During the PhD

• Fellow students This program has incredible camaraderie among the students. They are largely self-organizing and pass on knowledge from year to year about funding, exam prep, coursework, faculty, etc. They also host social events and form writing groups, peer mentoring, and other support groups.

• Language Harvard seems to have special words for everything: undergraduates are in “the college”, their majors are called “concentrations”, and we refer to graduate students using the letter G followed by their year in the program. First-year PhD students are called “G1” students. The summer between your first and second years, you’ll be called a “rising G2.” The Health Policy PhD program has five “tracks” also called “concentrations”: methods for policy research, economics, political analysis, decision science, and management. Students are admitted to a single track that they stick with for their whole PhD. The tracks have some overlap, but their own curricula and requirements.

• Organization Harvard University has many schools nested within it, e.g., Harvard Medical School and Harvard Divinity School. Among these, the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS) is special because it is the only school that can confer PhD degrees. Thus, the Health Policy PhD program is based at GSAS, but the faculty who teach and advise students are spread across five other schools: Harvard Business School, Harvard Kennedy School, Harvard Law School, Harvard Medical School, and Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health.
  In addition, there are other doctoral programs at Harvard that cover similar areas of research. For example, the Kennedy School has a PhD program in Social Policy and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health has a PhD program in Population Health Sciences. Like ours, these PhD degrees are technically granted by GSAS.

• Finances In their G1 and G2 years, students are paid a stipend for living expenses (about $31k for the academic year) by the program. Nearly all students also receive a stipend from the “dissertation completion fellowship” (aka DCF) in their final year. Most students also supplement the stipend with additional paid work. Thus, if you take five years to complete the program (which is the norm), you’ll need to find funding for summers plus the G3 and G4 years. Students often find this stressful, but the leadership of the program is keeping an eye on all students to make sure no one experiences a funding gap.
  What kind of funding do students find? It varies a lot. Some students have jobs (called “proctors” and “tutors”) working with undergraduates that provide housing and some meals (14-21 per week, depending on the job). Some students work as “teaching fellows” (called “teaching assistants” at most universities) for Harvard classes, both graduate and undergraduate classes. Some work as research assistants for Harvard faculty, at an hourly rate that varies a lot from school to school. Graduate student workers (e.g., teaching fellows and research assistants) at Harvard are unionized.
  Some students are funded on training grants that faculty affiliated with the program manage; these often are restricted based on citizenship and immigration status and may also limit students’ ability to work other hours for pay. Summer internships and fellowships with outside organizations (e.g., private industry or government) are another way that students make money during the program. Working for these outside entities means students and are not bound by the union or other rules about graduate student work.
  Tuition and health insurance are paid for all students in the program. The health insurance is pretty good; the dental insurance is not (this may change with a new union contract). Living in Boston is expensive; nearly all students have roommates or live with family.

• Coursework Your G1 and G2 years will be spent taking courses, and it will be a lot of work. Your fellow students will take many classes with you, but there is a lot of flexibility in the coursework (see the course requirements by track here) so you won’t quite be traveling through them together as a cohort. However, in your G1 year, you will take a year-long class together called “core” that will introduce you to the key topics in health policy and many of the affiliated faculty. The is the main time the whole cohort (i.e., everyone admitted to all tracks of the program at the same time) will spend be together. Otherwise, you’ll mostly be with students from your track.

• Pre-dissertation research Some students do a research project or internship during the summer between their G1 and G2 years. This isn’t required, but can be a nice way to explore relationships with faculty and research ideas of interest to you.

• Qualifying exams In the spring after your G2 year, you’ll take two comprehensive exams (also called “quals”). One is the “general exam” that everyone in the PhD program takes, the other is a track-specific exam, which varies. The Methods for Policy Research track, for example, takes a two-part exam where the first part is a critique of an article and the second part is a hands-on data analysis problem. The students form study groups and work with program faculty to prepare for these exams. Failing is extremely rare; this is not a “weed-out“ mechanism, it’s a check point for the faculty to make sure students are generally on track.

• Dissertation years In your G3 year, you’ll explore potential dissertation topics and assemble a committee of 3 faculty members who can mentor that work. You’ll also start attending a weekly research seminar where students present their in-progress research. For more about G3+ years, see this slide deck that I present at the beginning of the research seminar each fall.

• Prospectus After your G3 year (or the spring of G4 at the latest), you’ll present a written description of the work you intent to do for your dissertation to your committee, called a “prospectus”. The written prospectus is usually 25 to 30 pages, sent to the whole committee. You’ll also give an hour-long talk to your committee (called the “prospectus defense”) and immediately afterwards, discuss it with them. This is an important opportunity to get feedback on your plan for the dissertation and ensure that all the members of the committee agree that if you execute that plan, you’ll have a dissertation.

• Dissertation A dissertation usually comprises three publishable papers that are related somehow (though they may be loosely related). “Publishable” means it could be published as an article in a peer-reviewed journal. However, it does not mean “published”; some students never publish their dissertation research in journals and others do not publish until after they graduate (during their first job). Students do not have to generate research projects entirely on their own; your faculty mentors will help you. You can find past dissertations here.
  The last thing you do as a student is “defend” the dissertation. This entails sending a complete copy to the whole committee and then giving a public talk, which is called a “defense”. At the defense, you will present all of your research and the committee will ask questions, and then “pass” you. No one fails the defense; it is a celebratory occasion. If you’re not ready to defend, your committee will delay the defense until you are ready to pass.

After the PhD

• “Going on the job market” In the fall of their final year, students who are looking for a job in academia (i.e., a faculty position, either in research or teaching) “go on the job market”, meaning they start applying for jobs that will start the following summer or fall. The job search calendar is more flexible for students who are applying for postdoctoral positions or jobs outside of academia. The members of your dissertation committee will help you develop application materials, practice your “job talk” (i.e., a presentation you will give to prospective employers), and write letters of recommendation for you.

• Potential jobs You can find out about alumni of the program here. The jobs they have span the full range of possibilities across research and teaching in universities, research and policy analysis in industry and government. The alumni of the program can be a powerful resource for the rest of your professional life. They are typically generous in giving their time to current students and other alumni to help with searching for jobs and navigating professional issues.

Acknowledgments

Many thanks to Amanda Speller, Kacie Dragan, Rebecca Gourevitch, and Jason Buxbaum for improving this page with thoughtful edits and additions.