Help on Columbia Stats PhD decision...

[is_a_PHDapplicant]

Hi, I'm deciding whether to commit to Columbia for Statistics PhD. I like to work on ML-related problems and I found some great professors who did a lot of interesting work in my research direction (so finding advisors/fellows is not a problem for me). My future career goal is most likely in the industry and so I definitely want to do summer research internships during my PhD. However, I have done a brief browse (on LinkedIn & Google search) of current stats PhD students and it appears that very few of them do industry internships. I was wondering why this is the case: is it due to the heavy workload in the program; or is it because most students in the program orient their career towards academia; or is it because advisors at Columbia generally have high research expectation that it'll be hard to meet if you do internships/don't spend more time on it in the summer, or is it because LinkedIn is just a small sample of the students in the program.... If anyone has any insights into the culture/environment there, I'd love to know. Thanks!

Edited March 10, 2023 by is_a_PHDapplicant

[bayessays]

I'd also suggest you ask the department this directly -- "do you support/encourage students doing internships over summer?" is a question that any reasonable statistics department would expect from applicants, and if this is important to you, you should go to a department that enthusiastically says "yes." 

[Econometrician]

I imagine most don't (i) keep their LinkedIn up to date or (ii) don't find it important to add internships to their LinkedIn.

[PhysicsKid]

This also seems like a good thing to ask students during visit days!