4 ms·

Looks like a UK PhD. Can't speak to that. But.... I did a part-time MS in the US at a relatively low-pressure school (I switched to part-time from full-time af

by pnathan 10y ago

Looks like a UK PhD. Can't speak to that. But.... I did a part-time MS in the US at a relatively low-pressure school (I switched to part-time from full-time after looking at my loan level). I can confidently say that I don't wish anyone to have the experience of working all day, then coming home and working into the night on research, day after day, rabbit trail after rabbit trail. My work quality suffered dramatically between full and part time grad school. I would love to have a PhD sometime, but I simply don't have the ability to do what I would consider adequate research when I work part-time. edit: Oh yes. There's a collaborative environment when working in the halls of the academy. That is, IMO, an intangible and extremely valuable experience. It is not like undergrad in the US.

boxy310 10y ago
Tried to do a full-time PhD, dropped out due to crippling poverty and depression. Tried to do an evening MBA, dropped out for the exact reasons you stated. Only Master's program that actually gelled with me was a professional MA in a stats-based profession. My general stance is to not recommend a graduate program unless you're deeply passionate about the subject and you're willing to bear a significant amount of opportunity cost.
- mathattack 10y ago
  I went full time to grad school because of the pain that I saw others go through when they went part-time at night. If you're just in it for the learning, you might as well leverage Coursera. Whether it's a Phd or professional masters, full time is only justified if you want the networking or mentoring.
  - tostitos1979 10y ago
    Industrial research in CS is in a very bad state. This makes faculty jobs even that more competitive. Honestly, as a professional researcher, I do not recommend a PhD for anyone at this point.
    - mathattack 10y ago
      I'm curious where you are writing from. In Silicon Valley it seems like there's a demand for CS Phds so long as they can pitch themselves as data scientists. Google, Microsoft and others hire lots of Phds too. It gets very thin elsewhere though.
      - tostitos1979 10y ago
        I am talking about the Bay area as well as North America. For a while, I kept getting recruiters trying to interview me as a data scientist when they saw a PhD in my linkedIn profile. I ended up having conversations with said recruiters explaining to them PhD != data scientist.
light_hue_1 10y ago
This isn't a UK PhD, at least it's not up to the standard of any rational UK PhD I've ever seen. I've supervised Masters theses and PhDs in the US at a top institution. No one can do a part-time PhD; it's just so much work. The fact that Reading is willing to sign a PhD with basically no research with one publication in an absurd venue is pretty sad. This wouldn't pass for a thesis proposal here! It's also very sad that this person's adviser is willing to shirk her responsibility and just let him go without a proper education. Part of the problem with the UK is how funding works encourages this reckless and pretty selfish behavior on the part of faculty members for their own benefit. A PhD is supposed to teach you how to do research, pick a big problem, break it down in several different ways, push the state of the art several times, and learn how to communicate in reasonable venues. Looking at his thesis and publication he's done none of the above. As for the UK vs the US, I have collaborators there and have postdocs from there. A US PhD is like a UK PhD plus a postdoc. You're basically just halfway toward being able to do good research by the time you're done a UK PhD so standards are pretty low, although not this absurdly low. There's a reason why getting a faculty position in Europe with a European PhD almost requires a US or Canadian postdoc. As the parent said part of what the PhD gives you is the access to people that are smart and capable. Being around them will make you much smarter and more capable in ways that are intangible but obvious in retrospect. Doing this remotely defeats the whole purpose. Because of this in the US you would never get into any reasonable (top 100 or even lower) grad school if you said you wanted to a part-time PhD. That being said. A real PhD is worth it. You'll learn a lot. You'll work very hard for 5-6 years and at the end you'll be far better equipped in any environment.
- kchoudhu 10y ago
  > The fact that Reading is willing to sign a PhD with basically no research with one publication Something tells me that the parlous state of higher education funding in the UK has a lot to do with this.
- reuven 10y ago
  I agree that a PhD at a good US institution is full time. But there were people in my program who got off relatively easy: A professor would basically say, "Here's some data I've collected over the years. Do some new analysis on it, and you're done." Now, those people still worked very hard. And there is often something to be said for analyzing existing data in new ways. Or collecting some data that extends the stuff that was already done. But there's a world of difference between that and what my advisor expected, namely that we do something completely original and groundbreaking.

by pnathan 10y ago

boxy310 10y ago

Tried to do a full-time PhD, dropped out due to crippling poverty and depression. Tried to do an evening MBA, dropped out for the exact reasons you stated. Only Master's program that actually gelled with me was a professional MA in a stats-based profession. My general stance is to not recommend a graduate program unless you're deeply passionate about the subject and you're willing to bear a significant amount of opportunity cost.

mathattack 10y ago
I went full time to grad school because of the pain that I saw others go through when they went part-time at night. If you're just in it for the learning, you might as well leverage Coursera. Whether it's a Phd or professional masters, full time is only justified if you want the networking or mentoring.
- tostitos1979 10y ago
  Industrial research in CS is in a very bad state. This makes faculty jobs even that more competitive. Honestly, as a professional researcher, I do not recommend a PhD for anyone at this point.
  - mathattack 10y ago
    I'm curious where you are writing from. In Silicon Valley it seems like there's a demand for CS Phds so long as they can pitch themselves as data scientists. Google, Microsoft and others hire lots of Phds too. It gets very thin elsewhere though.
    - tostitos1979 10y ago
      I am talking about the Bay area as well as North America. For a while, I kept getting recruiters trying to interview me as a data scientist when they saw a PhD in my linkedIn profile. I ended up having conversations with said recruiters explaining to them PhD != data scientist.

light_hue_1 10y ago

This isn't a UK PhD, at least it's not up to the standard of any rational UK PhD I've ever seen. I've supervised Masters theses and PhDs in the US at a top institution. No one can do a part-time PhD; it's just so much work. The fact that Reading is willing to sign a PhD with basically no research with one publication in an absurd venue is pretty sad. This wouldn't pass for a thesis proposal here! It's also very sad that this person's adviser is willing to shirk her responsibility and just let him go without a proper education. Part of the problem with the UK is how funding works encourages this reckless and pretty selfish behavior on the part of faculty members for their own benefit. A PhD is supposed to teach you how to do research, pick a big problem, break it down in several different ways, push the state of the art several times, and learn how to communicate in reasonable venues. Looking at his thesis and publication he's done none of the above. As for the UK vs the US, I have collaborators there and have postdocs from there. A US PhD is like a UK PhD plus a postdoc. You're basically just halfway toward being able to do good research by the time you're done a UK PhD so standards are pretty low, although not this absurdly low. There's a reason why getting a faculty position in Europe with a European PhD almost requires a US or Canadian postdoc. As the parent said part of what the PhD gives you is the access to people that are smart and capable. Being around them will make you much smarter and more capable in ways that are intangible but obvious in retrospect. Doing this remotely defeats the whole purpose. Because of this in the US you would never get into any reasonable (top 100 or even lower) grad school if you said you wanted to a part-time PhD. That being said. A real PhD is worth it. You'll learn a lot. You'll work very hard for 5-6 years and at the end you'll be far better equipped in any environment.

kchoudhu 10y ago
> The fact that Reading is willing to sign a PhD with basically no research with one publication Something tells me that the parlous state of higher education funding in the UK has a lot to do with this.
reuven 10y ago
I agree that a PhD at a good US institution is full time. But there were people in my program who got off relatively easy: A professor would basically say, "Here's some data I've collected over the years. Do some new analysis on it, and you're done." Now, those people still worked very hard. And there is often something to be said for analyzing existing data in new ways. Or collecting some data that extends the stuff that was already done. But there's a world of difference between that and what my advisor expected, namely that we do something completely original and groundbreaking.