Sunday, April 19, 2015

Blog CLXXXI (181): The Raw Numbers

One thing leads to another.

After the posting of the raw number of Ph.D.s produced was made available, the question quickly became, how many Ph.D.s has every school produced, and how do they rank by sheer numbers.  I was attempting to avoid going through all the data that way, but in the end, I surrendered.  Below is a new set of rankings according simply to numbers of Ph.D.s placed in jobs.  With these raw numbers, no effort is made to assess the prestige of various schools.  I will provide some analysis at the end of these rankings. The number in bold is the history department's ranking using the raw numbers. The number in parenthesis is the ranking according Clauset, Arbesman, and Larremore.  The number on the right is the number of Ph.D.s that department has placed at other departments that award the history Ph.D.  I will provide some short analysis at the end.  The raw numbers are:

1
(1)
324
2
(2)
307
3
(7)
253
4
(3)
246
5
(6)
240
6
(4)
184
7
(11)
180
8
(12)
173
9
(5)
172
10
(13)
162
11
(10)
128
12
(9)
108
13
(15)
74
14
(25)
69
15
(24)
66
16
(14)
62
(19)
62
18
(23)
61
(29)
61
20
(16)
58
21
(31)
55
22
(22)
52
23
(21)
49
24
(8)
43
(33)
43
26
(57)
41
27
(20)
35
28
(30)
30
29
(38)
29
30
(36)
26
31
(17)
25
(27)
25
33
(48)
21
34
(18)
20
(41)
20
36
(40)
18
(42)
18
(59)
18
39
(46)
17
40
(35)
15
(37)
15
42
(32)
14
43
(44)
13
(52)
13
(56)
13
(58)
13
(68)
13
(110)
Jewish Theological Seminary of America
13
49
(78)
12
(63)
12
(64)
12
(75)
12
53
(34)
11
(49)
11
(134)
Southern Baptist Theological Seminary
11
56
(26)
10
(28)
10
(53)
10
(54)
10
(90)
10
(99)
10
62
(39)
9
(60)
9
(71)
9
65
(47)
8
(65)
8
(70)
8
(83)
8
(94)
8
(96)
8
71
(61)
7
(67)
7
(69)
7
(77)
7
75
(73)
6
(78)
6
(86)
6
(91)
6
(106)
6
(109)
6
(113)
6
82
(45)
5
(50)
5
(84)
5
(85)
5
(89)
5
87
(51)
4
(62)
4
(81)
4
(87)
4
(97)
4
(107)
4
93
(76)
3
(80)
3
(82)
3
(100)
3
(105)
3
(116)
3
(118)
3
(119)
3
(122)
3
(125)
3
103
(43)
2
(66)
2
(72)
2
(79)
2
(88)
2
(92)
2
(93)
2
(98)
2
(101)
2
(102)
2
(103)
2
(104)
2
(114)
2
(121)
2
(124)
2
(127)
2
(128)
2
(132)
2
(136)
2
122
(74)
1
(95)
1
(111)
1
(112)
1
(115)
1
(117)
1
(120)
1
(123)
1
(126)
1
(133)
1
(140)
1
(143)
1
134
(108)
0
(129)
0
(130)
0
(131)
0
(135)
0
(137)
0
(138)
0
(139)
0
(141)
0
(142)
0
(144)
0

Configuring the data according to simply the number of Ph.D.s that a department has produced and placed basically confirms the findings of Clauset, Arbesman, and Larremore.  Many schools change position, but much of it was only one or two spots.  There are only a few dramatic changes: the Jewish Theological Seminary of America being the biggest example, but Ohio State and Texas made some significant movement upward.

There was also some movement at the very top levels of the rankings.  The members of the "Magic Eight" are a bit different.  The biggest difference is that Braendis dropped out of the top 20 altogether.  All in all, though, these changes strike me as quibbling.

The raw data shows that there is a steep hierarchy at work in the history business.  Even within the top eight it is clear that certain schools have far significant advantage over others.  There is a significant break between the second and third ranked schools of over 50 placements.  There is an even bigger gap between school number six and number seven.  There are two more big drops.  One is between schools 10 and 11 and the next is between number 12 and 13.

Even finishing in the top ten hides some major differences.  The number one school (Harvard in both configurations) has placed 324 of its graduates.  The number 10 school according to the raw numbers is UCLA, which has half the number of Harvard.  This step decline continues into the second ten.  At number 20, Brown has 58 placed alumni, which is only a third of the 162 UCLA Bruin Bears that have found employment.  This step decline continues in the third ten.  Michigan State has less than half of Brown's figures. 

As Clauset, Arbesman, and Larremore argued and this examination of the raw numbers confirms, there is a significant gap between the elite history department—whoever they may be—and the rest.

1 comment:

  1. There's a real risk in reading the numbers this way. If I read the methodology for this study correctly, they look at the faculty employed at PhD-granting history departments to get their count of PhDs, and they do not assess the department in which they received their degree. So the numbers for each institution can be inflated by universities with an array of departments (American Studies, Classics, Gender Studies) that place students in departments. As a result, the numbers may or may not shed light on the placement rate for history departments.

    Alongside the risks of over-interpreting their raw numbers, using placement rates into PhD-granting departments does not tell the whole story about academic job placement for history PhDs. As my study with Maren Wood noted, students from lower-ranked schools (as measured by NRC and U.S. News) generally had higher placement rates into departments that did not grant PhDs.

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