Admission to PhD EECS/EE at Berkeley/Stan/MIT for Fall 2011

cosmicfish
Fri, 19 Nov 2010 09:01:09 +0000

paxboyo,

First of all, your assumptions are off. While graduation from a “better” school does improve your chances of getting a tenure track position, it is not by as much as you think. Randomly sample any department’s faculty and you will see a wealth of faculty from outside of the top-5.

For additional reference, UIUC’s (top-5) assistant professors (not including UIC) in ECE come from:

Arizona State
Berkeley
Carnegie Mellon
MITx4
Stanfordx3
UCF
UCLAx2
UCSD
UCSF
UMiss
UT Austin

So 8 out of 17 come from higher schools, the rest from good but still “lesser” schools. Penn State EE at University Park (top-25, small faculty)?

Illinois
Michigan
UT Austin

If your goal is to jump directly into a tenure-track position at a top-5, then I would say a PhD from a top-5 would be a big advantage, but if you just want a good faculty position then I would say the best route is to concentrate on doing well wherever you are! Plus, many people start as junior faculty at “lesser” schools and then take better positions at “better” schools later on.



Nevertheless, I don’t see any reason not to give this a try as I have seen many MS holders with lower research achievements get into stanford.

Here’s a few reasons:

(1) Without a good reason for your departure (as others have suggested) you will be a bad bet, as you will still have the same shortcomings from your last admissions round but will now add the stigma of disloyalty. Remember, there is a big difference between completing an MS program and leaving a PhD program early with an MS degree.

(2) The adcoms will look for a reason for your impending departure, and they will either find the bad one you provide or will contact your current faculty looking for a reason. There is nothing preventing them from doing so, and before gambling their time, money, and reputation on you they will want to know.

(3) If and when they contact your faculty, you will become persona non grata. Again, why waste resources on someone who does not even want to be there?

(4) Any school would consider you a risk - do you consider their school to the “top”, or are you going to leave there after a year or two trying to inch higher up the food chain? A top-10 PhD program is a big deal, and throwing it away for something slightly better is worrisome.

(5) When you are applying for professorships, you will STILL have a stigma of disloyalty. The academic community is very small (especially in a given specialty) and you will be surprised how much people remember about you.

No one here has any stake in your decision. Regardless, if you do this, please let us know how it turns out - if we hear nothing we are apt to assume things went bad for you.