Why did you apply where you applied?

[turambar85]

I skimmed through the posts and tried a couple of things in the search function and didn't see a comparable thread.  So, since we are all sitting here panicking while schools either don't respond, or respond in a way that makes us wish that they never had, I thought it would be nice to step back and look at why people chose to apply where they did.

 

So, why did you pick your schools?  How many were "safety nets"?  Did you have a specific strategy in mind?  

 

Edit: Did your undergraduate advisor (or MA advisor) assist you very much in crafting your list?  Did you take their advice?  And are there any things that you would do differently if you could redo this cycle?

Edited February 24, 2014 by turambar85

[greencoloredpencil]

As far as picking schools my list was composed in the following way. First I used Leiter rankings and department strengths (this included things like a particular professor of interest, etc) as a rough guide to forming a preliminary list. After that I thought about my chances at each and trimmed down my list so that I had a certain proportion of reach, good-shot, and safety schools. Then I showed my list to several professors in my AOI at my undergrad institution for advice. With their help I further edited the list. 

[turambar85]

As far as picking schools my list was composed in the following way. First I used Leiter rankings and department strengths (this included things like a particular professor of interest, etc) as a rough guide to forming a preliminary list. After that I thought about my chances at each and trimmed down my list so that I had a certain proportion of reach, good-shot, and safety schools. Then I showed my list to several professors in my AOI at my undergrad institution for advice. With their help I further edited the list. 

What did you see as a good breakdown of reach, good-shot, and safety net schools?  And what (assumed) odds of admission did you have in mind when determining where schools went on that list?

 

My first time around, I probably had (what I thought was) 2 complete reaches, 3-5 reaches, 2-3 okay shots, 1-2 good shots, and 2 safety nets.  I took each category to be, by percentage: 0-2, 2-5, 5-10, 10-25, and 25-50.   

 

I think that I was wrong on a lot of those, and I believe that I would take 2 reaches and put them in the "good shot" category.

[greencoloredpencil]

What did you see as a good breakdown of reach, good-shot, and safety net schools?  And what (assumed) odds of admission did you have in mind when determining where schools went on that list?

 

My first time around, I probably had (what I thought was) 2 complete reaches, 3-5 reaches, 2-3 okay shots, 1-2 good shots, and 2 safety nets.  I took each category to be, by percentage: 0-2, 2-5, 5-10, 10-25, and 25-50.   

 

I think that I was wrong on a lot of those, and I believe that I would take 2 reaches and put them in the "good shot" category.

 

Well in deciding a breakdown I had to ask myself if I would be okay attending a program outside of the top 20 or 25 or if I'd rather reapply next year if I was not admitted anywhere. I ultimately decided on very few schools that I'd be happy to attend outside of this range, 3 to be exact, so they became my safety schools. I suppose "safety school" might be a misleading term to use since admissions are so competitive and it would be mistaken to count on being surely admitted anywhere. Anyway, I decided to really target the 10-20 range in terms of Leiter rankings for this reason. My reaches were the number of top ten schools I applied to. I've been told by my letter writers that I have a very good shot for the programs I've applied to. However, so far I've only been waitlisted at one program in the 10-20 range.

Edited February 24, 2014 by greencoloredpencil

[Establishment]

As far as picking schools my list was composed in the following way. First I used Leiter rankings and department strengths (this included things like a particular professor of interest, etc) as a rough guide to forming a preliminary list. After that I thought about my chances at each and trimmed down my list so that I had a certain proportion of reach, good-shot, and safety schools. Then I showed my list to several professors in my AOI at my undergrad institution for advice. With their help I further edited the list. 

 

I'm curious if you would spell out what sort of things your professors did to help further your list. Did they say that you were missing out on a few schools who were strong in your AOI? Did they say that you shouldn't apply to certain schools because the professor who you thought had X as an AOI, wasn't an entirely strong figure for X?

[turambar85]

I'm curious if you would spell out what sort of things your professors did to help further your list. Did they say that you were missing out on a few schools who were strong in your AOI? Did they say that you shouldn't apply to certain schools because the professor who you thought had X as an AOI, wasn't an entirely strong figure for X?

I know that I'm not Green, but I thought I'd share my experience.  My mentor had a large role in my choices in schools.  He actually came up with a list himself, broken down into the different categories.  I ended up changing much of his list - it was WAY too optimistic.  It's a good thing I did, too, or I would be doing something else right now.  

[greencoloredpencil]

I'm curious if you would spell out what sort of things your professors did to help further your list. Did they say that you were missing out on a few schools who were strong in your AOI? Did they say that you shouldn't apply to certain schools because the professor who you thought had X as an AOI, wasn't an entirely strong figure for X?

 

Yes, they did basically exactly what you guessed. We talked over each school on my list and I heard opinions from them regarding things like you said. I removed some schools and added others based on their recommendations. My AOI is a little divergent (I have two separate areas that I am very interested in) so I wanted to find schools strong in both areas.  I asked professors who specialize in each respective area of my AOI for help.

Edited February 24, 2014 by greencoloredpencil

[philophilosopher]

This is an excellent thread! To be honest, I found it very difficult to choose schools and navigate the massive amount of (oftentimes biased) information. Obviously, the PGR was a good place to start, and, of course, I consulted my undergrad profs a little bit. In the end, I really only chose schools based on the faculty they had who were working in my area and who stuff I had read and was familiar with. I told myself that I would only apply to schools that, provided I was accepted, I would actually really want to attend.

 

As a semi-safety, I applied to two funded masters (even though they are not really safeties because they are so competitive) that had at least one faculty member working in my AOI. 

[turambar85]

This is an excellent thread! To be honest, I found it very difficult to choose schools and navigate the massive amount of (oftentimes biased) information. Obviously, the PGR was a good place to start, and, of course, I consulted my undergrad profs a little bit. In the end, I really only chose schools based on the faculty they had who were working in my area and who stuff I had read and was familiar with. I told myself that I would only apply to schools that, provided I was accepted, I would actually really want to attend.

 

As a semi-safety, I applied to two funded masters (even though they are not really safeties because they are so competitive) that had at least one faculty member working in my AOI. 

Yeah, partly I was just curious but I also was hoping that this could develop into something that helped future students craft a better list based on the failures of their predecessors.

 

My failure (the first time) was not realizing what a "good" school or a "safety net" actually meant, relative to me and my abilities.  I ended up getting lucky and getting a few acceptances, and one with funding (UW), but it could have easily gone a different direction.  

 

Students get obsessed (I did) with the PGR, and the top 50 schools, and end up building a list that it unrealistic and that may not even be best for them anyway.  It's a shame really.  We spend countless hours fretting over admissions, crafting a personal statement, revising a writing sample, etc.  But, when it comes to deciding which schools to put on the list, I think that most of us (myself included, again) don't spend enough time "shopping around".  We miss out on some real gems that way, and end up with stressful cycles full of rejections.  

[PhD applicant]

In response to your comment about not shopping around, I know I didn't. The first school I looked at I fell in love with, like a big dumb animal and it stayed my first choice. I admit I have no realistic expectations, I expect to get into the awesomest schools, and then I will bad-mouth them for not thinking as much of me as I do after they have rejected me. But I walked into it knowing this, so were they really unrealistic. I mean, isn't our abnormally obnoxious ego what makes us philosophy majors. I mean, there are theater majors... but I think of those more as 'attention sluts'.

[wandajune]

I applied to 12 schools. Four of these are (PGR) ranked in the top 25, five in the 50-25 range, three unranked, and one terminal MA program. I chose these schools because I wanted to apply to a wide range, I felt these programs were a good fit for my interests, and I liked the location of the programs. I would consider the unranked and MA program as my "safety nets" (if there is such a thing). At the time of applying, I sort of thought all schools in the top 50 were a "reach" for me, based my weaker undergraduate institution and the belief that my writing sample might not be that good. My undergraduate adviser encouraged me to apply to a wide range, and helped make suggestions of good programs based on my AOIs.

 

If I could do anything differently, I may not have applied to some of the lower ranked and unranked programs on my list, and I would have applied to more "reach" schools. I do think the risk of being shut out associated with applying to more highly regarded programs is worth it compared to the long-term risk of applying to an unranked university with worse placement rates. Not to say anyone should take too much stock in the rankings, but I am concerned about job placement eventually, and the better ranked programs on my list generally happen to have better placement rates. (Though I'm not regretting it too much, because I do think it's hard to estimate how successful your application might be before the results actually come out. And I've already gotten into a few programs that I would be quite happy attending.)

[objectivityofcontradiction]

I applied based on: fit (there had to be at least one Kant scholar in every department I applied to), placement record, and location. Then I began to look at the 'fluff,' i.e. size of stipend, availability of summer funding, is this school an active conference hoster (hostess?), cost of living, music scene in the city, etc. 

 

I spend an uncanny amount of time researching where the author's of the papers and books I enjoy teach, and have put in a serious amount of CV perusing over the past 2+ years. So my list of schools was very well researched. I think it is good advice to look up where a philosopher you enjoy teaches, and see what they are writing about and have written about in the past; then, maybe see where they got their PhD., then you think, well, maybe I should apply there, given that that school produced this philosopher, and so naturally may have people I'd like to work with. That is, only if the original philosopher you researched works somewhere that does not seem all that conducive to your interests. 

 

Things like that. 

 

My MA supervisor and I would often talk about my list as well. I'd drop names of people and institutions, and he'd give me his thoughts. It was through this process that I added schools to, and subtracted them from, my list.

Edited February 25, 2014 by objectivityofcontradiction

[philophilosopher]

My failure (the first time) was not realizing what a "good" school or a "safety net" actually meant, relative to me and my abilities.  I ended up getting lucky and getting a few acceptances, and one with funding (UW), but it could have easily gone a different direction.  

 

Students get obsessed (I did) with the PGR, and the top 50 schools, and end up building a list that it unrealistic and that may not even be best for them anyway.  It's a shame really.  We spend countless hours fretting over admissions, crafting a personal statement, revising a writing sample, etc.  But, when it comes to deciding which schools to put on the list, I think that most of us (myself included, again) don't spend enough time "shopping around".  We miss out on some real gems that way, and end up with stressful cycles full of rejections.  

 

I applied to 12 schools. Four of these are (PGR) ranked in the top 25, five in the 50-25 range, three unranked, and one terminal MA program. I chose these schools because I wanted to apply to a wide range, I felt these programs were a good fit for my interests, and I liked the location of the programs. I would consider the unranked and MA program as my "safety nets" (if there is such a thing). At the time of applying, I sort of thought all schools in the top 50 were a "reach" for me, based my weaker undergraduate institution and the belief that my writing sample might not be that good. My undergraduate adviser encouraged me to apply to a wide range, and helped make suggestions of good programs based on my AOIs.

 

If I could do anything differently, I may not have applied to some of the lower ranked and unranked programs on my list, and I would have applied to more "reach" schools. I do think the risk of being shut out associated with applying to more highly regarded programs is worth it compared to the long-term risk of applying to an unranked university with worse placement rates. Not to say anyone should take too much stock in the rankings, but I am concerned about job placement eventually, and the better ranked programs on my list generally happen to have better placement rates. (Though I'm not regretting it too much, because I do think it's hard to estimate how successful your application might be before the results actually come out. And I've already gotten into a few programs that I would be quite happy attending.)

 

A few notes/comments. I think it is really funny that a lot of us (myself most definitely included) initially characterize our schools based on the PGR; it is quite amazing how dominant and pervasive it has become, primarily because (I assume) it is the only statistically/methodologically rigorous ranking of philo departments by philosophy academics. It is definitely a pharmakon: it can most certainly be useful as a starting point, but over-reliance on it can likely lead to missing out on some really cool programs with good faculty and good placement records. I am interested in continental philosophy and so I definitely applied to some "speppy"schools, like Vandy, Boston College, Emory, etc. Most of those schools have really solid placement records but our almost ignored in the PGR. I don't really know the point of this post, but, it is quite striking to me how easily I am subsumed into adopting one set of rankings (the PGR) simply because it is so easily available and so widely regarded. There is definitely a merit in doing the grunt work and "shopping" around to other non-PGR-ranked schools.

 

EDIT: I also really do not think there is such a thing as a safety school in philo grad admissions, at least for grad admissions with funding. There are so many applicants for so few spots. Even at the lesser known schools, there are so many applicants that the pool is bound to be somewhat competitive. Maybe there are some rare students who know they will end up somewhere. But that somewhere is by no means guaranteed because departments seem to admit candidates based on a variety of factors with varying degrees of import in the components of an applications. 

Edited February 25, 2014 by philophilosopher

[Weltgeist]

(there had to be at least one Kant scholar in every department I applied to)

this was basically my criteria but swap 'Kant scholar' with 'Hegel scholar'

Edited February 25, 2014 by Weltgeist

[AcademicX]

A few notes/comments. I think it is really funny that a lot of us (myself most definitely included) initially characterize our schools based on the PGR; it is quite amazing how dominant and pervasive it has become, primarily because (I assume) it is the only statistically/methodologically rigorous ranking of philo departments by philosophy academics. It is definitely a pharmakon: it can most certainly be useful as a starting point, but over-reliance on it can likely lead to missing out on some really cool programs with good faculty and good placement records. I am interested in continental philosophy and so I definitely applied to some "speppy"schools, like Vandy, Boston College, Emory, etc. Most of those schools have really solid placement records but our almost ignored in the PGR. I don't really know the point of this post, but, it is quite striking to me how easily I am subsumed into adopting one set of rankings (the PGR) simply because it is so easily available and so widely regarded. There is definitely a merit in doing the grunt work and "shopping" around to other non-PGR-ranked schools.

 

EDIT: I also really do not think there is such a thing as a safety school in philo grad admissions, at least for grad admissions with funding. There are so many applicants for so few spots. Even at the lesser known schools, there are so many applicants that the pool is bound to be somewhat competitive. Maybe there are some rare students who know they will end up somewhere. But that somewhere is by no means guaranteed because departments seem to admit candidates based on a variety of factors with varying degrees of import in the components of an applications. 

I agree with you. I am also interested in Continental Philosophy and it was a struggle to realize that the schools that were strong in my AOI were ignored if not bashed by Leiter. I am not saying that Leiter's rankings are not useful, but I take them with a grain of salt, especially when it comes to continental philosophy. Seriously, the guy calls my advisor Alan Schrift a "mediocre" Nietzsche scholar in his blog, when Schrift is the main editor of Stanford's upcoming 19-volume translation of the Complete Works of Friedrich Nietzsche. Even if I know that I shouldn't care about Leiter's rankings because of its biased methodology against continental philosophy (and particularly SPEP schools), I often regret not having applied to more top-25 programs (I guess we can't really escape the desire for recognition). But then again, I would not enjoy having to take the majority of my classes in analytic topics, even if I could work with one or two professors who specialize in what I like. 

Edited February 25, 2014 by Johannes14

[Differance]

I agree with you. I am also interested in Continental Philosophy and it was a struggle to realize that the schools that were strong in my AOI were ignored if not bashed by Leiter. I am not saying that Leiter's ranking are not useful, but I take it with a grain of salt, especially when it comes to continental philosophy. Seriously, the guy criticizes my advisor Alan Schrift as a "mediocre" Nietzsche scholar in his blog, when Schrift is the main editor of Stanford's upcoming 19-volume translation of the Complete Works of Friedrich Nietzsche. Even if I know that I shouldn't care about Leiter's rankings because of its biased methodology against continental philosophy (and particularly SPEP schools), I often regret not having applied to more top-25 programs (I guess we can't really escape the desire for recognition). But then again, I would not enjoy having to takeithe majority of my classes in analytic topics, even if I could work with one or two professors who specialize in what I like. 

 

I ran out of upvotes, or I would give this ten. I was in the exact same boat, except I didn't have any advisors of Alan Schrift's caliber- I went to a very weak undergrad institution.

[Establishment]

The PGR makes no claim to be relevant for continental pickings. So, I'd be curious to hear more about the perspective about finding schools not picked out by PGR for analytic based schools, if there are any.

 

For next year, I've browsed through the universities listed under the PGR specialty listing for my particular areas and looked at their departments and faculty members and will probably be selecting programs largely from that.

 

I honestly don't really know what went through my mind my first application cycle last year. My interests in philosophy had been undergoing a radical change at around the time of my application cycle, so that was unfortunate. At the time I felt like I knew what I wanted to do, but I really didn't. I was just dealing with some superficial interest in some areas I hadn't done any work in yet.

 

In any case, I applied mainly to MA programs because I knew my application was overall going to be weak despite coming from a strong school, and having good quantitative stats. The reason for this is largely because of my writing sample. I wrote it from start to finish in under 48 hours (that is, a two-day cram session during finals week), and spent less than 5 hours editing it before sending it off to programs. (Pro-tip: Don't do this. This kills the applicant's chances.) I then applied to 1 unranked PhD, 1 low ranked PhD, and 1 medium ranked PhD. I did the unranked because I thought it'd be a safety (which it turned out to be), the low ranked because of interests based on the PGR, and the mid-ranked because I independently knew some of the faculty there that I wanted to work with.

 

I didn't really have any help from my list. One of my professors mentioned the professors they knew at my school. He also indicated I rethink about applying to one of the top-10 programs, which I ended up heeding.

 

Next year should look better. My interests will be a lot more firm and I'll be applying to a large amount of places rather than just six. I think my general method of picking out places is fine. I never did apply to a program just purely out of its PGR ranking. It was always because they had faculty I was interested in.

Edited February 25, 2014 by Establishment

[AcademicX]

The PGR makes no claim to be relevant for continental pickings. So, I'd be curious to hear more about the perspective about finding schools not picked out by PGR for analytic based schools, if there are any.

 

For next year, I've browsed through the universities listed under the PGR specialty listing for my particular areas and looked at their departments and faculty members and will probably be selecting programs largely from that.

 

I honestly don't really know what went through my mind my first application cycle last year. My interests in philosophy had been undergoing a radical change at around the time of my application cycle, so that was unfortunate. At the time I felt like I knew what I wanted to do, but I really didn't. I was just dealing with some superficial interest in some areas I hadn't done any work in yet.

 

In any case, I applied mainly to MA programs because I knew my application was overall going to be weak despite coming from a strong school, and having good quantitative stats. The reason for this is largely because of my writing sample. I wrote it from start to finish in under 48 hours (that is, a two-day cram session during finals week), and spent less than 5 hours editing it before sending it off to programs. (Pro-tip: Don't do this. This kills the applicant's chances.) I then applied to 1 unranked PhD, 1 low ranked PhD, and 1 medium ranked PhD. I did the unranked because I thought it'd be a safety (which it turned out to be), the low ranked because of interests based on the PGR, and the mid-ranked because I independently knew some of the faculty there that I wanted to work with.

 

I didn't really have any help from my list. One of my professors mentioned the professors they knew at my school. He also indicated I rethink about applying to one of the top-10 programs, which I ended up heeding.

 

Next year should look better. My interests will be a lot more firm and I'll be applying to a large amount of places rather than just six. I think my general method of picking out places is fine. I never did apply to a program just purely out of its PGR ranking. It was always because they had faculty I was interested in.

 

It is not true that the PGR doesn't claim to be relevant for continental philosophy. Leiter also has rankings for many specialties in philosophy, including 19th and 20th century continental philosophy. 

 

http://www.philosophicalgourmet.com/breakdown/breakdown29.asp

 

At first glance, it is evident that this rankings are biased towards overall-analytic departments with a couple of professors doing continental philosophy, rather than programs that specialize in continental philosophy (except maybe Chicago that has several people working in continental. One wonders why Chicago is only ranked 20 in the overall PGR). On the contrary, top 'SPEP' schools whose specialty is continental philosophy are barely considered even in these specialty rankings. I don't know about the others, but I don't think that a department in which my AOI is underrepresented can be considered a great fit. Is as if Leiter recommended a student interested in philosophy of mind to go to a SPEP school because they have 2 faculty members working on that topic. All the while, that student can benefit from taking graduate courses in Derrida, existentialism and the early Frankfurt School. 

Edited February 25, 2014 by Johannes14

[Establishment]

It is not true that the PGR doesn't claim to be relevant for continental philosophy. Leiter also has rankings for many specialties in philosophy, including 19th and 20th century continental philosophy. 

 

http://www.philosophicalgourmet.com/breakdown/breakdown29.asp

 

At first glance, it is evident that this rankings are biased towards overall-analytic departments with a couple of professors doing continental philosophy, rather than programs that specialize in continental philosophy (except maybe Chicago that has several people working in continental. One wonders why Chicago is only ranked 20 in the overall PGR). On the contrary, top 'SPEP' schools whose specialty is continental philosophy are barely considered even in these specialty rankings. I don't know about the others, but I don't think that a department in which my AOI is underrepresented can be considered a great fit. Is as if Leiter recommended a student interested in philosophy of mind to go to a SPEP school because they have 2 faculty members working on that topic. All the while, that student can benefit from taking graduate courses in Derrida, existentialism and the early Frankfurt School. 

 

I don't disagree. I guess I should have been more careful with my words. The PGR does give continental rankings, but these rankings are of a particular kind that might not be satisfiable to certain continentalist groups. Perhaps the "bias" or tendencies of the rankings have to do with the members selected for those particular area rankings. (Although I wonder. Riverside and Brown are popular because of their coverage of "19th century continental philosophers", such as Nietzsche. Except that the students who attend there that I know wouldn't consider themselves continentalists, but analytic philosophers interested in the work of Nietzsche. Which is perhaps where I got the idea that the PGR, even for its "continental rankings", isn't for continentalists.)

 

So although the PGR is inadequate for those certain respects, I was surprised by the thought that for general analytic, the PGR might be considered deficient or misleading and was curious for more information. (keeping in mind certain assumptions about what the PGR is and how to properly use it)  This is really what I wanted to get at, the contrast, had I said what I meant or had wanted to mean.

Edited February 25, 2014 by Establishment

[AcademicX]

I thought this might be relevant. It is Brown's Richard Heck critique of Leiter's ranking.

 

http://rgheck.frege.org/philosophy/aboutpgr.php

[Monadology]

I thought this might be relevant. It is Brown's Richard Heck critique of Leiter's ranking.

 

http://rgheck.frege.org/philosophy/aboutpgr.php

 

Purely coincidentally I was reading up on the various critiques on the PGR today (I googled the Gourmet Report to look at a certain program's rating and came across this.

 

Some more sources: 

 

This one links to a bunch of posts and discussions of it (including some interesting statistical analysis on the same blog)

 

This one has some letters to Leiter regarding the PGR from faculty:

 

 

[i hope this isn't derailing the thread too much, the PGR seems pretty relevant to our reasons for applying where we do]

 

EDIT: Neither link seems to work. Weird. 

EDIT2: Fixed, i think.

Edited February 25, 2014 by Monadology

[PerpetualApplicant No More]

First, I'm in a bit of a unique situation in that I had the option to leave my MA program this year or next year. I chose to apply to a handful of my favorite schools, with the plan being that if I got rejected, I'd reapply to those schools plus many others next year.

 

Second, I think I went in to this with a different theory (given that this is my fifth time applying, and I spent time at a M.A. program at a leiter-ranked Ph.D. school). Ultimately, I'm concerned about job placement, but looking at the school's overall placement doesn't paint a great picture. What I looked at is how the students of my POI's (my potential dissertation committee) placed in the last 5-10 years, as this is the most relevant data to my placement potential. What I realized is that while top schools do place overall better, at the middle tier of ranked schools (median 3.0, i.e. UCSD to Georgetown) your adviser really matters. In the 3 years I spent at my first MA program (in that 'median 3.0' tier), we placed two doctoral students at jobs in top 10 terminal MA schools and two at ranked Ph.D. programs--including one at a top five program!

 

What these students had in common, other than being the caliber of students at top 20/10/etc schools, is that they worked with the most famous faculty at my program (well, the intersection between the set of the most famous and the set of the 'not impossible to work with').

 

With that in mind, I applied only to schools where I felt I could put a dissertation committee together that would, if my work were of sufficient quality, give me a chance to land a research/top SLAC job.

 

I used the PGR but not the 'overall rankings.' In fact, the only piece of data I look at on that particular page is the 'median score' because I think tiering is more realistic than straight ranks. But the most important thing to me was that the program was ranked in all of my specialities (I looked for mind, cog sci to stand in for psychology/psychiatry, and either ethics or action to stand in for moral psych).

 

Then, I looked at which faculty it was who earned that school their sub-field ranking, and looked at 1) whether their views and my own were in the same ballpark and 2) how well their students placed.

 

Next I cut a few out for being in really bad (in my admittedly coastal elitist opinion) locations, figuring they'd go in the 'next year' pile. Finally, I dropped one school because of a crazy early deadline (one of my letter writers wanted me to finish the semester before committing).

 

And that's my list.

Edited February 25, 2014 by perpetualapplicant

[TheVineyard]

I think most critiques of Leiter's rankings fail. The Continental thing is just patently false...some of the top rated programs are focused in Continental, there are several subfields that are "Continental" and ranked so you can view the school rankings there and make your judgements based on subfield...

Saying that the report is biased towards big departments...well, big departments offer a larger pool of philosophers, so saying that the report is "biased" towards big departments is like saying that pie-eaters are biased towards large pies....it is completely justifiable to believe that better departments are larger ones, due to having either very strong focus, or a broad base of subfields.

If you take Leiter's rankings as a ranking of how prestigious/quality the department was viewed by other philosophers in 2011, then nothing can be taken away from it. The subfield breakdowns are even more important and even more helpful.

[philophilosopher]

A lot of things you just said are extremely cursory and misleading. The issue is that many schools that are primarily continental with well-published faculty are not included anywhere on the list, and part of the reason for this is the allegation of a biased methodology that favors analytic departments. So, obviously there are continental rankings in the report (no one is denying that); what they are denying is that those continental rankings are a fair and accurate representation of the quality of all continental departments in the US.

 

Also, the second issue you raise is somewhat troubling. Many small departments can be of excellent quality if the people in that department publish quality material in their areas of specialization. The PGR fails to properly account for quality qua quality and is instead skewed by quantity. Imagine if your main AOI is Phil of Mind and there was a three-person department composed of David Chalmers, Daniel Dennett, and Josh Knobe. This program would be excellent for you but, in the PGR (which is heavily based on the quality and quantity of research), this program may very well be ranked as equal to a mediocre department composed of 10 people working in phil. of mind whose total amount of publishing is comparable to or more than Chalmers, Dennett, and Knobe solely because of the fact that there are more people doing more research. It seems obvious that the small department would be a much stronger in terms of phil of mind, but, the PGR would have no way of indicating it. That is the issue with the larger university bias; it practically eliminates the consideration of a small cohort of strong faculty to be ranked well in the PGR.

 

Note: obviously this is a fictitious example and I am not really familiar with phil. of mind; there is no need to get into nitpicking about who is a good in phil. of mind. Also, though it is probably a rare case that such a cohort of small yet prolific and excellent faculty exists and remains unnoticed, the fact is that the PGR theoretically has now way of accounting for this or factoring it in fairly.  

Edited February 25, 2014 by philophilosopher

[TheVineyard]

A lot of things you just said are extremely cursory and misleading. The issue is that many schools that are primarily continental with well-published faculty are not included anywhere on the list, and part of the reason for this is the allegation of a biased methodology that favors analytic departments. So, obviously there are continental rankings in the report (no one is denying that); what they are denying is that those continental rankings are a fair and accurate representation of the quality of all continental departments in the US.

 

Also, the second issue you raise is somewhat troubling. Many small departments can be of excellent quality if the people in that department publish quality material in their areas of specialization. The PGR fails to properly account for quality qua quality and is instead skewed by quantity. Imagine if your main AOI is Phil of Mind and there was a three-person department composed of David Chalmers, Daniel Dennett, and Josh Knobe. This program would be excellent for you but, in the PGR (which is heavily based on the quality and quantity of research), this program may very well be ranked as equal to a mediocre department composed of 10 people working in phil. of mind whose total amount of publishing is comparable to or more than Chalmers, Dennett, and Knobe solely because of the fact that there are more people doing more research. It seems obvious that the small department would be a much stronger in terms of phil of mind, but, the PGR would have no way of indicating it. That is the issue with the larger university bias; it practically eliminates the consideration of a small cohort of strong faculty to be ranked well in the PGR.

 

Note: obviously this is a fictitious example and I am not really familiar with phil. of mind; there is no need to get into nitpicking about who is a good in phil. of mind. Also, though it is probably a rare case that such a cohort of small yet prolific and excellent faculty exists and remains unnoticed, the fact is that the PGR theoretically has now way of accounting for this or factoring it in fairly.  

 

You really think that a department with Chalmers, Dennet, and Knobe would be ranked mediocre in philosophy of mind? You've lost yours, sir!