I was reading a paper on performance in economics graduate schools in the USA today, see Athey et al (2007).
One of its findings is that only 75 percent of enrollees completed their PhD degree in the top economics schools in the USA.
The new Geary Institute project examining "Fourth Level Ireland" will offer new and unprecedented insight into the issue of non-completion across MPhil and PhD courses in all subjects in Irish universities. This will be achieved through the tracking of post-graduate students in what might be the world's first "fourth level panel".
I've looked around to see if a panel study has been conducted on post-graduate students before, but can't find any indication that it has. Any further information on this would be appreciated. It could be the case that the Geary study on "Fourth Level Ireland" will offer ground-breaking information on the determinants of PhD student retention.
One of its findings is that only 75 percent of enrollees completed their PhD degree in the top economics schools in the USA.
The new Geary Institute project examining "Fourth Level Ireland" will offer new and unprecedented insight into the issue of non-completion across MPhil and PhD courses in all subjects in Irish universities. This will be achieved through the tracking of post-graduate students in what might be the world's first "fourth level panel".
I've looked around to see if a panel study has been conducted on post-graduate students before, but can't find any indication that it has. Any further information on this would be appreciated. It could be the case that the Geary study on "Fourth Level Ireland" will offer ground-breaking information on the determinants of PhD student retention.
This is an extremely important issue (both in Ireland and abroad), given the large investments that are made in PhD training, particularly in the key areas of ICT, biotechnology and pharamaceuticals.
1 comment:
thanks for that post Martin. I am always really interested in work that looks at predicting academic success for some reason! Scott-long has papers going back to the 80s on the predictors of whether you get a good job or not. I use this data in my econometrics classes. Also, Ian Walker has been doing work on whether it pays to go to tutorials. In terms of FLIP, it would be interesting to examine the extent to which success is determined by cognitive skills, non-cognitive skills as well as surface features of the University. Questions such as the one raised in the above paper are also interesting such as what are the early signals that you have a potentially top academic on your hand. Working closely and collaborating with top people must have a huge effect on performance though there is of course a huges selection effect here.
There is also a recent NBER working paper on the use of incentives and social support to facilitate performance among undergraduates.
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