animal_spirits

Thanks, decision_09, for completely validating my decision to make a new account for this. I'm not the least bit sorry for asking the questions I did, but I am relieved to not have my name associated with them.

Bored - Thanks for the concrete example of Sims. That's consistent with what I know about the job market - a good letter can get you an interview but not a job. So maybe the guy who made that critique knew about Sims and generalized from there or maybe there are more examples. ... which is why I made this new account. As long as I'm anonymous, though, people's defensiveness is really helpful. It got this thread a lot of attention and led to some really well-constructed rebuttals of those concerns. I'm sorry (kind of) for pissing people off, but I didn't make up those rumors and it's better to air them out then to let people assume they're true.

I guess I have no way of proving it but I am not this "biker" guy. I think the concerns I raised are wholly legitimate. I also think they've been answered to my satisfaction. Some of what biker said is ridiculous - they just hired Thornton and I don't see her leaving before getting tenure, so 5 years minimum. However, nobody has seriously attempted to respond to his other concerns about faculty movement, other than to claim that he is me.* -as *I'm kind of proud that I've got that sort of evil reputation.

No. I actually have a very compelling offer from them. I made a new account to ask this because I'm worried about anonymity. I don't want to piss people off and have them know it's me. asquare - do you really think I should have asked Lam about this stuff in person? Honestly? I'm sure he would have wanted to know who told me this stuff and where they work, which would be awkward as hell. Shit, I think he would have taken it personally. That means no straight answers and he resents me for asking. I can think of no better place to air out nasty rumors than an anonymous message board. That said, I think you've rebutted the major concerns pretty thoroughly which is what I wanted. One issue: you say the attrition rate is not zero but my impression is that it's close. At the flyout current students said that the prelim pass rate was very high and that they couldn't think of anyone who passed the prelims and didn't finish. Do you have ballpark numbers on this?

Some bad things floating around about Michigan's program: Over-selling/over-placement of job market candidates. A professor at another institution said he thought Michigan's success with placements lately was partly the result of over-selling candidates. He asserted that many recently placed grads were bombing in their new positions and that this might come back to bite the department (and future students) in the ***. Alternatively they may be able to use the good placements to attract better students and the gamble may pay off. The possibility that they are bullshitting in their rec letters and that this might hurt future job market candidates is very disturbing. Weak long-term financial position. Compared to its peers the department appears flush with money now but the economic prospects for the whole state of Michigan look dismal. If this impacts the department in will have repercussions in terms of faculty hires and the department's ability to attract and fund good students in the future. Too easy/attrition rate too low. Apparently almost everyone graduates, which sounds good on the surface. However, my advisor claimed I would be better off at a place with a higher attrition rate because the students that "should" have been weeded instead remain in the program using up resources. Anyone know the truth about any of this stuff? Full disclosure: they are on my short list of schools for the fall although based on these rumors I'm tempted to go elsewhere.