3 ms·
Don’t you normally need an undergrad to start a PhD in the US as well? In the UK an undergrad is 3 years in most cases, then 3 years for a PhD, so 6 years tota
by chrisseaton 4y ago
Don’t you normally need an undergrad to start a PhD in the US as well?
In the UK an undergrad is 3 years in most cases, then 3 years for a PhD, so 6 years total.
Some institutions will technically admit you for a PhD with no prior degree at all, but nobody does this in practice.
- foldr 4y agoIt's less common now in the UK to admit people to PhD programs directly from undergrad. In many cases you'd be expected to do a one-year masters first, although that's not a universal requirement.
- randomsearch 4y agoNowhere near universal. It’s common to go from undergrad to PhD in the U.K. Tbh most Master’s, esp MSc, don’t add anything.
- foldr 4y agoVaries a lot from field to field.
- dannymi 4y ago>Don’t you normally need an undergrad to start a PhD in the US as well? Yes, but not a graduate degree. For comparison, at least in Austria, you need to have finished both a Bachelor of Science (3 years) and a Master of Science (2 years) in order to be able to start a PhD. That's usually not the case in the USA (and some common law countries), where you only need the equivalent of a Bachelor of Science in order to start the PhD. You then do a small version of the Master of Science in parallel with the PhD.
- chrisseaton 4y agoSo the UK is probably the best model - 3 years undergrad, 3-4 years PhD max.
- hnbad 4y agoOh, that explains why I see more Americans going for PhD (successfully or not) than, say, Germans. It never made sense to me because I was used to it being the thing you can do after an MSc/MA and those already seemed like a questionable choice for many jobs.