Does it matter where a PhD is done? - (Nov/22/2011 )

Just curious for everyone's thoughts, how important/not does the university/institute/college where you do your PhD play?

Does it matter if your university is the best is the country or top 10 etc?

What about having an experienced professor as opposed to a junior scientist as your supervisor?

At the end of the day, a PhD is a PhD yes/no?

although the ranking of your university seems to get more important, the decisive factor usually is the quality of your supervisor - and there are excellent supervisors who are young group leaders and bad supervisors who are well established senior scientist - and vice versa. Most important is that you think you can spend 4/5 years with your supervisor and the people in the lab - because I have seen many people choosing their supervisor by reputation who did hate their PhD and who were really unhappy in the groups.
So in my eyes its supervisor/group first, then topic, and then the institution. If you like what you are doing and where you are doing it you will be more productive which will in the end define your chances.

I second what Geb said.
Really, is always better to join a group you like rather than ranking.

I am new joining here and it is my first post.I have the same question does it matter where your phd done.I am asking this again because recently i got a phd position in a institute which is top rated in india but when it comes to pI he is average in his field with few international publications with a impact factor of 2 and the area is reproductive endocrinology but he will give freedom to think and execute is it good to join his lab

venkateswararao nuthakki on Wed Jul 2 07:17:36 2014 said:

I am new joining here and it is my first post.I have the same question does it matter where your phd done.I am asking this again because recently i got a phd position in a institute which is top rated in india but when it comes to pI he is average in his field with few international publications with a impact factor of 2 and the area is reproductive endocrinology but he will give freedom to think and execute is it good to join his lab

It also depends on other options....

Its hard to tell. 

Venkatesh, 

Welcome to Forum! 

If you are confident that this PI will allow you freedom to think and execute your experiments, then you must go ahead and join the lab. This holds true, if you are a person who likes to work independently and under minimal supervision. 

A lot of PhD candidates like the 'freedom speech' from their PIs at first but later complain about the lack of supervision they get from them. Investigators can get pretty busy at times, bigger the institute bigger are their responsibilities as well. The good thing is that he, too, is looking for increase his publication record, so your work should be helpful for him and both of you can grow together.