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> But also because it makes the PhD not much different than working in industry. I believe this is viewed as a feature, and not a bug. For the most part, acade

> But also because it makes the PhD not much different than working in industry. I believe this is viewed as a feature, and not a bug. For the most part, academia serves as one of the few reliable ways to emigrate to the U.S., and exploits that fact to generate a large pool of inexpensive labor. In exchange, these students are rewarded with a US visa and a comparatively well-paying job. Neither party expects these graduates to stay in academia, so the ability to follow orders, work to a deadline, and solve highly-abstract problems provide a much more tangible benefit than inculcating the creativity, communication skills, and bureaucratic know-how that differentiates successful professors. In many ways, including these reasons, I think the PhD is starting to be viewed by some as a "super-Masters degree" that simply requires more work or takes longer, rather than as requiring a distinct, different skillset. Note that this is based only on my observations of a top-50 US graduate program; this might be totally different in a top-4 program, for example. However, one data point I found particularly persuasive is that in our program with ~300 PhD students, we have fewer than 30 (and probably fewer than 10) students with US citizenship or green cards.

noodlenotes 8y ago
I've observed this myself and it's creating a weird dynamic in data science. More often, companies are requiring PhDs for their entry level data science positions. (Because there's a surplus of people who want to enter the field and it's difficult to tell who will ultimately be successful. Possessing a PhD is a good predictor of success.) But there are very few American-born students going on to get PhDs who are interested in industry because, well, why would they waste another 5 years in school when they can get software engineering jobs with only a BS or MS? According to this study [1], 38% of all data scientists are non-US citizens and nearly half of early-career data scientist are non-US citizens. It's weird that we're pushing US citizens out of data science. [1] http://burtchworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Burtch-Works-Study_DS-2018.pdf http://burtchworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Burtch-Wor...
- neuromantik8086 8y ago
  When you say "data science" does that encompass traditionally educated statisticians and business intelligence folks? If you only count the practitioners out there who self-identify as data scientists you get a pretty incomplete sample of what the field actually is.

noodlenotes 8y ago

I've observed this myself and it's creating a weird dynamic in data science. More often, companies are requiring PhDs for their entry level data science positions. (Because there's a surplus of people who want to enter the field and it's difficult to tell who will ultimately be successful. Possessing a PhD is a good predictor of success.) But there are very few American-born students going on to get PhDs who are interested in industry because, well, why would they waste another 5 years in school when they can get software engineering jobs with only a BS or MS? According to this study [1], 38% of all data scientists are non-US citizens and nearly half of early-career data scientist are non-US citizens. It's weird that we're pushing US citizens out of data science. [1] http://burtchworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Burtch-Works-Study_DS-2018.pdf http://burtchworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Burtch-Wor...

neuromantik8086 8y ago
When you say "data science" does that encompass traditionally educated statisticians and business intelligence folks? If you only count the practitioners out there who self-identify as data scientists you get a pretty incomplete sample of what the field actually is.