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Sure, I think it’s good to both first get the data on which scholars come from which schools, and I also think unpacking the social and political construction o

Sure, I think it’s good to both first get the data on which scholars come from which schools, and I also think unpacking the social and political construction of prestige is a great research agenda. But to assess whether prestige is a source of bias in the hiring process, you have to separate prestige from other markers of quality. Otherwise, you have a big confounding variable problem. This author, and also the quoted professor of education, don’t seem to engage with that, and in fact seem to beg the question by assuming that prestige is an independent force in hiring decisions, which, I thought, was the thing the article was trying to demonstrate.

cycomanic 4y ago
Have you been on a university hiring committee? My anecdotal evidence is that yes prestige very strongly matters and coming from a very prestigious university often outweights other factors such as publication record. I haven't read the original article yet but one can easily test if e.g. the publication record of a graduate student from a non-and prestigious uni differ to the extend that is indicated by the hiring.
- setgree 4y ago
  I have not been on a hiring committee — I actually failed my comprehensive exams partway through grad school which is how I ended up in tech :) — but your hypothesis sounds very reasonable to me. I’m just saying that we need a more careful causal identification strategy than that provided herein to say whether prestige has a meaningful effect on hiring, on average.
- ninjin 4y ago
  I have been on multiple hiring committees and had insights into plenty of hiring processes at other “top-25” universities. My experience is that it is more complex than simply using prestigious universities, supervisors, and collaborators as markers. In fact, I have so far never heard that kind of argument raised, while I have heard diversity arguments raised more times than I can count. Rather, my experience tells me that having attended prestigious universities, as well as having had “great” supervisors and collaborators drives up other metrics for a candidate such as publications, impact, collaboration networks, etc. Success breeds success across academic generations, due to overall positive perception of people/institutions, (in particular at top American institutions) ample access to funds, etc. Note also – and this is very important – that the metrics I mentioned are considered “objective” and disconnected from prestige. Making matters even worse, the ability to make use of the opportunities that these prestigious institutions bring, is of course correlated with intrinsic attributes you want to see in a candidate (not everyone that goes to Harvard ends up being a superstar). It is very difficult for me to pick this apart. How can I possibly objectively tell whether individual A that entered a top-5 institution or individual B that entered a top-100 institution is most deserving? Given the complexity of it all, I suspect that I can not, but I also sincerely doubt that the insistence on “objective” metrics does much to alleviate an already very messy situation.
  - visarga 4y ago
    > How can I possibly objectively tell whether individual A that entered a top 5 institution or individual B that entered a top 100 institution is most deserving? I presume you can read their papers.
    - ninjin 4y ago
      Of course! If only we and thousands of other hiring committees would have thought of that! Obviously we read their work, their CVs, their teaching statements, their research proposals, listen to their presentations, have personal meetings, etc. But if you read my original comment again I am sure you will notice that this is not what I am talking about. I state multiple times that these “objective” metrics that you now tout in response to my post are strongly correlated with prestigious institutions and supervisory pedigree. Thus, picking them apart is incredibly challenging.
      - visarga 4y ago
        Use blind reading, remove the author name and institution from the papers.
        ninjin 4y ago
        Okay, let my try to put this gently, go back and read my original post again and then respond here as to why your reply here is obviously nonsensical. Sorry, I am losing my patience here as you do not even seem to understand the basics of the ongoing discussion and what it is that is problematic.
- j7ake 4y ago
  All else being equal eg publication record, a candidate A from a less prestigious place is ranked higher than candidate B from a more prestigious place. This is because the candidate A did the same stuff with much less support than B. The issue is that prestige is highly correlated to research outputs, so it is difficult to disentangle.
  - cycomanic 4y ago
    While it maybe should be that way it definitely is not in my experience. In my experience if you have done a postdoc/PhD at e.g. Stanford people will look much less thoroughly at your publication record. I've actually argued in committees that a candidate from a less prestigious school should be reranked higher than a candidate from a prestigious school, because they had a much better publication record. The interesting thing was once I brought this up in the discussion, most people agreed. However in their own ranking they had put the person from the prestigious school higher, which indicates to me that this is an unconscious bias.
    - j7ake 4y ago
      I guess it depends on the publication record. But a bad publication record from someone who came from a prestigious place gets an extra negative from someone who came from an average place. On the other spectrum, someone from nowhere solving something big makes huge headlines (mathematician from unknown place solves millennia-old problem). At that level it doesn’t matter where you came from, you’re in. It’s the muddy middle that becomes difficult to assess. Two people who have published decently but not great. Nothing remarkable about them. Then prestige may factor in to their benefit.
jltsiren 4y ago
I think this study is approaching the limits of what can be determined using quantitative methods. The academia is not single field but a collection of tens of thousands of overlapping niches. If you want to understand the dynamics in a niche, you must spend years studying it, which does not scale. In the niche I'm most familiar with, where I can often tell the difference between the reputation of a researcher and the quality of their work, prestige does not seem to have a significant role. University of Cambridge is the only institute that stands out, while most top people and most faculty members come from a wide range of reputable but unexceptional research universities. Prestige seems to have a bigger role in another subfield I work in, but I'm not as confident in evaluating the people in it. The big difference seems to be that this subfield favors building large labs and emphasizes the role of the PI as a manager and a visionary rather than as a researcher. I'm not even sure if the quality of research means the same things in this field as in my home field.

cycomanic 4y ago

Have you been on a university hiring committee? My anecdotal evidence is that yes prestige very strongly matters and coming from a very prestigious university often outweights other factors such as publication record. I haven't read the original article yet but one can easily test if e.g. the publication record of a graduate student from a non-and prestigious uni differ to the extend that is indicated by the hiring.

setgree 4y ago
I have not been on a hiring committee — I actually failed my comprehensive exams partway through grad school which is how I ended up in tech :) — but your hypothesis sounds very reasonable to me. I’m just saying that we need a more careful causal identification strategy than that provided herein to say whether prestige has a meaningful effect on hiring, on average.
ninjin 4y ago
I have been on multiple hiring committees and had insights into plenty of hiring processes at other “top-25” universities. My experience is that it is more complex than simply using prestigious universities, supervisors, and collaborators as markers. In fact, I have so far never heard that kind of argument raised, while I have heard diversity arguments raised more times than I can count. Rather, my experience tells me that having attended prestigious universities, as well as having had “great” supervisors and collaborators drives up other metrics for a candidate such as publications, impact, collaboration networks, etc. Success breeds success across academic generations, due to overall positive perception of people/institutions, (in particular at top American institutions) ample access to funds, etc. Note also – and this is very important – that the metrics I mentioned are considered “objective” and disconnected from prestige. Making matters even worse, the ability to make use of the opportunities that these prestigious institutions bring, is of course correlated with intrinsic attributes you want to see in a candidate (not everyone that goes to Harvard ends up being a superstar). It is very difficult for me to pick this apart. How can I possibly objectively tell whether individual A that entered a top-5 institution or individual B that entered a top-100 institution is most deserving? Given the complexity of it all, I suspect that I can not, but I also sincerely doubt that the insistence on “objective” metrics does much to alleviate an already very messy situation.
- visarga 4y ago
  > How can I possibly objectively tell whether individual A that entered a top 5 institution or individual B that entered a top 100 institution is most deserving? I presume you can read their papers.
  - ninjin 4y ago
    Of course! If only we and thousands of other hiring committees would have thought of that! Obviously we read their work, their CVs, their teaching statements, their research proposals, listen to their presentations, have personal meetings, etc. But if you read my original comment again I am sure you will notice that this is not what I am talking about. I state multiple times that these “objective” metrics that you now tout in response to my post are strongly correlated with prestigious institutions and supervisory pedigree. Thus, picking them apart is incredibly challenging.
    - visarga 4y ago
      Use blind reading, remove the author name and institution from the papers.
      - ninjin 4y ago
        Okay, let my try to put this gently, go back and read my original post again and then respond here as to why your reply here is obviously nonsensical. Sorry, I am losing my patience here as you do not even seem to understand the basics of the ongoing discussion and what it is that is problematic.
j7ake 4y ago
All else being equal eg publication record, a candidate A from a less prestigious place is ranked higher than candidate B from a more prestigious place. This is because the candidate A did the same stuff with much less support than B. The issue is that prestige is highly correlated to research outputs, so it is difficult to disentangle.
- cycomanic 4y ago
  While it maybe should be that way it definitely is not in my experience. In my experience if you have done a postdoc/PhD at e.g. Stanford people will look much less thoroughly at your publication record. I've actually argued in committees that a candidate from a less prestigious school should be reranked higher than a candidate from a prestigious school, because they had a much better publication record. The interesting thing was once I brought this up in the discussion, most people agreed. However in their own ranking they had put the person from the prestigious school higher, which indicates to me that this is an unconscious bias.
  - j7ake 4y ago
    I guess it depends on the publication record. But a bad publication record from someone who came from a prestigious place gets an extra negative from someone who came from an average place. On the other spectrum, someone from nowhere solving something big makes huge headlines (mathematician from unknown place solves millennia-old problem). At that level it doesn’t matter where you came from, you’re in. It’s the muddy middle that becomes difficult to assess. Two people who have published decently but not great. Nothing remarkable about them. Then prestige may factor in to their benefit.

jltsiren 4y ago

I think this study is approaching the limits of what can be determined using quantitative methods. The academia is not single field but a collection of tens of thousands of overlapping niches. If you want to understand the dynamics in a niche, you must spend years studying it, which does not scale. In the niche I'm most familiar with, where I can often tell the difference between the reputation of a researcher and the quality of their work, prestige does not seem to have a significant role. University of Cambridge is the only institute that stands out, while most top people and most faculty members come from a wide range of reputable but unexceptional research universities. Prestige seems to have a bigger role in another subfield I work in, but I'm not as confident in evaluating the people in it. The big difference seems to be that this subfield favors building large labs and emphasizes the role of the PI as a manager and a visionary rather than as a researcher. I'm not even sure if the quality of research means the same things in this field as in my home field.