Graduate admissions process makes no sense

[equinox]

Oh wow. eigen- sorry for repeating what you said, I was typing at the same time you were, I swear.

[Eigen]

Haha, no problem. At least it means I'm not the only one who thinks this way :-D

[ringo-ring]

Sorry, but creativity, which is important for research of course, is best of all measured by portfolio, publications, and writing samples. I simply don't understand how can some bullshit professor, who is by himself is no more creative than an empty can of soda, will have any right to assess my creativity. He can only write his own bullshit opinion nothing more. I will never understand why this little crap of paper called LOR played such important role in deciding my admission. If that's rules of the game then I better quit.

GRE tests + GPA + portfolio/pubs is more than enough to make a decision. LOR you might want to look if you want to know applicant's social skills nothing else

[fuzzylogician]

Sorry, but creativity, which is important for research of course, is best of all measured by portfolio, publications, and writing samples. I simply don't understand how can some bullshit professor, who is by himself is no more creative than an empty can of soda, will have any right to assess my creativity. He can only write his own bullshit opinion nothing more. I will never understand why this little crap of paper called LOR played such important role in deciding my admission. If that's rules of the game then I better quit.

GRE tests + GPA + portfolio/pubs is more than enough to make a decision. LOR you might want to look if you want to know applicant's social skills nothing else

Research is a social activity. In many cases it involves teams collaborating on projects, brainstorming, commenting on colleagues' work, presenting your own work. You don't work in a vacuum. Even if your research only requires a pen and paper and nothing else, you still depend on others for peer reviews, for acceptance to conferences, even for proofreading your texts. The difference between work that has not been read by others and one that has been extensively presented to peers and commented on by them is enormous. It is important to get other people's opinions, to hear from others who have different fields of expertise or theoretical or methodological orientations, etc. There are also other social obligations in academia, not least among them service and teaching. There are also very mundane things like having someone to bounce ideas off of, or help you figure out why your script is not compiling, or what could have possibly gone wrong with your latest experiment to make the data look so strange, or cover for you when you are sick but have to teach - just to name a few examples. Not to mention that people in general do not enjoy working with people who don't respect them. You appear to have a low opinion of your current teachers and future colleagues and peers, which could affect those who will be working with you. That is exactly the kind of thing a good LOR should warn against, and which will not come through your own words and evaluations of yourself, nor from your grades. It does matter what those who are in charge of your training think of your level of success. It does matter how creative they think you are, and how likely you are to be able to complete the course of studies of a rigorous graduate degree. With all due respect, you haven't been through the program and your high opinion of yourself is not enough by itself. Even if you are exceedingly brilliant, if you are unpleasant to work with, you could have trouble finding a school, appropriate mentors to work with at whatever school does accept you, and subsequently a job (by the way, you'll need reference letters for those future jobs, grants and promotions if you hope to stay in academia). On the other hand, if you are creative and productive, there is no reason why that should not come across in your LORs.If you've used your resources wisely, presented and received comments about your work from your teachers, then they should be familiar enough with it to praise it as it deserves. The evaluation of experienced researchers is an important part of the LOR and pertains to the merits of your work, not to your social skills. Both are important. An admissions committee may read the finished product of one of your works which you submit as a writing sample, and its members may even become excited and search for other publications by you, but they cannot be as familiar with your work process as your LOR writers, and honestly I don't think it's reasonable to expect them to read multiple works by the many applicants that they get, when they could read summaries and opinions about that work written by trusted colleagues who have been through the graduate school process and have successfully emerged out the other end.

Edited March 22, 2011 by fuzzylogician

[Eigen]

What Fuzzy said. And yes....If you don't like the whole "letters of recommendation" thing..... Theres a lot more of it through the rest if your career. From post-docs to faculty positions and even grants!

[ringo-ring]

Research is a social activity.

Absolutely! Interactions and teamwork are very important in science, a bit less in humanities

(you might want to visit another topic I created to learn more about this: )

But still, it doesn't mean other people opinions should be the most important factor in grad school applications. All in all, everyone sees other people through his/her own lens, and their judgement is not accurate. The only thing that LOR's are getting accurately is social skills. They're important, but they're not the most important thing in research, that's what I'm trying to say.

[Eigen]

It's impressions from people who have been around you for a while.... To an adcom that has nothing but some paper to judge you a by, of course the assessment of one of their colleagues is going to be important in deciding who of a very large number of people to give a spot to.

[fuzzylogician]

Absolutely! Interactions and teamwork are very important in science, a bit less in humanities

(you might want to visit another topic I created to learn more about this: )

But still, it doesn't mean other people opinions should be the most important factor in grad school applications. All in all, everyone sees other people through his/her own lens, and their judgement is not accurate. The only thing that LOR's are getting accurately is social skills. They're important, but they're not the most important thing in research, that's what I'm trying to say.

I'm not sure why you think that LORs get social skills accurately but other skills inaccurately. Why aren't both equally subjective opinions? (is there such a thing as an objective opinion?) Why do you think that these opinions are the most important factor in grad school admissions, and why are they an unfair criterion?

Yes, LORs are indeed very important, because they are a direct testament from active researchers within your field that your work is creative, independent, innovative -- and yes, that you'll fit socially in a research community. But LORs are paired with the SOP, where you tell your own story of your work, and with the writing sample, which is a more direct indication of your ability--and you obviously choose the best such indication and you polish your SOP until it shines.. It's not three random people who you choose to render an opinion about you and your work. It's the three people who you have worked closest with you and who know your work the best. Why would they not have a high opinion of the merit of the work, not only what you vaguely call social skills? Presenting work, listening to criticism, revising -- those are all social in nature but they are important professional skills. The people you meet with on a regular basis should have a good idea of how you do in these important academic areas, and other aspects of your application packet just can't provide this information.

Edited March 22, 2011 by fuzzylogician

[ringo-ring]

I'm not sure why you think that LORs get social skills accurately but other skills inaccurately. Why aren't both equally subjective opinions?

That is because for social/interpersonal skills, there seems to be no better measure than assessment of another person; for everything else, like knowledge on some subject, there are better, more objective ways to get an estimate.

And not everyone will have about ~10 people who know you and your work well, to select three the most professional and honest ones who will rate your work objectively; most of the time, you'll have to go with what you have, and in the end, the final result depends on luck - some students happen to get the good teachers but other do not. What I'm trying to say, LOR depends on person who wrote it as much as on the student, which makes students very hard to compare fairly based on LORs in competitive admission process.

[Eigen]

There are no other reasonable measures of work ethic, research skill/talent, the ability to come up with your own projects, the degree of self direction the student has shown....They are all very important traits.... The most important traits for a researcher, really.Your grades and GRE say very little helpful about your potential fir graduate school, and your SoP could be honest or not. Your publication record shows something, but says little about how much of the work was really yours.

[ringo-ring]

If my talent, determination and abilities to come up with my own projects is nothing more than what another person thinks of me, then I better kill myself.

[fuzzylogician]

That is because for social/interpersonal skills, there seems to be no better measure than assessment of another person; for everything else, like knowledge on some subject, there are better, more objective ways to get an estimate.

That's a bit naive. If you're thinking of the GPA and GRE, the quality of the education applicants in different schools in different countries receive vary widely. Even within the same institution, I'm sure you know that the same class can be wonderful or terrible based on the instructor who teaches it. Grades can be curved up or down, and in any case they don't reflect true knowledge of a field. The GRE tests all kinds of things, but knowledge of your (anyone's) chosen field is certainly not one of them. A select publication or writing sample also cannot hope to provide the adcom with an objective measure of your knowledge of the field. It'll likely be a very narrow assessment of a very narrow problem (as it should be! papers and publications are not about conveying to the world everything you know about your field). The opinions of your teachers about what you learned in school is no less objective than all of those other measures. Together with them, they provide the adcom with a more complete picture of your training.

And not everyone will have about ~10 people who know you and your work well, to select three the most professional and honest ones who will rate your work objectively; most of the time, you'll have to go with what you have, and in the end, the final result depends on luck - some students happen to get the good teachers but other do not. What I'm trying to say, LOR depends on person who wrote it as much as on the student, which makes students very hard to compare fairly based on LORs in competitive admission process.

Yes, some luck is involved. That is true. Some measure of luck is also involved in the GRE and in the grade you get for a class you took in semester X with prof Y whose exam was or was not more difficult than in other years or than you would get in another institution. So those also depend not only on the student but also on the person who wrote the test, for example, or the TA who wrote the grading key and decided to be more or less lenient. Truly objective criteria just do not exist. However, the opinions of those you work with can teach the adcom much more about who you are as a researcher and a student than your grades. You need to understand that as you move forward in the academic world, these subjective measures become increasingly important and in many cases replace those things that you are calling objective criteria. Research is based on the exchange of ideas, on peer-reviews. These are not uniform by any means, let me tell you. You can get terribly conflicting comments from different reviewers who have read the exact same text. Not everyone has the expertise to judge the many kinds of work that they encounter in the process of assessing applicants for jobs, grants, etc., and even those who do have the expertise do not necessarily have the same opinions of all the work. If such a consensus existed, academia would not -- and so people rely on the summaries and recommendations of others quite often when they evaluate candidates. So the writing sample and publications are not objective. Nor is the SOP, I'm sure you'll agree. And so we conclude that is not such thing as an objective measure, which is why the application asks for many different things that cover different aspects of your work that are relevant to your fit and possible success within the graduate program that you're applying to. You can think of the LOR as a form of peer review -- one of many that will come in your academic life -- but a favorable one, where you get to choose your reviewers.

Edited March 22, 2011 by fuzzylogician

[wtncffts]

Gosh, ringo-ring, I never like to resort to ad hominem arguments, but it really seems like your problems with LORs arise from negative personal experiences and not dispassionate analysis of their merits. BTW, nobody, I don't think, has said that LORs are or should be the most important part of the application. They're taken together with all the other elements to create a holistic sense of an applicant's potential.

Your last reply is off the mark. Of course, your talent, determination, etc. are your own, and are ultimately what will carry you through. However, you might be surprised to learn that admissions committees don't have magical mental machines with which they can scan your brain and say, "Oh, look, this guy has x amount of talent, y amount of determination...". They need to gather information about you from afar with limited resources. Your own 'statements of value', as it were, such as SOPs and writing samples, are helpful, as are observations and remarks from others, usually people who are 'experts' in the field and professionals in the education of academics.

I find odd your assumptions that putative recommenders are 'tainted' by subjectivity while oneself is a perfect judge of one's own character. If anything, it's the opposite: if there's anybody more partial, biased, etc. about one's capabilities, it's one's self. Do you accept the notion of work references? How about peer-reviewed journals? In your line of thinking, it would seem that nobody but yourself has the right to make evaluations about your work and have those evaluations carry weight. It's almost solipsistic.

EDIT: for some reason, fuzzylogician's last post didn't show up before I posted. I agree with the remarks.

Edited March 22, 2011 by wtncffts

[ringo-ring]

That's a bit naive.

The post above is stupid.

[ringo-ring]

I find odd your assumptions that putative recommenders are 'tainted' by subjectivity while oneself is a perfect judge of one's own character. If anything, it's the opposite: if there's anybody more partial, biased, etc. about one's capabilities, it's one's self. <...> In your line of thinking, it would seem that nobody but yourself has the right to make evaluations about your work and have those evaluations carry weight. It's almost solipsistic.

I never mention that oneself is perfect judge - it presents as much skewed pictures as LORs do. But there are definitely objective measures, such as tests. I agree that they cannot measure everything, just mention tests as an example measure that is objective. All in all, with the great availability of study materials online, anyone who is determined enough can learn subject regardless of what they teach in undergraduate course; so even some subjectivity is introduced by difference in initial education levels, it can be compensated for. Not so with LORs!

Do you accept the notion of work references? How about peer-reviewed journals?

I will not judge on work reference since we don't have them here.

Regarding the peer-reviewed journals, you can always select which journal you want to evaluate your submission. But as I mentioned before, with LORs you have to move on with what you have. If your fortune didn't provide you with good recommenders then there is little you can do about this. With journals, you can always submit your work where you think it will receive the most professional evaluation.

All in all, I think that LOR is very tainted measure, and it is better if we come up with other, more objective ways to evaluate applicants, leaving LORs for what can they do best - evaluate social skills.

[fuzzylogician]

The post above is stupid.

....and that's my cue to leave the discussion.

If you want to argue about the content of my posts, I think you will have noticed that I take the time to reply and that I provide the reasoning behind my arguments. If you want to get hung up on the form of the reply, and selectively cite only parts of the post (as you often do, btw, and I should have protested earlier and ask for full replies to all of my points and not selected half-points that you misrepresent) - then I am done. I hope that you can step back and read this thread again for its merit later on, and that others will benefit from whatever ideas were exchanged in it so far.

Edited March 22, 2011 by fuzzylogician

[ringo-ring]

well... I found some of your points interesting and wanted to argue with them; but I find it, how to say, beneath my dignity to reply posts that contain ad hominem arguments

[fuzzylogician]

well... I found some of your points interesting and wanted to argue with them; but I find it, how to say, beneath my dignity to reply posts that contain ad hominem arguments

Forgive me from citing wikipedia here, but I think it'll do for our present purposes;

An ad hominem (Latin: "to the man"), short for argumentum ad hominem, is an attempt to link the validity of a premise to a characteristic or belief of the opponent advocating the premise.

Now read just the text you cited, not even the thoughtful comment that followed it.

"That's a bit naive."

"That" would be the content of your claim, not you personally. You (in person) don't interest me at all, it's the posts that I am arguing with. The reason I write is in the hopes that others will benefit from the exchange of ideas, even if you don't want to learn from them.

I'd appreciate it if you did not misrepresent my intentions.

Beneath you to reply to posts "that contain ad hominem arguments" ... the nerve of some people.

Edited March 22, 2011 by fuzzylogician

[truckbasket]

Aww man... I thought this discussion was happening over here:

It looks like you've got the same conversation going in two different locations, only this one is snarkier!

TB

Edited March 22, 2011 by truckbasket

[wtncffts]

well... I found some of your points interesting and wanted to argue with them; but I find it, how to say, beneath my dignity to reply posts that contain ad hominem arguments

Were you referring to fuzzylogician's or my post? Because I don't think fuzzylogician said anything which was ad hominem in that post, or earlier.

I, on the other hand, freely admitted that I held your arguments to be negatively affected by what is seemingly a personal grievance of yours. I mean, I can't remember your exact words, but if you're calling your professors "bullshit" and knowing nothing more than a soda can or something like that, and arguing that LORs are only about social skills in the sense of schmoozing profs, it's clear to me that your rejection of LORs as a reliable measure is based on whatever personal experiences you've had, and not on their merits in themselves.

[wtncffts]

Aww man... I thought this discussion was happening over here:

It looks like you've got the same conversation is going in two different locations, only this one is snarkier!

TB

Yeah, I thought I had posted something about this somewhere else... my points stand!

[qbtacoma]

Now I want to see someone be offended by the requirement that we have to give them our names to apply ("that's so personal!") and I will have seen someone get deeply offended at every aspect of the applications process. Yay!

Seriously though folks, I know we're all Unique Snowflakes (I certainly am!), but there's just no good way (read: "nice" way) to assess large groups of people and their potential without generalizing/testing/asking other people, and any numbers of these measure will reveal our weaknesses, as they should. There's no need to resent that. We need to be holistic good candidates for programs to pour half of decades and thousands of dollars into us.

[neuropsych76]

I think a lot of people focus on getting a recommendation from a "star" professor, and I think that is not at all necessary. A professor that knows you well and thinks you can do well in graduate school is all that's needed.

Graduate admissions really isn't all that complex: Do well in classes, have a good understanding of the base material, have several years of in-depth research experience (that you can explain and discuss well) have some good extra-curriculars/awards/society memberships, and have 3 professors that know you well enough to write good, personal letters for you by the time you graduate.

I agree with this.

I wasn't wildly successful in the admissions process but I've had a few interview/visits from some pretty solid schools as a senior in college. I didn't have any super star recommendations but I knew my professors very well and I think that allowed them to write good letters. I had an average GRE score and an above average GPA. But, I went out of my way to obtain lots of research experience, including working at other institutions when needed. That is what I think separated from other applicants (a few professors told me this) and it really wasn't that hard to do since I love research. Additionally, it isn't that hard to present at conferences if you make the extra effort to obtain good research experience. Motivation and work ethic are important components of graduate school admissions success.

[truckbasket]

Yeah, I thought I had posted something about this somewhere else... my points stand!

Haha!

And there's another variant an the same discussion here: ... a poll to rate the most important factors for admission -- and SOP isn't provided as an option to vote on! Oh well!