Is it worthy to enroll in grad school in USA for 2020 after the pandemic COVID-19?

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phygre123
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Joined: Tue Jul 18, 2017 12:13 pm

Is it worthy to enroll in grad school in USA for 2020 after the pandemic COVID-19?

Post by phygre123 » Thu Mar 26, 2020 12:02 am

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Last edited by phygre123 on Wed Mar 16, 2022 8:28 am, edited 1 time in total.

livelongandprosper
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Joined: Fri Nov 29, 2019 3:42 pm

Re: Is it worthy to enroll in grad school in USA for 2020 after the pandemic COVID-19?

Post by livelongandprosper » Thu Mar 26, 2020 2:09 am

phygre123 wrote:
Thu Mar 26, 2020 12:02 am
Now, the situation is becoming worse day by day. USA is sooner or later be in recession and has no certainty about its economy. Will the grad schools be able to provide the same funding? Will the research in the University have the same priority as before? I am from Asia and how much discrimination will I have to tolerate in USA in the future? Could I find peace of mind in USA if I join and study in USA? How could I protect myself in USA as a international students so that I reassure myself before I leave my sweat home and caring family.
Well, as far as I know, if the US will be in recession, so will be most of the world, so the problem will likely not be limited to US schools. I am not sure if you can know from the beginning how the situation will affect your funding. I would imagine that if you go to a private university, the situation might be better than if you were to go to a public university.

Regarding discrimination: No one can answer that since we don't know how the situation will pan out due to the recession. I'm about to finish my bachelor's degree in the US as an Indian student and I did not face any discrimination over the last 3.5 years and haven't heard any such cases from my friends...You can protect yourself by not interacting with any human, ever, once you're here! Seriously, don't worry, I'm sure you'll find an equally loving and caring family here!

jabennett2194
Posts: 118
Joined: Tue Jun 12, 2018 6:54 pm

Re: Is it worthy to enroll in grad school in USA for 2020 after the pandemic COVID-19?

Post by jabennett2194 » Thu Mar 26, 2020 6:10 am

Another thing to consider, many schools (STEM in particular) have a sizeable majority of Asian students because they are usually categorically more qualified.
Thus you will likely encounter a great Asian community wherever you go :D

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Nishikata
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Re: Is it worthy to enroll in grad school in USA for 2020 after the pandemic COVID-19?

Post by Nishikata » Thu Mar 26, 2020 8:31 am

I think the user phygre123 was more concerned about discrimination from the general public.
in graduate school, it is common to see that Asians form the majority. There is little to worry about.

For example, only 2 non-Asian graduate students are in Princeton's CMT group.
https://phy.princeton.edu/research/cond ... ter-theory

There is no concern about discrimination for being Asian there.

geekusprimus
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Re: Is it worthy to enroll in grad school in USA for 2020 after the pandemic COVID-19?

Post by geekusprimus » Thu Mar 26, 2020 12:36 pm

If the economy doesn't recover very quickly, grad schools will probably have fewer positions available next year. Most schools are done with the main round of admissions for this year, so people who already got acceptances aren't likely to see them rescinded (unless they failed all their classes this semester, of course). As far as the worth of attending grad school here, looking at the economy now is a bad idea; if you're entering school in the fall, you won't be graduating until 2025 or so. There is the issue of continued funding to worry about, especially since grants and fellowship opportunities are probably going to be stingier for the next couple years. However, your first two years of graduate school will mostly be classes, and your typical graduate program will guarantee you funding, at least in the form of a teaching assistantship, for at least that long.

As far as discrimination is concerned, it's an unfortunate reality that some anti-Asian (specifically East Asian) sentiments have grown in the last couple months because of the coronavirus. Not long after the outbreak (and before things started shutting down left and right), a lot of Asian-owned stores and restaurants did lose a lot of business (unless they supplied toilet paper, that is) because of stupid people thinking that eating at a doughnut shop or shopping at a grocery store owned by Chinese immigrants would give them the coronavirus. This isn't as common in college towns already comfortable with large Asian populations, though, and I suspect the offending idiots will largely calm down when the virus finally runs its course (hopefully before the end of the summer).

phygre123
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Joined: Tue Jul 18, 2017 12:13 pm

Re: Is it worthy to enroll in grad school in USA for 2020 after the pandemic COVID-19?

Post by phygre123 » Mon Apr 20, 2020 10:22 pm

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Last edited by phygre123 on Wed Mar 16, 2022 8:29 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Nishikata
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Re: Is it worthy to enroll in grad school in USA for 2020 after the pandemic COVID-19?

Post by Nishikata » Tue Apr 21, 2020 12:22 am

The language barrier is still a big minus to study in China.

There are no doubts many expert professors exist in China, but this expertise may not be conveyed to the students who don't speak Chinese.
Countries like China and Japan make their own physics books, so the terms and phrases are also written in the local language.

In the formal curriculum, yes you can still get notes and lectures in English. However, the insights, advice, and experience of their rich scientific community may not be as easily available to non-Chinese speaking students.

And since our life is not only in Campus, we will have some language hurdles in our social life as well.

phygre123
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Re: Is it worthy to enroll in grad school in USA for 2020 after the pandemic COVID-19?

Post by phygre123 » Tue Apr 21, 2020 12:52 am

del
Last edited by phygre123 on Wed Mar 16, 2022 8:29 am, edited 1 time in total.

geekusprimus
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Re: Is it worthy to enroll in grad school in USA for 2020 after the pandemic COVID-19?

Post by geekusprimus » Tue Apr 21, 2020 2:28 am

phygre123 wrote:
Mon Apr 20, 2020 10:22 pm
After watching the pandemic I think USA is not developed in science than China. China is planning to attract talented people. There is no doubt about stipend and if you work there then you will earn two times greater than USA because of their business opportunities. Also, point to be noted is whatever we choose hep, cmt, string, gravitational does not matter because we have to earn for our famimy in future. I know many will say this is my dream for which I will say put that dream under the sunlight to fade away because if you are in USA you will not get right health care when you are contracted with Corona, and also their is uncertain that you will return your country alive. In my suggestion, it is better to drop a year or at least avoid going some states of USA and Wuhan of China till this pandemic ends, and try to find better PhD program in Europe or China. Nowadays, USA has very precarious situation.
To address a few of your concerns about the United States:
  • The United States is undoubtedly safer than China, coronapocalypse notwithstanding. There's an astounding amount of freedom that you will never have in China due to the Chinese Communist Party's strict censorship policies.
  • Healthcare is far from perfect in the United States, but many of the issues are wildly overblown by our media, which earns money by making mountains out of molehills. Any credible American university will give their physics graduate students good enough health insurance to guarantee quality healthcare, just as any reputable employer in the United States would. Our handling of the coronavirus has been less than satisfactory, but your odds of contracting it outside of New York City are pretty low, and your odds of survival are very good. If you're still concerned about getting it, China probably isn't where you want to be, either; there's a lot of growing suspicion that they've intentionally undercounted and suppressed the numbers to save face. They have over a billion citizens and waited longer than the US before acknowledging that it was an issue, but their infection and mortality rates don't look like those found in any other country in the world.
  • 99% of PhD programs in the US worth a bean will only accept as many students as they can offer tuition waivers and stipends to. The wages aren't terribly high for graduate students, but they're typically enough to live on. How much you make after your PhD depends on where you choose to go, and if you think that you can make better money elsewhere, you certainly don't have to stay in the US.
If you don't want to study in the US, that's fine. Europe has lots of great schools, too, and many of them offer competitive stipends and outstanding research programs. But I would be hesitant to study in China, even if it looks like the prospects are better at the moment. Between the protests in Hong Kong, the political fallout over the coronavirus, the censorship (something academics have never gotten along with), and the human rights abuses in their factories, China is a bomb just waiting for someone to light the fuse, and I wouldn't want to be around when it finally blows. No matter who ends up winning (the reformists or the CCP), it's not going to be a good place to be.



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