<p>For music performance, dance, art portfolio, various other arts, teachers, accountants and most other undergraduate business majors, many engineers, and various other practicing professions (beyond the traditional professions of law, medicine, church, military, architecture, and a few others), all I can say is: you know who you are. For others, academia vs pre-professional is a distinction worth noting.</p>
<p>Correct me if I'm wrong, but I suspect that conservatory applicants, and even more generally many fine arts (especially in performing fine arts) appllicants, are in the main not focused on PhD statistics. For good reasons, I don't blame them. Likewise, West Pont and Annapolis engineering majors. Let's put them all in some other statistic.</p>
<p>I think some very interesting points have been raised. </p>
<p>I would not have expected the extremely high rankings for the music conservatories. Someone suggested the high ranking indicates that many conservatory students go on to get doctorates because they are failures as performing musicians. That is not a conclusion I would jump to. As with any UG degree, many students will end up working in careers not related to their degree. I have no idea why so many conservatory student get doctorates.</p>
<p>Interesteddad suggested that the few Ph.D. graduates do not alter the academic culture but rather reflect that culture. His explanation makes sense to me. I doubt very few students enter college with a goal of getting a doctorate. More likely the culture of the college stimulates their intelletual curiosity and they continue on to get an advanced degree. If the culture is less academic, fewer students will continue their education.</p>
<p>Another point has been raised several times. The rankings do not include those who go on to get MD's. That is true, but quite a few schools thought of as medical school feeders have high rankings.</p>
<p>None of us seem to have many facts to back up our speculations and arguments, but it is very interesting to speculate. It is kind of fun to sit back with a bag of popcorn and watch the fire. Sometimes it is even fun to throw on a new log. It is my not so humble opinion that a culture of partying and alcohol is very detrimental. I think Dartmouth has earned the low ranking because of the lax attitude toward alcohol. I think it is a bad mistake to allow alcohol in the dorms. Many underaged kids just are not able to an alcohol/party culture. Some develop serious problems and no one benefits.</p>
<p>"Swat grads created ???"</p>
<p>Paycheck!! One of the best movies ever.</p>
<p>
[quote]
The PhD-aspiring students are not the cause of a campus culture. They are the result of a campus culture, usually one that was well established before they were born.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I'm still not convinced. How can this culture be prevailing if the majority of students go on to do something OTHER than get a PhD? </p>
<p>Look at Stanford, which probably isn't wholly atypical of other selective institutions who ranked highly. Ten years out, the class K & B studied broke down like this: 29% of students had J.Ds, 16% of students had M.Ds, and 20% students went on to earn MBAs, while only 8% got the PhD. This is just ten years out, so we know these figures would go a bit higher (In the NRC figures, Stanford ends up with over 11% getting a PhD or similar doctorate). </p>
<p>If it's Top 20, then, you'd argue that the "prevailing" culture is one slanted towards PhDs? I don't see that, not when three times as many students got J.D.s, etc.</p>
<p>I wouldn't argue with a suggestion that a high placement on the list might mean there is MORE emphasis on that kind of graduate study, MORE promotion of scholarly life, MORE emphasis on the kinds of activities we associate with an academic profession life. More, that is, than on the average campus, or on a campus lower down on the list. I'd agree that this might be the case. </p>
<p>But prevailing just doesn't work for me, not when it doesn't seem to explain the wide variety if pursuits seen in graduates.</p>
<p>A strong culture where learning is supported may lead to more Ph.D.'s along with more MD's, JD, MBA's and other postgrad studies and degrees. It is not that the small number of PhD's is important by itself, but the ranking based on doctorates may reflect the academic culture.</p>
<p>"You do not see to many rankings dominated by schools known for their undergrad focus (so many LACs in this case). Is it a coincidence or is there a connection?"</p>
<p>No it is not a coincidence. See post #14. Compare the list in post #11 to post #8. More generally, LACs are non-diverse so there are a greater percentage of students enrolled all doing the same thing. Whereas large universities having even greater numbers of intellectually passionate students might have other students, perhaps in completely separate colleges there, that are studying other stuff that does not lead to a PhD. So there "ranking" on this list is downgraded based on this. The LACs have nothing else but an LAC. So they are "rewarded" by this methodology for their lack of academic diversity.</p>
<p>It doesn't necessarily mean LACs are Better due to their undergrad focus. It means they are academically focused AND they don't have much else going on there except programs for which a PhD is the terminal degree of choice.</p>
<p>There may be universities who have even more intellectually focused kids, produce more PhDs, but are further down this list because they also have students with other career objectives on the same campus.</p>
<p>
[quote]
A strong culture where learning is supported may lead to more Ph.D.'s along with more MD's, JD, MBA's and other postgrad studies and degrees. It is not that the small number of PhD's is important by itself, but the ranking based on doctorates may reflect the academic culture.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I think we'd agree there; that's pretty much what I was saying in my 4th paragraph. It's the idea that "a relatively high PhD number = a prevailing culture" that feel a little more tenuous to me.</p>
<p>I guess I should be asking where interesteddad draws the line--he said Williams (#17, a ranking I find respectable) has a prevailing jock culture. Stanford was the school I had data on for other types of postbaccalaureate degrees, which is why I used it. However, it's a poor example because it has even lower doctorate-earning %age than Williams. </p>
<p>Is there a point at which the ranking stops indicating the "prevailing culture"?</p>
<p>From my own experience, I do think there is a lot of self-selection or steering of kids toward LAC's related to their intellectual interests. I still recall a conversation I had with an uncle of mine when I was in 11th grade or so. He was a college professor. He asked me what grade I was in, and when I told him he said, "Well, it looks like you can look forward to going to school for another 10 years." (He was exactly right). He then came up with a list of good schools for me that included (in addition to HYPS) a long list of what we would now recognize as among the top LAC's on that "PhD list." So I went to the public library, found the catalogues, and wrote to those schools for applications. Of course, this didn't predestine me either to attending an LAC or to getting a PhD, but it imparted some impulse in those directions.</p>
<p>"Schools with strong performing and visual arts programs also don't do as well in these rankings, unless there's a separate conservatory (e.g., Oberlin). "</p>
<p>You mean EVEN if they have a separate conservatory. In many cases, including Oberlin, the separate colleges are all lumped together, regardless of their diverse missions. So when lists of, eg, % phDs in a specific (non-music) field are produced, the schools with the diverse colleges all look "worse" in that subject than they would look if they didn't have these other specialized programs. Because predictably few Conservatory students (15-20% of Oberlin) go on to get PhDs in History. OR whatever. Mini has related the same phenomenon in some univrsities that have large schools of social work.</p>
<p>The one time when one of these lists was corrected by stripping out Oberlin's conservatory students from the denominator it appeared substantially higher on the % list. Oberlin is high anyway; however there may be other colleges out there for which the amount of error is more severe than that case.</p>
<p>The inclusion of diverse colleges is not consistent either.
For example, Cornell has seven undergraduate colleges with separate admissions:
Arts & Sciences well ok
Industrial & Labor Relations (few future bio PhDs there!)
Engineering (few % History PHDs )
Agriculture ditto
Architecture ditto
Human Ecology ditto
Hotel Administration ditto</p>
<p>Some of these schools obviously produce few PhDs of any type; it isn't their mission. Yet they are still lumped in.</p>
<p>Look at the total PhD production in table in post# 11 for Cornell. It provides whatever intellectual atmosphere is required for a ll those future History PhDs, quite apparently. But it's got all these other things going on too, so it appears lower in % History PhD production than an LAC that doesn't have all these other specialized schools. It is not necessarily less intellectual an atmosphere to support the ambitions of those who want to pursue a Phd. It just has more than that going on. It is more diverse.</p>
<p>Maybe Kalamazoo (ranked "higher" on a % phd basis) is just as good an environment for a future PhD than Cornell is, but frankly I doubt it for most subjects. It can't possibly have the breadth of upper-level courses available. Or the number of peer students who will pursue phds afterwards, along with other advance degrees. Or the cross-polination offered by the presence of these other specialized colleges.</p>
<p>In contrast, for whatever reason, I don't believe Columbia's separate undergraduate colleges, Columbia College, Fu College of Engineering, Barnard College and School of General Studies, are all lumped together, the way Cornell's separate colleges are. So the order that schools appear on the list are tainted with input inconsistencies of this type.
This is not apparent to the casual observer, whose resulting impressions might be distorted.</p>
<p>Ph.D. candidates have much less need for immediate income. They are much less likely to be Hispanic or African-American, much less likely to be first generation college students. Future doctors and lawyers, and to a lesser extent Ph.D. candidates are much more willing to take on debt. Doctors and lawyers are much more assured of future learning potential than Ph.D. candidates. Folks with significant debt from their undergraduate days are much less likely to be willing to take on substantial debt following. College teaching is, on the whole, a peripathetic career, and is much less attractive to students rooted in strong family and community life.</p>
<p>Now it could very well be that strong academic orientation campuses are, in the main, associated with white, upper-middle class, non-first-generation college student bodies. But it could equally be the case that, in broad strokes, percentages of students pursuing Ph.D.s (as opposed to MSWs, advanced nursing, or teaching degrees) is simply strongly a function of demographics.</p>
<p>"For music performance, dance, art portfolio, various other arts, teachers, accountants and most other undergraduate business majors, many engineers, and various other practicing professions (beyond the traditional professions of law, medicine, church, military, architecture, and a few others), all I can say is: you know who you are. For others, academia vs pre-professional is a distinction worth noting"</p>
<p>The problem is that the students at a university who are pursuing all those "other" areas you mentioned are lumped in with the ones for whom the academia vs. pre-professional distinction may be relevant . Thereby confounding the data you want to appropriately make this distinction. In some cases.</p>
<p>Mini, I do think that's part of the selection process. I just wouldn't use the word "simply." Within the very large number of white kids with college educated parents there is further selection. I certainly helped to point my son toward colleges that suited his self-professed intellectual interests. I didn't so advise other kids in his cohort.</p>
<p>Monydad, face it. Cornell just isn't an intellectual place. :)</p>
<p>Aren't you glad you discovered CC? You didn't know you were living with such a delusion. :) :)</p>
<p>No, they simply "advised" each other (remember the "Hundredth Monkey"? ;))</p>
<p>It wouldn't take a genius (just some sweat) to correct Ph.D. productivity for the effects of race, income, first-generation college status, and age (some campuses have substantial cohorts of older students), just as it wouldn't take a genius (just some sweat) to add MSWs, terminal engineering degrees, teaching degrees, and advanced nursing degrees into the mix.</p>
<p>Can't imagine that most prestige schools (or parents of those whose kids attend them) would want to see the results though.</p>
<p>I think there are a number of things going on with conservatories and students who eventually acquire doctorate level degrees. First off, conservatory students seem to be a bright and driven lot. Many come from families who value education very highly and are willing and able to spend large sums of money on lessons, instruments, youth ensemble memberships, etc... So you are starting out by assembling a class that tends to be very intelligent, has a strong work ethic and an excellent support system. (I know there are many exceptions to the above, but we are talking about averages over hundreds to thousands of students and doctorate rates on the order of 10 to 20%.)</p>
<p>After obtaining their bachelor's degree, they enter a scarce job market where the usual model is that once you have found a good job, you keep it for the next thirty or forty years. It frequently takes years of auditioning to land such a job. In the time before they connect with that job or stop trying, their best option to stay in the hunt is to continue in grad school where they can continue practicing and studying with a top teacher. </p>
<p>Those who go to a conservatory with an interest in becoming a teacher themselves will probably want to teach at the college level rather than at the elementary or high school level. (Again, there are exceptions like the Curtis grad who teaches trumpet at a local HS.) They realize that a doctorate can get them into a long-term tenured position whereas a bachelor's or master's degree will only get them hired as a low-paid adjunct or perhaps as an associate prof. who will be encouraged to move on in a few years.</p>
<p>The vast majority of conservatory grads will still not get doctorates, but those who are so inclined are more likely than most to have the required combination of ability, opportunity and resources.</p>
<p>Mini:</p>
<p>The problem with your theory on race, ethnicity, and socio-economic status is that many of the high per capita PhD producers are among the more diverse elite colleges in the country, including your favorite, Occidental. Those very high on the list also include many schools with large ethnic diversity, including Stanford, MIT, Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Swarthmore, etc. I actually think you might find a correlation between PhD production and schools with an aggressive commitment to ethnic diversity.</p>
<p>The ethnic breakdown on PhD recepients is available from the NSF database. Someone doing that research would have be a careful of historic trends since poor and/or non-white students were not included in elite college enrollment to any signficant degree until very recently.</p>
<p>Here are the results for 2003:</p>
<p>Black, Non-Hispanic 2,097 5%
American Indian or Alaskan Native 141 0%
Asian or Pacific Islander 8,345 20%
Hispanic 2,206 5%
White, Non-Hispanic 24,405 60%
Other/Unknown Races & Ethnicities 3,516 9%</p>
<p>Total 40,710 100%</p>
<p>A second set of results for 2003, including only PhDs awarded to udergraduate grads of US colleges and universitiies:</p>
<p>Black, Non-Hispanic 1,634 6%
American Indian or Alaskan Native 131 0%
Asian or Pacific Islander 1,673 6%
Hispanic 1,250 5%
White, Non-Hispanic 20,462 77%
Other/Unknown Races & Ethnicities 1,261 5%
Total 26,411 100%</p>
<p>Be careful interestdad.... mit is for sure ethnically diverse, but also has a huge frat presence and a problem w/binge drinking, both of which you seem to believe have a negative correlation with all those future PhD's roaming the labs and the halls. And don't forget all those professors who are busy targeting their teaching to the "engaged minority" at the expense of the other great unwashed.... who managed to get themselves admitted nonetheless.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Monydad, face it. Cornell just isn't an intellectual place.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I don't know much about Cornell, but as I was doing these lists, I concluded that it must be a very academcally oriented place. It has one of the highest per capita PhD production rates in the country despite being the second largest school in top-50. That's what I drew from this particular slice of data, but maybe I'm wrong.</p>
<p>Interesteddad, I was joking.</p>
<p>But you knew that.</p>