I hope this wasn’t directed at me, as my wife just defended her doctoral thesis a few hours ago 
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Not at you. Congratulations to your wife!
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Bingo.
What it comes down to is this: you either believe that small private colleges confer some benefits that are generally not as readily available at much larger schools, or you don’t. If you believe that large research behemoths confer these benefits as readily, easily and often as do smaller schools, then you must believe that smaller schools have little to no value - it almost follows logically. And if you think that, then there’s nothing more to discuss, because I, and others, disagree, and we’ve reached the last turtle.
Of course, it should go without saying (but nothing ever does here) that PhD = greater intellectual curiosity is not a categorically accurate statement, and the OP probably didn’t intend for it to be categorical. But it’s also not some random attempt at connecting concepts, the various appeals to the exceptions (e.g., “light” subject PhD and nothing better to do) notwithstanding. People seriously seeking and achieving admission to a PhD program are typically not people who lack ability to do other things. They also tend to care a lot about their field of interest, a factor that has been basically blown off in this thread. And, there are plenty of fields that need them. My cousin at Cornell is in fisheries. His work is important, but it won’t make him rich, and he doesn’t care. Believe me when I tell you the math section of his brain can run with anybody. Fisheries is what he cares about. Period.
That the world is full of non-PhD people who are exceedingly bright and intellectually curious is, I think, well understood. Or is anybody shocked that the wonderkind who 5 semestered MIT while publishing 3 papers, one of which solves one of the great questions of our time, is intellectually curious and had opportunities that better appealed to him? Why do we always end up at MIT, which is an outlier institution full of outliers?
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A major problem with PhD per capita lists like this is that small LACs are inherently favored because they lack the (pre-)professional programs offered by universities. Most undergrads in architecture, engineering, nursing, business, etc. are obviously not planning to pursue PhDs.
PhD per capita lists would be MUCH more useful if they did not use the total number of undergraduates at each school but rather the number of majors in each field at each school. In other words, the percentage of a majors in a department who earn PhDs in that field.
Let’s take your list as an example. Grinnell (#14) appears much better than Cornell (not in the top 50), right? But if you check the OIR websites and IPEDS, you’ll see that Cornell has averaged only about twice as many math majors per year (~60) as Grinnell (~30) despite Cornell being far larger in overall size. Cornell did not only match Grinnell’s PhD production rate but exceeded it; Cornell produced 3.6 times as many math PhDs as Grinnell between 1999 and 2018 (131 and 36, respectively). So why should Grinnell be ranked higher for math PhD productivity?
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The numbers you cite might also a bit misleading, as they exclude statistics, whereas the posted list includes statistics and math Ph.Ds. A quick look at the numbers indicates that Cornell has around 3.75 times the number of math or statistics graduates than does Grinnell.
More to the point, I don’t think the numbers were meant as a head to head ranking, nor do they indicate that Grinnell is “much better than Cornell.” Not sure how the OP could be any clearer about this. Grinnell’s productivity regarding math and statistics Ph.D. is not a disparagement of Cornell’s productivity. Rather it is an indication that, given the size of the college, Grinnell produces a decent number of math and statistics Ph.Ds. That may be useful information for someone considering Grinnell.
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No, they do not.
IPEDS reports that Cornell had 46 math majors and 15 statistics majors last year for a total of 61. Grinnell had a total of 30 math majors (no stats majors).
The Cornell OIR likewise reports an average of 63.5 math and stats majors combined over the last 6 years (381 math/stats majors between 2016-17 and 2021-22).
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The use of the word “belief” is where you lose me, despite the fact that I agree with your point. I don’t know why the big R1 vs. small LAC discussion has anything to do with beliefs. There are some students whose educational needs are better served at a large comprehensive U. There are some students whose needs are better served at a small LAC. This is not about beliefs- this about finding the right fit for each particular kid (a luxury for sure, but if you can afford “fit”, that’s fantastic.)
Don’t go to Brown to major in Nursing. That’s not a belief- that’s reality. Yes, I’m sure every year or so a kid finishes a BS at Brown and successfully enters a nursing program. But that’s a tribute to the flexibility of the American Higher Ed system, not a tribute to Brown training fantastic nurses. Don’t go to Julliard to major in finance. Even though there are many adults working in finance who are Julliard grads (I know one!) Don’t go to U Michigan and complain that their pilot training program is inadequate-- that’s what places like Embry Riddle are for.
Beliefs? Not sure why those are relevant.
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Thanks for the correction. The College Factual numbers have Cornell with a much higher number and Grinnell with a somewhat lower number, but I agree that the IPEDS is a better source.
That said, Cornell also granted almost 1,200 bachelor degrees in Engineering or Computer and Information Sciences, so there is tremendous potential for spill-over from other undergrad programs which potentially qualify a student for a Ph.D. in math or statistics, or are at least somewhat similar in focus. In other words, it may not make sense to focus solely on the undergraduate major that exactly corresponds to the Ph.D
And again, more to the point, these lists aren’t meant to be a head to head ranking of which is “better.”
Because the basic discussion about whether a small school offers advantages over schools with many more students and a focus on things other than undergraduate education is ultimately a matter of opinion. You’ve been in the infamous threads driven by our dear and seemingly departed friend Publisher, where he likens LACs to glorified extensions of private prep schools like Exeter, both academically and athletically. I think he’s wrong, he thinks he’s right. Beliefs.
I don’t disagree with anything else you wrote. I agree fit matters and that’s it’s a luxury to afford it. Agree with all that.
I think that denigrating the opposing point of view is a weak debate strategy- whether it’s the “glorified extension of prep school” argument, or “if you go to a large university every class will be with 999 other students and taught by a TA who doesn’t speak English”.
Neither are true, but both are frequently stated on CC without a lot of nuanced discussion. Except for “my neighbors kid went to UIUC and not a single professor was able to write a recommendation for him, that’s how huge and anonymous a big school is”.
Statements like this tell us a LOT about the neighbors kid, but very little about UIUC.
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I agree, and that is perhaps my pet peeve about these discussions. They lack nuance. See, as a good example, the two lengthy debates about the role and future of the humanities. Little to no nuance and conclusions based on a lot of unexamined assumptions.
Btw, I attended a large research powerhouse (excess of 30,000 students) and I had no trouble getting letters of recommendation. That does indeed tell you more about the neighbor’s kid than it does about Illinois.
I was looking one of the data bases that the OP linked to see how often my and @circuitrider 's favor LAC shows up in these quite varied categories of study. Then it occurred to me that kids from these schools are going on to get a PhD in something other than precisely what they studied as undergrads because it’s not typically offered as a major at LACs. I assume that holds true for kids at other schools who might pursue a PhD in something other than their specific major, but perhaps less frequently because the larger school will usually offer the concentration at the BA/BS level. Anyway, might that mean that it’s not as simple as counting the number of kids in each department, as in your example, and that having many more people overall still confers to the larger school some advantage in likelihood of reaching larger numbers? Maybe not as exaggerated as a simple per capita analysis might suggest, but still something?
Anyway, I come away from this thinking a few things: (1) we needn’t compare the two types of schools because it doesn’t really matter; (2) a kid should not come away thinking that they need to attend one type of school over the other to get to their PhD; and (3) the lists are useful to see which among all types of schools are launching kids successfully into PhD programs. Whatever one’s view of the value of the PhD, I think it’s safe to say that they’re not easy to achieve and some schools tend, for whatever reason, to crank out more than others. For example, while I can’t pin point exactly why, I’m not surprised that Swarthmore always seems to do well on this measure. I’m also surprised Amherst, a true LAC if ever there was one, doesn’t show up higher on lists more frequently than it does. Does it mean don’t go to Amherst if you want a PhD. Certainly not, but it’s a data point.
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I’ve seen many posts on this forum assuming that engineering students at highly selective colleges do not often pursue grad degrees, compared to other majors. All actual numbers I’ve seen do not support this, which I expect contributes to why tech colleges had such high rates of PhDs compared to nearly any other college type, in the earlier list.
I previously referenced the Brown 10 years out sample. The rate of PhDs by major in this sample is below. Engineering was well above the overall average for the college, and well above biology, but not as high as certain physical science majors. Instead the social science grouping had the lowest rate of PhDs. Econ is traditionally the most common major at most Ivy-type colleges. Among Econ majors at Brown, the rate of PhDs was under 2%.
Rate of PhD by Major at Brown (10 years out)
Physical Sciences – 16%
Engineering – 11%
Life Sciences – 9%
Biology – 7.5%
Humanities - 6%
Social Sciences – 3%
Economics – 2%
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Why is biology listed separately from other(?) life sciences? Also, are Brown’s numbers (particularly for students in biology) affected by the large number of premed students there, who would be choosing medical schools instead of PhD programs?
Biology is included within the life science grouping. I also listed biology separately (without other life science majors included) because the posted I quoted specifically mentioned biology. It’s a similar idea for econ and social sciences.
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Perhaps because economics is the traditional pre-Wall-Street major at those colleges?
Also, economics PhD study requires more math and statistics preparation than a basic economics major includes, so it may be that some economics PhD students were undergraduate math or statistics majors with economics electives rather than economics majors with math and statistics electives.
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I had similar thoughts. A large portion of econ majors choose to work in finance/consulting as a first destination. At Ivy-type colleges the portion is especially large. Brown’s stats aren’t working at the moment, so I’ll use Yale as an example. Yale’s post-graduate show the overwhelming majority of econ majors are working , with only 6% in grad school, Among those working, roughly 3/4 were working in finance or consulting. This also contributes to why schools that have an especially large portion of students going in to finance/consulting are often lower than other colleges of similar selectivity in PhD yield. The specific percentages of grad degrees for econ majors at Brown were as follows.
Econ Majors at Brown (10 Years Out)
No Grad Degree – 59%
MBA – 13%
JD – 8%
MS – 5% (most common MS field is engineering)
MD – 4%
MA – 3% (most common MA field is economics)
PhD – 2% (most PhDs are not in econ, average <1 PhD in economics per class year)
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I’ve written a LOT about LACs and PhDs. I will repeat my opinion as to the reasons, but very briefly: the sort of student who end up doing a PhD are more likely to attend a LAC than students with other career aspirations, LACs make a research/faculty career look more attractive, and there is more encouragement at a LAC for students who want to follow the route to a PhD.
All of these are true for Caltech, which is most definitely not a LAC, but have the highest proportion of undergraduates who end up with a PhD of any college.
Of course, most people with PhDs did not attend a LAC for their undergraduate. Around 5% of all students attend a LAC for their undergraduate, and around 10% of all PhDs attended a LAC for their undergraduate.
It is a little more difficult and requires a bit more initiative to get the experience and the contacts if a student is at, say, a research university. However, a student for whom this is really difficult will not do very well in being accepted to PhD programs, and has no chance of remaining in any PhD program for very long.
LACs are a uniquely American institution, so undergrads in the rest of the world manage.
Nobody should get me wrong. I think that LACs are excellent colleges for students who want to end up with PhDs. However, this is not true unless that student is otherwise a good fit for a LAC.
Amherst is always very high. There are close to 2,000 non-profit 4 year colleges. Of the top 100 by percent of students who go on to do a PhD, 67 are LACs, and Amherst generally falls in the top 20, or close. Being in the top 1% is pretty high.
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BTW about teaching in large research school. On my first day of orientation in Berkeley the graduate dean publicly said: “We don’t hire professors for their ability to teach. We hire them for their ability to do research. Expect bad teaching :-).”
Having said that majority of the teachers I had were great or OK. Very few were atrocious, but they were there.
I bet situation is somewhat similar in other big research Universities.
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I think times have changed since we were students. I had some absolutely terrible profs 30 years ago for sure. Conversely, my D overwhelmingly has had fabulous professors. She graduates in May and has only had one that she thought was terrible and he had an amazing TA so it balanced out ; ).
Students take school sponsored surveys at the end of every class and at least at her school, it seems like the department takes those results seriously. For example, that terrible prof ended up being assigned a mentor and then shared the class with a co-professor for the following semester.
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