Hello: Over the years there is some reflection for fellow master's degree graduates in organic chemistry of 1980s. It was generally a 6-year commitment for students. It was stressful and in one Big Ten school out of 68 entry level students for Chemistry Ph.D. -there were 4 mental breakdowns including two that were psychotic in nature.
This was Purdue but it had a reputation that it took a lot of grad students for all the courses of the engineers and disqualified many with a 'pre-lim' system. Anyway, if you left with a MS in that era some looked at it as a consolidation prize -except I had to do a 100-page thesis or so in that era. If you can share your thoughts from that era and how schools have made their schools more graduate student friendly .I hope other schools on this list have had students with more pleasant memories, but professors were a bit out of control in that era .
Robert Doti This scenario [Pre-lim] system you just describe is a form of professional bullying, if you survive it, then you are a winner(: It is a professional practice that test the candidates' strength to stay in the program.
Research these days has really diminished due to bipartisan political influences. There are plenty of studies which show this.
The last 20 or so years, the liberal "woke" agenda has taken over major universities. The big problem with this of course is there should not an "agenda" for any research.
Another big problem (and I know this for a fact) is that editors for nearly all research journals won't publish studies that don't address left wing or critical theory. And even though there are few conservative journals (I attended Liberty University) they won't publish articles which aren't in line with their agenda. Its really messed up.
So if writers want to get published, they have to follow the agenda of the journal. Which promotes biased research.
I have certainly witnessed the "dumbing down" of academics in the last 20 years.
Its really a shame.
I was asking if the mental stress of the grad students has heightened or not. In the 1980s there was a lot of stress but little grad student counseling or rights and pay was about 8K a year. There is commentary here if the degree is challenging and the response here is more in the humanities or social sciences in which political orientation may have favored interpretations as in history. The reason for the question is that about 10 years out what went on in the 1980s was still discussed by students in chemistry that endured it . I hope things are better,. There is stress now with funding for basic science seemingly cut and I suspect some of the pressure of the past will ramp up.
There is as much stress amongst graduate students as it was in the 1980's. But present-day Universities have employed counsellors to help students handle the stress. However, the competition levels have increased. The students are more of rivals pretending to be friends. Students naive enough, not to understand this, feel cheated and further stress follows.
There were very competitive men (primarily-high T). in the 1980s. There definitely was a favoring of the men that were professors (95% at my school) who were know as 'hardasses'. If you made it -it was a badge of honor to a postdoc or industrial job. In that case you might great thigs about your professor and school or be at least neutral. But it was not a normal way to live that seemed to affect people 10 year out. How? Bitterness if they left with a MS degree or job at that point. I was ok with that since my undergrad training was weak and so i was thrilled to get a good job in that era and good command of organic chem and techniques I needed to do. But the good jobs for MS have ended so it seems its Ph.D. or bust in the USA now.
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