Education: What goes into doing a PhD?

A PhD is often seen as a high peak of the traditional educational system. It has also become associated with many opinions and cultural quirks over the years - but at the bottom line, it is the entryway into the world of academia, or high level private research.

One common misconception is that doing a PhD necessarily means one’s end goal is being a professor or teaching at a tertiary institution. For example, even in the early days of data science in 2015, 38% of data scientists on LinkedIn reported having a doctorate. Meta (previously Facebook) also encourages the development of potential talent with doctorates with its Facebook Fellowship Program.

What remains less seen, however, are the ins and outs of actually pursuing a doctorate. The path can be long and filled with many challenges. The decision to pursue one is not trivial, as it involves many additional years of education on top of an undergraduate degree and sometimes a master's.

We’re glad to have with us Ms Xueqing Wang - a current doctoral student in Demography and Social Policy at Princeton University - to share some of her experiences!

This episode originally aired live on 26th Mar 2022.

Credits:

• Intro and Background Music: Anchor
• Outro Music: Jingle Jazz by Quantum Jazz