Schools hit hardest by economic crisis

[jose]

This situation isn't looking good. Looks like we did indeed pick the worst possible year to apply to grad school. I was so caught up researching professors that I totally overlooked the economic situation - 3 of my 7 applications are to UC schools.

Damn!

[kismetcapitan]

I do wonder - on the one hand, my sister (an adcomm at U Mich) says this year was going to see a flood of applicants, as employment is down so more people are looking to go to grad school.

On the other hand, does this mean that students who are able to pay cash up front for their programs have an advantage? Are grad school decisions truly need-blind?

[Tiglath-Pileser III]

Actually, I think small religious universities have been hit the hardest. Many depend upon private donations for their operating budgets. Large schools often have large endowments that can cushion them through an economic crisis. Smaller schools have very small endowments and fair a lot less well in hard economic times. Plus, they do not receive any government funding. A double-whammy that has led to some of these schools putting programs on hiatus.

[Killy Jelly]

Everyone says UC's are the worst of the lot.

However my boyfriend just got into two PhD programs at Irvine and Riverside with full funding, so all hope is not lost?

I'm still waiting to hear from Master's x.x

[TMP]

Michigan's hanging on pretty well. It relies quite a bit on its endowment and funding from the Fed (including NSF) to finance all science, medical, and engineering research. Still, departments are very cautious with their admit rates. For example, the history department used to make 36 offers and yield about 18-20 students. Since last year, they've decided to extend offers to the number of admits they can actually afford (assuming a 100% yield). So, a bigger waitlist for Michigan. So really, getting accepted at Michigan is a "whew" because you'll still be guaranteed to 5 year funding package, not just because it's a top-notch grad school.

[kdilks]

I think last year and this year are roughly equally bad to apply in. Some schools went into crisis mode early enough so that they could cut back on admissions significantly last year, other schools didn't and are making the necessary cutbacks this year.

---

To expound on what a few people have said, there are a few reasons Michigan is still doing so well. First reason is that a long time ago, the University realized that they couldn't rely on funding from the state, and focused more on private/government funding, so they've been mostly shielded from the state's economic situation. Second reason is the economic crisis hit just after Michigan finished a $3.1 billion fund-raising campaign. Third reason is that Michigan has taken advantage of the fact other schools/ the economy in general have been doing poorly to aggressively expand. They bought the recently abandoned Pfizer facility in Ann Arbor for dirt cheap, and are in the process of converting it to academic research facilities and hiring new faculty members to work there. I believe last year there was an initiative to hire something like 50 new junior faculty in various areas. I also know that at least in my department, Michigan was able to hire a lot of top job candidates because competing schools either had hiring freezes or couldn't afford new faculty.

At Minnesota, things were pretty bad last year. There was a state-wide hiring freeze (not just academics, all state jobs), and at least my department accepted significantly less people than they normally do. There was also a bit of a teaching crunch because the university increased enrollment to get more money and asked some departments to create more sections to account for this, but weren't giving more funding to cover the TAs for those extra sections. Things are still bad, and the University is still pushing really hard to cut costs and adjust to the new economy, but it's no longer a full blown panic situation like last year.

I've heard that MIT was having some financial issues even before the economic crisis as a result of poor investments in certain technology stocks.

[Emma2003]

UIC is in pretty much the same state as UIUC...Illinois is suffering from not only the bad economy but the bad management of Blago....When he left he left the state in shambles..everything that depends on state funding is suffering. The state of illinois owes UIC 236 million dollars.The town I live in is closing 2 of its three library branches. and my husband, who works for public transportation says that they are in danger of losing federal funds for public transport because they match what the state provides. Come to Chicago!!!!!

Brandeis caused quite a stir selling off their art collection, so maybe they're doing well, at this point?

Edited February 24, 2010 by Emma2003

[cogneuroforfun]

I applied last year, and the professor at UCLA I would have worked with got poached by UT-Austin in September. Whether that was due to budget issues or simply because he was an in-demand professor, I'm not sure.

I can add a bit about Yale. The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences is looking at admitting 10-15% fewer students overall this year (although some departments have stayed level, while others normal admissions numbers have been cut in half). It might not describe much in the way of actual changes, but here's a Yale Daily News article talking about how admission criteria might change a little: http://www.yaledailynews.com/news/university-news/2010/02/23/grad-school-cuts-change-admissions/ The gist of it is they're looking to be more holistic so they can make sure they graduate as many matriculated students as possible and cut down on the number of people who drop out of PhD programs after the first couple years. I'm in a fairly well-off department at the medical school, and we're not really seeing many substantial changes. Perks are being trimmed a little, but (so far) things like food for seminars have not been cut.

Edit: Oh, in addition, I think undergraduate tuition is supposed to go up by almost 5% next year. That's a pretty stiff increase, but I think if anything graduate student stipends and benefits will be pretty insulated from the economic troubles in part because undergrads pick up the bill.

Edited February 24, 2010 by cogneuroforfun