Open for Discussion: Does attending a liberal arts college really help a student get a PhD

Graduate School
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“Well, I would say that just because LACs proportionately send more students to graduate school does not mean that they do better at placing undergraduates in PhD programs. Students who go to LACs might be more motivated overall to get PhDs, or the same qualities that motivate a student to attend an LAC might be the same qualities that make them want to get a PhD later.”

Agreed.

“Well, you’ve moved the bar. The first thing you said is “if you want a PhD…” that you should go to the best research university possible. But that’s not necessarily true, because the statistics point out that it’s quite possible to get into a top research university and earn a PhD by going to an LAC - or a non-top research university, honestly (or a regional comprehensive university).”

I was assuming the goal is to enter academia, preferably at semi-elite research institutions, which of course isn’t always the end goal of a Ph.D.

“Furthermore, once someone has a BA and is already in a top PhD program, I see no reason why where they went to undergrad should have any bearing on their future success - once you get a PhD, nobody really cares where you went to undergrad.”

This is absolutely true. Based on my experience, I don’t happen to know anyone who went from LAC undergrad to Ph.D. at a top school, let alone to professor at top school. If they got in to a great Ph.D. program, then where they did their undergrad is indeed irrelevant, but the fact of the matter is if you want to go to, say, Harvard for a Math Ph.D., it is extremely difficult to get in, and it’s much easier if you went to a big name school like Berkeley, Stanford, MIT, Princeton, etc. (perceived quality of undergrad institution DOES matter for admissions, and so does whether they know your LOR writers – and they’re more likely to know them if you come from a strong university than a LAC). The same is true to a lesser extent at top schools outside the top 10.

“Google has a huge office in New York and a bunch of offices in other cities too.”

That’s fair. Let’s call “Google” a proxy for high-profile tech company in the bay area (or Seattle, etc.) and assume we’re talking about recruiting from the East coast or the midwest.

“Perhaps lecture classes with 300 students is not the optimum way to get to grad school?”

You have to take initiative. There’s still way more opportunity at big public schools. Btw, not all the classes have so many students. Look at Ohio State, for example, the biggest school in the country. Looking at their recent course schedules, their first year calc classes are huge, but even calc3 has under 100 students, and get into upper-level classes like analysis or algebra, and you’re looking at around 30 students. LACs and their smaller classes can be the right move for many students, and that’s fine, but there are tons of opportunities at the bigger schools.

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Another possible explanation for the statistics is that almost no liberal arts colleges have either engineering schools nor offer business degrees. People in these fields rarely pursue a Ph.D. Students interested in engineering are simply not likely to choose a liberal arts college. At many research universities, and perhaps most state universities, the most popular major is business.

In other words, it might have less to do with LAC’s preparing students for grad school, and more to do with research universities offering bachelors degrees which lead directly to a job. If we removed engineering and business majors from the statistics, the gap in Ph.D production would definitely be reduced, and might come close to equalizing.

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@mathandcs …so I appreciate your comments. I certainly don’t agree with all of them (or most of them). Many people claim that liberal arts schools are superior than major public or private large research based schools on PhD production. I wanted to hear good counter arguments. You provided at least one…

I actually think this is a very good counter argument to liberal arts colleges claims of PhD production. Do I know professors at top 50 research universities with a LAC background. Yes…of course…I’m also looking for it. Do I have classmates that are professors at top 50 research universities. Again, yes. The problem is that I know classmates that have spent most of their 30’s as low paid adjuncts. It’s not fair to lump these two career outcomes together and say “high PhD production”.

A major research university will clearly do a better job with job placement than a LAC. Perhaps the perpetual adjunct should have tried to pursue a different career path, and a large research university could have made this possible. I do not know of studies of LAC undergrads career paths once they get a PhD. Maybe the perpetual adjunct is an aberration that is just as likely to occur to a graduate of a large research university.

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I’m not sure that I would believe that LAC graduates who get PhDs are more likely to be perpetual adjuncts than research university graduates who get PhDs - especially given that there’s a wide range of both kinds of schools. Perpetual adjunct-hood seems to have a lot more to do with where and how you did your PhD, as well as luck (the market is just really bad in some areas - so an English or history PhD from even a well-reputed program, maybe top 30-40, could still end up adjuncting for several years just because the market is so tight and because they don’t want to leave academia altogether).