Proselytizing PhD Professors!

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Is it just me or are most PhD professors trying to get their students to pursue in PhD programs rather than medical school?

From personal experience, most professors believe that because a student expresses a genuine interest in the subject and is doing exceptionally well that the student's place is in a PhD program.

Many of my professors cast MD's in a negative light (citing statistics...MD's having high rates of depression and suicide...etc...) to try to convert their premed students.

How do you all think about this? Do you guys experience the same thing?

 

[Mr. Tee]

Yeah I get the same feeling.

Then the MDs make their own jabs at the PhD professors. Crazy world around us.

 

[DropkickMurphy]

From personal experience, most professors believe that because a student expresses a genuine interest in the subject and is doing exceptionally well that the student's place is in a PhD program.

OK, so you don't think if you see someone who is bright and full of potential you would try to recruit them into your field?

 

[DeadCactus]

OK, so you don't think if you see someone who is bright and full of potential you would try to recruit them into your field?

I try to steer them away. Less competition. Don't want people ruining my sweet gig...

 

[xanthomondo]

Yeah I definitely agree with you.

One professor, who was also my senior thesis advisor, literally gave me a lecture about once a month of why grad school is for me and why I should be a professor rather than a doctor.

...no thanks

There was one kid who was accepted to PhD programs, and you should have seen the way he was treated in his remaining lab/lecture courses. You would have thought he was made of gold or something, there was sooo much blatant favoritism.

 

[QofQuimica]

Is it just me or are most PhD professors trying to get their students to pursue in PhD programs rather than medical school?

From personal experience, most professors believe that because a student expresses a genuine interest in the subject and is doing exceptionally well that the student's place is in a PhD program.

Many of my professors cast MD's in a negative light (citing statistics...MD's having high rates of depression and suicide...etc...) to try to convert their premed students.

How do you all think about this? Do you guys experience the same thing?

You know how a lot of you guys like to come on here and bash stereotypical premeds? Well, imagine having to teach whole classes full of dozens, maybe hundreds, of them. Many of these kids have no interest in your subject whatsoever; they all think they deserve As and will fight with you for every fraction of a point; and they constantly gripe about having to actually learn some science. Now imagine that you have a small number of kids who are really intellectually curious, love to learn about science, and work hard. Who would YOU want to recruit to become the next generation of scientists? And wouldn't you feel kind of disappointed to find out that those kids are planning to go to med school just like the rest of the grade-grubbing masses?

Anyway, the solution is simple. If you're premed and interested in science and research, tell your profs that. Getting a PhD is one route, but you can do research as an MD or MD/PhD too. 🙂

 

[Doctor~Detroit]

Anyway, the solution is simple. If you're premed and interested in science and research, tell your profs that. Getting a PhD is one route, but you can do research as an MD or MD/PhD too. 🙂

haha. she has a phd, and she's subtly trying to recruit you. 😀

 

[Nasrudin]

You know how a lot of you guys like to come on here and bash stereotypical premeds? Well, imagine having to teach whole classes full of dozens, maybe hundreds, of them. Many of these kids have no interest in your subject whatsoever; they all think they deserve As and will fight with you for every fraction of a point; and they constantly gripe about having to actually learn some science. Now imagine that you have a small number of kids who are really intellectually curious, love to learn about science, and work hard. Who would YOU want to recruit to become the next generation of scientists? And wouldn't you feel kind of disappointed to find out that those kids are planning to go to med school just like the rest of the grade-grubbing masses?

Anyway, the solution is simple. If you're premed and interested in science and research, tell your profs that. Getting a PhD is one route, but you can do research as an MD or MD/PhD too. 🙂

Sure. I hear you. But on the other hand, I've seen a lot of hostility from scientists with regards to to the "premed metality" as if we enjoy competing against ourselves every step of the way. From my perspective--having been struggling in the real world for the last 15 years--I find the notion that to really delve into science I have to volunteer my time under the intellectual auspices of a scientist when I've got bills to pay is ridiculous. And I'm the endlessly curious type.
The phd racket is something the younger student might not have the common sense to break down to its bare essentials--its a job just like anything else. Teaching is kind of a co-dependent coercion on some level. Wanting accolytes of your trade is not the same as encouraging people to deal with their own intentions and situations effectively. The latter is the more rare.

 

[braluk]

There will always be some sort of rift between MDs and PhDs- I found it funny that on the third floor of the med school I am in right now, has a bathroom stall that is filled with acronyms of MD and PhDs and what they mean. Some examples: Medical *******es, or Put Head in Dumpster or silly things like that. Even funnier is that it's on the MD/PhD floor.

 

[QofQuimica]

haha. she has a phd, and she's subtly trying to recruit you. 😀

Bwah hahahah, now that you've given out my secret, I *will* have to hunt you down. And, um, pour a beaker of something nasty over you. Like, maybe, fly pheromones.

Sure. I hear you. But on the other hand, I've seen a lot of hostility from scientists with regards to to the "premed metality" as if we enjoy competing against ourselves every step of the way. From my perspective--having been struggling in the real world for the last 15 years--I find the notion that to really delve into science I have to volunteer my time under the intellectual auspices of a scientist when I've got bills to pay is ridiculous. And I'm the endlessly curious type.
The phd racket is something the younger student might not have the common sense to break down to its bare essentials--its a job just like anything else. Teaching is kind of a co-dependent coercion on some level. Wanting accolytes of your trade is not the same as encouraging people to deal with their own intentions and situations effectively. The latter is the more rare.

In my experience, the people who "compete against themselves" are not the ones who are the stereotypical premeds that we all know and don't love. 🙂

On a more serious note, I agree with you that it's best for profs to encourage students to accomplish their (the students') goals, as opposed to their (the professor's) goals. But most profs have what they think is the student's interest at heart. The ones who pressure bright students to go into science probably really do think that being a physician is less "intellectual" than becoming a scientist. I can't speak about the day to day job of being a physician, but as far as med school versus grad school is concerned, so far they're 100% right. You sure don't do these kinds of non-stop memorization fests in grad school.

OP, if you think the pressure is bad at the UG level, try to imagine what it was like for me as a *grad student* to announce that I was pre-med. Inititally, my PI was, ahem, not thrilled. Once I explained that I wanted to continue doing research and finish the PhD, he was very supportive though. I think some people just love science so much that they get really excited when they find others who share that obsession. My PI is definitely like that. The man eats, sleeps, and breathes chemistry. He comes up with ideas for new projects in the shower. That kind of thing.

 

[QofQuimica]

There will always be some sort of rift between MDs and PhDs- I found it funny that on the third floor of the med school I am in right now, has a bathroom stall that is filled with acronyms of MD and PhDs and what they mean. Some examples: Medical *******es, or Put Head in Dumpster or silly things like that. Even funnier is that it's on the MD/PhD floor.

PhD = Piled Higher and Deeper

You get one of those after you get your

BS = Bulls***

and your

MS = More of the Same.

 

[coffeebythelake]

I had a few geography and geology professors ask me if I wanted to go to grad school. Geography? Geology? I took a few courses in the fields but they weren't even my program of study!

 

[notaroche]

These proselytizing professors remind me of the infected from 28 Days/Weeks Later. Attack a healthy person until they are infected and then move on to the next poor sap.

 

[GreenShirt]

The reason PhD's do this is because very few people enter PhD programs. You don't need to actively recruit pre-med students, they come out of the wood work. As for students, the tiny fraction of pre-research students at each school feel complain b/c hey're a minority in a big sea of pre-meds.

Yes, there will always be mild infighting between MD's and PhD's (MD=Mentaly Deranged, PhD= Phony Doctor). My PhD boyfriend rolls his eyes every time he sees MDs go to lunch in his neighboorhood wearing their white coats as if they couldn't store them in their lockers at the hospital. etc. etc.

 

[Nasrudin]

Bwah hahahah, now that you've given out my secret, I *will* have to hunt you down. And, um, pour a beaker of something nasty over you. Like, maybe, fly pheromones.


In my experience, the people who "compete against themselves" are not the ones who are the stereotypical premeds that we all know and don't love. 🙂

On a more serious note, I agree with you that it's best for profs to encourage students to accomplish their (the students') goals, as opposed to their (the professor's) goals. But most profs have what they think is the student's interest at heart. The ones who pressure bright students to go into science probably really do think that being a physician is less "intellectual" than becoming a scientist. I can't speak about the day to day job of being a physician, but as far as med school versus grad school is concerned, so far they're 100% right. You sure don't do these kinds of non-stop memorization fests in grad school.

OP, if you think the pressure is bad at the UG level, try to imagine what it was like for me as a *grad student* to announce that I was pre-med. Inititally, my PI was, ahem, not thrilled. Once I explained that I wanted to continue doing research and finish the PhD, he was very supportive though. I think some people just love science so much that they get really excited when they find others who share that obsession. My PI is definitely like that. The man eats, sleeps, and breathes chemistry. He comes up with ideas for new projects in the shower. That kind of thing.

Right. I get it. I just think the whole phd thing is kind of a racket really. They should should shoot straighter with undergrads. Just come out with it and say look kid either find something slick and up and comming, get into it independently enough to branch off at the right moment so you can get a patent or start your own biotech, OR slump in for the long hall of whoring yourself out to the industry while you stand in the long line for the NIH duckets, OR if you want to be an educator prepare to be one in a stack of hundreds of applicants for Joe Schmoe University where they increasingly care more about how much money your bringing than how good of a teacher you are, AND be ready for a harder row to how in the public infrastructure if you're not a minority scientist.

And since I can read between the lines I don't need attitude about gunning against the competition so I can get the JOB I'm after. If I was going into grad school--read entrance requirement low 3.__--I wouldn't be gunning, i''d be takin it easy and hamming it up with prof's for the fun of it.

But I ain't, it's not, and so they can save their hollier than though pedantics for the next schmuck. The whole thing is set up for the rich kid or scholarship kid with time to kill anyway.