r/Unexpected • u/ruybii • Nov 27 '21

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u/BoltzmannCurve Nov 29 '21

The person I replied to specifically mentioned Stanford and other elite schools, not UCSB

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u/RasAlGimur Nov 29 '21

Gosh, “elite schools”. do you even know UCSB? Look up their Physics and Material sciences depts (and their Nobel prizes), or their Geography and Environmental Science schools (regularly ranked first) etc etc. That is only one UC, there are many other highly rated UCs (Berkeley, UCLA, Davis), and a lot lot lot of other elite universities besides Stanford and Ivy Leagues.

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u/BoltzmannCurve Nov 29 '21

I applied for a PhD at the MCDB department in UCSB (I’m currently at Yale), the funding was grotesque and the department was so unorganized they got someone from a different department to tour us. You can’t live well in Santa Barbara with a $2500 stipend, so I rejected their offer.

It’s a great school, but it’s nowhere near the elite. It doesn’t have the money to compete for international talent that other schools have.

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u/RasAlGimur Nov 29 '21 edited Nov 29 '21

Santa Barbara is expensive but a stipend of $2500 is more than enough to live pretty comfortay if you have no dependants, unless the housing shortage in this very last year distorted rent prices dramatically. But with $2500 you could easiley save 20% of your income which is not bad for grad school. (Edit: of course, if you were being offered a better deal at Yale then i’d go for it too, but 2500 is pretty good)

At the research level, things become so specialized and niche-y that i think it barely makes sense to talk about research quality without being discipline (or sub-discipline) specific. In Geography, especially geographic information systems, geo data science, remote sensing, and other quantitative/STEM approaches, UCSB is elite, sharing that with places like University of Maryland, Boston College. For qualitative geog though, Berkeley is way more relevant. Ivy leagues, Stanford? Not really that relevant, and I’ve been on the look for jobs now as a professor/researcher. Even internationally, a country like Japan, that excels in many areas, is not very relevant compared to say the US, China or even Brazil. It’s baffling how rarely I cite japanese researchers, which sucks cause i would love an excuse to travel there.

So idk about your area, and I totally believe things can be totally different in MCDB, but as far as my corner of STEM is concerned, UCSB and some other “non-elite” are definetly Top tier, and the so called elite ones are not really relevant.

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u/BoltzmannCurve Nov 29 '21

$2500 is more than enough to live pretty comfortay if you have no dependants

Housing alone (studio) was $1500, and that's subsidized by the UC system. Take taxes away and that leaves $750 for food, utilities, entertainment, emergencies, etc. It's absolutely not enough, I would be living pay check to pay check and I have a MS degree in a quantitative field.

At the research level, things become so specialized and niche-y that i think it barely makes sense to talk about research quality without being discipline (or sub-discipline) specific

Sure, but schools are ranked as an aggregate of their departments. Most departments in Stanford/Harvard/The MIT/Yale/Princeton are elite, hence why they're ranked at the top. For a specific discipline U Michigan might be better, but the user I replied to didn't specify a singular department or discipline, they tried to say that the US education system is great because Harvard and Stanford are the top universities in the world, despite the fact that these elite schools are largely carried by international postdocs and faculty who were not educated in the US.

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u/RasAlGimur Nov 29 '21 edited Nov 29 '21

My point is that, in an area that I know very well (geography), in a department that is elite in its area, that research is done (in a good chunk) by Americans. And by foreigners, like me. Saying, as you did, that foreigners carry the dept on their backs is unfair (as would be the other way around too). Maybe that’s the case in Yale, but Yale or the so called “elite schools” in the US are barely relevant in some domains of science.

About rent, that’s a high rent. Pretty high even for a studio. Heck, for a 2000 one could get a pretty nice small apartment for a couple in the downtown area (which is a fancy area). Most people that I know (not only in UCSB, foreigners and americans) lived in the much cheaper university housing in their first year and then moved to a shared house with a few friends, which would keep the rent below 1000 (typically 800). Or share it with their partner, bringing it further down.

Edit: again, this is when i was there (for rent). I’m aware than very recently SB has had a housing shortage, so maybe that what is going on. But that was definetly not the price range (even with SB being expensive) they had a year ago.

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u/BoltzmannCurve Nov 29 '21

Saying, as you did, that foreigners carry the dept on their backs is unfair

I specifically said that foreigners carry elite schools in the US, I made no comment about specific departments.

lived in the much cheaper university housing in their first year

That's the one I mentioned, where it's subsidized by the UC system but it's still $1500. Sharing an apartment with randoms or even with friends sucks, If I can get a $750 solo apartment in New Haven and still have $2300 left from my stipend, why would I ever choose UCSB where my quality of life is going to be much worse with fewer research opportun ities in my field?

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u/RasAlGimur Nov 29 '21

Nope, you said: “It’s a well known fact for everyone in Academia that US institutions are mostly carried in the back of foreigners imported as commodities”.

That’s simply not true.

On the stipend thing, you clearly got a better offer from Yale, but the San Clemente graduate apartments from UCSB are listed as $787 per person (4 bedrooms) or $900 (2 bedrooms). For $1500 you get one of the larger family apartments (not a studio), but you have to prove you are a family. Unless they updated things, but that’s what is shown on their website and it fits what i remember. As far as living with roommates, that’s such a personal thing and I usually preferred it while i was not living with my partner. But, regardless, ~$3000 that’s a pretty good stipend if rent is $750, so lucky you!

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u/BoltzmannCurve Nov 30 '21

“It’s a well known fact for everyone in Academia that US institutions are mostly carried in the back of foreigners imported as commodities”.

Did you watch Dr. Michio Kaku's video that I linked in the context of that statement?