<p>Hello, </p>
<p>Which would you pick, if you were going to grad school and had only these 2 choices?:</p>
<li><p>Lower-ranked school, World-renowned professor.</p></li>
<li><p>Higher-ranked school, much-lesser known professor. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>??? I hope this question hasn’t been answered in another previous thread… it’s a pressing problem i’m having right now …</p>
<p>The PI is the most important factor of a student’s grad school experience. That said, it must always be considered that your preferred future PI might not turn out to be a good fit. So it is always best to go to a program where there are multiple great professors you could see yourself working for.</p>
<p>You should also consider that many world-renowned professors have huge labs and may not have time to directly supervise their grad students. Such labs aren’t for everyone.</p>
<p>Cross post with Aceflyer who put it better than I could. Excellent advice.</p>
<p>hahaha…</p>
<p>That is the thing…there are TWO of these no-names…and they are married…and like superheros in their respective fields. And it would be a great honor to work with either of them.
So AceFlyer and Happymom, if the professor is ideal, (and there is a backup, and I think it will be a good fit)–would you say it’s more important to go with the Dr. Most Important, than the Dr. Nobody at a Better School…?</p>
<p>Thank you!</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>If the ‘backup’ professor is married to the first professor, personally I wouldn’t really consider that to be a safe ‘backup’. If things don’t work out with the first professor, IMO it would be kind of weird to go work for the first professor’s spouse. Especially as most married professors (if they both work in a similar overall field) have similar advising styles and often co-advise students.</p>
<p>In the end it’s up to you. You should go with whatever you think would be the best fit. If there’s no one you want to work for at the ‘better’ school, then don’t go there. But in my humble opinion I don’t think you should consider the prestige of the school or the prestige of the professor as top priorities. The most important thing is to find a lab where you will be both happy and productive. It is possible to work for a relatively unknown professor and end up really successful; it is also possible to work for a world-renowned professor and turn out to be mediocre. It’s all about the ‘fit’.</p>
<p>Hi dfh, I am in a very similar situation as yours and I am chosing the “lower ranked” school with 2 world-renowned professors. They are about 19 places difference on the US News ranking, if that matters at all. #7 vs. #26.</p>
<p>A lot of people have brought up the whole ‘big lab’ problem to me as well - I am already working in a big lab where I get to talk to the PI just about once every 3 months and really like it, so I think it will be less of a problem for me NOT to have a lot of one-on-one time with my new PI.</p>
<p>Also, my significant other can no longer relocate (thanks to current economic downturn) and I would still be near him. Whether you think that should even be a factor or not, it definitely makes MY decision easier.</p>
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</p>
<p>I agree that one shouldn’t choose a school just based on its US News ranking. In fact, it’d probably be a very bad idea to select one program over another merely because the former was ranked higher on US News.</p>
<p>I think there are definitely advantages to working in a ‘big lab’. As I said before, it isn’t for everyone. However, there are many people - like Patches - who genuinely enjoy and even prefer such an environment. A ‘big lab’ facilitates greater independence, provides a bigger ‘community’, and allows more opportunities for intra-lab cooperation and collaboration. ‘Big labs’ also tend to engage in more interdisciplinary work and as such, it may sometimes be very helpful to be able to easily consult with another lab member who has expertise in a subject area you may personally not be well versed in.</p>
<p>The disadvantages of course are that you won’t be mentored as closely and the PI is less invested in individual students’ success - the PI’s continuing success isn’t going to be predicated on the success of an individual student. Again, it is up to each student to find the environment that is the best fit for him/her.</p>
<p>I once had a physics professor who went from MIT to a pretty low ranked PhD program in physics. He ended up working with a star professor who became a nobel laureate. My old professor’s thesis was actually referenced in the nobel laureate’s research summary. I was able to look it up. My old physics prof had no problem getting tenure track positions at very prestigious schools after this.</p>
<p>Everything Ace said is so true, especially about “the PI is less invested in individual students’ success”!</p>
<p>It really depends on your field - if you are working in someone’s lab the individual matters much more than if you’re in a social science field where your committee at a top-ranked school might make up (in terms of job prospects, though perhaps not advising your work) for the advantages of the big name.</p>
<p>NVM this post; I misread PatchesNBrownie’s “especially” as “except” haha</p>
<p>But to help the OP, I have experienced working in a large lab. My PI is surprisingly attentive and always keep up with the weekly meeting (some were carried using webcams). </p>
<p>I say it really depends on the PI; a small lab with a family-oriented PI who is starting a company on the side plus hobbies outside of academia might just be as hard to get in touch as a super-dedicated PI in a large lab.</p>
<p>wow…well shoot.
I guess I’m just going to have to go with my gut on this one…and although the lesser-known PI at the big school was more…congenial and welcoming, maybe…he also seemed close to retirement and not really…100% invested in hard-core research and publications and kicking a$$.</p>
<p>on the other hand…the well-known PI seemed a little less warm/welcoming but really, really smart and dedicated to their discipline, and focused on academia. </p>
<p>I guess overall i got a good vibe from professor at the smaller school…</p>
<p>and a good vibe from the school itself at the bigger school…</p>
<p>thanks for all your words of wisdom… :)</p>
<p>Top programs are top programs for a good reason.
Usually it is because of selectivity (your colleagues will be smarter and more interesting), quality of faculty by some measure and reputation.</p>
<p>If you are talking about US News field-specific graduate school rankings, I would definitely consider #7 over #26.</p>
<p>Perhaps another thing to consider is the question of why the lesser-known faculty isn’t a big shot. For example, they might be new faculty. If you’re lucky and you find an ambitious new faculty member working on a cutting edge project, you might be able to get in on the ground floor and actually be a part of the emergence of lab as a big deal in the field.</p>
<p>I think we also have to realize that science is like pop culture in that it suffers from fickle trends. There are people who get big names not because the quality of the research or questions they’ve answered are exceptional, but rather because they’re working in a field that the editors of major journals have apotheosized, but which may end up as just the science du jour. Equally good and equally important research occurs in less well known labs, but may not be as well publicized if the work being done isn’t as trendy.</p>
<p>At least in my own perusal of the faculty available at the schools I was interested in, I noticed that many of the big names held zero appeal for me because the work they were famous for was done ten years earlier and their giant (and presumably impersonal) labs are working on tying up the loose ends in old research rather than continuing with ambitious, cutting edge, new projects.</p>
<p>I guess it also depends on your motivation. Do you want to do science because certain questions just really fascinate you, or do you want to do science for the intellectual glory that may result? It’s not a strict either/or, and ideally, both end up coming true. But in my case, I’m more interested in pursing the exact questions that interest me rather than joining a lab with a big name that is of fleeting intellectual interest to me.</p>