no job placement outcome listed

[betahat]

Thank you for the aggregate information on Chicago, but it why doesn't Chicago publish it's full record of placements each year (i.e. a list of where everyone who was formally on the market went) as many of it's peers do?

From the aggregate we can tell things like: 51% get academic jobs, 28% of academic placements are in top 20 schools (14% of total placements are top 20). So on average around 3 of Chicago's students get a top 20 job each year.

However, we can't see if those 2-3 good placements are always in the same field, which schools in the top 20 Chicago's placing at, or the kinds of academic jobs the other 70% are getting.

We expect any top department to do well by it's top students. What happens to that next bracket of students (top 10, but not top 5)?

[econcurious]

Originally Posted by jlist

Dear Econcurious: I am sorry to hear that your friend is not having fun here at Chicago. Please let this person know that s/he can always come and talk to me about research or their other issues.

On to placements. I would be shocked if your statement "the quality of academic placements from UChicago is not that good, barely comparable to top 10-15 schools" is correct. I have summarized our statistics very clearly in my post--with data from 1994-present to back those facts.

If you truly believe that the top 10-15 schools are placing 28% of their academic placements in top 20 schools, then you should write a paper about the large number of missing professors in the top 20 schools.

Of course, my mind can be changed with data--maybe I am wrong. I look forward to receiving the data behind which you are making your inference.

Best,
John

Dear johnlist: i know for sure that in 2006, the best placement from chicago was of natalia ramondo at UTexas-Austin and that's not even top 20. there were 2 other students that were placed at the Stockholm School of Economics, which is comparable to top 30 maybe. And these were the best placements for the year! Having in mind that Chicago graduates 25-30 students per year, it seems like for 2006, 0% of them got a placement in a top 20 school. in 2005, the best placements were of Salvator Navarro at Wisconsin and of Nathaniel Baum-Snow at Brown, which I guess could count as 2 in a top 20, which is still far from 28% of students in top 20 schools. in the same year, there were a couple of students placed at BU (top 25). Dear, john list of you have more detailed data, please, feel free to contradict me. It seems like for 2 consecutive years chicago didn't place its students well, which would seem worrisome to some people.
thank you!
-econcurious

[jlist]

Dear Econcurious: I am disappointed by your post. You have listed two years of results that attempt to make your case, but then I find that you had some very important information in hand that you decided to withhold. Your post on 6-24-07 at 1:14am pasted below shows that you knew how well we did in placing students this past year--you even noted yourself in that post that UC performed well.

Why are you ignoring this information now? There are peaks and valleys in everyone's placements, and that is why UC gives long-run averages. I guess some would just advertise this most recent year because we did so well. I refuse to partake in such games.

I need to check your claims with Julie Less to see about placements those years, but again, if you have data that shows that "the quality of academic placements from UChicago is not that good, barely comparable to top 10-15 schools" please send it along and I will gladly admit that I am wrong. Noting that UC had a few bad years in no way validates your claim. What did the other top 10-15 do in these years? What about the adjacent years?

Also, another poster asked for more individual placements. I have sent that request to Julie Less.

Best,
John
06-24-2007, 01:14 AM # (I would sincerely appreciate some advice about my graduate econ admission decisions)31 (permalink (I would sincerely appreciate some advice about my graduate econ admission decisions)) econcurious vbmenu_register("postmenu_462883", true);
Eager!


Join Date: Mar 2007
Posts: 34



Quote:
Originally Posted by apropos
In fact, I find it kind of silly that you keep babbling about the University of Chicago so much. I mean, it's a great department and such, but look at their placements and compare them to other universities. I believe they sent something like 3 people as professors into major research universities this year. I believe there was one going to U Mich, one CU-Boulder, and one was something else. That's it. This was out of graduating class of over 20 people, which doesn't sound very encouraging.

Not that I am a big fan of the UChicago, but this year I heard that actually they placed one guy in Princeton, one in Northwestern, one in UPenn, one in UMichigan and a few others in top 25 schools. Better placement than most other top 5-10 schools this year except for Harvard. Not bad!
Otherwise, I agree with all that apropos said. Also, just being in a top school wouldn't make you necessarily happy. How do you know you'll like it? Just because you'll get a brand name degree IF YOU MAKE IT? Maybe you'll be happier and more productive at a lower-ranked school.

[econcurious]

Originally Posted by jlist

Dear Econcurious: I am disappointed by your post. You have listed two years of results that attempt to make your case, but then I find that you had some very important information in hand that you decided to withhold. Your post on 6-24-07 at 1:14am pasted below shows that you knew how well we did in placing students this past year--you even noted yourself in that post that UC performed well.

Why are you ignoring this information now? There are peaks and valleys in everyone's placements, and that is why UC gives long-run averages. I guess some would just advertise this most recent year because we did so well. I refuse to partake in such games.

I need to check your claims with Julie Less to see about placements those years, but again, if you have data that shows that "the quality of academic placements from UChicago is not that good, barely comparable to top 10-15 schools" please send it along and I will gladly admit that I am wrong. Noting that UC had a few bad years in no way validates your claim. What did the other top 10-15 do in these years? What about the adjacent years?

Also, another poster asked for more individual placements. I have sent that request to Julie Less.

Best,
John
06-24-2007, 01:14 AM # (I would sincerely appreciate some advice about my graduate econ admission decisions)31 (permalink (I would sincerely appreciate some advice about my graduate econ admission decisions)) econcurious vbmenu_register("postmenu_462883", true);
Eager!


Join Date: Mar 2007
Posts: 34



Quote:
Originally Posted by apropos
In fact, I find it kind of silly that you keep babbling about the University of Chicago so much. I mean, it's a great department and such, but look at their placements and compare them to other universities. I believe they sent something like 3 people as professors into major research universities this year. I believe there was one going to U Mich, one CU-Boulder, and one was something else. That's it. This was out of graduating class of over 20 people, which doesn't sound very encouraging.

Not that I am a big fan of the UChicago, but this year I heard that actually they placed one guy in Princeton, one in Northwestern, one in UPenn, one in UMichigan and a few others in top 25 schools. Better placement than most other top 5-10 schools this year except for Harvard. Not bad!
Otherwise, I agree with all that apropos said. Also, just being in a top school wouldn't make you necessarily happy. How do you know you'll like it? Just because you'll get a brand name degree IF YOU MAKE IT? Maybe you'll be happier and more productive at a lower-ranked school.

Dear john list: i didn't refer to the placement this year, because i consider it an outlier, something that happens at Chicago once every 10-15 years, and not characteristic of the placement of Chicago at all. Unlike you, I am under the impression that Chicago's placement is mostly like the one for 2005 and 2006 and very rarely a good year like 2007 occurs. It would be great if you find more specific data to show that this is not true.
-econcurious

[econphilomath]

While having better data would be great, I think the burden of the proof is on the hypothesis that Chicago does NOT place well. The reference I made before is from 2005 and leaves chicago at a decent 5th in placements. We can argue if thats enough for a program with great students and which is known for the sweat and blood of prelims but thats another story.

Regarding the interesting detailed info econcurious cited on placements in 2005 and 2006, I fine it rather shocking that placements were that low but it is only two data points and 2007 was incredible. So I don't think its conclusive evidence and would not reject my null hypothesis that Chicago is great at placing its top students on average.

[asquare]

It's also worth remembering that placement is the result of the intersection of supply and demand. It does happen some years that top schools aren't making many junior hires. So to really worry about an outlier year for an individual school, you would want to see if placements dipped for other programs as well (because you should care about relative placements).

Also, these are small numbers from which to draw sweeping generalizations! I fully realize that the small samples are all we have to go on, but it's very hard to rule out idiosyncratic factors or even one-time shocks to a department or cohort (perhaps a lot of faculty turn-over that had a negative but one-time effect on placement; perhaps a shortage of funding 5 or 6 years earlier that resulted in a weaker than average incoming cohort). I'm not suggesting that any of these things explain particular results for individual schools in specific years, but the possibilities are worth keeping in mind.

[phdseeker]

This is so twisted.

Person A claims that Chicago is much worse than other top 15 schools.

Person B (supposedly JList) says that according to the statistics Chicago is doing pretty well in the last 15 years and challenges Person A to provide statistics for his claim.

Person C verifies what Person B is saying with an academic report from a third party.

Person A responds by saying that his own personal evidence, upon throwing out 33.3% of his data, suggests that Person B's school does not do as well as he would like, saying nothing about the other 14 schools.

Person B says that one should be careful about throwing away useful data, and urges Person A to provide data on the other 14 schools.

It is clear to me now that Person B is not JList from Chicago. No professor of his league would put time in with someone so nonsensical (if he does he needs to find a life). List's five year old could present a more logical argument than this guy, who seemingly wants to make his arguments by throwing away data that do not support his claim. My advisor told me that one should never say an observation is an outlier, and throw it out, if it refutes one's hypothesis.

My advisor also told me that he knows List well, and that he would never spend time on this forum. He said that it is likely List's grad. assistants working here, who are very close with List and report back to him.

[Guest Who]

Although my word means little to nothing to most, I can confirm that it is indeed John List posting. (I emailed him a year or two ago to inform him that someone was posting as him; he told me it was him. We'd had prior communication, for what it's worth.)

By posting on this board Professor List is providing a valuable service: the perspective of someone who's actually informed about the subjects being discussed. To me, this is a welcome respite from the usual (undergraduate) droll about needing a background in differential manifolds and other misguided hearsay.

Originally Posted by phdseeker

This is so twisted.

Person A claims that Chicago is much worse than other top 15 schools.

Person B (supposedly JList) says that according to the statistics Chicago is doing pretty well in the last 15 years and challenges Person A to provide statistics for his claim.

Person C verifies what Person B is saying with an academic report from a third party.

Person A responds by saying that his own personal evidence, upon throwing out 33.3% of his data, suggests that Person B's school does not do as well as he would like, saying nothing about the other 14 schools.

Person B says that one should be careful about throwing away useful data, and urges Person A to provide data on the other 14 schools.

It is clear to me now that Person B is not JList from Chicago. No professor of his league would put time in with someone so nonsensical (if he does he needs to find a life). List's five year old could present a more logical argument than this guy, who seemingly wants to make his arguments by throwing away data that do not support his claim. My advisor told me that one should never say an observation is an outlier, and throw it out, if it refutes one's hypothesis.

My advisor also told me that he knows List well, and that he would never spend time on this forum. He said that it is likely List's grad. assistants working here, who are very close with List and report back to him.

[shootermcgavin7]

Originally Posted by shootermcgavin7

Reactor, is there any way we could get a sticky about the EconWiki site? I didn't know it existed and I could envision it becoming a valuable resource, much like econphd.net is/was, perhaps even more so as econphd was contingent on a single very busy person updating it.

Originally Posted by Antichron

I second that motion.

Originally Posted by GymShorts

Since it has not become sticky yet, I shall third that motion.

So, about that sticky........

[SoulSearchingEconomist]

Sorry, this is a little off-topic:

What's the starting salary and salary trajectory for those 'top placements' from even the best of schoools? A professor of mine went to Stanford and now works for the gov't (DOJ); is there any way that the payoff (gov't bureaucracy, pay and advancement potential) is worth the sacrifice of 5+ yrs without a steady salary?

Thanks