NSF pilots 4-year PhDs with industry research placements
nsf.gov
nsf.gov
An academic pairs with a buddy in industry. This relationship usually remains fixed in their careers. The representative in the company hires an engineer, makes a CIFRE contract and asks the academic to register the student and takes care of paperwork. There is no open call, competitive submission of proposals, a committee and a process. I don’t know how government is OK with this. The company sends the information about the recruitment to the government and gets tax waiver. Therefore, the company hires an engineer paid by taxpayers, nearly free for the company. A small amount of money is sent to the academic for conference travel etc. In many cases, student remains in the company and there is no need for academic other than for periodic paperwork. Importantly, the student works on tasks assigned by the company, which in many cases is not really research. It could be product improvement, mechanical work, client work, or some R&D or short term research. It’s not science or long term research, and no classes are involved. Next year, next student, it will be the same pair.
The program attracts students because they want jobs (in many cases their contracts is extended after 3 years of PhD, and they are actually incentivized to work well during that 3 years and be a good employee). Companies like it because of essentially free engineers and government rapport. Academics are content because they can say they have a student (even if they don’t see the student much if at all sometimes), cite collaboration with industry, and get some money for travel. The academic cannot complain, or require student spend more time in university, because the company would say, we will replace you next time with another academic who will be happy to sign off to paperwork and not to cause issues. The three parties are happy, and the taxpayer looses, because of a badly set up program. Maybe the American version will work, not the French version!
Officially companies apply and are selected on the merit of application, in practice it's dramatically easier for companies already 'in the system' to re-apply.
The engineer (Mostly engineers, but also some scientists) is legally employed by the university, but typically spends all their time at the company. No tax shenanigans, the university's expenses are straight up paid by government.
They don't get a PhD, they just file reports and make presentations to the KTP org representative.
It's fairly common for them to enroll with the university during a KTP though, which sometimes can be paid for from the KTP training budget.
They also get a selection of training courses in business and management subjects, which curiously includes a large section on tax avoidance for small businesses.
The reality was unfortunately often not so great. What would happened is that the student would get 3-4 year contract with 50% allocation to the PhD research in addition to normal employment duties. That is not enough to graduate if the professor has high standards.
As a result, the student would transition to full time employment after the 3-4 years, try to work on research in the evenings, and give up after some time. Or they would graduate with a very low quality degree (I saw students graduate with a 0 or 1 publications and a very thin dissertation) that has practically no value to anyone beyond providing the student with a Dr. title.
In the end I was actively advising students against it, and to just go into industry with a masters degree or find a fully academy funded PhD position if they are serious about research.
Yes - the downsides you mention are all true. But similar downsides apply to most PhD students working directly at the university - either you have some teaching load and administrative duties, or you work in an externally funded project and have to write project reports and do a lot of non-research stuff, too.
As I mentioned elsewhere in the thread, if you want to have an academic career, doing a PhD in industry is not the best choice. But if you want to work in R&D or as a group leader in industry, these PhD positions might be a good stepping stone.
If you want more PhD's than that, you have to figure out a place for them to work; industry is a good "pressure relief valve".
I do think it would be good for all levels of academia to be more explicit about the goals of any given program. I think these things are often blurred together to the detriment of both student and staff.
The problem here -- and why universities even do research at all -- is that industry's support of basic science is not very stable. At least when I was in school, industry research generally was more applied and engineering-focused.
this would hopefully stop departments from over-admitting and encourage less adjunctification.
On the other side of things, you have PhDs coming out of the US with too many ideas and the inability to deal with basics such as sprint planning and CI/CD.
Not sure if this will help, but I would love it for the Colleges of Sciences peoples instead of a postdoc.
Get a PhD with years of experience, who knows your company, for the price of a secretary.
No reason why the good plumbers, electricians, or truck drivers of the world ought to look down on academics-- no matter how stuffy or highfalutin or soft-handed they might seem.
Every once in a while, academics come up with something useful. (And in fact, I think that that might just be the whole point).
I know the German system quite well and know people who did their PhD in industry, people who did their PhD in an externally funded research project, and people who pursued a more self-directed PhD while working as a research and teaching assistant.
I don't think that there is a general 'PhD inflation' in Germany (though there are some disciplines with this problem). It is well understood by most PhD students that an academic career is the exception, not the rule. Most of them choose to do a PhD because they like the academic environment and want to learn more. Most PhDs go on to work in industry research labs, science-adjacent roles (e.g., museums) or as group leaders in tech companies. There is sufficient need for PhDs in most fields.
Industry-embedded PhD students are required to meet the same criteria as other PhD students. They also publish their research at the same conferences - but it is often more on the applied side. One could argue that such research has "little scientific value" - but so does most research.
The most important outcome of a PhD is not the list of publications but a person who deeply understands a domain, knows how to critically analyze a problem, and finds good solutions. Doing a PhD 'in industry' also allows you to do this. And it gives you a foot in the door at that company.
FWIW, many PhD students I knew, e.g. at BMW, complained a little bit about the side-projects they were expected to do, or the bureaucracy at such large companies. And, because you don't have to do any teaching and rarely supervise undergrads in industry labs, you are less qualified for an academic career than PhD students who work at the university.
Interesting though. Not sure you can have an extensive publication list without a deep domain understanding. But an extensive publication list normally assures that you have it.
My professor always said, I don't want to see you PhD thesis, just show me your publication list. Actually, while we were obligated to write a thesis, in his opinion it should be sufficient to just submit your publications.
In all OECD countries, but in particular in Germany, there seems to be an enormous overproduction of PhDs – in case one sees a PhD as the starting point of an academic career or as an important asset on the job market.
https://socialscienceworks.org/2015/07/243/are-there-too-man...
I am aware of that system, doing a PhD in a company as an external PhD student. The "research" is extremely applied. That is good for the company, possibly even a better career choice, but has limited scientific value. You are also unlikely to switch back to academia and become a professor.
Most people mistake "feeling" for "thinking". Just because you don't like my post, does not mean it is not true.
https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/show-award/?AWD_ID=2624416
Appropriately enough for a pilot, there's a structured usual cohort-mentoring and outcomes evaluation component.
(NSF brings 3 years of $$$, but as it is, it doesn't seem like attempt to nudge people screwed over by GRFP restrictions towards industry.)
https://uidp.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/UIDP-I-PhD-Schol...
http://www.moe.gov.cn/srcsite/A22/moe_826/202312/t20231218_1...
Academia as we know it has been dead for a while, and AI is the final harbinger. The reproducibility crisis got that much worse now that the papers that nobody ever bothered to reproduce have grown 10x in number with the press of a button.
At least the industry research jobs pay well, even if they suffer many of the same issues.
If you work for a private firm, then they presumably own the rights to patents you develop while under their employment, depending on your contract. But also, you have access to patents and technologies through the corporate patent sharing agreements and licenses that you'd never have access to in the university system, so it can work both ways, where you may be able to develop things not possible in traditional academia, but whether you actually retain those rights is not as clear as in academia.
In the US, I've seen people start PhD programs with a BSc degree and take 6-8 years. I've encountered many engineering companies at job fairs who said that for them a PhD is a disqualifying factor for many positions, because the experience is not relevant but they would need to (or felt obliged to, for whatever reason) pay extra for this degree.
In Switzerland, people would do a 1.5-2 year MSc degree after their BSc. This would still be mostly classes with one 6-month-long research / technical project. This was the expectation for many technical jobs. Some then did a PhD, which would take 3-4 years and required to have a MSc already to apply. Many of these projects (at least in my field) were sponsored by the industry.
The true motivation seems to be that it is cheaper to fund 3 years than 5. Master's degrees have been made obligatory prior to doctorates (in the US this is traditionally not the case) and so are not covered by doctoral funding - rather they are paid for by students in many cases.
It may very well have sense to have a shorter track aimed at industry, but it shouldn't be called a doctorate and all doctorates shouldn't be shunted into this setup.
The critical part imho will be allowing for enough independence in research, and that the time isn't just wasted filling in remedial RAs pushing pipettes around. Real safeguards will be needed, likely overseen by the PI and committee.
I genuinely hope it works and helps industry "figure out" that R&D is more than just simply productizing over the next quarter.
There’s already a 3-4 year advanced degree in the United States with an optional thesis component that companies in relevant industries can intervene in and direct if they so desire.
So why are they calling it a doctorate? I don’t see the point. It’s not like the NSF under this administration is particularly fond of STEM doctorates.
I’m open to any theories about what the real point of this is.
There isn't.
And if you are trying to snarkily describe an MS, then most MS programs are too short.
> So why are they calling it a doctorate? I don’t see the point. It’s not like the NSF under this administration is particularly fond of STEM doctorates.
The I-PhD is basically a formalization of industry-sponsored PhDs based on the program site [0]
My coworkers holding such degrees would beg to differ.
> And if you are trying to snarkily describe an MS, then most MS programs are too short.
It wasn’t snarky, it was a listing of common points between the two. I don’t see what distinguishes this from a MS.
A year still isn’t enough time to write a doctoral-level thesis, so if the I-PhD is supposed to represent a “longer MS” then it’s still insufficient.
And to be pedantic, every single one of those credentials I've mentioned is a doctorate, even if it's not a PhD.
Edit: I just reread your comment. I think it is for students who are already doing their MS or have previously done so and are applying to PhD programs
I do wonder if NSF is hoping to seed more industry-sponsored PhDs as well, e.g., the first will be funded by NSF to establish the program, and industry will fund more once the program gets going.
Definitely makes sense to me they call it a PhD, not a master’s. A PhD is more prestigious and signals the holder is ready and eager to do cutting-edge research and has some experience doing so.
There are all kinds of master’s degrees (I say as someone who has one) and reasons for getting them, so they’re not as strong a signal of anything in particular. And they can mean someone switched careers, someone dropped out of a PhD program, someone took advanced classes during undergrad, someone got a bachelor’s in one country and wanted to study and work in another, etc.
Masters is usually about 2 years, though it could be longer in some cases or if worked on part-time. PhD is often 4-6+.
What 3-4 year degree did you mean? Bachelors?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_degree#United_Sta...
An aside, the Actuarial profession's fellowship credentials (FSA/FCAS) are considered to be roughly equivalent in content to a professional doctorate (not counting a medical residency), and have a completely different format.
It's mostly exam based from pure self study, and aspiring actuaries typically work full time in the industry after passing the first 2-3 exams and finishing a bachelor's (which can be in any subject). Typical travel time from the first exam to the fellowship credential is 6-8 years, IIRC. Employers pay employees for some study time and for exam leave for each exam, with a bonus for each one passed.
I bring this all up because there are a lot of other ways for education to be structured outside of the BS -> MS -> PhD pathway, and there are ways for learning to be integrated with industry.
You're making this up as you go. No MS lasts 3-4 years, almost all MS theses are book reports/unpublished because the student is primarily attending classes, almost none are directed by industry (see points 1 and 2).
[0] often a leadership or personality failure of the PI
I imagine there are departments where it’s more common to get a master’s by dropping out of the PhD program early than through any other path. Especially for people with a bachelor’s in the same field.
Lololol extremely. They're cash cows because of foreign students paying full price and not getting tuition waivers.
> Especially for people with a bachelor’s in the same field.
Lol bruh an enormous number of schools have 4+1 programs to enable students getting terminal MS even easier.
do you enjoy being a source of misinformation?
What do these words mean to you? To me they imply the degree is intended to last 3-4 years. The English is very clear here.