Old folks getting PhDs

The last time I checked the U.S. News ranking for criminology, it was still the same ranking from 2009. My PhD program was started in 2009, so we haven't even had the opportunity to become ranked. However, that hasn't hurt our graduates at all. All but one have found a decent position in academia so far. The job market is great for criminology and criminal justice instructors and professors. 99% of the programs out there aren't ranked, so they aren't looking for professors with degrees from ranked programs. Most PhD programs in criminal justice are designed to prepare students to teach a range of courses such as corrections, statistics, criminal law, and policing. Surprisingly, a lot of students come into the programs knowing very little about any of those. Regardless, students are usually getting the PhD because they love to teach and conduct research. I can tell you, however, that the job market is tough out there for those who are trying to teach at a college with just a master's degree. If you want to make a living off of just conducting research, that is also very tough to do without a PhD. Many employers are looking for it. You might be deterred by the hoops someone has to jump through to get a PhD, but there are people who aren't.

If someone wants to culminate their learning journey with a PhD and can afford it (some of them might even be fully-funded), then who cares? It's for their own personal enrichment. Some people want to climb Mt. Everest. Some people want to swim from Cuba to Florida. At least going for the PhD doesn't put your life in danger. If you've ever learned about Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, the top point that most people do not reach is self-actualization. Some people get to the point where they have already accomplished everything to satisfy the basic human needs and start to pursue things for self-fulfillment. They are trying to reach their full potential. Many people won't understand it because they will never get there.

 

My first one was supported significantly by student loans that I'm still paying on and will be for a very long time. But it tripled my income and put me in places I could never have seen otherwise.

I funded the second one myself--and it was comparatively inexpensive. (Yay, UK!)

 

Much of it is interest, too. In order to ask the one little question, you have GOT to be interested in the topic. So many lose interest or do not have it at all. Having said that, I know many that don't care and still finished a doctorate. It was a testimony in perseverance. The older I get, the more interested in woodworking I get. So, I think a doctorate isn't even all that useful for me. I still write scholarly papers and do presentations, for my work. No doctorate required for that.

 

You must not have coddling moths and raccoons.

 

It's easy for me to imagine people retiring and wanting to fill their lives with a new challenge, with something interesting and significant. Many people have nurtured a lifelong interest in some subject, be it history, philosophy or one of the sciences, that they were never in a position to pursue earlier in life. Given that older people aren't going to be as physically fit as they were earlier in life, an intellectual pursuit might make more sense than trying to become an NBA star.

Why? (That's a little insulting.)

One thing that nobody has commented on yet is the question whether the older doctoral candidate will be in any position to contribute to his/her discipline.

In that regard, I'm inspired by the example of Ernst Mayr, probably the 20th century's most illustrious evolutionary biologist.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Mayr

Mayr was born in 1904 and died in 2005 at the age of 100. He was a long-time Harvard professor who retired and became emeritus in 1975.

Subsequent to his retirement, he wrote some 200 scientific papers, more than many scientists produce in a lifetime. 14 of his 25 books were written after he was 65. I believe that he was 99 when he completed the last of them, What Makes Biology Unique, a profound inquiry into the philosophy of biology.

What Makes Biology Unique? | Evolutionary Biology | Cambridge University Press

 

Far be it from be to tell people how they shouldn't feel insulted over silly things.

But suggesting to a retiree that a sailboat might provide more "meaning" than a PhD is hardly an insulting comment. Sailboats are meant for recreation and enjoyment. It's a hobby that may bring you joy, challenge and a connection to nature, fellow man and the universe without even having to drop acid once.

A PhD, on the other hand, is not a hobby sport. My grandfather was a lover of history his whole life. The man could tell you, in great detail, nearly every aspect of WW1 and WW2. But his knowledge was acquired through reading the works of others. He wasn't a researcher. He had no desire to produce anything original in this space. He was a lifelong student of history. Despite his knowledge or, perhaps, because of it he likely would have been a terrible PhD candidate had he chosen that path later in life.

Also, PhD seats are limited. Time with doctoral advisors is somewhat of a precious commodity. Funding is finite. I'd wager that many of those undertaking these programs are not planning to be prolific writers like Ernst Mayr. Mayr, as you noted, was a professor for an entire career. The concept of research and publication was not lost on him. The things he wrote and published after age 65 were extensions of the work he undertook as a professor. He wasn't an auto mechanic who, at 65, cranked out a PhD and then began publishing his tail off. He was a prolific academic who, in retirement, was more prolific still. To put him up as an example how how a senior citizen can make it through a doctoral program from beginning to end and then actually continue to contribute to his or her field after defense just seems like an unfair, and overly romantic, comparison. But those who don't begin their pursuit of a doctorate until after they start taking social security are likely going to stop after they get their piece of paper, assuming that they even stick with the program after they stop having "fun."

In the meantime, a younger would-be academic intending to dedicate his or her life to this field is left looking for another program to accept them because Henry and Gertrude thought it might be a hoot to go back to school together so they can put "Dr." on their respective headstones. Again, if that's what you want to do then fine. But that doesn't mean that people aren't free to look at the activity for what it is, largely vanity and not-so-much a desire to further the study of your favorite field.

 

It just sounded flippant and demeaning, and of course you know it did, so don't play the "sailboats are meaningful" game, and don't add insult upon insult by playing the "you ubersensitive person, you get insulted over silly things" game, either. Look, it's not like you lit his/her cat's tail on fire or anything, but at least have the humanity to say: "Well, yeah, that was kind of demeaning, my bad."

 

Well, first of all, it wasn't "my bad." I wasn't the person who made the comment about getting a sailboat instead of a PhD.

But even if I were, I would stand behind that statement because people have a weird and warped sense of self-fulfillment if they think that earning a PhD late in life is going to bring them some weird sense of accomplishment because they were able to wrap up a dissertation just under the wire.

If you're a history buff that's great. Keep reading. If you want to do research then go out and do some research and try to get published. There is no reason to get a PhD after you've retired unless you are either planning a phase 2 where you go into teaching full time or you're hung up on the fact that you always felt you were smart enough to get a PhD and bummed out because you never did.

It's like when I hear about a senior citizen going to law school during their retirement (I read a feature article about one some years ago). Here's someone who has no intention of practicing law. They have no desire to apply that knowledge to anything. They want to go because they "always wanted to be a lawyer and life got in the way." Fine. And three years of incredibly expensive stress later guess what? You still will not have been a lawyer in your younger days. And you likely won't be a lawyer in your older ones either. Three years for the crappy part of being a lawyer without any of the ostensibly "amazing" parts of being a lawyer.

Same deal here. You're going to put yourself through the crucible and get the paper and then, what? Most likely hang it up on your wall and get to call yourself "doctor" around the senior center because you twisted notions of career achievements with feelings of self worth.

Like I said, people can do whatever they like. It doesn't matter to me. But if a person is taking this route then, best case scenario, they are simply naive as to the rigors and demands of a doctoral program and think it will be a quick and relatively easy pursuit like many masters programs. Worst case? They've convinced themselves that this last minute Hail Mary is going to compensate for a life of mediocrity and sub par achievement. Even if they get the doctorate they are likely then to find themselves in an even sadder place when they realize that the doctorate didn't change their lives and those years lost in the library cannot ever be reclaimed.

If you think it is "demeaning" to propose that there is more enjoyment to be found on your boat on the open water then I can't help you. But PhDs aren't made "for the fun of it" and acting like completing one is going to be fun, like gardening, is a level of fantasy that I'm having a hard time imagining.

 

The people who say such things--demeaning the doctorate or the person considering pursuing one--invariably do not have one. Those who have gone through it tend not to express such thoughts.

I don't think that a PhD-or-a-sailboat is a mutually exclusive arrangement, either. In fact, one could help you get the other. For example, getting a PhD might increase your income and, thus, make a sailboat more affordable. Conversely, one could obtain the sailboat first, then sail to any one of a number of islands in the Caribbean and pick up a freshly minted PhD from one of their many fine diploma mills.

 

I don't think anyone made the claim that you won't get a major sense of accomplishment if you finish the doctorate. The question would be whether the work to sense of accomplishment ratio is a bit skewed out of the individual's favor.

But I also think that a lot of people just don't consider what is involved in a doctorate. I've taken masters level coursework for personal fulfillment. And I could easily see how a person might take 10 or so classes like that and bam, here's a Masters.

There's a bit more to it when you get to PhD territory. If you want to do it, fine. If you finish you'll undoubtedly feel a sense of accomplishment. But you may also feel a sense of disappointment after finishing something so monumental.

If I spend the summer building an amazing play structure for my kids I can gaze upon it for years to come. Bought a boat? Here are the pictures of me out on the water with my family having a great time. Earned a doctorate? There's my dissertation. You can read it if you care. I could see a person obsessing over that doctorate and successfully defending their dissertation and then looking and saying "Well heck, now what? Build birdhouses?"

I'm not trying to be "anti-PhD." Even if you aren't planning a career in academia I can see why you might want a doctorate. Rich puts it best with his talk of practitioners and enhancing one's professional practice, for example. But when you specifically don't want to use it for a career because your career is behind you I question what, exactly, it is about the doctorate that is so enticing in that situation. And I think, if you really dug into it, you'd find that a lot more of it was about the vanity of being a "Doctor" than anything else.

I'd also be curious about completion rates among senior doctoral candidates. The promise of a PhD might be more driving than actually defending a dissertation.

 

The dissertations were easier.

 

I don't think that it's silly. It's something that I feel strongly about.

It suggests that older folks are best advised to restrict their attention, interests and ambitions to less intellectual and arguably more trivial matters.

Is pursuing advanced education out of interest and love for one's subject merely a "hobby sport"? It might be the most important thing in some people's lives.

In real life, different people are motivated by different things. Some people are deeply concerned with religion and there's a noticeable tendency for older people to enter the clergy. The Catholics are actively encouraging older priestly aspirants. Learning might be just as important to some people as their religiosity. I don't think that I want to call either one a "hobby sport", a phrase that to me suggests a way of killing time before death finally arrives.

That's a more persuasive point.

I don't think that retirement-age doctoral students should typically take spaces that would otherwise go to younger students.

Maybe that's a concern in some vocational/career subjects, such as medical school. It might be a concern at the more competitive doctoral programs like Stanford or the Ivy League.

But there are lots of doctoral programs out there, many of them offered by less prestigious institutions. (Virtually all DL doctoral programs would fit that description.) I expect that many programs (especially in the hard-hit humanities) need as many qualified applicants as they can get, since the schools' departments depend for their existence on having suitable enrollments and professors depend for their own livelihoods on having enough students to teach. So older doctoral students would serve a valuable service to higher education if they aren't displacing younger students, but instead are filling slots that wouldn't otherwise be filled.

Right. I don't think that the older students should necessarily receive all the tuition-waivers and stipends that full-time on-campus students in more high-profile programs often get. Of course some of that is pay for serving as teaching or research assistants, and if the elders are doing the same work they should be paid for it at the going rate.

I'd wager that the vast majority of people who post on Degreeinfo and who lust after earning distance doctorates won't be as productive either.

My point was to suggest that it certainly isn't impossible for many people who are retirement age to have a productive second career, especially in more intellectual pursuits that are less physically demanding. Others have done it.

You're assuming that it's all about "their piece of paper" and not about interest in the subject that's being studied. In some cases you might even be right, but so what? I expect that the majority of Degreeinfo participants lusting after DL doctorates just want the prestigious initials too. So does recognizing that constitute an argument against anyone enrolling in DL doctoral programs?

I do agree that all aspiring doctoral students, whatever their age, should be honest and realistic with themselves about what their motivations are.

"Henry and Gertrude" thinking that "it would be a hoot"?

Again, I don't think that most of the older students doing this would be displacing younger students if they are filling places that would otherwise be unfilled. Welcoming older students is probably most appropriate at the lower-tier doctoral programs that don't have a very good record placing graduates in tenure-track teaching jobs. Some of these programs can probably use all the applicants that they can get.

I don't see it as "largely vanity". I think that there are lots of elders with deep lifelong interests that they were never able to formally pursue due to job and family responsibilities, paying off the mortgage or whatever it was. Maybe their passion is for a subject for which there was little job market for new PhDs so that entering a doctoral program at a younger age didn't make much practical sense. But now they no longer have their earlier responsibilities and many of them have the funds and retirement-income to pay for the program. They don't need to hang their entire future (and that of their families) on their hopes of getting a tenure-track job.

Obviously enrolling in a doctoral program at a late age isn't for everyone. Many people would rather sail boats, visit tropical islands and get drunk. I'm not going to judge them for that or argue against their doing it. But I recognize that one size does not fit all and that returning to graduate school might be a wonderful thing for particularly curious, inquisitive and intellectual people.

 

Wasn't my experience. Nor does it sound like what my peers at Union and Leicester were experiencing. Quite the opposite. Perhaps those who would come to feel that way tend to opt out at the beginning or choose not to enroll at all. I don't know. But I've yet to meet someone in either program who felt the work necessary was outsized compared to the outcome. And I don't seem to recall that kind of feeling being expressed on this board over the past 15 years (more counting a.e.d.) But we've seen a lot of the opposite from those who've completed a doctorate.

If someone out there has done the doctorate and now regrets it, I would invite them to post about it. I'd like to read about why.

This is certainly true. A lot of the part-timers who end up ABD do so because they simply don't have an understanding about how different the doctorate really is, especially at the dissertation phase. It is unique.

Again, I haven't seen nor heard it. I have colleagues who hold doctorates in fields they don't even work in who don't say that. If the thing is going to be any sort of disappointment down the road, I don't see how you'll get through it anyway. I've heard lots of regrets from people who didn't finish, but never from graduates.

No. There might be some individual examples of this, but it just isn't like that. Besides, your "either/or" hypotheticals don't ring true. You can do a doctorate and still do other important things in your life, and not sacrifice the most important ones.

The typical reaction to graduating is, "Okay, what's next?" You get a desire to take that baby out for a spin.

Again, no. That's not what we experience around here, anyway. Sure, a lot of people who inquire/wish/dream about it do so for that reason. But that won't get you through the program, not by a long shot. Vanity sends people to diploma mills, not dissertation defenses.

I think the success rate for doctoral dissertations is pretty high. It's all the dropping out ahead of time that is troubling.

If you get to the defense, you are almost assuredly going to graduate. You might have to make major changes and--extremely rarely--even submit a different dissertation. But the process weeds out those candidates long before the defense. (Your advisor will almost certainly prevent you from defending if the dissertation isn't good enough to at least pass with major revisions. A few of those end up failing, of course, but it's very rare.)

My understanding is that a bit more than half of students who undertake the doctoral degrees complete them successfully within 10 years. (Per the PhD Completion Project)Overall on-time completions are between one-quarter and one-third. It's harder to get data on the doctoral dissertations themselves, but it looks like a lot of the dropping out occurs there.

I'm not trying to be argumentative, but I suspect one's experience in completing this endeavor is different from one who has not.

 

A sailboat does not do it for me.

You are an excellent debater and in most cases I am in agreement with you. However, I think you are on the wrong side of the argument concerning retirement and advance learning. Of course, there are some caveats about retirement and spending wisely. However, if retirees want to pursue graduate studies as part of their retirement and can afford it; then that is great for them, and maybe even healthy. I am against retirees getting graduate education for free. That money should be spent on the youth for all the good reasons - I will even use all your arguments to support why retirees should not be given free education especially doctoral studies.

My spouse and I will be travelling to South Africa in a few months. I am sure that we are going to have a good time. For me, I will even have greater times, if I was enrolled in a doctoral program in SA. Retirement should be a time for contentment and that is doing whatever that makes one happy within reason, and being able to afford it.

 

Sorry sorry, MY BAD.

 

As stated before, if you want it and can afford it, go for it.

I can best summarize and clarify my position by comparing this situation to the "if I win the lottery" discussion. Once we were playing this and a coworker said "if I won the lottery I would open a restaurant."

Now, the lottery we were discussing was one of those $100M+ powedball drawings. So this isn't a $1M hit that you need to either try to make it last or have one hell of a ride back to broke. This was easily the grandkids won't have to work if they don't want to sort of territory.

Naturally, if you have the money and the inclination, you can do whatever you want. But open a restaurant? Hard work and risk amplified exponentially be the fact that you have zero experience? That doesn't mean you can't become a gourmet cook or have an amazing space for entertaining friends. But a restaurant is how you would spend your life of leisure?

It isn't a wrong answer. But it's an answer that just sort of makes me wonder if the person knows what that would involve. Then again it is none of my business either way.

 

The average age of a doctoral learner at Union Institute and University is...wait for it...more than 50. (This according to a conversation I had recently with Union's president.)

 

The assumption seems to be that anyone can produce original scholarly publications, and that doctoral training is really just a transaction between organization and individual to obtain a credential that aids in publication or employment. This is backwards - the academic training by a mentor at that organization is what transforms one into a scholar capable of doing that kind of research. There are those who used to reach that level after their undergraduate education, but those (gifted) indivduals were usually from a time when secondary and undergraduate university education were both much more rigorous.

I think both of these statements are absolutely spot on, but have found both difficult to explain to people who don't share that experience or motivation.