| Topic Name: |
Advice Needed: PhD? |
| Message Name: |
No generalization |
| Date Posted: |
04/18/2000 |
| In Reply To: |
I know this is off topic, so I'll keep it short. Just to clarify, I don't think you'll find too many in agreement with the statement that PhD's are more difficult to obtain in Europe than the US. Besides the academic rigor and the standards of outside committee members, one of the most challenging aspects of a US Ph.D. program is its "open ended" nature. In contrast to the European system where Ph.D. programs are finite in duration, one can get stuck in a US program for a heck of a long time, often up to 10-12 years. This breeds some emotional stress I think to be unique to US PhD students and make the programs much more challenging.
OK, enough rambling... my humblest of apologies for taking up your time with this off-topic rant:) |
| Message: |
Of course it is not possible to make a general statement, but since I have a foot in both the academic and the consulting world and regularly read theses that are published in my field, I think I have a relatively good insight.
The committee evaluation is the same as in Europe, one opponent to "attack" the work and an outide evaluation group. From what I have seen, however, European theses are regularly longer. My own thesis has a volume of +250 pages and is not exceptionally extensive. Another aspect is that they often are more qualitative in their nature.
BTW, also the programs in Europe do not necessarily have a pre-defined time frame, i.e. you work until you are finished (this is, however, country dependent).
Anyway, this was not meant as an offense, but reflected my own experience. Be happy to have good MBA programs, because there the US are clearly ahead.
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