Does prestige of institution matter when applying to become a Professor?

[JDStat]

Hello,

I am a PhD student in Statistics and I am wondering how important the prestige of institution where I got my PhD is when applying for tenure track Professor positions.

I am a student at the University of Waterloo in Canada, the overall ranking of this university is not that spectacular but for Statistics, it is one of the top 3 in the country.

Will I later have trouble getting a job at prestigious institutions like, say, McGill University (ranked highly but not as strong in Statistics as Waterloo)?

Or would my publication record matter much more ?

 

thank you,

 

[Stat Assistant Professor]

The most important parts of the faculty application are the letters of recommendation and your publication record. If you have a strong publication record and can secure great letters from famous people (especially from people who are not your PhD/postdoc advisor or members of your thesis committee -- that actually helps a lot since it means your work is getting noticed by people who don't have a personal stake in your success), you should be in a good position to find a faculty job.

Prestige of PhD granting institution is certainly correlated with both of the above (partly because the top programs have more famous professors who are more prolific at publishing in the top journals), but a PhD from a mid-tier or lower ranked school seems to be much less of a hindrance in STEM than it is in humanities/social sciences. For example, I have seen faculty at Harvard University (including Assistant Professors and Department Chairs) in computer science, biostatistics, and physics whose PhDs are from UMass Amherst, University of Florida, and UC Boulder. The Associate Chair of the Harvard Biostats Dept did his PhD at University of Florida.

My advice is to do good work, secure a good postdoc, and network with the top people in your sub-area. The rest will follow.

Edited September 5, 2019 by Stat PhD Now Postdoc

[JDStat]

Hello,

Just wanted to say thank you very much for your reply, as a PhD student wanting to be employed in academia, I really do appreciate it.