UT Austin vs Yale vs UCSD

[what_ever_]

Hi, can anyone comment about PhD programs at these three universities?

I am interested in a faculty position after my graduation, and I am not interested in industrial jobs at all.

The research areas in these three universities are a little different and complicated to analyze, so I just need some information or general reputation about these three problems.

Thanks a lot!

[jjsakurai]

They are all good but in terms of overall reputation UT Austin > UCSD > Yale. Hard to say more without knowing what area interests you.

[what_ever_]

They are all good but in terms of overall reputation UT Austin > UCSD > Yale. Hard to say more without knowing what area interests you.

It's just like the order in the CS US News Ranking.

What I meant by reputation is in terms of the competitiveness when I try to seek for a faculty position after graduation.

E.g., the Yale CS department is really small and there are only about 20 faculty members, which makes the department hard to be ranked higher.

So to me, the CS ranking does not seem to be something we can rely on.

[jjsakurai]

US News Rankings have a strong correlation with the the prestige of the department. Chances for a faculty job are mostly going to depend on the work you do and the reputation of your advisor. What a higher ranked school can provide is more (and sometimes more well known) faculty members to collaborate with among other things. If your interests change, a higher ranked department is more likely to have someone else you wanna work with. The department prestige also has an effect but that is well captured by the US News rankings.

If you're at a North American undergraduate and are looking for a faculty job in North America, then you might wanna talk to faculty members at your department to figure out what they're looking for in a faculty candidate.

Another thing you could do is look at the past record of students at the aforementioned universities getting faculty jobs. That will give you a lower bound on the number of faculty job offers received by students at the three schools.

Edited March 30, 2012 by jjsakurai

[spark1989]

Dont go by the ranking alone. For example, Yale is supposed to be the last rank, but it has some amazingly good faculty members such as Spielman (he was a prof at MIT and is a top theory guy).

If you've already been accepted at these places, then I'm a little surprised as you appear to have applied randomly. If you plan to apply, then better start researching these places.

[Pauli]

what_ever_, it's very difficult to gauge your question since those universities are really like comparing apples to oranges. What were you aiming to specialize in? The difficulty of finding a faculty position is all determined in what field you're interested in. For example, were you interested in doing theoretical artificial intelligence or robotics research work? Then you would receive pretty decent training for obtaining a faculty position in those fields. How about human-computer interaction or machine learning? Perhaps UCSD would be up your alley. The strength of obtaining a faculty position is dependent on the strength of the fields offered by those program. Basically, if you're judging which grad school to attend in order to get a faculty position, you might need to be more specific on your needs.

Edited April 1, 2012 by Pauli