jukeboxhero

I’ve accepted NIU’s offer with an assistantship.

For the MA folks out there: yesterday I declined GSU (fellowship), SFU (assistantship), and Brandeis (partial merit scholarship + assistantship). I hope that helps allow some people to have a bit of time to make a decision!

I'm planning on starting an MA program in the fall. My background isn't primarily in philosophy, so I would like to spend some time between now and the fall trying to get up to speed on contemporary analytic philosophy. I'm currently reading 'Philosophy: a guide through the subject' edited by A.C. Grayling. I've found it a great introduction to analytic philosophy so far, and once I finish it, I would love to dig into a slightly more advanced (but not overwhelming!) overview of contemporary analytic philosophy. Does anyone have any book recommendations?

I declined an offer with assistantship from Houston's MA program a couple days ago. Best luck to everyone making decisions in the next couple weeks!

My background is in macro-economics. I greatly enjoyed my undergrad studies in econ, but my understanding is that graduate-level macro-econ (in most departments anyways, I'm sure there are some exceptions...) becomes increasingly about quantitative modeling, which I don't find nearly as interesting. Meanwhile, my interests are increasingly gravitating towards theoretical questions that push outside the traditional bounds of economics. In my brief exposure to philosophy so far, I find everything interesting and I've found it difficult to narrow down my interests (which is part of what is making choosing a program difficult). If I had to hazard a guess, I'd say I'm most interested in epistemology, mind, and moral psychology...

My background isn’t primarily in philosophy, so I’m finding that my general lack of knowledge about philosophy is making it that extra bit more difficult to know which program fits me the best (anyone have any thoughts/advice on choosing a program for someone without much of a background in philosophy?)

I don’t have a specific date in mind, but I would very much like to have the list narrowed down - and perhaps even make a decision - prior to the 15th. I want to give myself time to carefully consider each program, but once I do that, I don’t intend to keep people waiting unnecessarily!

Brandeis is unrealistic for me financially, but the others are all still in the game. Sorry I can’t be more helpful/definitive!

Just heard back from Brandeis, which was the last place I was waiting to hear from. For those who care/those on waitlists for funding, I am currently considering funded offers from: Georgia State (fellowship) Northern Illinois (assistantship) Simon Fraser (assistantship) Houston (assistantship) Brandeis ($10k merit scholarship + assistantship TBD) I am unsure when I’ll decide, but obviously I can only go to one place, so I thought some people on waitlists might want to know!

For what it's worth, I haven't heard anything.

Quick question: have Brandeis or Virginia Tech sent out acceptances yet?

Just declined offers with assistantships from Texas Tech University, Western Michigan University, and Ohio University.

I agree with you both - I will be in a better position to apply to PhD programs, and will likely get into a better PhD program as a result of completing an MA first. This is particularly true as my undergraduate major was not philosophy. That said, it is still always nice to hear direct testimony that a terminal MA is worth it!

Conventional wisdom suggests PhD placement rates should be one of - if not the - most important factor in choosing a masters program. Excluding Tufts (which it's fair to say does have a better placement rate) are there significant differences in placement rates between the other "Leiter mentioned" programs? I tried to dig into this today by taking a quick count of placements over the last 5 years for Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Northern Illinois, Georgia State, Brandeis, Western Michigan, Houston, and Simon Fraser. Somewhat less conventionally, I only considered students who went on to enroll in PGR ranked programs. Excluding students who didn't go on PGR programs wouldn't be the right approach for everyone, but it might make sense for someone who is (1) analytic philosophy focused and (2) wants to go on to a PhD program that maximizes their chance of ending up with a career at an R1. Some quick caveats: I counted quickly, I was mapping PGR ranks to programs manually, schools don't report placements the same way, etc, etc...I wouldn't be surprised if I made some mistakes. Those caveats aside, when you limit the sample to only students that go on to PGR ranked programs, there isn't that great of difference in the average PGR ranking of the PhD programs these students end up at. I found the average PGR placement rank for these MA programs ranged from 20 to 27, with a mean of 25, and median of 24. Houston was the low at 20, while two schools were tied for the high at 27. (This should be read as: Of students who graduated from the MA program at Houston in the last 5 years and went on to enroll in PGR ranked programs, the average PGR ranking of those programs was 20.) (Also, I'm mentioning Houston by name because I wanted to have an example to use, so I went back an double checked my math on that school. I haven't checked my math on the other schools, so I would rather not mention them by name.) Given the small sample sizes of students who went to PGR ranked programs (which ranged from 13 on the low end to 36 on the high end) can you really draw any conclusions about the differences in placement rates across these schools? Add to this factors determined before these students went to these schools (ex. undergrad institution), and 'luck' in the PhD application cycle, and there could be enough of a margin of error that I haven't found any significant difference rate in placement between any of these schools. Assume this is true. Then, if you are a sufficiently driven and personable student, committed to getting the most out of whatever MA program you go to, you will end up at the same ranking of PhD program regardless of which MA program (of the ones listed above) you attend. I'm interested in what other people think about this (and I would be very happy for someone to make a compelling counter-argument). As someone deciding between several of the programs listed above, I had thought placement rate would be a major input into my decision. Now, I'm not so sure...

Has anyone heard anything about the waitlist for fellowships (Brains & Behavior, Legal & Political, etc.) at Georgia State? Thanks!