Program Decision Woes

[StatsG0d]

Hey everyone,

 

I've probably posted too much on this forum, and yet again here I come needing some advice/suggestions. 

 

I've been accepted to quite a few programs, and I am considering Purdue, Florida, Texas A&M, and Penn State, with primary consideration from the first two programs. Both Purdue and Florida offered me fellowships. For Florida, I will have to TA one year since it is a graduate school requirement. For Purdue, in the letter they said my fellowship would be administered as an assistantship, but when I emailed the chair, I was told that it would be administered as a fellowship for 4 years (i.e., no TA requirements whatsoever).

 

Purdue's program is huge. They have many faculty and many grad students. Strangely, it seems that the distribution of grad students among the faculty is very unequal. Some professors I wanted to work with were already supervising 10+ grad students. I worry that I will have to compete with fellow students to get my advisor's attention. One professor with whom I was interested in working currently has none (at least reported on the web site).

 

UF could not be more different. The program is pretty small, with ~20 faculty members and I think ~70 grad students. They just stole Michailidis from Michigan, who is very strong in machine learning. I was told I would have my choice with whom I would want to work, barring some professor being overburdened (but I was told this would likely not be the case). The placements at UF seem pretty impressive, particularly those working with Hobert and Ghosh, and Michailidis has a good track record of placing people at Michigan.

 

Does anyone have any advice? I'm on the fence, but I am slightly moving more toward UF at the moment.

[Ellies]

Personally, I think I would pick Florida. It sounds like a more interesting program to me. One year as a TA isn't really a big deal, and it will, in fact, give you valuable teaching experience.

[StatsG0d]

Thanks a lot! Yeah I'm not too worried about the one year TA thing really.

[bayessays]

No doubt that UF has great placement, especially if you want to do MCMC or Bayesian research, and Michailidis is a great addition as well.  Purdue also has people with good placements, but I would advise you to strongly consider the fact that it is such a large department.  If you thrive off of competition and will succeed because you have to be a top student to attract a good advisor, maybe Purdue would be a decent choice.  Personally, I think that added stress from that is much less than that from an extra year of TAing, which you will need to do anyways since it sounds like you want an academic job.  On the other hand, I think Purdue has many more faculty in machine learning.  Unless you have a preference for living in Indiana, I personally would go with Florida if you feel there are at least a couple faculty members you would want to work with (in case Michailidis is unavailable for some reason).  Hobert has placed students amazingly well, but analyzing MCMC convergence might not be your cup of tea, and Ghosh will be 80 by the time you are graduating.  Doss and Khare also do some cool stuff there.

[StatsG0d]

Wow. Thanks a lot, Bayesessays. You basically confirmed all my fears about the larger program. I think I'm leaning even more towards Florida now.

[wine in coffee cups]

I am not knowledgable about these specific departments, but I'd like to say things about some issues you raised.

Funding: sounds like the differences in funding packages are not a concern here. If you have a livable stipend and the work it requires is not unduly burdensome according to current students, consider that good enough.

Professors who have no students: ask current students what the deal is. If it's just the case that what they work on happens not to mesh with the interests of current students, fine. But every department has its a-holes, and it's good to find out who they are before you decide. If this person is an intolerable a-hole, you should look for other options.

Professors with many students: talk to several of their current students and ask how independent the students' working styles are, how often they have one-on-one meetings, email responsiveness, group meetings and how useful those are, can they get attention when they face roadblocks or deadlines, how progress is monitored, if postdocs or advanced students of the same advisor competently guide newer students, etc. A huge number of advisees might not be a problem if the professor has stellar supervisory and organizational skills. I would worry if advisees suggest they often feel out to sea, abused and overworked, pressured into specific research directions they aren't interested in, or if favorites are treated well while everyone else is neglected.

Paraphrasing advice a friend (surely lurking, hi!) shared with prospectives recently: at some point academic differences between programs are too minor to matter in the grand scheme of things. You are considering departments that have similar reputations, adequate funding, (hopefully) multiple viable potential advisors, diverse research areas when you change your mind, and outcomes you are content with. I think quality-of-life considerations are the deciding factor. Anywhere you go, you will face research setbacks, career anxiety, existential crises, deadline pileups, advisor disagreements, and personal problems at inconvenient times. When those things inevitably happen, you want to have a supportive community of students to commiserate with. (Could happen in a tight-knit program, or could happen in a big program with enough like-minded people.) You should feel able to get mentoring from faculty besides your advisor and not be in a fractious political environment preventing this. You need a place where you can have some degree of work-life balance to preserve your physical and mental health.

Good luck with your eventual choice!

[Stat Assistant Professor]

Agreed with wine in coffee cups. Quality of life is something you should strongly consider (I mean, you'll be living somewhere for 4-6 years, so you may as well not be somewhere that you loathe). I'm currently at a small department, which works for me in terms of my ability to interact with other students and faculty.  On the other hand, I readily admit that we don't have as broad a selection of research areas (e.g. we have no faculty working in the area of functional data analysis) or as many faculty working in specific areas. So if you wanted a lot of broad options, breadth would certainly be a legitimate concern. On the other hand, the faculty we have are generally very well-respected in their areas of research, readily accessible, and work with their advisees to publish papers.

 

The most important thing, I think, is to ensure you are in a supportive environment where potential advisors will be committed to your future success. So just make sure you will be able to get opportunities to publish and work closely with faculty at whichever place you decide to go.

 

PS - I sent you a PM.

[bayessays]

I very much agree with the two above.   You want a place where you could see yourself being happy, and hopefully you got a good picture of that at the visit days.  Florida is small, and that has its advantages academically.  But are you ok with maybe being one of two American students in your class? (I'm not sure how many students they actually have every year.  This is probably an exaggeration.)  Purdue has a lot more research options. In general (but certainly not always), I think larger departments are more likely to have a "sink or swim" attitude (which some people might thrive under), while smaller departments may be more invested in your success.  What was Purdue's attitude when you visited?  If I remember correctly, at Florida, every professor sets aside an hour for you during your visit, and you were told you could work with any of them.  Look back at your visit days, and think about 1) who your peers would be and 2) which type of academic environment it seemed like.  In addition to these, the other important thing is 3) you have to be sure there will be someone to work with that you would be happy working with on your dissertation.  When I think of myself going through the same process, these are the 3 questions I would consider most important.  Remember, I have never been to Purdue, so you know more about it than I do.

Edited March 14, 2015 by bayessays

[Stat Assistant Professor]

Speaking as an American at a heavily international department, I can say that the international students typically have good English, so interacting with cohort is not usually a problem.

Social life and dating should not be a problem either, even at a department that is very heavily international students. I hang out mostly with the few Americans, plus some of the international students who are not from China or India (I get along with the students from China and India fine, but do not socialize much with them outside of school). But there are many opportunities to meet people outside of your cohort if you are active about it (e.g. beach volleyball, pickup soccer, online dating, etc.).

Edited March 15, 2015 by Applied Math to Stat

[StatsG0d]

Thanks wine in coffee cups, bayessays (playing a little devil's advocate I see), and Applied Math to Stat. I have not yet visited Purdue, so I am unfamiliar about the culture there. I'll try to contact some students at Purdue and try to get a feel of how things are. Thanks again for the advice, everyone!

[WhiteLion]

I think my decision is choices are likely going to come down to Purdue, Ohio State, and maybe UC Davis, who told me they would give me a decision very soon(and I figure if Purdue and Ohio State took me, it isn't inconceivable that UC Davis might too). So I have been thinking about Purdue as well, although in my case, both Ohio State and Purdue are very large.

 

There is a student at Purdue who was previously a student at my current school, so I contacted him and asked him some questions about the program. I'll share the general ideas of what he told me in case you might find it useful.

 

-He mentioned that in his opinion Purdue is currently strong in bioinformatics and is putting resources into strengthening their computational stuff, but that they have had some of their top Bayesians leave recently and thus are not as strong there as they were 5-10 years ago. He also mentioned that have some people doing financial topics. Of course he did say that, being large, they have offerings in a wide variety of research areas, but those are the ones he mentioned specifically to me.

 

-I asked if students have to compete for advisers, and he said that he didn't personally see many students not be able to get a particular person as an adviser for that reason, but that some professors are popular and you do need to do well if you want to impress them.

 

-I asked how engaged he thought the senior faculty were in terms of active research and mentoring(since I have encountered some people before who are senior and seemed have little interest in these things), and he said that he thought the senior faculty were very active in both areas.

 

-I asked if the atmosphere was competitive and he said it didn't feel that way to him. Rather he felt that the students developed camaraderie working through the challenges of the program alongside one another.

 

I am hoping to visit Purdue as well. I visited Ohio State, and my visit dispelled a lot of those large school fears for me. Although there were some superficial large program things, like large cube-farm style offices for grad students, the student-faculty and student-student relationships seemed quite healthy and supportive and I didn't at all get the feeling that if I studied there I would be invisible unless I was consistently at the top of my classes/exams. Ohio State also has brought/is bringing in a number of new, younger faculty, and from talking to a few of them, I really felt they add a level of energy to the program. They seem eager to engage with students, and I was able to have some interesting conversations about both hot research topics and classical ideas.

[StatsG0d]

Thanks a lot, White Lion.

 

So in order to make my decision more difficult, PSU nominated me for a one-year fellowship (it is not confirmed). Here's what I see about each program:

 

PSU:

Pros: The students are VERY sociable (this is pretty important to me). The professors are very nice and accessible, and seem quite laid back. They have a ton of cool research centers, although the fellowships  in order to partake in these are very competitive. The academic and industry placements seem very strong. I was nominated for (but have not been confirmed for) a one-year fellowship.

Cons: The location is quite terrible, with Pittsburgh being the closest city (and it's a 2.5 hour drive). The cost of living is high enough to impede one from being able to live alone (pretty important to me).

 

Purdue:

Pros: I'm from Indiana, and Purdue is quite close to home so I could come see my family whenever I wanted to. The one professor I met there I absolutely adored. We had a great connection and I would love to work with her. Their industry placements have been stellar, with some graduates this year going to Amazon, Google, and Facebook to name a few. I have a two-year fellowship. Cost of living is VERY cheap.

Cons: The said professor from above is very popular, and I am unsure if she's open to taking on new students. They have not had very good academic placements in recent years. 

 

Florida:

Pros: Great weather, which I think is an underrated thing since quality of life is extremely important for a PhD program. I was offered a 4-year fellowship. Academic placements have been very strong for being a mid-tier program. Cost of living is pretty favorable. A small program means I could get very focused attention.

Cons: Average time to degree is 6 years. Industry placements have not been great (although the professor I want to work with has placed very well in both academia and industry). Gaining something of a bad reputation (multiple PSU faculty members warned me about going here, but admitted that Michailidis was a "great" hire--but they had no negative things to say about Purdue or A&M). The students did not seem very sociable, but I only got to meet with 3 of them. The small program implies fewer research areas, which could be a problem if I decide to switch topics.

[ar_rf]

Be careful if the professor that you want to work with at Florida is Michailidis. I'm guessing that he will be very busy, as he will be directing the new Informatics Institute and I've heard that he will still be remotely advising the students he had at Michigan (as the hire seemed to be sudden and unexpected, so he didn't unwind his students like people often do). You might want to confirm if he will be taking students if you can get in contact.