<p>It’s not really about acceptance, it’s about funding. If there is no institutional funding, he should not go for a PhD, no matter where. That’s my strongly held opinion based on the current condition of the job market, which is so bad that people find it hard to imagine. Many very smart, talented, excellent scholars and teachers do not get f/t tenure-track jobs or even term instructorships. So, it’s very important to get through a PhD program without debt and in a timely manner, so that you have time to start over professionally if you have to.</p>
<p>I’m a PhD student in English right now, although not Renaissance studies. I applied to the same range of schools your son is looking at, so I can offer some insight. In no particular order:</p>
<ol>
<li>If you or he think that Indiana, Michigan, or UT-Austin are remotely safety schools, you really don’t understand enough about this process. First of all, while most of the usual suspects do have very good PhD programs, the graduate pecking order is not the same as the undergrad pecking order. This is relevant to admissions, but it is also relevant to job prospects. Where you went to school matters, but not as much as your dissertation and publication record, and I don’t think someone who goes to Columbia has a meaningful advantage over someone who goes to NYU, Rutgers, or any other school in the top 20-25.</li>
</ol>
<p>In addition, we’re dealing with such small programs here that the whole process is much quirkier than even elite undergraduate admissions. Departments are looking to fill niches and if, for instance, Columbia took several Renaissance people last year, they may be less interested in you than they would be in another year. Or, if there is one other amazing Renaissance applicant applying to essentially the same places, you may get shut out in multiple schools. In any case, even successful applicants are usually rejected by more schools than they are accepted by, and the schools that do accept them aren’t always the ones you would have expected to be their best shots. Someone might get into Harvard, and be rejected at the 11 other schools that he’s applied to. This makes it difficult to say that there’s a “range” of schools in which you are a shoo-in, unless you get down to programs that might not be worth going to at all, given the dismal job prospects. </p>
<ol>
<li><p>GPA doesn’t matter. If you are applying to these programs, they expect that you’ll have mostly A grades in your literature courses. You don’t get extra points for having a 4.0 vs. a 3.9. GRE also matters very little, once you’re past a modest minimum threshold.</p></li>
<li><p>As far as I am aware, there is no such thing as provisional acceptance. What I think NJSue is talking about is the phenomenon of programs that will admit more students than they expect to finish and just weed out the weaker ones over the course of the first year. Columbia used to be notorious for this, but this is no longer the case for students admitted to the PhD program, and I’m not aware of any top school with a reputation for doing this today. If a school is admitting you to a funded PhD program, it is because they expect you to finish. </p></li>
<li><p>Some of the schools you are looking at have a terminal MA program in addition to the PhD program. Many do not. At Columbia, if you apply for a PhD, there are three options:</p></li>
<li><p>You are rejected.</p></li>
<li><p>You are rejected from the PhD program, but admitted to the terminal MA program. Sometimes, MA students are subsequently admitted to the PhD program, but this is not normally the case, and it will require another application process.</p></li>
<li><p>You are accepted to a joint MA/PhD program. This means that you will get an MA after you’ve completed certain requirements on your way toward the PhD (even, by the way, if you already come in with an MA from elsewhere - you don’t get much credit for that)!</p></li>
</ol>
<p>At schools that don’t have terminal MA programs (Yale and Harvard included), 1 and 3 are the only options. </p>
<ol>
<li><p>This one is important: NEVER, NEVER turn down a fully funded PhD offer from a good program for an MA, funded or not, at a more prestigious school. Turning down U Illinois or UMich for an MA at Columbia or Chicago would be lunacy. MA programs are notorious cash cows for universities, so they’re likely to accept many more students. The boost to your application from attending such programs is fairly minimal. Sure, a lot of students from those MA programs get into great schools - but that’s because they are good students, not because Yale adcoms are super impressed by someone doing well at Columbia’s terminal MA program. The same student might also have gotten in if he had spent the previous year teaching English in Tibet. </p></li>
<li><p>On that subject, MAs, with the exception of things like a fellowship that include a year at Oxford, are rarely worth it if you already know that you want to go on to the PhD. An exception to this would be a case in which a student has some definable weakness in his application that could be overcome through a year in a good MA program. For instance, if a student had a rocky college career, or did well at a really mediocre school, or didn’t major in Lit or a related field, an MA might be helpful, or even necessary. That doesn’t seem to be the case here.</p></li>
<li><p>I don’t know when fendrock’s acquaintance went to school, but normally, the top programs guarantee funding for a certain number of years to every student. There is no such thing as getting in without funding. It isn’t a matter of getting a “scholarship” to a lesser program and paying full freight at a better one. The one exception I can think of off the top of my head is Berkeley, which has a somewhat larger cohort but only funds about half of its students. I’m sure there are more, but with job prospects being what they are, I wouldn’t advise anyone to go into debt for a humanities PhD. </p></li>
<li><p>I wouldn’t be so quick to eliminate schools that don’t have Renaissance faculty that totally match his interests, as long as there are some Renaissance scholars in the department. Even at good schools, there is always a chance that the one professor you’re dying to work with won’t stick around, and while I’m sure it is great to work with Stephen Greenblatt, until you know that you’re going to have the luxury of weighing an offer from Harvard, don’t write off the school with a solid, if not world-class, Renaissance faculty. </p></li>
<li><p>While a few of us here have some background in this process, I’m going to suggest you take a look over at The Grad Cafe, another site dedicated to the grad school admissions process. I wouldn’t take everything people say over there as gospel - plenty of people on the site seem to think you need publications and conferences to be a competitive applicant, which isn’t remotely true - but as a whole it may give you a much better sense of what the climate is like out there.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Sorry if any of this came off as excessively blunt, but it is very important to go into this process prepared. Good luck, and I’ll keep checking back in if you have more questions!</p>
<p>Thanks to both of you! No worries apprenticeprof, this is a huge step for my son and we both appreciate your candor. We want all the advice we can get and it is very helpful. Thank you! Do you mind my asking where you are going?</p>
<p>I’m careful not to reveal that only because there are few enough English PhD students that it would be very easy to figure out my real life identity once I did that, and I don’t necessarily want every CC post I’ve ever made tied back to my actual name. I’m a pretty opinionated person :).</p>
<p>Fully understand 
You were VERY helpful, and your opinions were very good. We thank you immensely again, and best of luck in your graduate career!</p>
<p>You are getting excellent advice from NJSue and apprenticeprof. I’m the mom of former PhD students and spend most of my time in a heavily academic social circle. As much as you and I would like to help our kids with the graduate school process, we really can’t. 
Their professors have to help them. They are the ones with the insight. It isn’t our job to figure this out and we can’t get up to speed fast enough to be of any use. </p>
<p>Still :eek: I have something to add:
Some students are advised to make appointments and go visit the professors with whom they wish to study in graduate school.</p>
<p>
Your son probably won’t have the luxury of worrying about campus culture, so it’s better not to even go there imho</p>
<p>I absolutely agree: No safety schools. No such thing.</p>
<p>I think it is okay to pay for a PhD if you are a trustfund kind of family and your kid will never really need an income.</p>
<p>Make sure you really read the websites and know which schools have a terminal master’s, which are direct entry into a PhD program/ have a non-terminal master’s. And some master’s are funded, some aren’t. Adept googling can get you some of this info.</p>
<p>I was also going to suggest gradcafe.</p>
<p>If you want to pay for a master’s, Europe (and Canada) tend to be cheaper, and given your son’s area of interest, Europe might be a great place to study.</p>
<p>I cannot edit for some reason so just adding: also check to see if a PhD program requires a master’s. Some do, some don’t. Sometimes there are other ways to get into a PhD program too.</p>
<p>You might find some useful info here [Chronicle</a> Forums - Index](<a href=“Chronicle Forums”>Chronicle Forums)</p>
<p>Seems to me your son needs to be in touch with his college profs who will be writing recs as well as advising him as to best schools for his interest. Your questions do not seem to fully reflect that aspect of the process. Grad education is by no means always about looking to Ivies for top reputations. If you look at various history programs for example you will see that Michigan and Wisconsin are top five in some specific areas, far outranking many if not most Ivies. I am less familiar with English and the specific sub specialty you say your son is looking at but unless he is going into this with some good input from present faculty, both admission and funding processes could be mysteries to him. Personal relationships are a huge factor in these fields–faculty members often recommend their students to their colleagues. And keep in mind that tenure track positions in the humanities are very rare and often politicially sensitive. Many PhDs end up going in to other fields where their degree is a nice plus but not always related to their work. One does not want to be a PhD who owes money or gave up much to get the degree.</p>
<p>Thank you all for your advice! I will look into the terminal vs. non-terminal Master’s for certain. He did not apply to anything that required a master’s beforehand but I do know that UI Urbana does ask applicants to go through the master’s program first if you don’t have one (though they ask you to tell them if you plan to go on for your Phd so they clearly separate the sheep from the goats right away). I want to get a headstart on all the decisions so that when it does come down to decision time (assuming we have the luxury) we want to help him decide within the deadline.</p>
<p>Speaking as the parent of a PhD my understanding is that you get an MA first in PhD programs. And even when you get in to one with funding you can be kicked out if you don’t to perform well enough the first two years, which is how long that first part of the cycle usually is. A good program may admit some nonfunded students to continue from the MA program into the PhD program perhaps to replace those who have dropped out, but generally speaking I believe the trend is to decrease the class size as time goes on. And finishing a dissertation and actually getting the PhD is a big deal in itself; even when class work is completed there is a long way still to go. </p>
<p>As some of the other posters have indicated, humanities graduate work is a very specialized area in terms of advice and admission, not like undergraduate admission and success at all, and not like law school. To my mind the best advice you could get and then give on this thread is to tell your son to do as much research as possible into the schools that have faculty in his us socially and then follow the advice of his present professors regarding where he is most likely to find what he needs in terms of funding and program. It isn’t a parent-driven process or even much of a parent-assisted one other than giving him some extra money to live on if that is feasible.</p>
<p>Thank you again, performance won’t be an issue, as I said he likes to be challenged! the more work he has the happier he is!
Interesting, yea, research is the best, we have been heavily. His professors helped lead him to these choices, and thanks, yea, we just do what we can to help research, and encourage them to follow what they want to do! That and the waiting game is all we’re doing, researching so he can be ready in the spring!</p>
<p>Mattmom, you do get an MA first, but in a lot of programs without a terminal MA option there is no real separation between the MA and PhD students - the MA is just something you get along the way. So, once you’ve done x number of courses and passed x exams, you can get your MA. </p>
<p>I don’t think getting kicked out is common for people in competitive English PhD programs. You are admitted based on a pretty substantial writing sample as well as a general level of academic high performance. While this doesn’t necessarily mean you’re going to ultimately finish your dissertation - or write a particularly good one, if you do - it does suggest that you’re capable of doing the things it takes to at least get to the dissertation stage. I know people who have failed a set of exams, but there’s usually an opportunity for a retake, and unless something has gone very wrong you should be able to pass in two tries. </p>
<p>Far more common, I think, is people whose dissertation isn’t going well, or who haven’t built up the kind of record they would need to go on the job market, quietly deciding to cut their losses and leave. Even if a professor prompts this decision, I don’t think it is normally in the form of “you’re out,” since by the time that kind of conversation happens, you’re usually not getting much in the way of funding anyway. </p>
<p>I do want to add, Shakespearemom, that you shouldn’t despair if he doesn’t get into a program this year, as it isn’t at all unheard of for people to regroup after an initial disappointment and apply much more successfully the second time around after they get a better understanding of the process. Sometimes it is a matter of applying to different places; sometimes it is a matter of packaging yourself more effectively, but in either case, it happens, and pretty often.</p>
<p>shakespearemom,</p>
<p>I know you posted looking for CC parents to offer advice, and apprenceticeprof gave more info as a current grad student. </p>
<p>Thre were only a few things I did as a parent as a prospective grad student.
- I paid for application fees and GREs to be sent.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>I asked about selection of schools. Son did not include 2 schools I wondered about, but accepted his answer that they did not have faculty in his area of interest. He had a safety MS program in the mix, which was a non-funded MS, and only the best would be asked to move onto funded PhD program. </p></li>
<li><p>Son did all the interview weekends. He did not like the facilities at a place, or really liked the grad students at another. At the end, he was torn between 2 schools (actually, individual labs/profs). I paid for him to revisit. I reminded him it could be 6-7 years of his life, so cost of a flight was an incidental.</p></li>
<li><p>Son applied for outside scholarships.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Truly, as a parent in the grad school application process, we can only offer support and a little funding. By this point, it is all on them.</p>
<p>My son-in-law is working on a PhD in a social science field. Based on his experience, I’d reiterate that your son should not enroll in a program that doesn’t offer him funding–either a teaching assistantship (which pays a monthly stipend) or a research assistantship (which also pays a monthly stipend). Along with the stipend, he should get free tuition. Getting funding means that the department really wants you as a student. Which is the second factor that’s important–does your son have an undergraduate mentor. That means someone who is willing to call his colleagues at the universities on your son’s list and go to bat for your son, i.e., telling them that your son is someone who has what it takes to do research, publish–basically that he’d make a good academic. Graduate admissions are very different than undergraduate admissions. Graduate admission is much more competitive because there are so few slots and almost all of the applicants have strong GPA and good GRE scores. Given that there are so many excellent applicants having a mentor can make a huge difference. My son-in-law got into a doctoral program with funding that was at the same university from which his undergraduate advisor received a doctorate.</p>
<p>Thank you all again! I appreciate apprenprof and the parent info, both is important! I am passing all of this on to my son, and he greatly appreciated the graduate advice and gradcafe link, he read that and it gave advice too. He does have some great advisers with contacts and such, thanks for the comfort, yea multiple trips will probably be the answer, we are preparing for that come spring. Thanks also for the comfort, he and I would be crushed if he doesn’t get anything, but your words help!</p>
<p>I’d imagine a Masters from an Ivy league might be helpful if you wanted to teach at a New England prep school. Otherwise I don’t have much advice. Twenty years ago UVA was a top school for Renaissance studies in English - have no idea if it still is. I imagine his professors can give him much better advice that most of us can.</p>
<p>The OP’s son should ask his professors at his undergrad school what they think.</p>
<p>Re teaching at good prep schools armed with an MA from an Ivy, secondary schools are increasingly hiring PhDs from top schools–a direct result of the shrinking tenure track market for PhDs, at least in locations they really want to settle in. Not to say you cannot get hired with just an MA, but it is not the door opener it might once have been.</p>