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CS Professor here: Depending on the institution, it's possible to get a PhD without an undergrad or meet alternative requirements to get an undergrad along the
by ianmiers 6y ago
CS Professor here: Depending on the institution, it's possible to get a PhD without an undergrad or meet alternative requirements to get an undergrad along the way.
The trick is you need to get admitted to the program. This is harder but doable. To get into a very good PhD program, you typically need some demonstrable track record of research and/or a letter of recommendation from a professor vouching for your interest/ability/potential. Of course, others do get in just on transcript and test scores, but it's rarer.
You could get a job as a programmer in a research lab and then leverage the relationships from there. Or you could try working with a professor informally (perhaps starting with software engineering for some project) and go from there.
Once someone knows you and knows you have interest and aptitude, the lack of an undergrad degree should be solvable for at least some universities.
Finally two pieces of advice: Ph.D.s are supposed to be paid. Not that well (think 25 to 30k a year for a low cost of living area, 45k for say NYC), but if not it's a major red flag. Second, the quality and trust you have in your PhD advisor is way more important than the institution. A Ph.D. is almost an apprenticeship under someone. It goes badly if that person treats you badly
- convolvatron 6y agoI did this. with this specific goal in mind I started reaching out to professors working in areas I thought were interesting. The only reason I was able to engage with one of them were: - had an SV startup background and the professor was interested in spinning them off - someone who was friendly with the department and had a sterling reputation went out of their way to pave the way for me - had some publications in the field you're absolutely right about 'some universities'. a couple CS departments were interested, but there was just no way the graduate school would let them bring me on. still, it was a process. I worked as a paid researcher for a while, and was able to take grad classes as part of the (very generous) professional staff education policy. with a good (graduate) gpa, and a good GRE score (coming at the GRE from a graduate perspective made it a lot easier), I was accepted at that institution. sadly I never developed a good relationship with an advisor and wandered off after teaching undergrads for a couple years. but yes, its possible if you care enough (edit: thinking about it..if you do care that much, maybe its not that hard to just get a BS? or diploma-mill MS?) (edit again: I'm a systems guy, and I strongly suspect that the theory people are very different - I think if you had a really substantial publication history that might be enough?)
- mrfusion 6y ago> try working with a professor informally (perhaps starting with software engineering for some project) and go from there. I’ve been wanting to do this for years. Any tips on how to find a project and a willing professor? I’ve emailed interesting professors but I’ve never heard back. (I was even curious to start a website to match up researchers with volunteer programmers.)
- ianmiers 6y agoIts hard, we get a lot of emails and ignore most of them. You need to find some interesting insight or question, not "can you work with me." Making me think about research is a welcome thing. Making me think about managing people, not so much. Couple of tricks: try not engaging via email. Twitter works (but again, make it a stimulating conversation, not a "work work" one). Or if they have code on github under active development, try contributing there.
- mrfusion 6y agoThanks. I like those ideas. I’ll give it a try.