Decisions Decisions

April 1, 2008 9:43 PM

Should I go to graduate school at UBC or UW-Madison? Help me decide what to do with my life!

I'm graduating from an state school in the midwest in May. I hope to continue my education to get a master's and then a PhD and (ideally) become a professor some day.

After applying to only a couple grad schools (I'm quite poor and the applications cost a lot), I ended up getting very positive responses, and am now left with a hard decision between studying at University of Wisconsin-Madison or University of British Columbia in Vancouver.

Both schools are described to me as 'top-notch' in my field. Although, I think Madison is the more prestigious one in my particular area of study. Both would end up covering all my tuition expenses and giving me a good stipend on top of that. My money is coming in the form of a research assistantship at UBC and a prestigious fellowship at Madison. In Vancouver, a more expensive city, I would probably have barely enough money to scrape by, and would have to work as a TA for 3 hours / week or possibly more to earn extra money (I have experience working as a TA, so that is not a big worry). While in Madison I would be receiving a few thousand more, and be able to live comfortably (by my standards, as I'm used to working 2 jobs and barely scraping by) without teaching at all.

I visited both schools and liked the professors I would work under. My professor at UBC does not speak english as a first language, but was easy enough to understand, friendly, and seemed very intelligent. At UBC I was unable to meet more than one grad student to question, while at Madison I met many people and they all were quite friendly and seemed like a tightly knit group. It seems like at Madison I would have contact with and help from a wider variety of professors in different fields working collaboratively, although I might also have less one-on-one attention from my adviser (at UBC I am one of only 2 students under a prof, rather than one of about 15).

The project I would be working on at UBC is more interesting to me, more in line with my previous study, has a field component, and would likely keep my attention longer.
The project at Madison is also quite interesting. It is broader in topic, and more useful in current times, possibly giving me a wider range in the future or a better resume.

As far as location goes. Both are very nice cities. I was more in love with Vancouver due to its beautiful location with beaches, mountains, forests, and everything else. The idea of moving out of the country to somewhere far away by myself is exciting, frightening, and a hassle. The diverse international community in Vancouver was wonderful, as well as the availability of all different cuisines (crepes!), and the novelty of a slightly different culture. Madison seems like it may have more of a 'college' town feel, which I've grown a little sick of over the years (I wouldn't like being older than everyone else in the city). But I do find it appealing that there will probably be many good bands passing through Madison, it might be easier to meet people/make friends there, and I do love cheeses.

So: should I go be poor in beautiful Vancouver, studying a topic that interests me very much, but has less current relevance, with a young, intelligent professor who has me as his only masters student.
Or, go be well-off in cold Madison, studying a topic that interests me less, but has more relevance, with many prestigious professors as a group of many friendly grad students?
Anyone from either school/city have extra tips for me as well?

posted by speef to education (27 comments total)

Are you admitted for a master's program in both schools? Could you continue for a PhD in either place? Is this in a humanities field, or a field with practical application in industry etc outside the university?
posted by LobsterMitten at 9:54 PM on April 1, 2008

If it's in science, COME TO MADISON.

I am a student at UW-Madison majoring in neuroscience and it is top notch.
posted by kldickson at 10:34 PM on April 1, 2008

I'd go to the school where I'd be able to study a topic that interests me. When I was in grad school, I met many, many people were were unhappy because they were stuck in a school studying something that did not appeal to them in a deep, meaningful way. Some of them dropped out, some of them stayed and became bitter, depressed, and/or burned out. Those people were known to everyone as being negative, which kept them from forming close personal and professional relationships with fellow students and professors. Grad school--especially a PhD--is mentally and physically demanding. Study what makes you happy.
posted by HotPatatta at 10:35 PM on April 1, 2008

Don't judge Madison by this winter. They had the most snow ever this year, it was the most brutal winter I can remember. Same here in Green Bay and really all over.

In other words it was an aberration.

If you are asking what school would you enjoy more over the next 2 years I don't have an opinion, I'm biased towards my own state. I love Madison but I've never been to Vancouver so I can't compare.

If you are asking about what would be best for you career then I would think Madison has the most cachet. It's really a well respected University.
posted by Bonzai at 10:43 PM on April 1, 2008

You might find this essay helpful: Advice for Undergraduates Considering Graduate School. It was written by Phil Agre, an old professor of mine and a true genius.
Good luck with your decision.
posted by HotPatatta at 10:45 PM on April 1, 2008

I think this is not really a question that AskMe can answer, because so much depends on the specifics, like your exact field and the particular departments and people involved.

But based on what you describe here I would pick Madison. It has what sounds like a more stimulating and collegial departmental environment and a significantly lighter teaching load, which means more time to work on your own research and professional development. Against that you're weighing going to a smaller department with fewer potential colleagues, just one real potential advisor (what happens if this person leaves?), and a more teaching-heavy position, to work on a less widely marketable project, because it interests you slightly more. I'd only make the decision for UBC if the research project at Madison were something you'd be so little engaged by, and so little passionate about, that your interest in it wouldn't get you through a graduate program.
posted by RogerB at 10:49 PM on April 1, 2008

I know this doesn't answer your question, but Vancouver can be done very cheaply. I be living proof.
posted by rhinny at 10:59 PM on April 1, 2008

are you a US citizen? i don't know about UBC, but at toronto nearly all the available scholarships were exclusively for canadian citizens or permanent residents. as an american on a study permit, there were very few i could even apply for. conversely, a lot of US scholarships are for students at US schools only. kind of a rock and hard place situation - it might be worth looking into.
posted by sergeant sandwich at 11:09 PM on April 1, 2008

Well jeez, at least say what field it is or something so those of us who are grad students at UBC can answer in a bit more detail... how much money are you going to make, I can tell you if you will be scraping by or not.... you like bands? Vancouver gets tons of concerts, almost everyone who tours the west coast stops by, what sort of music? You're worried about meeting people? What sort of person are you, who do you like to hang out with?

In short, welcome to AskMe speef, general questions like this can only be answered by you, but the more specific they are the more we can help you, so more info please!
posted by PercussivePaul at 11:46 PM on April 1, 2008

As far as Madison being a college town, it's also the state capitol and home of exciting companies such as Oscar Meyer--which is to say that it's more than student housing slums and undergrad bars, though it's not (obviously) a large city. I lived there for 4 years post-college and have lived in much larger cities since then, but part of me misses the scale of things there and the way daily life was pretty chill (with good ample good beer and cheese). Not to mention living on the cheap there was a lot less painful for me there than it has been living on the cheap in a major city (the apartments I lived in were twice the size for half the rent of what I now pay and my rent was on the higher end of things for Madison).

For school, I'd see if I could talk to some of the UBC grad students before making that sort of decision. TAing is a useful experience, but it can suck a lot of time away from your own work. I don't know if you got a sense of this already, but it's also good to know how long it usually takes for people to finish the program under your potential future advisors.
posted by mandymanwasregistered at 2:20 AM on April 2, 2008

If it's in science - especially computer science or electrical engineering or anything like that - Madison is the only choice.
posted by arimathea at 2:38 AM on April 2, 2008

I go to UBC and the teaching opportunity was the deciding factor for me (among Canadian schools -- I didn't look in the US), but it depends greatly on your program, your project, and how long you'd be committing to stay in the city (a masters is not a long time, you might want to consider giving 2 years to something you love over something you're not sure of and having more TA experience is always good on a CV). I like Vancouver a lot (now) but it is expensive and has its downsides.
posted by SoftRain at 2:51 AM on April 2, 2008

What are you planning to do with your graduate degree? If you plan to teach after you graduate, having the TA experience is critical (or at least, having the option to TA). On the other hand, not having to TA your first year might be nice.

Me, I'd choose Vancouver any day of the week...
posted by leahwrenn at 3:42 AM on April 2, 2008

It sounds like the biggest thing going for Vancouver is that it's beautiful. As a completely biased 19-year resident of Madison, including undergrad and grad school, I am here to tell you that Madison is gorgeous. The lakes, the outdoor activities, the Farmer's Market (year-round now!), the culture... you name it. Madison is great. Screw the weather; at least you can share it with everybody else :)
posted by Madamina at 5:20 AM on April 2, 2008

Madison has Visions :-)
posted by i_cola at 5:58 AM on April 2, 2008

Based only on the information provided, I would recommend Madison. You say you intend to go on to a Ph.D., so in some ways the master's is preparation for the Ph.D. for you. Then in that case you're better off in an environment where you have exposure to diverse faculty, other students, and research styles. You will get better preparation for the hunkering down and narrow specializing required for the Ph.D. and you will have a wider network of people to draw on in your research career. Also, people's research interests change as they get deeper into their work, and an environment that can accommodate those changes is preferable to one where you have to continue with a (now) uninteresting topic because there is nobody else to work with you on what you'd rather be doing.

You can always go to UBC for your Ph.D. or as a professor later on :)
posted by needled at 6:15 AM on April 2, 2008

speef, as someone mentioned above a little more information would help us give you more informative answers. Specifically: what field are you studying? Do you intend to work in Canada or the US?

Nevertheless, given the info that you do provide, UW seems the obvious choice to me:

(1) More money and relief from teaching. Don't underestimate the time sink that teaching can be; pursuing a degree on a prestigious fellowship frees up your time and looks much better on your CV than being paid through research assistantships.

(2) Wider variety of people to work with. Standard advice to grad school applicants is "don't go to a program just to work with one person." Your adviser may turn out to be great, but may also be a dud. At UW, you have other options and an established tight-knit community as a support network; at UBC, its not clear what other resources you have.

(3) More prestige. Given a choice between working with a young professors with no other grad students vs. a program with a number of established, prestigious professors, I would choose the latter. Also - and this will likely be controversial - like it or not, everything else being equal, American universities simply have more prestige than Canadian ones do (full disclosure: I am an American currently on the faculty at a Canadian University). If you are looking for jobs in the U.S. in the future, having UW on your resume will be better than UBC - and, ultimately, that will make you fare better in an extremely competitive academic job market.
posted by googly at 7:42 AM on April 2, 2008

Bias up front: I'm an American and I got my Masters in Computer Science from UBC last August. I opted to go to UBC over Carnegie Mellon and Johns Hopkins (among others) and have never regretted it. I did my undergrad at the University of Colorado.

So: should I go be poor in beautiful Vancouver, studying a topic that interests me very much, but has less current relevance, with a young, intelligent professor who has me as his only masters student.

Two things that stand out here are the things I highlighted. First, even a Masters degree is a pretty significant commitment to a single topic. If you're seriously about taking this all the way to a Ph.D., you're going to be wanted to be as invested in it as possible from the get go.

Second, and more importantly, being able to command more of your advisor's time can make a tremendous difference on the quality of your graduate work. This is contrary to some of the advice above. My advisor had students (3 MSc, 1 PhD), I was able to schedule weekly meetings and drop at times if I wanted to chat. Some of my colleagues' advisors had 10-12 students and this was an unceasing source of stress for them. Trying to get any kind of meeting was difficult, the feedback they received was less than fantastic. It was the real-life incarnation of Ph.D. Comics. When writing one's thesis, it's great to be left alone ... until your advisor scraps half the chapters you wrote three months before and you've got to do them all over again.

It's not through any malfeasance on the professor's part, it's just that managing the research activities of ten people, plus your own, plus your teaching duties, plus departmental politics, plus any committees you chair, etc. is a tremendous workload. Generally, the further along a professor is, the less time they're going to have for any individual student. Any "prestigiousness" on their part only compounds this.

Plus, the Vancouver is a much, much nicer city to live in ;) You're not going to be a graduate student 100% of the time, unless you plan to go insane. Vancouver's appeal above Pittsburgh and *shudder* Baltimore influenced my decision as much as the school's themselves did. It's make it very easy to immigrate to Canada as well, which is nice if that's something you'd look for at some point.

If it's in science - especially computer science or electrical engineering or anything like that - Madison is the only choice.

I'm going to disagree. Madison is good, don't get me wrong, but UBC has one of the best CS departments in Canada (along with Waterloo and UofT). The differentiation is going to come down to what your specific research interests are. Ask others have asked, what's your field of study speef?
posted by Nelsormensch at 8:05 AM on April 2, 2008

I want to point out something that hasn't been brought up yet. I don't know about Madison, but UBC is kind of a commuter campus. It's way out on the edge of the city (in a beautiful setting - on a rocky point surrounded by forests and beaches). The surrounding area is very affluent, and there is a large park separating the campus area from the rest of the city. Apart from the residences (though there are some nice ones - look up Green College), there is not much affordable housing on or near campus.

THis is a good thing and a bad thing. It's bad because most students have a lengthy bus ride each day, though the buses are good and you get a pass really cheap; also it means the campus is quiet in the evenings and doesn't feel like much is going on. It's good because it will encourage you to leave the bubble and experience the rest of the city. But on the whole I would count it as a negative.

Also, I don't know if you've visited many Canadian universities; the culture tends to be noticeably different than American universities, e.g.: very little emphasis on athletics, very few fraternities or sororities, less of a college party feeling. For me this is a strong plus for UBC, but that's a personal choice.

googly is right about the prestige of being in an American school, though. Madison gives you much better recognitiob.
posted by PercussivePaul at 8:48 AM on April 2, 2008

For whatever it's worth, I love Madison as a city. I interviewed here for a grad program, and I've been living in downtown/campus for five months. I'm going to be really sad to leave. (Decided on a Philly grad program that was a better fit.) It's cheap! I have a car, and it's really useful. But, there's "community car" action that people like.
posted by zeek321 at 9:08 AM on April 2, 2008

Since you are planning to become a professor someday this will probably require a PhD.; that being said, you need to look at the publication record of your adviser and if possible, the graduate student publication records in the program you are interested in. You need good, publishable research that will enhance your CV. If the faculty you work with has a poor publication/presentation record and does not seem to publish with their advisees that would be a red flag to me. Also, how is the faculty hire and placement of the department in your field? Do they get their grad students placed either in jobs or teaching positions? Are post-docs from the program in good places?

In my experience of civil engineering, at a research institution, you should be publishing at least 2 papers as a masters student and presenting at conferences. YMMV because you have not mentioned the field that you are entering but your decision needs to be framed by the long term goals you wish to attain and how to go about attaining it.

Also, did you research the funding issues if you decide to continue with the doctorate? Funding/resources and the ability of your adviser to acquire it also needs to play into the equation.
posted by jadepearl at 9:41 AM on April 2, 2008

As an undergrad I'm majoring in math and atmospheric science. Continuing on, a degree at UBC would be 'atmospheric science' and at Madison it would be 'land resources' or 'environmental resources' (they may be changing the name)

This is actually a con for madison, because the major there being 'interdisciplinary' requires me to take social sciences courses and such, when really I'm just a math major at heart (although I do care about the social implications of climate change and weather of course, but thats just not my area of study). I would be focusing on computer modeling and remote sensing in my research though.

I've been told by professors lately, as well as some people on here, differing things about what matters most. I was told by some that my degree name/university matters a lot, so the 'land resources' would not be great. However, I was told by another professor that all that matters is my adviser's status, publication record, and how much I like him/her.

I've also been told to not think about the amount of money (as long as its enough to live on) or how great the city is.... so I guess I'm trying to look at what would propel me to a PhD and ability to choose where to live later on. Both places have only offered me funding for 2 or 2 1/2 years. However, I've been assured that if i attend either school and do well, funding for a PhD will fall into place... I'm not sure how true this is at either.
posted by speef at 10:32 AM on April 2, 2008

I moved to Madison from Seattle to go to graduate school, and I practically kissed the snowy ground when I got there I was so happy to see the sun. I would take a thousand Madison winters over one more in the pacific northwest.
Your adviser's status and connections matter a lot, do not discount this. I think a larger department with more opportunities is almost always a better decision unless you are really, really sure you know exactly what you want to be studying. Considering you are coming right out from undergrad, it is unlikely you really know what you will want to be doing unless you decide to put on blinders and drive away at whatever opportunities present themselves.
But, it might be fun to live in a totally different part of the world from where you've done your undergrad, and if things don't work out that would be a learning experience if nothing else.
posted by ch1x0r at 8:11 PM on April 2, 2008

I'm currently an undergrad student at the University of Minnesota. Though I like the Twin Cities, I personally have been thinking about transferring next year to UBC. UBC has serious draw for me; it seems like it could make college an incredible experience.
posted by Camel of Space at 11:44 AM on April 3, 2008

Camel of Space, the grass is always greener. Undergrads here at UBC whine as much as they do everywhere else and I don't know that they would call their experience "incredible". What is it that draws you so much?
posted by PercussivePaul at 12:47 PM on April 3, 2008

It's not the city I grew up in, it has an amazing program in my major (Asian studies>japanese), it's a top university in North America, I'm guessing the people might be more of who I'm looking for, etc. Could you give me some insight about your experience? mefi mail or email
posted by Camel of Space at 1:43 PM on April 3, 2008

I think it comes down to: who is giving you more money.
posted by k8t at 3:34 AM on April 7, 2008