Georgia State Visit Recap

While enduring the “miracle” of modern air travel from Oklahoma to Atlanta via Chicago, I received a voice mail from Georgia State’s PhD director saying she’d like to discuss my application. She gave me her cell phone and suggested I could call her at any time, but I made the decision not to give her a ring during my 1:00 AM cab ride back to the north side. We did speak the following day and she managed to pull together a visit and interview session the following afternoon. What follows is the same framework for the previous to re-caps.

LOCATION

As much as I promised never to be considered an Atlantan, I am one. I’ve been here for 9 years, done professional tours of duty in the suburbs and in the city, done church inside and outside the perimeter, and did grad school deep within the concrete jungle at GSU from 2005 to 2007. So, I’m intimately familiar with the surroundings and staying here for doctoral work would present a different set of geographic questions. Mainly, do I stay put in my suburban home and take the train down every day or do I pick up and move in town where the rest of my life is.

There are also other things to consider: do I need to take this opportunity to go somewhere new, start over, and abandon distractions (especially those present in such a large city). On the other side, staying means an in tact network and support structure and less to get used to prior to putting my brain through the intensity of the next few years.

FACULTY

The faculty is small, but percentage-wise is actually very well known. One professor is actually referred to as a rock star (no joke) within our field, is constantly sought out at conferences, chairs a prestigious journal editorial board, and shows no signs of slowing down his research program. The department head has seen a slight drop in productivity during his administrative tenure (to be expected), but over a 10 year period before accepting that role he was the most-published academic in one of the top psychology journals. There are two other talented researchers who also happen to be very nice people, and the department has just scored a big hit by getting someone from Michigan State to come down to join the ranks.

The size of the faculty is somewhat deceiving, because this is the research portion of the faculty. Most of them focus the bulk of their time on research, mentoring doctoral students, and a few graduate classes. There is a much larger faculty contingent that handles the bulk of the department’s teaching load.

From a personality perspective, two of the four primary faculty in the organizational behavior section would be my preference to work with, and a third would be good from a subject matter standpoint but not the best personality match.

STUDENTS

Georgia State has a very small program, and I had lunch with all four current students. There were two others, but one dropped out and the other was asked to leave because of some integrity issues. The remaining students were very kind and open about the program, though two of them were international and definitely have difficulty with the English language. At times, I was unsure whether I couldn’t understand them or whether they had not understood the question I posed. Needless to say, I spent the bulk of the time interacting with the two American students.

Three of the four were just two days away from their comprehensive exams, so their brains were a little fried and the energy level may have been a little lacking. Still, they were very welcoming and seemed excited and ready to add a couple more students to their ranks.

PROGRAM

Similar to the culture of the other programs I’ve visited, GSU prefers to admit a very small number of students they think will be successful and collaborative. They demand a great deal from the candidates, but are also committed to investing in them and making them successful. They make it clear that the goal is not to wash out those that come in, but rather to use the learning crucible to produce the next generation of renowned scholars.

The methods and theory training are similar to that of most other programs, with the exception that they add a few courses along the way, making the likelihood of completion in four years unlikely. That said, they do not limit funding to four years, eliminating some pressure from the candidates.

The program has just been re-started/ramped up in the past few years and doesn’t have a lot to judge in terms of placements. The few that have graduated in recent years have landed positions at solid research institutions, and the reputation of the faculty is no doubt helpful when entering the job market. In fact, the “rock star” researcher has made it clear that having a PhD program at GSU was important to them because they are dedicated to mentoring and producing a generation of productive academics, not because they needed an ego boost or cheap labor.

SUMMARY

I was pleasantly surprised with what I saw and heard and am thankful that the opportunity to visit came together so quickly. There seems to be an opportunity to learn good solid research skills and to present and pursue ones own ideas, which is attractive. The small size is both a major plus and minus, though and I’m not sure what side of that fence I will fall on during the decision process.

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