover to fit in. Do your job well. Be courteous to students you teach, your peers, and faculty. - I think everybody likes the idea of being best buds with people in their class, but don't feel like this is your only avenue to find friends. Find activity or affinity groups when you get to campus. I joined a couple of recreational clubs during my first year and met most of my friends this way. Funnily enough, a lot of those people were in my program, but 3-4 years ahead of me in their graduate career. I would say the same thing to anyone starting a new job in a new city. If people who end up starting the program with you become your friends, great. Otherwise, realize there's a whole sea of people out there to meet. - As with any good program, you will find that some of your classmates are ridiculously more experienced than you, way smarter than you, or whatever. If you start school with the mindset of comparing yourself to your classmates in an effort to prove yourself, you are setting yourself up for depression. Be the best graduate assistant you can be. Learn from your classmates where you can and help them out when you can. You're in! Don't pysch yourself out!

No, you didn't misunderstand. He is definitely talking about reaching out to the one school he wants to get hired by 5-10 years from now. Seems like a little bit of red flag to have a "dream job" before even starting a PhD program. If you're looking for TT positions in the humanities/social sciences, realize that it isn't uncommon for people to apply to 50+ positions. Other than that, I don't have much else to add to what TakeruK said, whose advice is spot on.

(Atlantic Story) (NYU Debt Stories) (NYU Marketing) (Work Study?) I have no personal experience with NYU (Thank God!). However, with the exception of some professional programs (law, business, medicine, Tisch), NYU is a diploma mill that seems to primarily view students as revenue generating units. Even if you're fully funded, there are downsides to a program like this. If the marketing/revenue generation attitude affects your department, very little attention is probably paid to student/faculty ratio, career placement, usefulness of the program, etc .... After all, the point is to enroll as many people as possible without jeopardizing opportunities for revenue generation in the future. I think NYU is second only to the University of Phoenix in terms of outstanding student loan debt. Just make sure your program isn't one of their many cons.

If OP isn't talking about Antarctica, I'm with you. Also, why apply to a school on a "horrible" continent? One can't exactly take the train to Paris for the weekend.

If the NYC program is NYU, go to Atlanta.