Timeline for Does it ever make sense NOT to go to the most prestigious grad school you can get into? [closed]
Current License: CC BY-SA 2.5
13 events
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| Nov 4, 2010 at 4:52 | history | edited | Romeo | CC BY-SA 2.5 |
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| Nov 2, 2010 at 17:27 | comment | added | Ryan Budney | I'd like to encourage respondents to acquire accounts at math.stackexchange.com and respond to the thread there: math.stackexchange.com/questions/8652/… Ideally people would do that rather than respond in off-topic threads here. | |
| Nov 2, 2010 at 15:40 | history | made wiki | Post Made Community Wiki by S. Carnahan♦ | ||
| Nov 2, 2010 at 15:30 | comment | added | danseetea | (continued) Second, there is a difference between a good researcher and a good teacher (I am not claiming there is a negative correlation! just that there is not necessarily a positive one). Some of the books which have given me the most insight into mathematics were written by authors that (for whatever reasons) were not holding a position at a prestigious university. | |
| Nov 2, 2010 at 15:30 | comment | added | danseetea | @Vivek Shende: While it is certainly true that communication "with the environment" is very important, I'm not sure you are necessary going to get worse mentoring at a less prestigious school than, at say, Princeton. For two reasons. One, I inherently disagree with the classification of "bad mathematicians" and "good mathematicians" based solely on what university they have been able to get a position at. (continued) | |
| Nov 2, 2010 at 15:21 | answer | added | Scott Carter | timeline score: 12 | |
| Nov 2, 2010 at 15:20 | history | closed |
Ryan Budney Mariano Suárez-Álvarez Andrés E. Caicedo Qiaochu Yuan Andrey Rekalo |
off topic | |
| Nov 2, 2010 at 15:17 | comment | added | Stopple | To elaborate on my comment above, you can go to PhDs.org graduate-school.phds.org/rankings/mathematics to see the recent NRC ranking data by 'Student Outcomes'. This is a combination of how many students are funded, graduate on time, and get jobs. | |
| Nov 2, 2010 at 15:14 | answer | added | Kimball | timeline score: 4 | |
| Nov 2, 2010 at 15:12 | comment | added | Vivek Shende | As far as I can tell, there are various intangible aspects of being a mathematician that are not gleaned from books, and certainly not "on your own", but instead by some sort of osmotic process from exposure to the great mathematicians. And these are more likely to be found at a more prestigious school. | |
| Nov 2, 2010 at 14:42 | comment | added | Stopple | More important than which school you get into is, in which one will you be successful and complete a PhD? | |
| Nov 2, 2010 at 14:40 | comment | added | Ryan Budney | I'd like to suggest posting this to the math.stackexchange website. Please read the FAQ for details on what is and is not appropriate for MO. | |
| Nov 2, 2010 at 14:38 | history | asked | anonymous | CC BY-SA 2.5 |