U.S. GRADUATE TRAINING: Top Ph.D. Feeder Schools Are Now Chinese

Source: Science Magazine

A new study has found that the most likely undergraduate alma mater for those who earned a Ph.D. in 2006 from a U.S. university was … Tsinghua University. Peking University, its neighbor in the Chinese capital, ranks second. Between 2004 and 2006, those two schools overtook the University of California, Berkeley, as the most fertile training ground for U.S. Ph.D.s (see graph). South Korea's Seoul National University occupies fourth place behind Berkeley, followed by Cornell University and the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

The rankings were compiled by the Commission on Professionals in Science and Technology from a survey conducted by the U.S. National Science Foundation. In part, they reflect the fact that 37% of doctoral recipients from U.S. universities are not U.S. citizens. Sui says they also point to the wider choice of good careers available to U.S. students who hold a bachelor's or master's degree; foreign-born students are more likely to need a Ph.D. to find a good job, she says.

Berkeley still retains its top ranking for the number of undergraduates who went on to earn Ph.D.s over the past 10 years (1997 to 2006). But its total of 4298 isn't that far ahead of Seoul's 3420. And Tsinghua and Peking could well surpass their Korean rival in upcoming decadal tallies.


Read more: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/321/5886/185

---

So, we've also outsourced our THINKING to China.

Will the last sentient being in America please turn off the lights on your way down to McDonalds? Thank you.

-----

Oh, and tell me about all the "good careers available to U.S. students who hold a bachelor's degree".

What BS. There are good jobs for rich kids who go to school as "legacy privilege" and get to be lawyers and brokers and rob the rest of us blind. Otherwise, your bachelor's degree will get you a job at Enterprise rent-a-car, if you are lucky.

arendt

which means China has twice as many people of above average intelligence, than the US has people all together.

just plain simple numbers

When the oil crisis makes everything more local again, that is 1/3 of our university graduates who are elsewhere.

And don't tell me they stay here. First, there are huge backlogs for H1-Bs and for green cards. Second, I have seen with my own eyes job fairs in Boston where the jobs being offered are in China, Singapore, Taiwan, and India - for Asians who want to go home.

arendt

Chinese students in our graduate programs, why not question why our own kids aren't in them.

Anyway, graduate students in science and techonologies have been heavily foreign for years for 2 main reasons I know of--

the world is a very big place and the best of the best from around the world aim for places like MIT and Stanford while our kids are heading off to law or biz school. Fair competition means Asian and South Asian students will outnumber us simply because there are so many of them.

Foreign students pay full fare for their education.

through grants, fellowships, TA/GAships or some combination of the above. Departments don't make money off of grad students, unless you you count the school as a whole making money from their cheap labor and the increasing trend of giving PhD students and even MA students full classes to teach. And in that case it doesn't matter where the student comes from.

I, too, don't blame Chinese students for wanting the best opportunity and I agree that we should examine why US students are filling more of those spots. However I don't think it's as simplistic as "US students wanna go study business or law and rake in money". I had really strong GRE scores, finished my department's honors thesis program, won several awards and even had a publication credit, and almost flawless grades from my undergrad university, but I only got into 2 of the 6 PhD programs I applied to. I suspect my shortcoming was not playing the social network game well enough and getting to know the people on the admissions boards. Even my glowing recommendations weren't enough; in one case I knew a student who went to a conference, got drunk with someone on the admissions board of a school she wanted to go to, and POOF she's in because the professor liked her. Even though her GRE scores were abysmal.

There are so very many things that go into PhD program admissions procedures that I don't have the energy to even get into it here, but I WILL say that the reputation/stereotype of foreign students and Asian students in particular as hard workers who will take whatever you throw at them and never, ever complain is a factor. Especially considering how they abuse PhD students and even MA students, using them as cheap labor for introductory classes without paying them anything different, and considering how a foreign student is less likely to start a stink and demand unionization, out of fear of losing their ability to stay and study, they are looked at as perfect choices.

Add to all of this the fact that China can't build enough schools to keep up with teh demand, and we are seeing the logical outcome.

You want to know why U.S. kids don't take this track?

A) Because they all want to get-rich-quick.

They all want to go where the money is - FIRE (finance, insurance, real estate). I had a conversation with a group of American Jewish graduate students. They said that, in the current generation, most Jewish folks were taking a pass on the sciences because there was no money there. Even doctoring is now perceived in a worse light because of all the HMO hassles. When you lose a group as talented as the Jews, you know something is wrong.

B) Because they have been trained to expect to be entertained and to get instant gratification.

Science requires hard work and you may have to work for years to get a result. Corporations and media sell instant success, instant gratification, no money down, buy it on credit.

------

Whom do I blame? I blame the disgusting culture that the Corporate Media and corporate domination of the entire society has created. Its no surprise that we have lost interest in science. I didn't post this to complain. I posted it as factual confirmation of a trend that I have personally witnessed. Now I have hard numbers to make my point. (Of course, that won't matter to the very people to whom I want to make my point.)

arendt

Science and corporate interests are anything but mutually exclusive. There is big money to be made in many fields,like bioengineering and, don't laugh, agriculture.

If we were talking undergrad trends, I would absolutely agree with you 10000000000000000% that greed is what drives students. However, when it comes to PhD programs, there's still a lot of us who chose that route for sheer love of discovery. It doesn't help that schools are corporate funded and use their grad students as cheap labor, however. I see capitalistic greed manifesting differently here.

As I have discussed in my other posts, foreign PhD students are desirable for a number of reasons. I think one of the biggest reasons for this trend is also one of the characteristics unique to postgrad admissions: there are few set in stone admissions requirements; primarily a GRE score and a record of undergraduate study (and a TOEFL if you're foreign). Beyond that, selection of students into a PhD program are extremely contingent upon what the department wants. Without quotas, departments are going to use a lot of arbitrary calculations for deciding who they want to give slots to.

if the undergrads are all driven by $$$, then where do the applicants for grad school come from, in your experience?

arendt

the actual number of people going on to PhD's is quite small compared to the number of bachelor's degrees churned out. I personally would like to see trade schools funded a LOT more and aim to strip them of their reputation as somehow meant for intellectually inferior students. Our universities are being treated like career preparation programs and that's just problematic for everyone except those who stand to profit from huge enrollment numbers...

not true. some do, many don't.

many graduate schools hell bent for NIH research grant money (sucking at the federal teat) need graduate students for research.

many graduate students have their tuition paid by the departments they are doing research in, AND receive from 27000 to 31000 stipend a year, for living expenses.

in other words, the graduate students are getting a free degree (can take four to eight years) AND all their living expenses are paid.

the graduate schools make no distinction between students who are u.s. citizens, or foreign students.

talk about a gravy train for students....

You aren't going to get 27 large from a state school for being a research assistant and a public university. Well, in take home pay, anyway. Now, if you count the tuition waver, then that might be in the ballpark.

At many grad schools, it is simply taken for granted that students will put in 80-100 hrs a week -- basically anytime you're not eating, sleeping, or teaching, you're expected to be working. Students who are given 20hr/wk teaching assignments (the norm) are still expected to work hard on their research projects. There's no "free" degree for anyone. And stipends are more likely to barely meet expenses, or fall short -- which is why so many grad students have to take out student loans just to get through school (it's quite standard for the degree-granting dept. to forbid outside employment).

OTOH, my (incomplete) understanding is that many Chinese students get stipends from THEIR gov't, not ours. Even if many of these students choose not to return to China, the number that do more than repay the gov'ts investment.

Let me relate a story:

when I was in grad school (1970s), I had a disgruntled postdoc as a TA. In one evening problem session, he went off on a rant about "how do you compete with someone who knows that if he screws up he will be planting rice in a village for the rest of his life?" Bizarrely, this postdoc went on to become reasonably famous in some obscure specialty. So, he was scared enough of the Asian contingent to compete.

My point is that to non-Americans, 80-100 hour weeks is a normal thing; and the working conditions and housing are a lot better here than in polluted, crowded China and India. So, to Americans its no gravy train; but to the Asian its, at minimum, a chance, an opportunity - something worth putting up with. Also, IIRC, there used to be bumper stickers in Silicon Valley that said something like "working 80 hours and loving it". To young techies, its all about motivation and about how cool the tech is.

Also, its no surprise to U.S. grad students that they are going to be worked to death and that the pay sucks. These guys/gals are quite smart enough to know they could make big bucks and have an easier life outside tech/science programs. Hell, the undergrads at the U. of Chicago have an informal slogan about the place: "Where the fun goes to die."; and that slogan has been in place from before I went to grad school. Americans used to do this because they were in love with science and because there were good CAREERS available when you got your Ph.D.

These days, science careers in the U.S. are a rat race or a joke. You get to compete with H1-B holders, you get to postdoc yourself around the country a year at a time. I can see why U.S. students are taking a pass.

arendt

Modern, gleaming cities. Natty businessmen with cell phones and women in designer clothing. To think of it as a bunch of peassants planting rice is like imagining the U.S. as nothing but a bunch of corn farmers.

China has a centuries-long tradition of success through scholarship. They've always valued study and education. The fact they have top-notch PhD candidates is just the result of ingrained values.

the gleaming, if highly polluted, cities near the coast, and the 400 Million people who still live in small villages. 400 million people is bigger than the whole US. Rural China truly is "another country" from urban China. The people in the villages are the "reserve army of the unemployed" that keep wages down in the cities. And don't think the people in the cities don't know it. How could they forget when they see the workers getting off the trains and sleeping in the streets day after day?

I have NOTHING against Chinese scholarship. That's not the point of the OP. The point is how we are going to stop America from lobotomizing itself?

arendt

You started off this OP talking about PhD candidates -- the best of the best in sciences. And then the discussion deteriorated to "they'll end up planting rice if they don't get into the good old U.S. of A." As if those brilliant students MUST get into the U.S. or they'll end up planting rice. Do you honestly think the Chinese government would waste their brightest that way?

There are two classes in the U.S. as well. There are people in economic pain here as well. Why denigrate Chinese science scholars to make a point?

at that time, many scientists and intellectuals WERE sent to plant rice.

Besides, I'm sure that after all the Chinese Ph.D. slots necessary to run their advanced society have been created and filled, the Chinese scholars will be in the same rat race that the U.S. scholars find themselves in today. (That is, this situation where an educated Chinese is practically assured of getting a job is a MOMENTARY situation in a rapidly growing and developing economy. I don't know if this situation will last another 5 years or another 50 years. But it is just as temporary as the situation in 1960s America.)

I do not understand your vehemence on this issue? Are you Chinese yourself? If not, then why are you so worked up that I have demeaned the Chinese. I could just as well say that if non-elite U.S. grad students screw up, they will be managing a Burger King in Omaha. I could say "it beats flipping burgers".

Its just an expression, which was really true 30 years ago. I am so sick of political correctness on this board. Grow a skin.

arendt

I'm third generation Chinese American. And when people start going "ching chong" or ridiculing Chinese accents, as in a post below, I remember all the times I was called "Chink" growing up, and all the times I had to work twice as hard to be accepted. You mention Jews in your posts -- well don't you think that Jews and Chinese are in many ways on parallel tracks? Both cultural groups faced challenges being accepted, and Jews and Chinese have a cultural inter-connectedness that goes beyond the fact China was one of the few places that Jews found sanctuary during the holocaust. Couldn't a little sensitivity be displayed toward very similar immigrants who come here with the same cultural values about education?

I have made it as clear as I can that I have no problem with the Chinese scholars or with any scholars. The problem I have is with an American system that wants to turn EVERY group of scholars into people who work for slave wages, with the implicit threat that if they make trouble, they will wind up at whatever menial job is on offer (burger flipping, rice planting, toilet cleaning).

As you point out, I am worried because Jewish Americans are losing their interest in science. I am worried because all AMERICAN ethnic groups, yourself included, are losing interest in science, while ALL scientists are being reduced to commodity status by the International race to the bottom funded by international corporations.

If you want to continue to bash me for relating a story from30+ years ago, it still is a free country - for a while more at least. Have fun. That's what those at the top want. They want us all hating each other so we don't get together and fight them. I think, for a THIRD generation Chinese, you are way too concerned that I might have slighted Chinese scientists instead of being concerned that science is going down the drain in OUR country.

I am sorry you have encountered prejudice. But, not from me. I have always been most respectful of Chinese culture and scientists. Do you want me to send you testimonials from the Chinese scientists I work with? Or is my word and my reputation at DU good enough for you?

arendt

So no, when you say "yourself included" as one of those who've lost interest in science, I hardly think it applies to me -- or to Asian-AMERICANS who make up a large number of scientists and physicians in this country.

Whether third generation or new immigrant, Asians get lumped together as "outsiders" in this country. We all get tarred with the same prejudice. To imply that third generation Asians should just "get over feeling attacked" is being completely unrealistic about what it's like to be an ethnic minority that has visibly non-white features.

My sensitivity to the subject is this: when Americans get riled up about all those chink scholars coming over from China, their anger and hatred ends up spilling over onto American-born Asians as well. White Americans can't tell the difference. An asian face is, by definition, alien. And why is it that Americans are angriest about grad students from China (and India as well)? If the hordes of scientists were coming over from Russia or Germany, there simply wouldn't be this same reaction because those people are white. The anger -- and the feeling that "oh no, we're doomed!" is in large part because the grad students we're talking about aren't white.

I keep talking about how science is going down the drain in this country; and all you can hear in the discussion are slights (by your POV) to your ethnic group. You have yet to comment on the overall dismal statistics on native-born Americans in science, which is the main point of the post - as indicated by my commentary in the OP.

You know, there are tons of ethnic groups in America. In academia, there have long been resentments about a "Jewish mafia". To address your supposed strawman, "hordes of scientists coming over from Russia", there IS great resentment at the rapidly growing "Eastern European mafia", whom many find offensively pushy and clannish, also. In my experience, no one ever called Chinese "pushy" or "overbearing", so if you are stereotyped *within* the scientific community, it is a good stereotype.

As for the society at large, many people on the East Coast are concerned about the influx of Eastern Europeans (not Chinese), who have taken all the summer jobs away from Americans. So it is not Chinese-only prejudice about job loss. Also, I am not aware that anyone is calling John Woo a "chink" (as YOU put the slur). On the contrary, the lack of ethnic prejudice against this criminal is held up as proof that Chinese have "made it" in this country. The main group on the receiving end of rabid, totally irrational, racial prejudice in America today is Arab/Moslem.

> when Americans get riled up about all those chink scholars coming over from China, their
> anger and hatred ends up spilling over onto American-born Asians as well.

AFAIK, most Americans don't blame Chinese *people* for the fact that our rotten corporations have exported our jobs. Americans feel how powerless they are, and see that Chinese workers have even less leverage. They certainly don't first think of Chinese *scholars* as the cause of our decline. The statistics I quoted are an effect, not a cause.

Can you differentiate between educated Americans worried about THEIR DECLINE in science and ignorant Americans "riled up" by racial prejudice? Why do you assume that bigots single out Chinese *scientists* over the guy who runs a local business? When LA rioters in the Rodney King case targeted Korean grocery stores, did you assume they were mad at Korean *scholars*?

Bottom line: why can't you join me in asking what we can do to get more Americans interested in science, instead of viewing the posting of a factual survey as an instance of bigotry?

arendt

They work as post-docs. I am not sure that H1-B visas matter when the pay is coming from research grant. To be honest, I am not entirely sure how it works, but I can tell you that a lot of the Chinese students that went to grad school with me are staying in the U.S....and there are an awful lot of post-docs from China. They do work harder for less money than the typical American of the same educational level...I think there is a little exploitation going on in some schools. That part is true as far as I know.

I don't mind them being here...all I have met are wonderful people and great friends and coworkwers, but I do worry how few Americans are coming through the system. It does not speak well for the affordability of college for the average American (I put myself massively in debt) nor for the state of our schools.

http://cornellsun.com/node/26639

trying to find a link to how many the US has but just from a brief overview we are very much more saturated with degree-granting universities..CA alone has almost 150.

http://www.census.gov/prod/2003pubs/02statab/educ.pdf

Total number of Colleges & Universities: 4084
Breakdown:
4 year: 2363
2 year: 1721
source: census.gov
Statistical Abstract of the United States
No. 257 Higher Education Summary

Don't know how many of the 4 years offer postgrad programs, and don't know how many of the 2,000 Chinese schools were equivalent to our 4 year programs and offered postgrad, but a cursory glance at the numbers indicates we have many more postgrad programs per capita than China by miles.

of all the Asian grad students I have known, ALL of them "deserved" to be there and were just as studious and serious as anyone else. However, I think it's fairly deliberate on the part of the Chinese university system to limit their own number of facilities and exploit the generally liberal and non-exclusionary policies many postgraduate admissions boards have.

Undergraduate programs often have a separate admissions department from postgraduate admissions which tend to handle admissions within the specific departments of study and at most require a double admittance (for my program, I had to be admitted by both Graduate Admissions as well as the department to which I was applying..undergrads had a separate Admissions Department altogether).

Undergraduate schools DO accept a lot of foreign students, but admissions tend to favor US students, especially State schools that offer a certain percentage of admissions to in-state students along with reduced tuition. Admissions to postgrad programs tend to be at the sole discretion of how the departments want to allocate their resources, as grad students cost departments a section of their budget, unlike undergrads. I think there is a deliberate attempt on China and other countries' part to restrict how many postgrad opportunities they offer and the most obvious result is a huge overflow into American grad programs.

also a fair indicator that the foreign person is bilingual, ANOTHER huge plus.

And China hasn't focused on establishing those schools yet.

there to help US citizens get PHD and education when you have numbers like these its very disturbing

:thumbsup:

Honestly, this is not funny.

The top programs, like, say Cal Berkeley's chemistry or computer science programs, accept no more than 1% of its Chinese applicants (however, programs like Berkeley have the luxury of the pick-of-the-litter). The less-prestigious programs, which sometimes lack for U.S. applicants, often take more Chinese students. But even then, those schools still have to reject the vast majority of its Chinese applications due to sheer numbers.

Take a medium-sized telephone book of white pages. Then rip out about ten pages. What's left would be the number of Chinese applications to U.S. programs which were rejected.

My guess is most are welcomed back home and given good jobs. Some of the best might stay here and do very well. Just my feelings but I also bet they are far more appreciated (and rewarded) back home then American science graduates are right here.

is foreign from China to Russian there are very few Americans now...
They get jobs here

the more those schools would appear to be "overrepresented" in terms of number of students. So if China has a small number of very large universities of course they will be high in the rankings. The US has a very large number of schools, rather than a handful of large schools, so US schools are less likely appear high on this list. The Chinese and Korean schools mentioned are more like centralized "national" universities -- something the US does not have.

The lead-in to this article makes it sound like Chinese are taking over US grad schools, but then the second para acknowledges that all foreign students combined are still in the minority (37%). {Can't access article w/out subscription, so can't check this for certain, but} I believe that European & Russian students make up a very substantial portion of that 37%.

It's worth noting that in the US, the majority of students who go on to grad school do not have Bachelor's degrees from the major "producers", but from smaller colleges. Again, because there are so many of them, their combined output of students exceeds that of the largest producers.

It's true there's an increasing enrollment of Chinese students in US schools. But let's not confuse things with misapplied statistics.

The headline is just a hook for me to raise a concern that fewer and fewer native-born Americans have any interest in pursuing a career in fields requiring post-graduate work (except for M.D.s J.D.s, and MBAs). Might this have something to do with the fact that 33% of the country thinks the earth is 6,000 years old?

Even more worrying, the foreign-born percentage at the best schools is just as high as at the Podunk U's. Its across the board. Maybe the foreigners get a good basic education without having to remortgage their house. Maybe their governments subsidize them. I don't know. All I know is that U.S. grad schools feel like the United Nations these days - which wouldn't be a bad thing if it weren't for an increasing ghettoization: Chinese student clubs, Indian student clubs, Russian student clubs. Of course, to have an American students' club would instantly be blasted as prejudice; but American students can wind up feeling isolated both by the outside world (American contempt for higher ed) and by the grad school world.

And, sometimes, the foreign contingent has an impact on undergrad education. For example, when your TA or post-doc speaks with such a heavy accent you can't understand his/her lectures, or when their lack of English skills makes it hard for them to get to the heart of your question.

So, I have been worried a long time about this situation. The news story just puts some concrete numbers on the problem. You can make statistical excuses all you want. The problem is real.

arendt

name-brand state universities for undergraduate science because too many kids have come home complaining that they can't understand their TA.

That means that very bright kids are going to lesser state school or to some less-prestigious private colleges. Those kids don't get in to MIT.

I really think that U.S. schools, directly taxpayer funded or funded through state and federal research grants should encourage and at least somewhat favor U.S. students. IMO, it gives taxpayers much more value than totally citizen-blind admissions, which are in part a gift to our economic rival and perhaps someday resource enemy countries.

Don't waste your time writing to condemn the kids and me for being racist. Been there, read that.

There's no way a TA would survive at a major university without good English language skills. Good grief.

I have more than once had to console my Korean friend; her class of 120 would put her in tears at least twice a month. Between the snickering and the constant "can you repeat that again?" she was just frustrated to no end. She ended up having to give them lecture outlines to get them to quit complaining to the department.

I think part of it IS that the students may not have heard her clearly, but I think a not small part of it was a certain amount of bias against Asians, if not outright hatred. Students hear the same "OMG they're coming for our jobs" shit all over campus...

:)

nowadays wouldn't want to.

The American academic world has changed from one of relatively secure, full-time employment to one of part-time, short-term jobs.

Asian grad students can go home to prestigious jobs, if not in universities in their homeland, then in research institutes or companies.

Good for the economy.

Once the education systems and job opportunities in their own countries improve that will turn into a trickle.

elite technology, scientific research, and cutting-edge service sectors.

supersize that ?