Is a PhD harder than a Masters or Bachelors? Not what you think!
Вставка
- Опубліковано 5 лип 2024
- Here are the five ways to work out if a PhD is harder than a Masters or a bachelor's degree. I have been through every academic level and a PhD is very different from a bachelor's in a variety of ways. Here's what you need to know.
▼ ▽ Sign up for the newsletter
Join 5,000+ email subscribers receiving the free tools and academic tips directly from me.
Sign up is FREE: academiainsider.com/newsletter/
▶ Get my eBook: The Ultimate Academic Writing Toolkit: academiainsider.com/peer-revi...
▶ Recommended Apps, Books and Courses: academiainsider.com/recommend...
▶ Join my members-only insider community: academiainsider.com/community/
▶ BUY ME A COFFEE ☕ and get 4 BONUSES: andrewstapleton.com.au/coffee
................................................
▼ ▽ TIMESTAMPS
0:00 - what you actually do
3:59 - what you need to achieve
8:23 - the voices in your head
12:04 - structure
13:42 - age related issues
................................................
▼ ▽ TOOLS
▶ Best PhD Writing Tool - Writefull - link.andrewstapleton.com.au/w... (Get 10% off with my link)
▶ Avoid plagiarism - Quillbot - link.andrewstapleton.com.au/Q...
![Biggest No-Nos for PhD students [10 to AVOID!]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/phVlIdFR5CU/mqdefault.jpg)
I have a full-time job and doing PhD part time. I totally agree with you on PhD students delaying adulthood. People I met during PhD tend to sound (even look) 5-10 years younger than peeps I met while working in the industry, even if they are the same age. Some of them have the life outlook of undergrad students while working people are thinking about retirement funds, real estate & having family etc. Not saying the latter is necessarily better, just an observation.
I found undergrad to be more difficult academically: so many courses to only take bits and pieces of information from and the answer can't be "I don't know at this time, let me follow up with you after this"
Graduate school is more difficult mentally: handling your own pace, rigor, advisor, academic politics, rolling the dice on every grant/paper submission if the reviewer is having a good day, and having your success/future be measured on the gamed system of publications.
I found my master to be easier than undergrad . When you become a master , ideally you should be able to accurately plan , design, execute and analyse any scientific experiment within your filed. I just finished my masters in biotechnology and started my own business based on it. Thanks for all your advice along the way Andy , really provided clairvoyance.
I got higher grades and found it easier to do both of my Master's than my Bachelor's. I think it was partly my interest in the subject and also I was older when I did the Masters
For me it’s the opposite though, I didn’t really like writing exams and taking lectures, though I learned the trick of getting good grades. But in research I feel it’s creative and less boring, we will have new things to think about every day.
Which PhD degree did you get?
Undergrad is a lot of hard work due to courses and the need to get good grades. But phd has uncertainty which results in stress and melancholia
You hit the nail on the head with feeling like you are held back because everyone else is moving forward and doing well in their careers! I’m still glad I chose this path! One week to submission :-) thanks for your videos they are great!
I like that you addressed the "aging issue." Yeah...delaying the "real world" interactions may be a hard decision, yet I was thinking about the changing physical adaptability for intensive work. When I was in my undergrad, I could easily work from morning to the middle of the night without a break except to relieve myself, and now I felt exhausted after a few hours of work and the need to relax for a bit. Like you said, people need to balance their life and work during postgraduate years because there are no more nagging TAs and rigid timetables unless you make up one of your own - maybe I learned to take a step back and allow some delay and imperfection, or maybe I'm no longer in my teens, and I can't have only 3 hours sleep without feeling like shit when I'm walking to the school.
Thanks for this video! It is very helpful!
I agree. Taking classes and writing exams was boring, I never really liked it. Like you, I learned how to play the game and got to the top of my class. I started my master in 2021 when Covid was at its peak. I have got lazy, cocky and less motivated due to the fact that everything was online and I didn't have to get up anymore to go to classes (physically). The result was, that my grades got a bit worse. Usually, your grades get better when you do your Master's. At my university (in Germany), our Masters are 3 semesters, where we take classes and write exams in the first two semesters, and do research and write our thesis during the 3rd semester.
So there is a happy ending for me. I started my master thesis right at the moment when everything opened up again (march) as an abroad student in Belgium. I have been working on carbon nanotubes in OLED applications. I really thrived in research to the point where my Belgian professor offered me a PhD position 4 months in. I worked my ass off, showed great communication and project management skills and most important: As it is very difficult to work with carbon nanotubes I have had a lot of "bad" results, but never got demotivated. Tenacity and not losing motivation are the most important qualities a professor seeks in a PhD. Now, I will defend in September and I will start my PhD in November. Really excited, I love research.
Thanks for the video. I follow your videos because I am at the point of going to do a Ph.D. with Industry experience. It is helpful your videos. Have you ever met someone, or do you have any comments about doing a Ph.D. and having a part-time remote job? Thanks
In the UK Masters are graded and aren't a binary pass/fail. There's Distinction (top class), then merit and finally pass. Distinctions can be quite hard as you've often to get an average distincion level in exams and a distinction in your dissertartion
i found my master's quite a bit not difficult than my bachelor's for the most part but that was because i had - as it turns out - undiagnosed and untreated adhd. less structure and supervision makes functioning with adhd waaay more difficult
Glad I don't have to prep for BA exams any more, but moving from MA to PhD, am I going to miss the regular dopamine hit of submission grades?
For me it was other way around I like research its open ended whereas the time pressure of undergrad was too much.
if I want to apply for PHD program, and I have already published a journal article, should put it in the application or just mention that I have experience in research?
…and here I am working on my second Masters nearly 30 years after the first one…
Thanks a lot for your videos! do you know of an academic counseling service for postdocs? I feel like I need to have someone like you tell me exactly what I should do as a postdoc in my particular situation, etc. :D
it is funny that mostly undergrads have access to that sort of thing.
Hi Mariam, I don't know of any particular Post-doc counselling services. Approaching your University support service for help may be the best first stop - even if it is marketed towards undergraduates.
You might have a look at Karen Kelski's "The Professor is In." I believe she does coaching. Not sure about for post-docs.
its so weird hearing "you probably aren't making a lot of money as a PhD student" as someone who lives in Poland... here, if you're a PhD student on a grant, you're getting *way* more than people in industry or even post-docs! im applying to PhDs this year and im looking at options that give me higher stipends than even some jobs in IT,,,,
that sounds really weird. are you sure you are looking at the right stats? in Germany when you have a full-time PhD position it's quite a lot of money, that's true. However, almost nobody gets that, it's almost exclusively a part-time position - only super elite labs and professors probably with political connections or industry backing could afford a full-time PhD and you'd have to be pretty amazing or lucky to get one.
@@Teilnehmer im currently working part time with some current PhDs students and they do very much get those stipends. for a PhD student on a grant in my uni, for your first two years of PhD you get around 6-7 thousand złoty a month, and for two more around 7.5-8.5 thousand złoty, tax-free. for comparison, a minimum wage job after taxes is around 2.6 thousand, a starter salary in an IT firm is around 5-6 thousand. the catch is that it's not a lot of money converted to dollars or euros (8.5 thousand PLN is barely 2k dollars a month), it's just that the cost of living in Poland is very low compared to other EU countries so it ends up being A Lot of money
@@mattie1478 but how can you make more money than post-docs? that's really very strange.. 8.5 thousand PLN would be pretty good even in Germany and about 300€ more than the majority of PhD students get here. The median (not average!) salary in Germany is lower than that I think
@@Teilnehmer you can if you get in a top university and get a stipend from both the university and a grant as a PhD student. a postdoc working in a public funded uni can work without getting grants, but then their salary will be around 4-5 thousand złoty only. a postdoc on a grant gets way more than a PhD student on a grant obviously. a PhD student without a grant stipend at my uni gets 2-3 thousand złoty a month, which is around the minimal wage but livable if you live in a dorm or with your parents (and therefore pay little to no for rent and utilities)
So what is it exactly in USD? Can you tell me which specific university and major?
To me, the key differentiator is the industry experience I had gathered via my career. During my undergraduate, I had none so I found it to be a total slog. Being a gormless git didn't help either. I started graduate and postgraduate studies decades into my professional career and I found them to be far more enjoyable. There's a lot more work to be done and a lot more emphasis on being able to manage my time responsibly, but being a mature adult both were easier to handle. I could never have pulled off graduate school without the adulting and work experience.
Unlike most people here, I really enjoyed my undergraduate work. I liked that the expectations they have for your are clearly defined. All you have to do is do your work, follow instructions, and show up prepared for exams, and you're good. I worked hard, but it was fair. I respected the program, I did well, and I was happy.
In graduate school you become your own boss. There is nobody telling you what to do anymore, and I found that very difficult. I was lost and disoriented. I did manage to muddle through master's degrees in two different disciplines. In the second of my two master's degrees, I'm pretty sure that the only reason I graduated was because my supervisor was up for tenure, and he needed a win for his tenure committee.
Which leads me to this epiphany. You're not in graduate school because your supervisor wants to help you in your career. You're in graduate school because your supervisor wants you to do something for him that is going to to help him in his career. Figure out what that is, and you're good.
I found my masters easier than my bachelor's. I had to courses that I wasnt interested in but had to take it because it was required. My masters only focused on my area of interest.
our HOD said to us that his honours year (4th year in UK / US; its an additional degree where i am from) was the hardest year of his student life
For Finnish perspective it seemed to me that Master's and Bachelor's were pretty much the same. Maybe Master's was easier as you didn't really have to care about basic subjects in Engineering. Ofc, the thesis is a big chunk of work, but even then it often really isn't anything novel or new. Don't know about PhD, but it really ends up being quite a lot more work and harder to do.
Thought I would briefly comment on what you were saying about which is harder we all know which is harder however I do disagree slightly on what you’re saying while under graduate of course is easier because it’s there to give you the information and then your exam and you do coursework what you forgot to mention and this is what I did is that I did a substantial piece of research on my final year 20,000 words on a specific question that I need to answer so it wasn’t all about coursework and exams yes of course depends on the type of degree a person is doing well that was my experience and one or two of my exams by the way lasted six hours so my degree was quite difficult.
Undergrad is easy being the sense of closure is strong in terms of finishing exams submitting papers that dont really matter. Research in phd with so much independence and focus on what you love is fun, but the lack of closure is there if you dont regulate it well, it can feel like youre stuck. Doesnt help that youre in your late twenties during your phd and the the brain chemistry is sort of changed? I cant explain it
You know you said something there that reminds me of people I know who are doing and undergrad and they are like "How's your course going" and I'm just like Well ermm I'm not really doing a course I'm researching and that's it. I'm not really doing what you are.
Cause they want to relate but I'm just like ye that's not what is going on In my life and don't know how to explain that
Having done all three I think that it is a bit like trying to compare eggs with wood, but if I had to rank them I would put it this way: Hardest = PhD, Next hardest = BSc, Easiest = MSc. Doing a first degree (BSc) is hard. It is three years of study and exams on all sorts of units on all sorts of topic areas and skills, together with lab exercises and an undergraduate project. So I would never say that completing a first degree (BSc) is anything other than difficult. It is however a bit like a conveyor belt, it is a game with a well organised structure and with rules. If you simply follow the rules you win and get some sort of prize. I rate PhD as hardest because it is a bit like a game with no rules. In a PhD there is no guarantee, and I can attest this through bitter experience, that you will get anything whatever you do personally. If you are doing a PhD project it has to be something which no one else has done. This means there is no guarantee it will work or produce results. There are so many hazards, imponderable factors and contingencies which you could never foresee. This is simply talking about what happens on the lab bench, let alone any issues with a supervisor or colleagues. Doing a PhD is like being thrown into the deep end of a swimming pool full of sharks, it is 'real life', and in real life there are no guarantees.
I found masters easier than undergrad. Fingers crossed for phd 🤞🏼
@@pl5094 England. I did Msc then MA. Considering phd but dont know if I will find it too difficult 😫
@@georgia3045 Are you in yet? (The PhD program)
The Anglo-Saxon attitude to academic achievement: "Hi Herman, what do you do?" "Urhh I hold the bucket for my Uncle's window cleaning business". "Hi Dan, what do you do?" "I move the boxes from here to there in a warehouse" "Hi Johnny, what do you do?" "I'm doing a PhD in quantum computing at Cambridge University Advanced Projects Institute". "Oh, you're still in school."
Seems like PhD is not a real investment , in terms of money and Time.
Unless you have passion for research or want to get an academic job.
It's true my friend, but academic jobs are not stable . It depends with the upper Authority In terms of getting stable job with in academia.
That really depends on many factors, particularly what your field is. I'm about to start a PhD program after being in the workforce for a decade. I found that my upward mobility had plateaued without a PhD, so this is definitely going to open up a lot of new and higher paying options for me.
It all depends on perception. Someone can easily say their whole education was a waste of time and money. They could have just spent several years learning ONLY what they need, and could have been a genius in the workforce by the age of 15 !!
I did NOT find doing a PhD easier from a mental health perspective than doing a degree, because with a degree I could control how much I studied, revised prepared for exams. With a PhD I could not control whether my transformed cells would decide to secrete such and such proteins, or whether the only set of reagents we managed to get with great difficulty from some other group were still working, or if using the filters from this company would work as well as the filters we used to get from that company and so on and so on. The pressure to get key results on which everything else rested against endless technical failures of unknown cause makes you superstitious and stressed!
If you’re not talking about the Auchmuty Library Stacks, then every University must have a sex room in the library 🤷🏼♂️
My serious reply though is I found undergrad (B.Des(Arch))so much harder than postgrad (M.Arch) for multiple reasons. Looking back, 19 year old me went to uni to avoid getting a full time job, and to shut my mum up. It was reflected in the grades. I returned to do my Masters on my own terms, with my own goals, and when I was ready, and graduating with distinction indicates that I did a far better job!
@@joshmoxey9952 Masters in Archaeology?
@@94D33M Master of Architecture 🥰
@@joshmoxey9952 Nice! HOW'S it going now?
You kill joy! 15:03 mins
The coursework for my Master is hilarious. "Find an appropriate dataset and apply the principles from modules 1 to 5 and write a report of no more than 4 000 words"
This is nowhere close to my experience. My bachelors was very difficult if not unfair, with a whole set of courses having a passing rate below 40%. I needed 6 years for a 3 bachelors, and now I am blazing through my masters cum laude.
Pretty simple to answer this one, and from years of experience. Anything that involves multiple timed, written exams is infinitely harder than something that involves undertaking and writing up a project. Why? take a guess at who is REALLY planning and writing up the student's PhD project? !!! --> in my experience, I've witnessed, at first hand, waaay too many supervisors doing waaay too much of their student's work. That, my friends, is the shocking truth. Obviously, there are exceptions where the student has to do the lion's share of the work, but unfortunately, that's far from the norm from what I've witnessed.
--> A PhD is all too frequently a FALSELY INFLATED reflection of the student's actual abilities.
I am finding my BA/BSc hell rn, the lecturers speak in monotone voices and kill any lingering motivation I have left. I like doing research and I love conducting my own experiments, I hope postgrads better🥲.