It is harder to earn a Ph.D. in the Philippines than abroad!

A few years ago, I overheard a colleague say "... sa (name of an Asian country) lang ang Ph.D. niyan..." I should have said something because I have learned long ago that it doesn’t matter where one earns his/her degree; what really matters is what one does with it. I know people who earned their Ph.Ds from very well-known universities, but who did not accomplish much afterwards, and vice versa.

In the Philippines, we have progressed far enough so that we are now routinely granting Ph.Ds in many disciplines. Still, many of our students, especially the young and the unattached, opt to go abroad than stay in the country to get their Ph.Ds. Is it because we believe that a Ph.D. from the Johns Hopkins University (just for an example) is more prestigious than a Ph.D. from the University of the Philippines (just for an example)? Is this another example of our "colonial mentality"? Are we afraid that somebody might say of us, "... sa Pilipinas lang ang Ph.D. niyan?"

Well, I have news for you: It is harder to earn a Ph.D. in the Philippines than in the United States or Europe.

That may be too sweeping a statement to make. But let me compare graduate programs here and abroad. The basic requirements are more or less the same: formal coursework, an oral candidacy exam, completion of a thesis and successful defense of it.

The number of formal courses required varies. In the University of the Philippines, 45 units of formal graduate courses (15 three-unit courses, or equivalent) beyond the BS degree are required (see, for example, http://www.dilnet.upd.edu.ph/~mbb/academic.htm for the Molecular Biology and Biotechnology Program; I believe this is true for all programs in UP). The Biophysics Department at Johns Hopkins (http://www.jhu.edu/~pmb/program-curriculum.html) requires five core courses, as does the Biophysics Program at Harvard (http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~biophys/ProgramOfStudy.html); the Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry at Yale (http://www.mbb.yale.edu/gp/gp_04a_fyc.htm) requires at least seven courses, of which four are specifically required, while the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics at Columbia (http://cpmcnet.columbia.edu/dept/gsas/biochem/gradwork.html) requires six (four core courses and two electives).

At what point the oral candidacy exam is taken also varies. At UP, the qualifying exam is taken after all the coursework is done. At Johns Hopkins and Columbia, the student is evaluated at the end of the first year; at Yale, the oral candidacy exam is taken at the beginning of the second year; at Harvard, the qualifying exam must be completed by the end of the second year.

(Here’s a surprise from Johns Hopkins (http://www.jhu.edu/~pmb/program-curriculum.html): "Proficiency in biochemistry, cell and molecular biology is evaluated formally with an oral examination at the end of the first year. Students who have never taken courses in these areas are welcome, but not required, to take such courses during their first year. Tutorials and self-directed study provide alternative avenues for preparing for this evaluation." In other words, one does not need to take formal courses to take the qualifying exam! This is not surprising because Johns Hopkins is patterned after the universities in Europe and there (I know this is true in the UK) there are no (repeat: NO) course requirements for the Ph.D.)

But the biggest difference between getting a Ph.D. here and abroad is the ease with which thesis research can be accomplished. The labs abroad are relatively well-funded, all the equipment that a student needs to perform experiments are usually in the lab or just next door, and supplies and consumables are literally within easy reach. (And we are all well-aware of how it is in the Philippines.)

And graduate school in the US (and in Europe, too?) is (usually) free! Not only are one’s tuition and other fees paid for, but one also gets a living allowance that could be big enough to support a family (not luxuriously, of course). In the Philippines, we (usually) pay.

So, why then do many stay and get their Ph.Ds in the Philippines? I would suspect it is mainly for personal reasons. It takes an average of five to seven years to get a Ph.D. in the US (although some have done it in less time, for example, Dr Enrique T. Virata, the very first university professor in UP, who got his Ph.D. in Mathematics from Johns Hopkins in two years!). It is not easy to be away from family for five to seven years and be in a strange land at that. It cannot be because we are afraid that we cannot compete with foreigners. Let us not forget that the Filipinos who have been accepted in universities in the US had competed for slots with students from the US and from the rest of the world – and had won. Indeed, many of our countrymen have done exceptionally well in their studies abroad – and afterwards. Walang sinasanto ang Pinoy!

Could we, maybe, make it as easy to get a Ph.D. here as it is abroad? Or, do we want to be able to say, "... sa US lang ang Ph.D. niyan...?"

I realize that most of the Ph.D. holders in the Philippines at the moment, including myself, got our degrees abroad. I do not mean to belittle our degrees. If for some reason I have offended anyone by this article, I can only say, "Batu-bato sa langit, ang tamaan huwag magagalit."

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Eduardo A. Padlan has a Ph.D. in Biophysics from the Johns Hopkins University. He retired from the US National Institutes of Health in 2000 and is currently an adjunct professor in the Marine Science Institute, College of Science, University of the Philippines Diliman. He is a corresponding member of the National Academy of Science and Technology, Philippines. Send criticisms and rebuttals to [email protected].