amchiclet Posted January 28, 2010 Share Posted January 28, 2010 I graduated from the master's program at the CS department at UCLA. Now I feel I am ready and motivated for a PhD. My research are is programming languages. My wife might be getting a medical residency position in Minnesota. If that happens, I am forced to move there and stay there for at least 3 years. Question 1 What are your opinions on 1) going ahead and do a PhD at U of Minnesota, when I know I might have a shot at top universities 2) going into the industry, wait for my wife to finish residency, THEN apply to top universities I haven't decided if I want to start-up, do research, or go to academia afterwards, but my research advisor said that if I graduate from a highly respected university, my chances for a tenure-track at a good university would increase. Question 2 It's also possible that I will get rejected by all the top universities, but I think I have a good chance going back to UCLA. Between graduating from UCLA and U of Minnesota, do you think it's a big difference? US News ranks UCLA (13) higher than U of Minnesota (31). I appreciate any comments. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NEPA Posted January 28, 2010 Share Posted January 28, 2010 (edited) If I were you, I'd ask those questions in the Computer Science forum. Edited January 28, 2010 by rwfan88 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
amchiclet Posted January 28, 2010 Author Share Posted January 28, 2010 If I were you, I'd ask those questions in the Computer Science forum. Thanks for the suggestion. I don't think the moderator will let me do that at this point though Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gazelle Posted February 2, 2010 Share Posted February 2, 2010 The U of M is a highly ranked public research university; when Yudolf became president, it was ranked 7th, and Yudolf's plan was to make it a top 3 school by a certain date. Not sure where it is now, but it's a good research school. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Str2T Posted March 6, 2010 Share Posted March 6, 2010 The U of M is a highly ranked public research university; when Yudolf became president, it was ranked 7th, and Yudolf's plan was to make it a top 3 school by a certain date. Not sure where it is now, but it's a good research school. I think those are undergrad stats . . . The U of M is usually ranked right around position 30 on PhD program lists. However, the U of M considers themselves a top ten when admitting -- their admittance rate across the board for PhD programs is 5% (close to or higher than many "top 20" schools). I'm not sure if this is because the U of M is the only legit PhD-granting school in Minnesota (for miles and miles and miles) or in reaction to the graduate school doing everything in its power to become a top 20 school. Either way, getting in a the U of M is no small task and should be seriously considered for most grad programs. gazelle is correct--they place research very high on their list of priorities (sometimes even to the detriment of their students). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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