oije

Thanks for the information! That's a great relief on my part. I didn't want to go to Stanford with absolutely no hope of a Ph.D. down the road. And I think even on its own an MSEE from Stanford is pretty good. How long did your coworker who went to MIT eventually stay at Stanford? Was he in a lot of debt? Or did he find some form of funding?

So I just got accepted into the Stanford MSEE program. I applied for the Ph.D. program, but they denied me the candidacy and put me on the MS for EE list. I've been reading a lot about the MSEE degree at Stanford, especially ideas that the MS program is a cash cow. I honestly don't mind having to pay IF I can have at least a chance at the Ph.D. program at Stanford, but I don't know how difficult it is to be able to find an advisor if you're not in the Ph.D. program. I have also been accepted as a doctoral candidate into UT Austin (my home school) in the CommNetS group. I'm not yet sure of the funding here, but at least I'm in somewhere. On the other hand, I am also waiting on Harvard, Caltech, and CMU Ph.D. programs. They may be long shots, but I would definitely pick a Ph.D. at one of those places, or even a thesis-based Masters, then the MSEE program at Stanford, especially because the Stanford MSEE program is non-thesis based. So what are the options if I do want to pursue a Ph.D. at Stanford, but by going into the Terminal MS first? I don't want to be in a program where even the professors won't let me do research because I'm not in the Ph.D. program. Thanks in advance to any replies.