Unranked programs

[Duns Eith]

To those who are applying to unranked programs, which ones do you have in view/are you applying to?

(Provisional definition: an unranked program is a program with a PhD in philosophy, yet does not appear on the top-50 US or top-50 english speaking world. They may appear on specialized lists. E.g., Texas A&M, University of Sheffield, etc.)

Mine?

• Purdue
• Urbana-Champaign
• Buffalo
• Michigan State
• Loyola

Some of them have many faculty under whom I could easily and joyfully study. Even some of them are preferred (faculty-wise) over some ranked schools. (Not giving examples!) Some pay better, too. E.g., Michigan State University has a massive stipend: $21,500. (Compare this with Wisc-Madison, which apparently has only $11,600 yet ranked 21st on top-50 US)

Edited December 31, 2016 by Turretin

[matchamatcha]

Most Canadian schools aren't on the top 50 ESW list (and surprisingly, also not on the top 50 US list!?!?!), so I guess those are technically "unranked".  Mine are: Boston U, Washington Seattle, McGill, Alberta, Calgary.  I might also apply to a couple really really unranked Canadian schools (Guelph, York) because we desperate, fam.

[Swann]

Mine UR schools are DePaul, Boston U, and Vanderbilt. And, to be honest, DePaul is among the programs I hope to get into most.

[spinozalzanda]

Loyola Chicago, Duquesne, Calgary, Oregon, SUNY Binghamton, and Kansas, for me. 

[dgswaim]

I had applied to several unranked schools that were sort of "boutique" philosophy of biology departments (Utah, Cincinnati, Arizona State HPS, etc.). I seriously considered attending them over other "higher ranked" offers. 

[Duns Eith]

Related question: given that you applied to unranked programs, what drew you there? How'd you find them? When someone says that an unranked program is a foolish career move, what is your justification to believe otherwise?

[goldenstardust11]

Yup, as someone with continental leanings, most of my programs are unranked (10/13 of the PhD programs I'm applying to). I found out about the programs by word of mouth, searches for programs strong in my areas of interest, and researched them based on faculty work and recent placement, like @KevDoh

In response to career concerns, I guess I'd just say given my interests, this was the method that made the most sense to me and makes me feel like I have the highest chance of success (both on just getting in, and on getting enough training in my areas to make me competitive going forward)  Hopefully, whatever route we choose, it will work out for all of us!  

[psm1580b]

On 12/31/2016 at 1:17 PM, Turretin said:

Some pay better, too. E.g., Michigan State University has a massive stipend: $21,500. (Compare this with Wisc-Madison, which apparently has only $11,600 yet ranked 21st on top-50 US)

Be careful with this, many schools are cagey as to whether tuition is taken out of that stipend amount or if the stipend is on top of tuition. Such a gap like that makes me think W-M takes tuition out of that number. 

[Duns Eith]

5 hours ago, psm1580b said:

Be careful with this, many schools are cagey as to whether tuition is taken out of that stipend amount or if the stipend is on top of tuition. Such a gap like that makes me think W-M takes tuition out of that number. 

How would you read this?

"Each year the Department sets aside a number of Graduate Assistantships for entering PhD students (we no longer offer graduate assistantships to entering MA students). In the current academic year, graduate assistants received a total financial package of at least $21,523 for a level 1, ½-time assistantship.   This package includes a waiver of up to nine credit hours tuition each term, health insurance coverage, and for out-of-state students, waiver of out-of-state tuition."

I think the word "includes" might be ambiguous, but I read it as stipend ($21,523) + tuition waiver, health insurance as well

[maxhgns]

43 minutes ago, Turretin said:

How would you read this?

"Each year the Department sets aside a number of Graduate Assistantships for entering PhD students (we no longer offer graduate assistantships to entering MA students). In the current academic year, graduate assistants received a total financial package of at least $21,523 for a level 1, ½-time assistantship.   This package includes a waiver of up to nine credit hours tuition each term, health insurance coverage, and for out-of-state students, waiver of out-of-state tuition."

I think the word "includes" might be ambiguous, but I read it as stipend ($21,523) + tuition waiver, health insurance as well

 

My reading: The total financial package is $21 523, and requires you to discharge duties as a half-time (teaching?) assistant (it's not clear if that's once a year or every semester). Included in that package is a 9-hour tuition waiver and health insurance (coverage; it's not clear to me exactly what this amounts to. e.g. it could just be catastrophic care, or it might even be just partially paid for; as in, you're cleared by default to pay to access the university policy). Students probably still have to pay fees out of that 21k, however, and it's possible that the tuition waiver is actually only partial (e.g. if full-time doctoral students register at twelve credit hours a term instead of nine).

[panpsychist]

One thing worth pointing out, though I fear it's already kind of a cliche, is that {RANKED PROGRAMS} isn't extensionally equivalent to {PROGRAMS WORTH ATTENDING}. In fact, it could be argue that the two don't even overlap that much. Also keep in mind that there are programs that, over the years, have chosen not to be Leiter-ranked. 

[goldenstardust11]

13 hours ago, Turretin said:

How would you read this?

"Each year the Department sets aside a number of Graduate Assistantships for entering PhD students (we no longer offer graduate assistantships to entering MA students). In the current academic year, graduate assistants received a total financial package of at least $21,523 for a level 1, ½-time assistantship.   This package includes a waiver of up to nine credit hours tuition each term, health insurance coverage, and for out-of-state students, waiver of out-of-state tuition."

I think the word "includes" might be ambiguous, but I read it as stipend ($21,523) + tuition waiver, health insurance as well

This is how I would read it as well, but I agree that with @psm1580b's point, "includes" could be ambiguous... :/ I suppose once we receive offers, we just confirm everything with the department? 

[The_Last_Thylacine]

On 1/3/2017 at 9:28 AM, Turretin said:

Related question: given that you applied to unranked programs, what drew you there? How'd you find them? When someone says that an unranked program is a foolish career move, what is your justification to believe otherwise?

This is how to find unranked programs. http://www.apaonline.org/?page=gradguide

[anonmaly]

The unranked schools I am applying to are: University of Cincinnati, Utah, UW-Seattle, and University of Oregon. For most of these schools, someone (another student or a faculty member) mentioned that there was someone at those schools who I may want to work with. 

 

Question for others, though: even if the quality of your education/the faculty is not dependent on being ranked or not, do you feel as though it is easier to get in to an unranked school? (Of course, I am leaving top ten schools out of this consideration for obvious reasons.)

[goldenstardust11]

Meh, I don't -think- so? But I suppose we'll see. The ones that do offer statistics, it looks as though there's a range of about 4-8% for PhD-track programs and somewhere in the 30% for MAs... I think it's just competitive all around 

[Naruto]

Memphis, Oregon, Cincinnati, Stony Brook, Marquette, Texas A&M, Georgia, South Florida, Purdue, New Mexico

[goldenstardust11]

12 hours ago, Naruto said:

Memphis, Oregon, Cincinnati, Stony Brook, Marquette, Texas A&M, Georgia, South Florida, Purdue, New Mexico

Cool! We have a few of those in common. May I ask what your AOI is? 

[Naruto]

11 hours ago, goldenstardust11 said:

Cool! We have a few of those in common. May I ask what your AOI is? 

Philosophy of mind, feminist philosophy, philosophy of race and gender. Memphis is my top-choice unranked program!

[goldenstardust11]

ah, cool. I'm not sure what my top choice is, TBH. There are pros and cons to all the programs. 

[Warelin]

From reading over this board, Michigan State's financial offer sounds similar to the way that University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee does.

http://uwm.edu/english/graduate/graduate-resources/financial-assistance/

$15,000		GTA salary (9 months)
$18,905		Approximate value of non-resident tuition waiver
$5,135		Approximate value of health insurance premiums paid by UWM
-$528		Approximate 12 month insurance contribution paid by employee
-$1,337 __________		Approximate student fees
$37,175		Total approximate annual value of assistance package for a single, non-resident, doctoral GTA

[Warelin]

Quick side note:
I found this: https://hr.msu.edu/hiring/studentemployment/gradasst/stipendRanges.htm

A level one half-time pays between $682 and $1186 biweekly. They pay about 19.5 times per academic year according to their numbers.

682*19.5= $13,299
1186*19.5=$23,127

The health portion of the SI charge for Fall and Spring is $1,504  ($152 bi-weekly for Fall 2016  and $156  bi-weekly for Spring 2017),  with the remaining $4,700 (477  bi-weekly for Fall 2016 and $487 bi-weekly for Spring 2017) covering the tuition.

[The_Last_Thylacine]

Often times, the stipends vary by department. 

Here is a resource: http://www.phdstipends.com/results

[Duns Eith]

12 hours ago, Warelin said:

Quick side note:
I found this: https://hr.msu.edu/hiring/studentemployment/gradasst/stipendRanges.htm

A level one half-time pays between $682 and $1186 biweekly. They pay about 19.5 times per academic year according to their numbers.

682*19.5= $13,299
1186*19.5=$23,127

The health portion of the SI charge for Fall and Spring is $1,504  ($152 bi-weekly for Fall 2016  and $156  bi-weekly for Spring 2017),  with the remaining $4,700 (477  bi-weekly for Fall 2016 and $487 bi-weekly for Spring 2017) covering the tuition.

So, you're a little bit more than amazing.

[Duns Eith]

12 hours ago, desolesiii said:

Often times, the stipends vary by department. 

Here is a resource: http://www.phdstipends.com/results

Oh my gooses! Northwestern offers $35,000?!! ...

[Kierkegaardashian]

On 1/6/2017 at 0:56 AM, panpsychist said:

One thing worth pointing out, though I fear it's already kind of a cliche, is that {RANKED PROGRAMS} isn't extensionally equivalent to {PROGRAMS WORTH ATTENDING}. In fact, it could be argue that the two don't even overlap that much. Also keep in mind that there are programs that, over the years, have chosen not to be Leiter-ranked. 

While I certainly agree that just because a program is ranked doesn't mean it's worth attending for a certain person because of his or her particular interests, there is definitely a (very) strong correlation between ranked programs and hirability. In that sense, they are very worth attending. I could find the reference for you, but something like 75% percent of tenure-track jobs are given to people with phd's from the top ten schools (part of this has to do with department size of course). So, I think it's pretty verifiably incorrect to say that rank and being worth attending don't even overlap that much. Even if you mean "worth attending" in the sense of "doing good philosophy" or something like that, I think that would be a hard argument to make. For me (and I'm guessing for most people on here), I want to attend a program that does the kind of philosophy I'm interested in, but I also want to get a decent job when I graduate, so ranking (unfortunately) definitely plays a factor in whether a school is worth attending or not.

Also, could you elaborate on your point that programs have chosen not to be Leiter-ranked? I've heard something vague along these lines once about Emory, but I wasn't aware that this was something that actually happened.