U of Toronto placement record

[Hcarp]

Hi all,

 

University of Toronto publishes their placement record from 2002 onwards here: http://graduate.philosophy.utoronto.ca/files/2015/02/Placement-record-updated-feb2_2015.pdf

 

I find the record peculiar. Of all Toronto PhDs who graduated between 2002 and 2010, NO ONE has landed a permanent job at a top 30 department. This is quite worrying. But then from 2011 onwards the record suddenly became much much better, with people landing post-docs at Harvard, NYU, UPenn and Cambridge, and some landing permanent jobs at UNC, UC-Riverside, etc.

Does anyone know what happened there? Any general comment on Toronto's placement prospects would be very welcome too. I have an acceptance there and thinking of taking it up. Thanks

Edited March 21, 2015 by Hcarp

[Infinite Zest]

This doesn't seem too out of place to me. All things considered, more graduates are taking postdocs now. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the pre-2010 graduates were offered postdocs from very good places but opted for TT jobs instead.

As for the permanent positions at places like UNC, those sorts of jobs are few and far between. So I'm also not surprised that there hasn't been one between 2000-2010.

[Establishment]

I randomly looked at UMichigan's placement since 2005. They've placed one person who was offered/is currently TT at a top-30 program. This is normal. Welcome to the philosophy job market.

[Gnothi_Seauton]

Just a note about the person from Toronto who got a job at UNC:  That person got a job in the public policy school after working on political philosophy at Toronto.  He isn't in the philosophy department.  It's a nice job to have to be sure, but you shouldn't walk away with the conclusion that Toronto is placing people into top 30 philosophy departments based on that data point.  If you are planning to work in a field like political philosophy that has obvious relations to other disciplines, then that placement would be good news for you since it opens up the job prospects a bit.  But it isn't evidence that Toronto is placing into top philosophy departments.  

[Jumbo Juice]

I think you're experiencing apophenia, OP.  From 2002-2010, Toronto placed two students into tenure-track positions at what are now top 30 universities:

UC San Diego (2)

Had 6 students take post-docs at top 30 universities:

University of Toronto (2)
University of St. Andrews
University of Michigan
UCLA
University of Oxford

And had 8 additional tenure-track or equivalent placements at Leiter-ranked schools:

York University (2)
University of Western Ontario 
Georgetown University
Birkbeck, University of London
University of Alberta
McGill University
Syracuse University

It also had TT placements at UI Urbana-Champaign (2), Vanderbilt, and several top SLACs.  
 

Edited March 22, 2015 by Jumbo Juice