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>shows that just 20% of PhD-granting institutions in the United States supplied 80% of tenure-track faculty members to institutions across the country between 2

>shows that just 20% of PhD-granting institutions in the United States supplied 80% of tenure-track faculty members to institutions across the country between 2011 and 2020 I feel like this is not the best representation here as they sorta switched what they are measuring. Imagine if every single PhD from every single university became a tenured professor at the exact same rate. We'd still see a pretty big imbalance because presumably there are some universities which give out 300+ PhDs per year because they have a ton of programs/departments and others that give out 30+ per year because they have very limited grad programs. Surely there is a skew but it just seems like a very deceptive way to look at it. Would be like saying that 50% of all Americans who become teachers come from just 20% of the states - but not adjusting for the fact that 50% of the population lives in the top 10 largest states.

lapcat 4y ago
> Would be like saying that 50% of all Americans who become teachers come from just 20% of the states - but not adjusting for the fact that 50% of the population lives in the top 10 largest states. There's data here for number of doctorates awarded by school in 2020: https://ncses.nsf.gov/pubs/nsf22300/data-tables https://ncses.nsf.gov/pubs/nsf22300/data-tables #1 was... Walden University. Which I'd never actually heard of before. It's a private for-profit online school. The rest of the top 10 is 2. Michigan 3. Illinois 4. Berkeley 5. Purdue 6. Texas A&M 7. Stanford 8. Texas 9. Wisconsin 10. Ohio State. So there's not a direct correlation between "eliteness" and volume of doctorates produced. Some of the elite schools are represented in this list, but "non-elite" schools are too.
- fasthands9 4y ago
  I think you are mixing up what I am saying - or what that stat was saying. Firstly, if Walden University produced zero tenured professors it would end up weighting exactly the same in the data as random small private university that produced 10 PhDs that also didn't become professors. The state does not involve "eliteness". They simply ranked all schools by number of PhDs they produced and took the top 20%. And fwiw considering this would be about 90 universities Im almost certain every school you listed would make that cut. I guess all I'm saying is that it would be nice to know what percent of total PhDs the same 90 schools are accountable for. My guess is about 50%.
- gnicholas 4y ago
  The list you cite undermines the article's claim about elitism because it looks like 4 out of the 5 schools that it lists are also on your list. So the conclusion is that the 5 schools that produce the most professors...include 4 of the top 10 schools in terms of PhD graduates. Not much of a surprise there!
  - lapcat 4y ago
    You can't just look at supporting evidence and ignore contrary evidence. That's profoundly unscientific thinking. What about the 6 schools — the majority! — on my list that are not elite?
    - gnicholas 4y ago
      Not all of the schools on the top 5 list are that elite. Three are public and only two are private. And UW Madison is not a super elite institution. For many people it wouldn't be in their top 20 schools, maybe more. I was surprised there was only one Ivy on the top-5 list. When I saw that list of schools, I thought "this person is saying these are the hyper-elite schools that are making too many professors?"
      - lapcat 4y ago
        Madison is more elite than you think. "Among the 1,070 departments that are ranked top-10 in any field, 248 (23.2%) top-10 slots are occupied by departments at just five universities—UC Berkeley, Harvard, Stanford, University of Wisconsin-Madison and Columbia; fully 252 universities (64%) have zero top-10 departments." https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-05222-x https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-05222-x
        gnicholas 4y ago
        That's not evidence of eliteness. It's evidence that they produce a lot of professors. And as the top-10 list above points out, they produce a lot of PhDs. It is an open question as to whether the reason they make a lot of professors is because they make a lot of PhDs, or because they are "elite".

lapcat 4y ago

> Would be like saying that 50% of all Americans who become teachers come from just 20% of the states - but not adjusting for the fact that 50% of the population lives in the top 10 largest states. There's data here for number of doctorates awarded by school in 2020: https://ncses.nsf.gov/pubs/nsf22300/data-tables https://ncses.nsf.gov/pubs/nsf22300/data-tables #1 was... Walden University. Which I'd never actually heard of before. It's a private for-profit online school. The rest of the top 10 is 2. Michigan 3. Illinois 4. Berkeley 5. Purdue 6. Texas A&M 7. Stanford 8. Texas 9. Wisconsin 10. Ohio State. So there's not a direct correlation between "eliteness" and volume of doctorates produced. Some of the elite schools are represented in this list, but "non-elite" schools are too.

fasthands9 4y ago
I think you are mixing up what I am saying - or what that stat was saying. Firstly, if Walden University produced zero tenured professors it would end up weighting exactly the same in the data as random small private university that produced 10 PhDs that also didn't become professors. The state does not involve "eliteness". They simply ranked all schools by number of PhDs they produced and took the top 20%. And fwiw considering this would be about 90 universities Im almost certain every school you listed would make that cut. I guess all I'm saying is that it would be nice to know what percent of total PhDs the same 90 schools are accountable for. My guess is about 50%.
gnicholas 4y ago
The list you cite undermines the article's claim about elitism because it looks like 4 out of the 5 schools that it lists are also on your list. So the conclusion is that the 5 schools that produce the most professors...include 4 of the top 10 schools in terms of PhD graduates. Not much of a surprise there!
- lapcat 4y ago
  You can't just look at supporting evidence and ignore contrary evidence. That's profoundly unscientific thinking. What about the 6 schools — the majority! — on my list that are not elite?
  - gnicholas 4y ago
    Not all of the schools on the top 5 list are that elite. Three are public and only two are private. And UW Madison is not a super elite institution. For many people it wouldn't be in their top 20 schools, maybe more. I was surprised there was only one Ivy on the top-5 list. When I saw that list of schools, I thought "this person is saying these are the hyper-elite schools that are making too many professors?"
    - lapcat 4y ago
      Madison is more elite than you think. "Among the 1,070 departments that are ranked top-10 in any field, 248 (23.2%) top-10 slots are occupied by departments at just five universities—UC Berkeley, Harvard, Stanford, University of Wisconsin-Madison and Columbia; fully 252 universities (64%) have zero top-10 departments." https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-05222-x https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-05222-x
      - gnicholas 4y ago
        That's not evidence of eliteness. It's evidence that they produce a lot of professors. And as the top-10 list above points out, they produce a lot of PhDs. It is an open question as to whether the reason they make a lot of professors is because they make a lot of PhDs, or because they are "elite".