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Piotr Migdal
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I think the most important is:

  • Are you happy with your PhD in general?

It covers a lot of issues, but usually you don't want to do a PhD in a place where students are unhappy and frustrated. The good thing is that if students feel really bad, they rarely hide it.

The next things are related to:

  • General contacts on the line student-advisor (How much contact and support can you expect, both for research and administrative stuff?).
  • Funding (Is it a problem or a non-issue, e.g. for attending a conference?).
  • Research (What the actual research looks like? What is the toughest part, biggest emphasis on, the most time-consuming part, etc?)
  • How much time does it typically take to finish PhD? Does it happen often that someone drops out?

Other questions will depend of things you consider important. You may expect a lot of autonomy, or a lot of guidance. You may expect a very ambitious programme, or a PhD-life balance. You may like to teach, or you may like to keep it at minimum. You may be eager to travel a lot, or prefer to stay mostly in one place. You may be more into a particular branch of science or methodology, or into another...

Piotr Migdal
  • 26.6k
  • 10
  • 74
  • 126