Conventional wisdom* asserts that a student pursuing a master’s degree should be given a research project that’s ready to go. The questions should be developed, the field site identified, and the funding in place before the student arrives to begin work. These students have to complete lots of coursework and research in a short period of time, so they can’t fool around with harebrained thesis ideas. On the other hand, Ph.D. students are expected to develop their own project.
As I’ve progressed through grad school, I’ve noticed that there are many Ph.D. students who are unprepared to put together a project from scratch. The only people who are really capable of designing a new project in a timely way either have a master’s degree or worked in their discipline before starting grad school. Otherwise, students may flounder because they don’t have a deep enough understanding of the literature or the relevant experience to know what the pertinent research questions are.
I did have work experience (but no master’s) and still I came into an established project. I think the research has proceeded in different way than if I hadn’t been involved, but the fundamental idea was Research Advisor’s. In addition to the advantages of having the core ideas already worked out by an expert, I also had funding. I have heard of faculty who make incoming Ph.D. students rewrite funded proposals, tweaking them with their own ideas, in order to “take ownership” of the project. I think this is a waste of time. In my field, students usually have to write a research proposal to achieve candidacy. This exercise was very challenging and beneficial for me, even though I didn’t conceive the original project. By the time I defended the proposal, I had reworked it into something pretty different than Advisor had at the outset. But I couldn't have done that right off the bat.
It seems to be getting more common for students to embark on a Ph.D. straight from undergrad. I see the appeal for the students, since a Ph.D. doesn’t necessarily go faster after a master’s, and for the faculty, who get better trained staff with lower turnover. Still, I think this trend is a little disturbing because many students coming right from undergrad are overwhelmed by the independence of grad school. It’s not that they are incapable of doing the work, but that they don’t have the necessary experience to initiate it. In my opinion, people starting a Ph.D. right from university should either join an established project to which they can contribute something new or vital, or they should be given a small project to get them started. I think it’s not right for faculty to take on inexperienced students without giving them something to start with. They are, after all, students.
*This whole post comes from my experience with how things work in eco-, geo-, and/or ecogeoscience.
13 comments:
Interesting! I think if I had to do it again I'd have done an MRes first (a new-ish degree in the UK that rotates you through 3 different labs over the course of a year, feeding into a PhD in your favourite rotation lab). They only really became popular after I'd already started my PhD, and MRes students coming in after me seemed much better prepared than those of us who came straight from undergrad. My first 6 months were a bit of a confusing blur!! Mind you I wouldn't have swapped my supervisor and labmates for anything in the world, so maybe it was all for the best.
I also think that part of the problem is with the system in the states. For instance, there are very few biochemistry masters programs in the United States. Or at least very few advertised masters programs in the US. Even schools that had them weren't very keen on students enrolling in a masters program. I spoke with the graduate coordinators that had both a PhD and Masters program and was told that most profs preferred to take PhD students straight out of undergrad than masters students straight out of undergrad. Ok, the point of this long rant is that I think most students (at least in biochem) are actively discouraged from doing the BS, MS, PhD route and are strongly encouraged to do the BS straight to PhD route.
I am at odds with this one.
Part of me believes that the PhD experience is learning how to define a problem, and how to investigate it (not necessary solve it). This can be particularly intimidating when you first start out in the PhD process. My own thesis worked much this way and I am proud that I dug myself out of an ambiguous topic into a well-defined topic of my own making.
However, I see many friends struggling with "lack of mentorship" or "ill-defined" projects, and I see that this situation can be an unnecessary waste of emotion of time for both the adviser and student. In this case, inheriting a project or going into a well-established project would make sense.
Maybe there are two types of graduate students, and both are "right".
I think it mostly depends on the type of student and the adviser's perception of how they want their students mature. It is important that both student and adviser discuss how this process works (sink or swim vs. step-wise learning). Ideally, both student and adviser would agree ;)
But really, how many first year students think of these things or discuss them with their potential advisers? I certainly didn't.
I think you're right on the money (as usual) EGF. I think it's really important for advisors to develop at least a seed project for PhD students when they enter the lab. The situation is very similar in biology, where PhD students less than a year out of college are expected to think up their own research project, and it usually ends up being an exercise in wasting everyones time.
Sometimes I think advisors forget that they're supposed to TRAIN their trainees.
I think in general everyone joins an established project. For example, if you choose to work with Adviser X you will do something related to X's research, especially if you are on X's grant money. As other said your independence is a function of how your adviser handles students. But this issue is similar to lots of skills one should "learn" in grad school, there is huge difference in the amount of training one gets and how much you have to learn on your own.
I came into (after working some between undergrad) a project on a specific grant. Our goal was to solve question B, however it was up to me to figure out how to do this. I read the literature and would propose ideas to my adviser. I think through trial and error I finally figured out something that worked. Other students in my dept. doing a master's or Ph.D. do a rotation of two labs their first year where they get a definitive project with the methods all laid out for them. Few students come in, like I did, on a specific grant.
My adviser has said that the main difference between a masters and Ph.D. is how much lab work one does. For my master's we mailed out a lot of samples, although I still did certain things in house. He also says that for a master's student one never does method development-that is something saved for the long journey of the Ph.D.
Cae, that sounds like an interesting and useful degree.
Amanda, the same thing is happening in ecogeo science. Some schools are giving phd students tuition waivers and stipends but making masters students pay tuition!
Janus, wouldn't it be great if more young students read blogs so they would know to think about things like "sink or swim" vs "handholding"? I have a niece who is considering a research career -- I think I need to send her links to some blogs. :)
Sciencemama, I think sometimes we lose sight of the progress people make during grad school. What a student can do at the beginning is so limited compared to what she can do near the end.
Jennie, while I think it's more common in my (sub)field to join an established project, there are lots of students who don't. There are students who design a brand new project based on the advisor's expertise, or they assemble a committee that covers all the areas involved in the project.
I think I'll write a post about how students join labs in departments like mine.
Sorry to catch you late like this, computer is still fritzy.
Going straight to PhD's in geology departments was becomming more popular when I had just gotten out w/ an M.S. in 1978. At that time, MS students at least in my department were expected to come up with their own project, with advice from their thesis advisor; and I imagine that some students knew more about what direction they wanted to go than others, and that some were given more direction than others.
In geology, for a MS it was often just a matter of finding an area that hadn't been mapped in some detail, and mapping it. I chose an area, started mapping, then moved to another area, started mapping - and then chose a different thesis advisor because I was getting zero input. At that point, my new thesis advisor, in touch with industry, found a project that a company wanted done, and it turned into a great thesis project for me.
I don't know what things are like in geology now - would have to check through the geoblogoshere.
Also late to the party but your conventional wisdom is certainly what I've seen as well. My MS was a funded project that I got to make my own and figure out the details. After doing this, I was concerned about my ability to independently come up with my own ideas and projects. My advisor typically suggests projects and you take an idea and run with it but I wanted to branch out further because I had already had that experiance of having a project handed to me.
Most straight from undergrad students here do what you did but there is a period of floundering. Perhaps it is so similar because we are in very close fields....
Of course, what I did can be bad too...on my last grant rejection I got the comment "How does this relate to the advisors research?" Ack!
You guys aren't late! Your comments are welcome any time. :)
And dancingfish, I suspect we are in fact in the same field, but very different subfields
Like Janus Professor, I think it is at least as much a [lack of] mentorship problem as lack of experience. I think a PI should find out how much a student knows and where they need advice for each new lab member individually. Having one independent student doesn't mean all the others are the same (surprising, no?) Many good talents are lost because of sink or swim, or other annoyances in academia that are not necessary but part of the current culture. Sciencemama's comment on training is spot-on.
I agree with Amelie that lack of mentorship is the real problem, because what someone learns during a master's program can also be learnt during the first few years of a PhD, given the proper training by the advisor.
I suppose how useful having a master's degree prior to going for the PhD would be depends on what type of master's program it is. I know several people with master's degrees in my field who have pretty good theoretical knowledge of research but no practical skills since their programs consisted only of coursework and no actual benchwork. I don't think those people had significant advantages in grad school compared to the ones who entered straight out of undergrad.
On the other hand, my grad school classmates who had previously worked as technicians or research assistants were much faster at getting their thesis projects up and running than people like me who only had limited research experience as an undergrad.
I think graduate school admissions (at least the top 50 graduate schools in the US) are becoming increasingly competitive-they look for students who have the grades plus enough research experience to prove that the students will be capable.
From what I see, a master's program is sometimes sought by bachelor's students if they did not get into med school and they are planning on reapplying to med school, or if a student is undecided on their future and testing their abilities in a master's program to see if they want to either do industrial work or PHD work in the future.
I agree with mad hatter. I think that it really depends on what type of research exposure a student had in his/her undergraduate years that would allow for graduate study preparation. In my undergrad, depending on who your mentor was, you can either get a limited amount of training (like say your whole project mainly consisted of doing one technique; preparing cells, etc.) or you can get a full research experience (reading hundreds of papers, getting trained for a wide variety of molecular research techniques, and whether these techniques were important to your project would not even matter, you still got exposed to it).
Also depending on the graduate school, students are allowed to do a round of rotations during their first year where they do smaller experiments to test whether they would be interested in a particular lab. Some schools may require a certain number of classes to take, as well as teaching.
When you look at the average time someone takes to complete a PhD, going straight to PhD rather than from a master's is pretty sensible.
There is also a question of what someone might get out of a master's program. I've heard instances where master's students graduate with a project that is comparable to a project an undergraduate might have done during a summer program.
Yes! I completely agree.
I went straight to PhD and wasted a great deal of time trying to learn the literature, figure out what would work and what I would like to do, and then what it would really need to do it. I would have been much less difficult with good mentoring, but I was expected to work entirely independently - something that I had no idea how to do.
A masters would have been very helpful. Unfortunately, my department is getting so that masters students are not even admitted.
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