In our most recent "how can we help you?" thread, Kent writes:
I'm a current MA student about to visit PhD programs, and I've realized that I have no idea what to say in meetings with potential faculty advisors. I've thought about trying to read some of their work beforehand, but I'm not sure how discussing that would help me (other than perhaps getting a handle on their methodological approach). I'm concerned about quality of advisement and so on, but I don't want to ask questions that might come off as indelicate or rude. Some guidance would be much appreciated!
Great query. In my experience, a student's eventual choice of PhD supervisor is absolutely vital. Some supervisors are effective, churning our successful PhDs and job-candidates left and right. Other supervisors, on the other hand, are truly awful–routinely having students who either never graduate or fail to be competitive on the job-market due to poor mentoring.
As I don't work as a PhD supervisor myself, and it's been a long while since I've been in a PhD program, I'm not sure what a prospective student should say or ask a potential advisor during a campus visit–beyond simply having a conversation and trying to suss out whether the advisor is a good fit 'personality-wise.' For what it's worth, my first-, second-, and third-hand experience is that being a good personality fit is important. Some particularly confident students may thrive under pressure–and indeed, may even need pressure from a supervisor to work effectively (if they are liable to procrastination). This kind of student may benefit from having a really active, vocal, and critical supervisor. However, other students–for example, students liable to insecurity–may respond poorly to an advisor like this. Indeed, I've not only seen this happen–certain types of students losing confidence in their abilities (and, in turn, their work-ethic) due to overly-critical supervisor. In my experience it may be one of the single biggest causes of PhD students never finishing their degree.
On that note, I would encourage PhD students like Kent to not only try to suss out the personality fit of a potential PhD supervisor, but indeed, the 'personality' of the entire department they visit. Here is what I mean. In my experience, different PhD programs have very different cultures–different departmental 'personalities.' For example, some PhD programs are super-competitive, in the sense that grad students and faculty may talk a lot behind the scenes about which grad students are 'smart', which ones aren't, and so on; the faculty as a rule may be super-critical of students; and there may even be a lot of one-upmanship between faculty and students (in seminars, etc.). Such an environment might be a miserable place to work–and a place one might not flourish, even if the program is highly ranked–if one is not a super-competitive and confident person. In my experience having visited different departments, these differences can be pretty stark. Because a PhD program is anywhere from a 5-8+ year commitment, I would very much encourage prospective students like Kent to ask themselves when visiting a program, "Setting aside how highly ranked this place is and how famous their faculty members are, is this a place where I can see myself enjoying my work, my colleagues, and flourish over the better part of a decade of my life?" If the answer to this question, "I really don't know", that would give be pause.
But these are just my thoughts? What are yours, particularly those of you who have gone through the process of choosing grad programs (as well as those of you who are Phd advisors!)?
Leave a Reply to Mike TitelbaumCancel reply