The Dark Side of Graduate School
It wasn’t that long ago that you could get by with a high school diploma. Now, a bachelors seems to be the minimum. It also wasn’t that long ago that a bachelors could be gained in 4 years. While times have been declining in recent studies, the “4 year” degree has taken longer than that for most students for years. What will be the future requirements for a “good” job? Will it be a Masters? Ph.D.? Something else? As someone that has been through graduate school and has children that I expect may want to do the same (I’d love to have them surpass me, isn’t that what all parents want?), I can’t help but think about my time in grad school and what I learned. Unfortunately, what I learn most was what a dark and sadistic place graduate school can be.
1) It’s not about what you know, it’s about who you know
If you knew nothing else about grad school than the application process, you’d probably still have a pretty good idea what it was like. Getting into grad school is often a function of how well you kiss up and who you know than it is of how well your record looks. If you do any research on getting into grad school, you’ll find oodles of recommendations to “contact professors.” What they don’t tell you is this can be the single most important step. If you’ve studied under a professor (and have a letter of recommendation from them) that is respected or at least known by the professors at the grad school, your chances of getting accepted go way up. Is it fair? Hell no.
On the flip side, if you spend your time communicating with and “impressing” a professor (i.e. sucking up), they very well may be able to shepherd your application though the committee. Often, especially at smaller programs, the professors will sit down together and make application decisions. What do you think a committee like that will do if one of them says they like a particular applicant? If they say, “I’ve been talking to this one and they seem really on the ball?” Yeah, it smacks of a good ol’ boy system to me too.
2) Time is relative
I’ve found that there are two types of graduate programs. The Masters programs tend to be the big money makers for the colleges. They rush a group of students through in 2 years (or else) and make sure they constantly have a new group coming in every year. While the group of Ph.D. students may be 4 or 5 each year, the Masters program may be 10x’s that or more! That’s a lot of revenue for a college. And remember all those Ph.D. applicants that didn’t make the cut because they didn’t know the right people? Guess what? They suddenly get the, “You’ve been accepted… but into the Masters program that you didn’t apply for” phone call. Of course this is code for, “We don’t want you in our program but we still want your money.”
The Ph.D. student, on the other hand, is on no such fast track for a degree. While estimates range from 4-6 years to get a Ph.D., it is not uncommon to see people invest far more time. I’ve personally known people that have worked for 8, 9, 10+ years all without receiving their degree. And they spend most of that time in ABD land. ABD=All But Dissertation. This is the horrible time after you’ve completed all your classes, testing, and oral and written exams. All you have left is to write and get your dissertation approved. So this is just the doctoral candidate burning out or slacking off right?
Wrong.
3) Grad School = High School
Remember the bullies in high school? Now imagine that they have the power over your life like a professor. Imagine that those bullies have tenure and couldn’t get fired if they tried. Imagine that they’ve just landed a big contract for the university. Now imagine that their ego is so big that they can barely fit through the double doors to the auditorium. These are grad school professors. These are the people that are making decisions about dissertations.
I’ve known more than one Ph.D. candidate that had a year or more worth of dissertation work (a dissertation plan that was approved by their adviser) just to have it all discarded out on a whim by the same adviser. Can you imagine the frustration? The rage? These are people that have poured their hearts and soul into research just to have someone say, “You know what you should do? Completely change everything and start over again.” This is not only a year or more of your life wasted but a year of future work lost plus all the fees you paid to the college. Who do you complain to? What is your recourse? Nothing, that’s what.
Even if you have a supportive adviser, most programs require that your dissertation be approved in a committee. That means that even if you find one of the few sane professors, you’re still going to have to get it past your committee (which can require you to make changes) and also defend it to the entire department. What does this teach you? The only thing I can think is it is showing you how to deal with the most demanding and insane clients – times 2. I’m not sure grad school is exactly where you should be learning that lesson.
4) Like to read? Grad school is your place
You’ve probably heard about all the reading you need to do in grad school – this is mostly true. I’ve found that reading load generally has an inverse relationship with the ability of the instructor. The better the instructor, the less they make you read (mostly because they know how to teach) and vise versa. One of my favorite grad school instructors required almost no reading but lots and lots of thinking. The better thinker you were, the better you did in his class.
That isn’t to say that the reading doesn’t have value – it does. But unless you are a character in one of those primetime crime dramas, you’re never going to be able to recall all that on command. It will be there in the back of your mind, however, to inform future thought. But again, paying what you do for grad school, should you really only get a reading list? With grad school costing upwards of $50k a year or more, I’d expect a bit more for my money.
5) An advanced degree can actually cost you a job
Many of the people who are looking to hire often come from the “bachelors is all you need” era. You’ll find that not only is your Masters or Ph.D. not appreciated, but can actually keep you from being hired. The fact is that the male ego is a fragile thing. There are more than a few people out there that won’t hire anyone that they see as a threat to their position. A Ph.D. or Masters may very well fast track you to that group.
6) The “Ivory Tower” isn’t what you think
One of the things you hear is that professors get insulated from the real world in their “Ivory Towers.” The thought is that it is all theory and no practice in the universities. Well, that may or may not be true, but I personally think that theory has its place. If they don’t do it at the universities, it’ll never happen. The problem is when you hire a professor to do a “real” job, they tend to over-complicate and bog down what could be a fairly simple job.
The truth is that the Ivory Tower is not full of theory, it’s full of ego. When a professor creates a theory, they tend to get ego-invested in it. God help them if they get the theory named after them. It’s a rare professor (nay, human) that honestly welcomes having the theory named after them refuted (usually by someone that names the new theory after themselves). So what they look for in students is someone that first believes in their theory and wants to do research with it and second believes that the ground that the professor walks on is hallow. In some cases I’m being facetious with that second point but you’d be surprised how often that is an apt description.
I’ve met a lot of different professors from the totally sweet and lovable to the blackest of the evil. To a one, they haven’t had a problem asking a student to redo a year or more of work. The difference seems to be the delivery of the news, not the content. And that’s the damnable part of it. The Ivory Tower isn’t about theory or practice, it’s about being out of touch with reality. The best analogy really is high school. The university system seems to be filled with a bunch of cheerleaders fighting over who gets to lead the cheer. And God help whoever gets in their way.
I’m sure there are plenty of people out there that have stories contrary to the bleak picture I paint. But for every one of those, I’m willing to bet that there are 5 or more of mine. I’ve known people that just couldn’t take getting screwed any more and gave up. I’ve known people that have taken a year or more off after having their research throw out. I’ve known people that had to fly across the country to meet with a professor that had for some reason refused to sign their dissertation even though it had been approved and defended successfully. This same lack of signature was about to get the Ph.D. candidate thrown out of the country, and they still had to fly across the country to get the required signature! And this person had come to this country to work with the professor because they were so well known in the field.
The university system in general and graduate school in particular is deeply flawed. Way too much power is in the hands of people who have absolutely no incentive to do what is right for their students. Professors at grad schools have only need to get tenure and to keep the grant dollars flowing in order to have near unquestioned autonomy. When a professor has just landed a multi-million dollar contract for the university, do you really think the administration is going to lean on them because some whiny grad student doesn’t want to redo their data for the third time?
There is no question that you receive training in graduate school. There is no question that said training helps you become better in your field. But there is a big question as to whether or not graduate school is the most effective vehicle for that training. For the amount of money you spend, you should have rights. You should have the education you deserve. Most of all, you shouldn’t be subjected to the whims of egomaniacal professors with near unchecked power. And my graduate school wonders why I refuse their requests for donations.
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You need to call Fox News and do a segment.