Man_About_Town

I'd say USC CS overall falls into the 2nd Tier for CS PhD programs, if you consider the top tier to be MIT, Stanford, Berkeley, CMU type programs and 2nd Tier to be Caltech, UCLA, USC, U Illinois, Purdue type programs. Living in Los Angeles is obviously way better than living in Ann Arbor, unless you have love for college towns. You write your ticket in industry and in academia with a CS PhD. The job market for Stats PhDs is robust but in no way as great as it is for CS PhDs.

Not sure what is Nontraditional about your profile. You have a traditional, stellar background that makes you competitive everywhere, especially with a soon to be published paper in hand. Only thing "missing" is that many slots at Stanford/MIT/etc are gained by a famous PI from Princeton/CMU/etc making a phone call to his/her colleague saying "You really want this student in your lab". Regardless, you are going to get a bunch of acceptances. Might want to apply a bit more broadly though. There are a lot of great programs other than the ones you listed. How is Berkeley not on your list?

I wanted to crowd-source to see if this is a problem at my institution or everywhere. I am a PhD student completing CS coursework, and with COVID all of my classes are online like everyone else. These courses are usually 200+ students and a mix of mostly MS students with some PhD students. I am not sure if students are more likely to ask questions because of the online format, but the MS students in the class (small number of PhD students so I know who they all are) frequently interrupt the professor to ask questions to which they clearly already know the answer. I briefly reviewed some literature and this is a pseudopathologic thing that young children do in order to show adults they are smart and know things. But it is so blatantly obvious that these students already know the answer, as their question is phrased as "Professor, isn't X so because Y?" It is only the MS students that do this. Is this common everywhere?

Respectfully, absolutely do not take this advice. I am an MD that is now in a PhD program. If you are even questioning whether you like clinical medicine in your first year of medical school, then it is absolutely not for you. Every conversation I have with doctors my age is about our "Out from clinical medicine". I can count on one hand how many physicians I know that do not regret going to medical school. In more detail: 1) I did research in undergrad and between MS1 and MS2 years. This is enough time to get a good publication out, but not to develop real research independence. The problem with medical school is that every step along the way in clinical training is a complete stop in research momentum. Imaging a PI having to restart his/her career every 4 years. That is what medical school, residency, clinical fellowship, etc do to you. 2) Entering a PhD program after med school (as I did) is not wise unless you enjoy 300k of student loan debt. Also, the pool of successful research scientists that are MD-only and have research skill gained from research fellowships post clinical training is shrinking. Many grants that apply to work in anything other than very basic clinical research want the PhD. 10-20 years ago this was not the case, but it is now. Compound that with the burden of clinical/teaching/admin duties as an MD and you get the point. 4) There is truth here, but the job market for PhDs, especially in industry, where a lot of interesting research now occurs, is hot. Take the advice or leave it. There is a reason that almost 20% of doctors are planning to leave clinical medicine: https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/hospital-physician-relationships/why-more-physicians-are-leaving-medicine-4-takeaways.html. I would guess that number from 2016 is closer to 25-30% now.

Yes, it is harder to get into most PhD programs with a Master's degree or other doctorate (MD) completed prior to starting your PhD. This is not because of anything having to do with the "science of science", but is because of the "business of science". Graduate students with a prior graduate degree or professional degree are not eligible for most NSF fellowships and many other fellowships, thus accepting you as a student into his/her lab would potentially create a more difficult funding situation for the PI.

Does anyone have strong knowledge of UCLA's BME PhD program? I've narrowed it down to UCLA vs some other LA programs. I am limited to LA. I was admitted to UCLA via their old "direct-to-specific-lab pathway", not their new "4-year" rotation-based, general admission pathway. As such, I did not go to preview day and I do not think I am going to have time to do a full visit before the April 15 deadline.

When I interviewed at Caltech, the current students and faculty were constantly talking about the huge donation that they just got from a "Chinese Billionaire". The actual term Chinese Billionaire was used. So either way, the money is coming from overseas at all these schools. My reason as to why Caltech is not creating a degree cash-cow is that the tiny size of the school simply could not sustain it. Or being in the Billionaire's favor makes it unnecessary. And you nailed it. My interests are in bioengineering. I think depending on your sub-interest within BME, your best lab could be at Caltech, UCLA, or USC.

This is sadly not limited to USC. Every single research University in the U.S. is following this model. Harvard has been doing this for years via their "Executive Education" program: https://www.exed.hbs.edu/programs/Pages/program-finder.aspx . Look at those tuition prices for week-long "courses" that give you nothing more than a certificate, not a degree. All schools use their Masters programs as a cash-mill, but USC simply does this better than other schools. This will only continue to expand with distance-learning. Look at how many schools have created online Data Science Masters programs overnight with 50K+ tuition. In the era of decreased, more competitive research funding, these schools are being industrious. All that aside, I think there is a strong argument that depending on what program you are pursuing in engineering, USC is on-par with UCLA and Caltech. Disclosure of conflict of interest: I recently interviewed at Caltech, UCLA, and USC for PhD programs and am likely going to choose USC as it has the best lab-fit for me.

All, Can anyone strongly comment on the job prospects for a CS PhD grad vs a BME PhD grad in industry, specifically in AI/ML and Neural Engineering? I have an admission at a top-30 CS program in CA but some attractive BME PhD offers where there is a much better lab fit for my focus. I think for jobs in academia it is a no brainer: go with the CS program where they are begging CS PhD grads to take tenure-track positions. However, if my programming skills are strong after my BME PhD, would the job prospects in industry be limited by the degree? I hear it is really "all about the research", and not the field of study of the PhD degree.

Has anyone else had the odd experience of attending a "visit" or "preview" day, only to find out that some of the applicants in attendance were already accepted and for other applicants the day served as a formal interview day with admission offer still to be decided? I want to say it is odd at best and unprofessional at worst.

Anyone with any communication at all from UCLA: email, Skype, phone call, tweet, message-carrying dove?

Would have to strongly consider USC based on the better commute alone.

CS. My guess is that they will Skype interview applicants as necessary over the next few weeks and get offers out that way. They said they were trying to have everything wrapped up in about a month, so if you have not heard from them yet, I would not be too concerned.

Had Skype interview with 2 UCI CS Professors. Went well. They had 2 very specific projects in-mind for me with which they want assistance, but made it seem like my actual work towards thesis would be wide open. They let me know at end of Skype interview that they are sending a recommendation for admission to committee and I should get formal letter or admission within 2 weeks. I have not heard a peep from USC CS. My area of interest is in Computational Neuroscience and AI/ML.

Lots of purple and blue on that list. Congratulations!