PhD | Geographical Perspectives

How to Contact a Professor and Potential Research Advisor

If you’re thinking about going to graduate school in geography and you’re a regular reader you know I promote the idea of finding the right professor to advise you rather than only looking for a good graduate program. I also suggest contacting potential research advisors as part of your admission campaign.

This passage below (an answer written by Barry Rountree on Quora) is the best advice I’ve seen for making initial contact with a Professor you’d like to work with in graduate school.

Dear Dr. Q,

I have read your papers X, Y and Z and have a few questions about how the work might be extended. Should I send these questions to one of your Ph.D. students or may I send them to you directly?

Many thanks,

Your name here.

In two sentences, you have demonstrated that:
1. You know what the professor is working on and you have a significant interest in it.
2. You have the capability to read peer-reviewed papers
3. You have the capability to think beyond what’s in the paper to what future papers might look like.
4. You understand that the professor is a busy person, and that a graduate student might be more responsive. If you impress the graduate student, the professor will hear about it.
5. You have the tact to develop a bit of a relationship first before asking about coming onboard as a Ph.D. student.

You might object that you don’t know what kind of research you want to do. If that’s the case, why would an advisor take you on?

You might object that you don’t really care what work you do, you just need admitted into a Ph.D. program. Again, why would an advisor take you on, especially if the choice was between you and someone who had a passion for their research area?

Finally, you might object that having to read and think hard about three papers just to find out that the professor doesn’t have any funding for students is not a good use of your time. As reading papers and thinking hard about them is something you’ll be spending the rest of your career doing, raising this objection might indicate that a Ph.D. is not a good fit.

To sum up all of the above: promotions are an external validation that you’re already doing the work required by your new job description. Getting accepted into a Ph.D. program is just another promotion. You don’t need to be great at research (there are further milestones to demonstrate that), but you should be able to show that you have the capability of doing research. To demonstrate that to a particular professor, read their work and comment on it intelligently.

Very few prospective students do this (perhaps because very few prospective students are able to do this). But the ones who do get noticed.

Hi Justin,

First of all, I would like to thank you for sharing such good articles that help us a lot in our decision making process.

I am from Brazil and when I was an undergrad I studied for a year in the US where I took a course on the foundations of GIS and after that I spent a semester learning more about the applications of GIS in natural resources.

I went on to earn an M.S. on Forest Engineering in Brazil with focus on hydrology, water quality, remote sensing and GIS. Now I am looking for a PhD program in the US that would allow me to better understand how GIS works, how to program and develop an open source GIS-based water resources management system that I could implement in my country later on.

Do you know any program that would contain the research line that I have mentioned?

Thank you so much in advance,

Maciel

Dear Maciel,

Applying to PhD programs is an exercise in finding a compatible research mentor. Rather than looking for the best program/department or University you should be searching for a professor who shares your research interests and, ideally, has the ability to support your research with grant funding. At the very least you need to receive a teaching assistant appointment that covers tuition and pays a modest stipend. If you’re paying tuition in pursuit of a PhD you’re doing it wrong.

Here are seven steps to follow:

Decide on a research focus area and, preferably, a specific research question/topic you intend to pursue. If you don’t know for sure you’re probably not ready for a PhD campaign.
Read the salient literature in your chosen sub-field. You can begin by simply doing a keyword search in Google Scholar. Try searching for “water resources management” and “GIS” or similar. Find the most interesting articles and read them. Then look for more recent articles to learn about current research threads. By the way, if you find yourself hating this exercise in exploring the research literature you may want to rethink your decision to go after a PhD.
Once you’ve waded far enough into the literature you should be able to identify some of the key researchers in your field (if not, keep reading). Find out where these researchers work. Many will not be in Departments of Geography. They may be Civil Engineers or Earth Scientists. The interdisciplinary nature of most research in geography means there will be contributors from a variety of disciplines. If you’re set on a geography PhD then list the key researchers who are faculty in Departments of Geography. Capture their contact info.
Prepare a brief statement of research interests and a cv. Keep it short and simple. Think business card rather than autobiography. Send an email to the professors you have identified in step #3. The email should also be very brief. These are busy people. If you write them a novel they won’t read it. Your goal in the email is to capture their attention and ask about opportunities to work with them. If they aren’t looking for students they may know who is looking. If you don’t hear back from them right away don’t be put off. Like I said, these are busy people. You may have to be a squeaky wheel to get their attention. Be polite but persistent.
Hopefully you will be able to have a productive dialogue to help point you in the right direction. If you’re lucky you’ll make a connection with a good researcher and begin to form an idea where you’d like to study. Apply to these programs. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Apply to multiple programs.
If at all possible try to visit the programs that interest you most. Call the Department in advance and see if you can schedule a meeting. Visit the professor(s) you’ve contacted. Remind them who you are and what you’re interested in doing. Express your enthusiasm. Don’t waste their time. This is a golden opportunity to learn more about where to apply, who is working on the latest and greatest, who would be good to work for and who wouldn’t. Listen carefully. If you can’t afford to visit in person then try a few phone calls. You might catch them at their desk in a good mood.
If you’ve done the legwork, aced the GRE and submitted strong applications articulating your fit with the department then you should be in good position to receive an offer. If you have more than one offer, congratulations! Choose the best fit. Select the best offer with the program where you think you can be successful. This will take several years and you don’t want to be miserable. Don’t be distracted by my rankings or by ideas of prestige or notoriety. Choose the place where you think you’ll be happy.

That’s it! Hope this helps some of the prospective PhDs out there … especially Maciel.

How to get into Graduate School: 3 Secrets to Success

Since I started blogging about careers in GIS and graduate programs in geography I’ve received many emails and comments from people who want to get into grad school. Many of them don’t really know where to start. When I started thinking about grad school back in 1991-1992 I didn’t know where to start either. If I could go back in time, here are the three key insights I’d share with my younger, better-looking self.

Before I get into the 3 insider secrets let’s define what I mean by grad school. The type of grad school I’m talking about here is a research-oriented Master’s or PhD program. I’m not talking about Medical School, Law School, B-School (except if you’re going for a PhD in Business rather than an MBA). Engineering school may well be a completely different world as well.

My PhD is in geography so my experience is most relevant to those considering a Master’s or PhD in geography. That said, geography is unique and I’m a bit of an oddity as well. Geography cuts across social sciences and physical sciences and shares some sliver of an academic Venn diagram with Computer Science, Statistics and perhaps even Visual Art and Graphic Design (via Cartography). In my case, I had a Professor of Computer Science on my dissertation committee. I took grad level courses in Economics and Business Statistics and for 5 years I worked closely with PhDs in Operations Research and Supply Chain Management. I also worked for the USGS and interacted with environmental science types for 2 years. So I think it’s safe to claim some ability to provide guidance outside the realm of geography. However, you will need to decide for yourself how applicable my experience is to your particular field of study.

Secret Tip #1. Grad school is an apprenticeship. If you think about grad school as another set of courses to take with a project or thesis to write at the end, similar to the typical undergraduate college experience, you’re missing the mark. The best way to approach grad school is to think of your advisor as a mentor who will help to train you in a particular area of research. This is most certainly true at the PhD level and you’ll get more from your studies if you treat a Master’s degree the same way.

In addition, this has implications for selecting target academic departments. Rather than exploring different programs you should be evaluating different professors as potential mentors. Most students, I think, spend a lot of time weighing the pros and cons of various programs, departments, and Universities. And I don’t mean to dismiss this approach all together. In fact, it’s critical to find a department and a University where you can be successful. But, in my opinion, your choice of advisor is more important than any other consideration. This means that in searching for the right graduate school you should focus first and foremost on finding the right professor to become your research mentor. Turns out that this is good practice for graduate school generally and for research specifically because you need to start by conducting a literature review. This forces you to read research articles and identify an area where you’d like to make a contribution. Along the way you’ll begin to identify key players in your field of interest. Write down their names. Find out where they teach. Look at their CV. Read their papers. Send them an email. Try to reach them by phone. Meet them at a conference. Offer to buy coffee or lunch. Ask if they need a hard-working grad student to help advance their research agenda. Don’t be annoying but be persistent. This will put you on their radar screen. And, as you’ll see below, you don’t want to be anonymous when you apply for admission.

Secret Tip #2. Standardized scores are critical. It’s not really fair but it’s the reality facing admissions committees in any department that receives far more applicants than spots available. It’s not fair because standardized tests are culturally biased. If your cultural background is markedly different than most of middle America it can be a challenge to achieve a good score. If you’re a lousy test taker coming from middle America you’re in even worse shape because members of the committee won’t be able to excuse a low score.

Why are test scores so important? Because the logistics of admissions make it so. Here’s the reality. A graduate department admissions committee might consist of 2-3 faculty and 1-2 grad student assistants. Let’s say the committee has 20 spots available for new students and receives 120 applications. First the committee will likely have a few slam dunk candidates (try to be this type). Maybe a professor has already expressed a desire to bring in 1 or more students (see Secret #1 above to join this crowd) or maybe a student has already secured their own external funding (via NSF grant or comparable). These applicants, let’s say 5 of them, are already in and now you’re down to only 15 spots available from 115 applicants. Wouldn’t it be nice at this point if the committee read each and every application package word for word and thought long and hard about how successful the candidate might be? Yes, it would be nice. But it would take too much time. So, what does an admissions committee do? They rank the candidates. What’s the easiest/best way to rank candidates? Standardized test scores.

Wait, why don’t grades matter as much or more? Well, because how do you compare a straight A student who graduated with honors from East Tennessee State University to a student who graduated with a 3.1 GPA from Dartmouth? How do you compare a Film Studies major with a 3.8 GPA to a Mechanical Engineering major with a 2.9 GPA? You tell me who’s the better prospective grad student. Not so easy is it?

And what about the applicants personal statement? Doesn’t that matter? Yes, it’s the tie-breaker. So, after the insider admits (again, see Secret #1) the committee will likely group the remaining applicants as follows: (1) top candidates, (2) middle of the pack and (3) no chance. So the “no chance” group is tossed out right away. No one probably even bothers to read their entire application packet because their GRE scores are so low. It’s sad, yes, because some of these applicants may have been very successful. But do you think the tenured Associate Professor who chairs the admission committee is going to get promoted to full Professor based on diligent student admissions efforts? Nope. Let’s say there are 25 applicants in the “no chance” group. So now we’re left with 90 remaining candidates in the “top candidates” and “middle of the pack” groups. Who are these top candidates? They are probably the applicants who scored highest on the GRE, with a few exceptions. So the committee will scrutinize this top group looking for reasons to exclude someone. Maybe they toss out a few but 10 applicants in the top group are given the green light for admission. That leaves 5 spots to fill from a pool of 80 remaining applicants. So now the committee members go to work combing through these applications to see who rises to the top. Let’s say each member of the committee dedicates a full 15 minutes to each application packet. That’s 20 hours of work. Or 5+ hours each for a 4-person committee. Maybe they have a week to come up with recommendations and meet again for another hour or two to make decisions.

So, you can see that it’s difficult to stand out. Your personal statement is absolutely critical. Your GPA is critical too. It helps to have attended a well-respected undergraduate institution. But, due to ease of use in the ranking/sorting process, I would argue that your GRE or GMAT is the most important factor if you are applying “anonymously”, meaning you failed to take my recommended approach in Secret #1.

Secret Tip #3. If you’re not offered funding you probably should not attend. If you’re going for a research Master’s or a PhD your studies should be funded by the department in exchange for teaching or research and/or related administrative work. This is the standard arrangement. If you’re admitted but expected to pay full tuition my advice is don’t go.

This is perhaps the biggest difference between research-oriented grad school and MD, JD, MBA and other professional programs. The best MA/PhD candidates don’t pay tuition. This is one reason why I think the PhD is a great path even if you aren’t after a tenure track professor gig. The education is outstanding and it’s “free” or at least you walk away debt free. This is in stark contrast to the high-flying doctors, lawyers and bankers who make bigger bucks but typically must pay off big grad school debt as well.

There are certainly exceptions to this rule. Sometimes it makes sense to pay full-fare for a Master’s degree that will set you up for the best possible PhD opportunities. But, generally speaking, if you are granted admission but the department doesn’t consider you worthy of a teaching or research assistant position, you’re better off waiting a year to try again or going elsewhere.

It’s not just the financial part of the equation; there is also an important perceptual difference. You won’t be thought of as a colleague by faculty if you’re paying tuition and attending classes like an undergrad. On the other hand, if you’re helping to teach or do research and you’re involved in department activities the faculty will think of you as part of the starting line-up. And when you’re a starter you get to play (and learn) more than those sitting on the bench.

There are certainly other considerations and probably many more insider secrets that I don’t know. But, these 3 tips just might set you far enough apart from the field to grab the attention of a professor in your field of interest. And finding the right advisor can make all the difference.

I was lucky enough to find a great mentor who was willing to give me a chance. His gamble and guidance certainly made all the difference in my career.

2013 Geography Graduate Program Rankings

About a year ago I posted a ranking of top geography programs based on the NRC survey of U.S. doctoral programs. There were some complaints about the rankings, which I suppose is inevitable. Some expressed concern simply because their program of choice wasn’t included. But, a more legitimate thread of concern came from those who worried that programs focused heavily on Physical Geography were given greater weight by the NRC due to some advantages with grant funding. In response, I created a survey and collected responses through 2012. In addition, I collected data on the PhD granting institution of current tenure-track professors and normalized by size of program in terms of number of full-time faculty. Then, I combined these three criteria and compiled a new set of program rankings.

[highlight color=”options: yellow, black”]I have now produced 2014 GIS Graduate Program Rankings and, more recently, 2015 Top Graduate Programs for Spatial Careers . Please check out these newer rankings! [/highlight]

Unlike the previous rankings, for which I could blame the NRC for any problems, these rankings are all my own and I take full responsibility for leaving your favorite program off the list. You can post your displeasure in the comments section below. Note, however, that programs that do not offer a PhD in geography were excluded from consideration. Also, please note the following caution for prospective graduate students copied from the 2012 rankings post: selecting a graduate program is an individual decision and the top programs listed here may not be the best program for you.

So, without further ado, here are my 2013 rankings of top Geography Graduate Programs.

UC Santa Barbara http://www.geog.ucsb.edu/
Colorado http://www.colorado.edu/geography/
Penn State http://www.geog.psu.edu/grad/
Ohio State http://www.geography.ohio-state.edu/
Wisconsin http://www.geography.wisc.edu
UCLA http://www.geog.ucla.edu/
Clark http://www.clarku.edu/departments/geography/
Boston University http://geography.bu.edu/
Oregon http://geography.uoregon.edu/
UC Berkeley http://geography.berkeley.edu
Arizona State http://geography.asu.edu/
Washington http://depts.washington.edu/geog
Maryland http://www.geog.umd.edu/
Illinois http://www.geog.uiuc.edu
Minnesota http://www.geog.umn.edu
SUNY Buffalo http://www.geog.buffalo.edu/
Arizona http://geog.arizona.edu
North Carolina http://www.unc.edu/depts/geog/
South Carolina http://www.cas.sc.edu/geog/
Syracuse http://www.maxwell.syr.edu/geo

Honorable mention: Iowa, Georgia, Oregon State, Michigan State, Indiana, Kentucky, Texas, Kansas

I look forward to hearing your thoughts and comments. If you would like to have your opinion on top programs included in future rankings please complete this survey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/SG75772

Spatial Career Guide – Geographic Information Scientist

This is my fourth post in the Spatial Career series. In previous posts I’ve written about how to prepare for a career as a GIS Software Developer, as a Geospatial Analyst, and as a Cartography/Visualization Specialist. In this post I will describe how to prepare for a career as a Geographic Information Scientist.

The most important word in this job title is “Scientist”. If you love GIS and maps and geography that doesn’t mean you will love being a scientist. The most successful GIScience people are scientific researchers who happen to be interested in geographic data. So, you should love the idea of doing science as much as or more so than gazing at maps and other representations of spatial data. It also means you should be pretty good at math, an excellent technical writer and a voraciously curious investigator (so much so that you’re willing to spend hour after hour combing through volumes of scientific literature). Beyond that, you have to be highly specialized in a particular thread of scientific inquiry. You might be interested in computational methods or cognitive science. Or, you might specialize in a particular physical science or social science discipline and focus your efforts on developing new spatial methods that will allow researchers in the discipline to pose and answer new questions.

As a scientist you are most likely to find a job in government or in academics. You can find opportunities in the private sector, and the opportunities here may grow, but they are often tied to the same sources of grant funding or they involve collaboration with government/academic scientists and you’ll be judged by similar criteria as you advance within your organization. In any case, unless you become an entrepreneur (which could be a great way to go if you have the right combination of skills – probably worthy of a separate blog post), you’ll be working on building a CV (rather than a resume) and you’ll want to publish as much as possible.

I think the best way to provide guidance for this path is to study a bit about current GIS-oriented scientists who are successful in the field. Hopefully this will help illustrate some of the options available as well as some of the common threads. So, I would encourage you to learn as much as possible about top GIS scientists. Here are a few key players that come to mind for me along with links to their web pages. This isn’t meant to be comprehensive or a ranking or anything (names are listed in alphabetical order). This is simply meant to get you started.

For a more complete list of top GIScientists, take a look at the program committee for the upcoming GIScience 2012 conference. Find their CVs and read about what they studied, where they earned their PhDs, what positions they’ve held and what they’ve published. This will paint a picture and provide a set of possible road maps.

After reading about some of these successful scientists, you might note that they fall into a few different categories. You’ll want to learn about the different topics of interest within GIScience. Here’s a quote from the GIScience.org website describing the vast array of topics:

“GIScience brings together leading researchers from all disciplines to reflect the wide spectrum of scientific research areas such as cognitive science, computer science, engineering, geography, information science, mathematics, philosophy, psychology, social science, environmental sciences, and statistics.”

So what should you do as an undergrad to prepare for a career in Geographic Information Science? Well, this may not go over well with some of my fellow geographers, but I would recommend majoring in something other than geography as an undergrad and then plan to study geography in graduate school. So if you want to become a computational scientist focused on geoinformatics you should probably study computer science as an undergrad. If you’re going to focus on quantitative methods you should consider a major in mathematics or statistics. For cognitive science, perhaps you would want to major in psychology or neuroscience. If you want to follow a path like Dawn Wright, study oceanography or another earth science so you can blend an understanding of that science with GIS-related methodologies. And so on and so forth. If there is a geography department on campus I would certainly take a few courses in geography. Rather than recommend a particular subject I would try to find out who the best geography faculty are at your college/university and take whatever they are teaching. You might take an intro class and then one or two higher level courses. Or, if you’re ambitious, just ask the professor if you can register for an advanced course without the prerequisites. In advance, simply purchase the intro level textbooks and read them. Wow, what a concept – reading the material instead of listening to a set of lectures! Should save both time and money.

If you’re going to be a scientist you should plan now to attend graduate school for at least a Master’s degree and probably a PhD. For graduate school, you should choose first and foremost an advisor that does the kind of science you want to do. If that advisor is housed in a department of geography, you’ll learn all the geography you need to know. In fact, not having been taught geography as an undergrad may work to your advantage. My advisor told me that he was happy that I didn’t need to “unlearn” some concepts that are frequently taught but confusing or misleading. Furthermore, if you come to grad school with a degree in a different scientific discipline you’ll have a unique perspective that may provide an advantage when it comes time to select a research focus. Often the most fertile ground for new discovery is found at the intersection of multiple fields.

I suppose that this post is a bit less concrete than previous career-related pieces I’ve written. If you’re somewhat undecided about what to study as an undergrad but want to pursue this path and need something more specific, then here’s a recipe that should work for most:

1. Major in mathematics, computer science or physics. These majors are available at almost all universities and will provide solid quantitative training and a good base to build from regardless of your career trajectory. If you’re not interested in any of these subjects you may not be interested in a career in GIScience either.

2. Volunteer to help a professor with a research project or sign up for independent study and do your own project. Ideally, the result would be a research paper. If it’s really good, maybe submit to a journal for publication. If you get published while an undergrad you’re a slam dunk for grad school admission. The project doesn’t necessarily need to be a GIScience topic with a GIScience professor. The idea is to see if you like doing research. Same with #3 below.

3. Attend an academic/scientific conference. Even if you don’t present work, this is a good idea because it will expose you to an important part of academic life (and the “unique” social behavior of academic types). Better yet, take your research from step #2 above and present your work. Learning how to do a presentation will end up being more valuable than any single class you’ll take in college. And, don’t worry about not being an expert. Just talk about what you know and make your presentation easy to understand. I’ve seen a lot of presentations by people who are clearly intelligent but can’t manage to make their findings coherent or comprehensible. I’ve also seen a few presentations that were a disaster in all possible ways. No one humiliates these presenters and no one will humiliate you either. Gain experience early in this important arena.

4. Talk to Assistant Professors about what it’s like to become a scientist and/or an academic. Read books like a A PhD Is Not Enoughand Getting What You Came Forand other similar books. Becoming a scientist is a huge time commitment. Go in with your eyes open and be prepared for a long haul. You won’t be able to sustain the momentum necessary to charge through the PhD let alone tenure review if you don’t have some love in your heart for science and academics. Find out the real scoop. It may not be as glamorous as you think. Or maybe it’s better than you thought possible.

5. Have fun and take some classes that you’ll enjoy even if they won’t add to your scientific credentials. You’re going to be in school for a long time and you won’t make much money for several years so lighten up. Be a fun, happy scientist who loves their work and enjoys the process of discovering and sharing knowledge. Try not to be an arrogant pain-in-the-ass scientist who takes themselves too seriously and craves recognition and respect above all else. I’ve seen both types and, believe me, you want to be the former.

I hope this helps. GIScience is gaining in importance and I don’t see that trend changing anytime soon. If you dream of a tenure track professorship at a major university, I think this is probably your best bet within the discipline of geography.

Top Geography Departments – Preliminary Survey Results

I’ve now received a grand total of 11 completed surveys. I still need a lot more to achieve some sort of reasonable sample size so please take the survey. In the meantime, here are some preliminary results.

The top 5 Geography Departments as submitted by survey participants are (drum roll please):

UC Santa Barbara
Penn State
Colorado
Arizona State
Ohio State

These are not terribly consistent with the NRC-based rankings. Penn State and Colorado make the top 5 in both lists (so far) but there are major differences, for example Maryland (#2 NRC) isn’t even in the top 10 at this point.

Which top 5 list makes more sense to you? And if your favorite departments aren’t where they should be take the survey so your votes can count.

Survey: What are the Top Geography Departments in the US?

Recently I compiled a ranking of the Top 20 Geography Departments in the US using the National Research Council’s assessment of doctoral programs. There were some big changes from the last rankings and I received several comments questioning some of the results. I thought it would be fun to conduct a survey and see how the results compare to the NRC rankings.

So, I created a survey to find out what you think. It should only take a few minutes to complete. Click here to take the survey!

There’s space within the survey to provide suggestions but feel free to use the comments section below as well.

Thanks for participating!

Big Changes in Geography Department Rankings

Yesterday I posted my Top 20 Geography Department Rankings. There were some big changes since the last time that the NRC produced rankings and I thought it would be interesting to look at how some departments have moved up and down. So, I compared the 1995 rankings with the 2010 rankings and prepared the list below. Boston University made the biggest improvement while the University of Minnesota took the biggest plunge.

Top 20 Graduate Geography Programs in the U.S.

[highlight color=”options: yellow, black”]This post was written in February 2012. Since then I’ve posted 2013 Geography Program Rankings, 2014 GIS Graduate Program Rankings and, more recently, 2015 Top Graduate Programs for Spatial Careers . Please check out these newer rankings! [/highlight]

I love lists and, especially, ranked lists. Even though I never seriously considered going to medical school or engineering school I was always very interested to find out which programs were ranked at the top. I routinely read the US News & World Report annual rankings of top colleges and graduate programs and I’ve since followed the Wall Street Journal and Economist MBA rankings. When I became interested in pursuing a graduate degree in geography, I was disappointed to find that there were no publications that ranked graduate geography programs. So, I’ve decided to create my own rankings and post them here.

The only available basis for developing rankings of graduate geography programs (that I’m aware of – please comment if you can suggest another good source) comes from the U.S. National Research Council’s survey of doctoral programs. Although some have been critical of the methodology used to develop the rankings, this is as good as it gets for small disciplines like geography. [If you don’t like the rankings below, take my survey and let your opinion be counted!]

Unfortunately, because these rankings were produced by academic types who are masters of creating difficult-to-understand prose for publication in peer review journals, you almost need a PhD to interpret their rankings. So, I’ve tried to clarify these rankings by simply aggregating them together to form a single ranking. So, without further ado, here are my top 20 geography programs in the United States: