4 ms·

On a completely unrelated note, is M.S. work in the CS world really: "fully supervised research work done in total peonage with little to no original input"? F

by jofer 12y ago

On a completely unrelated note, is M.S. work in the CS world really: "fully supervised research work done in total peonage with little to no original input"? For us, an M.S. thesis was supposed to be largely independent, publishable work. Is it that different in different fields? At least in the geosciences, M.S. research is basically your adviser saying "Here's an idea/interesting problem that I haven't thought much about but looks promising. Have at it." You do your M.S., publish, switch schools and start a Ph.D. (Or go into industry... An M.S. is a very common working degree in geology.) A Ph.D. is "Come up with three different, relevant, original ideas that work* and see them through". (*Obviously, most don't work, so it's largely an exercise it trying different things until something does.) I know we have a different academic culture than CS (and a wildly different industry culture), but is it really that different at the M.S. level?

analog31 12y ago
It's my hypothesis that as you rise through the academic ranks (i.e., from kindergarten through gradual school etc.) that you are given increasing independence to forge your own path, but one of the paths open to you is mediocrity. You can arrange matters so that you're virtually guaranteed to receive a degree for mediocre work, and to graduate with no prospects. I don't want to sound like an "internet tough guy" but rising up above that level is laid on the student to pursue. Sorry, I had to edit this again. I have a PhD in physics. My dire warning to graduate students is: You might be given a degree even if you didn't do PhD level work. I hope that's sobering, but at the same time motivating.
- deleted 12y ago
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eli_gottlieb 12y ago
At least in my experience, an MSc is constituted by "tackle one interesting idea/problem, under supervision and guidance from your advisor". The exact degree of peonage or independence you are given varies with how the advisor and student get along, and with their goals. However, generally, MSc research constitutes one paper's worth of output (two if you're good, or sometimes even quite commonly nowadays, since two papers' worth means more labor got done for the same "price" in stipends and degrees), and is more closely supervised and less independent than a PhD (but still more independent than a BSc thesis). On the other hand, my experiences have been weird, in that I had near-total independence for my BSc thesis (which, as a result, simply was not very good even though it was accepted with honors) (because my undergrad thesis advisors were involved in administration and I was doing a topic politically disfavored in that department), and an uneven degree of supervision for my MSc research (I've had a lot of guidance on what experiment to do and what statistics to run, but my advisor has never told me how to find the previous literature on our subject, even when I ask).

by jofer 12y ago

analog31 12y ago

It's my hypothesis that as you rise through the academic ranks (i.e., from kindergarten through gradual school etc.) that you are given increasing independence to forge your own path, but one of the paths open to you is mediocrity. You can arrange matters so that you're virtually guaranteed to receive a degree for mediocre work, and to graduate with no prospects. I don't want to sound like an "internet tough guy" but rising up above that level is laid on the student to pursue. Sorry, I had to edit this again. I have a PhD in physics. My dire warning to graduate students is: You might be given a degree even if you didn't do PhD level work. I hope that's sobering, but at the same time motivating.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]

eli_gottlieb 12y ago

At least in my experience, an MSc is constituted by "tackle one interesting idea/problem, under supervision and guidance from your advisor". The exact degree of peonage or independence you are given varies with how the advisor and student get along, and with their goals. However, generally, MSc research constitutes one paper's worth of output (two if you're good, or sometimes even quite commonly nowadays, since two papers' worth means more labor got done for the same "price" in stipends and degrees), and is more closely supervised and less independent than a PhD (but still more independent than a BSc thesis). On the other hand, my experiences have been weird, in that I had near-total independence for my BSc thesis (which, as a result, simply was not very good even though it was accepted with honors) (because my undergrad thesis advisors were involved in administration and I was doing a topic politically disfavored in that department), and an uneven degree of supervision for my MSc research (I've had a lot of guidance on what experiment to do and what statistics to run, but my advisor has never told me how to find the previous literature on our subject, even when I ask).