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Ph.D. growth and development (recruiting, marketing, etc.)

Ph.D. growth and development (recruiting, marketing, etc.). Srinivas Akella , Min Shin, Jing Xiao. Outline. Central issue: how can we recruit highly promising students and ensure high-quality PhD graduates? Recruiting and marketing Program development. Applicant Quality.

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Ph.D. growth and development (recruiting, marketing, etc.)

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  1. Ph.D. growth and development (recruiting, marketing, etc.) SrinivasAkella, Min Shin, Jing Xiao CS Retreat

  2. Outline Central issue: how can we recruit highly promising students and ensure high-quality PhD graduates? • Recruiting and marketing • Program development CS Retreat

  3. Applicant Quality • Current issues: • Different opinions about whether a student is qualified for admission or not because we do not have a (quantifiable) standard. • Applicants have diverse technical/non-technical backgrounds. • What capabilities do we look for in an applicant? • Technical training, research skills, communication, ... • Introduce quantifiable admission requirements • BS vs. MS requirements? • CS vs. other discipline requirements? CS Retreat

  4. Issues Discussed and Suggestions • Professor advocate or committee evaluation? • Mechanism for faculty to advocate to committee • Guidelines for admission? • Tradeoffs between different skills (GPA, GRE, research, CS background) • Weights of letters, GRE, grades, and faculty advocate’s opinions • Min. GPA requirement > 3? • Minimize possibility of potential orphan students • Having a candidate pool for expected scholarships CS Retreat

  5. Program Development • How can we ensure high quality PhD graduates? • Foundation and breadth of knowledge • Research achievements and capability for independent research • For (1), core curriculum requirements with options? BS vs. MS? • For (2), More structured graduate research seminar? • (1) even more important to interdisciplinary research. • For both (1) and (2), more effective QE? CS Retreat

  6. More on Ensuring High Quality Graduates • The most important part of a student’s career is after the student passes the QE. • The Ph.D. review process is essential for the graduate faculty to monitor a student’s progress and to decide on corrective actions if necessary. • Currently this is the only review and evaluation process outside of the one between student and thesis advisor. CS Retreat

  7. Actions to consider • Create a set of required core courses? What should they be? BS vs. MS? • PhD Committee or Graduate Committee to make a proposal? • Use the PhD review to develop a set of best practices for producing quality researchers? • Require teaching or class assisting to insure well-rounded graduates? • A stand alone PhD in CS? … CS Retreat

  8. Points Raised • PhD student review is important for quality control. Catch problems via review. • Focus on research skills vs. broad CS foundation. • Test research quality via presentation rather than written QE. • Requirements must ensure that PhD graduates know more than MS graduates. • CS knowledge: dept. guidelines. Research skills: advisor decision? CS Retreat

  9. Points Raised (cont’d) • Use subject GRE instead of QE? • MS as immediate step to PhD (for students without a recent CS MS degree) • Requiring thesis or project for MS? • Some research areas have trouble finding students with certain skills. • “PhD in IT” is not as visible to students as “PhD in CS” or “PhD in Computing”. • Proposal for PhD in CS? Political issues in NC? CS Retreat

  10. Recruiting Strategies • How can we balance the following different efforts for getting PhD applicants: • Develop undergraduate and MS students with research promise. • Recruit elsewhere domestically. • Recruit internationally. CS Retreat

  11. Possible ways to improve recruiting and marketing • Survey applicants/students on why they chose or did not chose us • Increased domestic recruiting • Better international recruiting: Establish relationships with top universities in China, India, Turkey, Israel, S. Korea, Taiwan, etc. • Identify universities and faculty from whom we have received strong graduate students • Use related mailing lists to advertise positions • Provide faculty travel support for domestic and international recruiting • Find funding for named fellowships • Fund application fee waivers for top applicants • Provide online FAQ for grad applicants • Prepare a list of universities to target and send letters to department chairs • Videotape and make distinguished seminars available on the web CS Retreat

  12. Issues Discussed and Ideas • Ensure good hit rate with the open house recruiting event. Need faculty to recruit to get more and better students to attend. • Faculty must give talks to be more effective. • How to handle resource crunch (e.g., money for hotels etc.) • First few get paid. Others pay themselves. • Use local industry to sponsor jointly visits by students. • How to engage MS students – make thesis option more attractive. • Current situation merits revisiting MS thesis requirement (funding, #faculty) • Combined BS with MS thesis track? • Use BS as testing/training ground for MS/PhD? Pair BS students with MS students. • Get funding for programmers and then hire BS/MS students for those positions. • Establish MS Design/Project course – regular meetings and presentations. • How to get good students from top international schools. CS Retreat

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