<p>I was doing some analysis for fun and found a surprisingly high relationship between PhD production and the average instructor salary per student. </p>
<p>"PhD production" was the ratio of PhDs produced 1995-2006 at baccalaureate schools to the average freshman class size at the school.</p>
<p>The correlation was very high +.89.</p>
<p>Why?</p>
<p>The next most important factor in PhD production was the SAT 25th percentile cubed +.74.</p>
<p>Peer Assessment from US News +.68
Grad rate predicted from US News +.64.
Freshman retention +.60.
Graduation rate +.59.
Acceptance rate -.58.
Student-faculty ratio -.57.
Percent of classes with under 20 students cubed +.55.
Percent of students in top 10 percent of class +.53.
Alumni giving RANK -.42.</p>
<p>The combination of salaries, peer assessment, predicted grad rate from US News, SAT 25th percentile, and alumni giving RATE accounted for 86% of the differences in PhD production (R-square=.86, Multiple R=.93).</p>
<p>I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts about the implications of all this for "college search and selection".</p>
<p>In other words, individuals from families with higher incomes who go to schools with students from other families with higher incomes are more likely to go on for Ph.D.s. (there may, however, be an inverse relationship for race at the very same schools)</p>
<p>Some scientific fields require a PhD for getting a decent job. Liberal arts PhDs clearly do so for the purpose of teaching in a college or university. Otherwise the vast majority of undergraduates either enter the work force, seek a professional degree (J.D., M.D., D.D.S), or go for an M.B.A.</p>
<p>I dont think the PhD "factory" analysis is worth anything but measuring kids who seek a PhD. Its of no relevance to the vast majority of people entering the work force.</p>
<p>I am quite certain the Ivy's produce a lot of graduates who go onto obtain a PhD and become "experts" in their chosen field. </p>
<p>It wouldnt affect where I would choose to go to college, nor where my kids would choose to go to college one iota. Then again, we aren't CalTech types who plan on inventing the next gadget, rocket or nanowidget designed to further erode our privacy rights and make it easier for evil people to steal not just our identity, but perhaps our DNA and personhood. </p>
<p>mini-
You and I agree that poverty is diabolically destructive to human development. However, I also think that parents with low potential tend to simultaneously earn less and, at the same time, pass on their genes and work ethic to their children. Both Mother Nature and Society are to blame.</p>
<p>"You and I agree that poverty is diabolically destructive to human development."</p>
<p>Oh, my point was rather different than that. There are lots of low-income minority students, especially African-Americans and Hispanics, who attend and do well at the schools you describe, and then go to law school, medical school, engineering school, business school, and (for some) toward an Ed.D, rather than toward Ph.Ds. Had nothing to do with genes or work ethic, but family condition and expectations.</p>
<p>But higher-income white students who go to school with higher income white students at schools with highly paid white faculty members paid for by high-income alumni giving across generations, have higher SATs (some of which due to the high schools they attend, the higher-income families they come from, and can afford SAT prep) are more likely to go on for Ph.Ds.</p>
<p>Wow, what a bunch of cynical takes! (And nocousin, what axe are you grinding?:)) Is it possible that the most dynamic professors get a lot of job offers, accept the best-paying ones, and go on to light fires under their students, motivating them and turning them on to the thrill of the intellectual life?</p>
<p>Cynical? Why would you think that? These schools described by CollegeHelp do an absolutely superb job in preparing minority students for professional schools, and white students for graduate schools, and they should be commended for it. Given what you've read, aren't you being the cynical one, assuming that those who don't go on for Ph.Ds are not equally turned on to the thrill of the intellectual life? :) (For what it's worth, the overwhelming majority of students at, for sake of argument, Swarthmore, do NOT go on for Ph.Ds, and they aren't the worse for it.)</p>
<p>
[quote]
I am quite certain the Ivy's produce a lot of graduates who go onto obtain a PhD and become "experts" in their chosen field.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Yes, but on a percantage basis, schools like Swarthmore, Oberlin, Reed produce more than Harvard, Yale, Princeton. To me, it's all about the campus atmosphere that draws the students there in the first place. </p>
<p>It's strange that 25th %ile would be more predictive than 75th %ile considering that a school's smartest students would be more likely to be able to attain admittance to PhD programs. Maybe, this, in general, would be saying more about a school's grade inflation, i.e. its dumbest students still have a high enough GPA to get into grad school. However, this runs counter to high PhD producing, notoriously tough grading schools like Swarthmore and Reed.</p>
<p>smarter students ==> more PhDs
more inspirational faculty ==> more PhDs
better mentors ==> more PhDs
more intellectual climate ==> more PhDs
less preprofessional/vocational ==> more PhDs
more research-oriented ==> more PhDs
more faculty research ==> more PhDs</p>
<p>I wouldn't say I have a fixation on PhDs. PhD production is sometimes discussed as a metric of college quality. I discovered some interesting relationships between PhD production and other factors, some not surprising. But, I was surprised by how strongly the average instructor salary per student was related to PhD production. I simply wondered whether anybody had any insights.</p>
<p>Are the faculty better connected professionally? Better mentors? Are there better resources generally? More inspirational teachers? Are they paid more because they bring in more grant money and therefore have a sort of "scholar factory" going? What?</p>
<p>Mini, your theory is a popular one here in NYC where wealthy children of ibankers and corporate lawyers seem to be all in search of a PhD or non profit work. The ultimate commentary on their parents' careers, lol!</p>
<p>I have kids who want PhDs and hire kids who were pre professional in HS. There does seem to be a greater draw towards high paying jobs--not to mention willingness to work endless hours--on the part of kids from humble roots.</p>
<p>Instructor pay per student: hmmm. Are we seeing here primarily something due to small class size, or are there real pay differences? One thing I'd expect is to see lower instructor pay per student at big research unis, since they're using grad student labor who work for cheap yet have relatively large discussion sections. So collegehelp, I'm wondering about the correlation for LACs versus unis. How much of a spread was there in instructor pay per student for all institutions? </p>
<p>nocousin, I have no idea where you get your ideas about scientists and ethics, but you might want to remember that the administration that for the last 8 years has been eviscerating our privacy rights has also been waging war against science. As for Caltech: in the last year, a couple dozen Caltech employees at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory have taken the government to court over privacy issues; others have resigned their positions in protest, a win for principle over common sense.</p>
<p>Isn't it a self-selection vicious circle? Truly academically-oriented HS seniors know the schools that produce future PhDs, so they attend and later earn those PhDs, unaware of instructor pay. The strong teaching and mentoring at these LACs is a prerequisite for future PhDs, and the simple arithmetic of small LAC classes produces the high instructor-pay-per-student correlation (but not causation). Doubling big U instructor pay won't increase their PhD rates; the instructors won't have any more time available per student.</p>
<p>IMO a major factor is that at small schools with low student-faculty ratios, students are more likely to develop close relationships with their professors, who are more likely to become their mentors and role models. Since the overwhelming majority of liberal arts professors at higher-quality schools will themselves be pure products of the academic system of graduate education and hold Ph.D.s in their respective disciplines, some substantial fraction of their students, viewing them as role models, will be drawn in that direction. At bigger and more diversified schools students will have fewer such close mentor/role model relationships. </p>
<p>A high rate of future Ph.D. production by an undergrad school probably signals a strong orientation toward the purely academic, in my view a positive. But it does not, without more, necessarily signal excellence. There are a lot of mediocre Ph.D. programs out there, and a lot of people are ill-served by pursuing a Ph.D. that is going to put them on the track toward underemplyoment or unemployment in their chosen academic discipline. I'd want to see which grad schools those kids get into, and where (or whether) they end up teaching after earning their Ph.D. But I'd also want to see how many of the undergrad college's alums go on to top law, medical, business, or other professional schools, and what career paths are pursued by those who elect to go straight into the workforce without a graduate education.</p>