Department of Philosophy

M.A. Placement Record

Summary

Since 1995, 119 students have graduated with an M.A. in philosophy from Virginia Tech. Approximately 90% of the students who have applied to Ph.D. programs have been admitted with funding. We have placed students in a number of leading philosophy Ph.D. programs, including Princeton, Columbia, Cornell, Indiana, Duke, Arizona, Brown, Notre Dame, Toronto, UC San Diego, UC Irvine, and Rutgers.

Students who do not wish to study philosophy at a doctoral level have been successful in pursuing other careers, both in other academic disciplines (Anthropology, Public Policy, and English, for instance) and outside the academy in the public and private sector (in computer-related fields, education, and Non-governmental Organizations (NGOs), among others). We are proud of our placement record for both groups of students.

The average number of students graduating each year throughout the existence of the program is 7. In the last five years, this has risen to between 7 and 11 students a year.

Acceptances are to Philosophy Ph.D. programs with funding unless noted. Beginning 2012 (and in some cases 2011), we record every program into which the applicant was admitted. Before that, we recorded only the program in which the applicant enrolled.

Placement

Graduation Year and Thesis Title
Philosophy PhD Applications
Subsequent Status
2013
 
“On Distinguishing the Meaningless from the Meaningful”
Yes
Attending University of California (Irvine) Logic and Philosophy of Science Department, also accepted University of California at San Diego, City University of New York Graduate Center, University of Notre Dame.
Non-thesis option
Yes
Attending University of Oklahoma, also accepted University of Notre Dame, Georgetown University, and Purdue University.
Non-thesis option
Yes
Attending University of Oklahoma, also accepted Purdue University.
Non-thesis option
Yes
Attending The Ohio State University.
Non-thesis option
No
Accepted, Virginia Tech Center for Public Administration and Policy; on the waitlist at Denver School of Public Affairs.
“On What We Confront in Perceptual Experience”
Yes
Accepted at Boston University.
Thesis option
Yes
No news.
Thesis option
No
TBD.
Thesis option
No
TBD.
Non-thesis option
No
TBD.
Non-thesis option
No
TBD.
Non-thesis option
No
TBD.
2012
 
Non-thesis option
Yes
Attending University of Washington at Seattle.
Non-thesis option
Yes
Cambridge University (without funding) and Georgetown University (on waitlist for funding).
Non-thesis option
No
Teaching Philosophy and English at Avon Old Farms School, Avon, Connecticut.
“Examining the 'Adam Smith Problem'”
No
Instructor, Lynchburg College.
Non-thesis option
No
M.A. program in Philosophy of Biology at Exeter University.
Non-thesis option
No
Private sector.
Non-thesis option
No
Private sector.
Non-thesis option
No
Private sector.
2011
 
Non-thesis option
Yes
Research Coordinator, Social Clinical Affective Neuroscience Laboratory, Virginia Tech. Beginning Ph.D. Fall 2013.
Non-thesis option
Yes
Rutgers University.
Non-thesis option
No
University of Chicago, Public Policy, MPP.
A Veritable Jekyll and Hyde: Epistemic Circularity and Reliabilist Theories of Justification
Yes
Purdue University.
Non-thesis option
Yes
Attending the University of Massachussetts, Amherst, also accepted University of California at Irvine and The Ohio State University.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of South Carolina.
Non-thesis option
Yes
Attending University of Toronto, also accepted University of Michigan, Cornell University, and University of Pittsburgh History and Philosophy of Science.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Virginia.
Non-thesis option
Yes
Rice University.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Arizona.
Non-thesis option
No
Instructorship at University of Toledo
Non-thesis option
No
Virginia Tech, STS Ph.D.
 
 
2010
 
Non-thesis option
Yes
Ohio State University.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of California, San Diego.
Non-thesis option
No
Virginia Tech, Planning Governance and Globalization Ph.D.
Non-thesis option
No
University of California at Irvine, Biology Ph.D.
Non-thesis option
Yes
St. Louis University.
Non-thesis option
Yes
Ohio State University.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Southern California.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Buffalo.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Arizona.
Non-thesis option
No
University of Nevada, Reno, Mathematics MA.
Non-thesis option
--
--
Non-thesis option
--
--
 
 
2009
 
Non-thesis option
Yes
Brown University.
Non-thesis option
No
University of Virginia, Law School
A Critique of Langton on Kantian Substance
No
Ph.D. plans deferred
Supervaluationism, Penumbral Connections, and the Nature of Higher-Order Vagueness
No
Instructorship at VT
Non-thesis option
Yes
Virginia Tech, ASPECT Ph.D.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Oklahoma.
Non-thesis option
No
George Mason University, Law School
Inescapable Wrongdoing and the Coherence of Morality: An Examination of Moral Dilemmas
No
Instructorship at VT
Non-thesis option
Yes
Declined Ph.D. acceptances in favor of law
Non-thesis option
Yes
Private sector
Non-thesis option
No
Private sector
 
 
2008
 
Non-thesis option
Yes
Indiana University.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Southern California.
Non-thesis option
Yes
UC San Diego.
What Dolphins Want: Animal Intentionality and Tool-Use
Yes
Virginia Tech, STS Ph.D.
Non-thesis option
Yes
Washington University, St. Louis.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Virginia.
Non-thesis option
Yes
Indiana University, HPS Ph.D.
Non-thesis option
No
Cardozo Law School
Non-thesis option
No
Private sector
A Davidsonian Response to the Dead Metaphor Problem
No
Private sector
Non-thesis option
Yes
Private sector
 
 
2007
 
A Modifier-Based Philosophy of Whole Number
Yes
Princeton University.
Non-thesis option
No
UNC Chapel Hill, Medicine
Non-thesis option
Yes
Michigan State.
Between Hull and a Hard Core:  Varying Patterns in the Evolution of the Darwinian Research Tradition
Yes
University of Connecticut.
Creating a Community of Equals: Luck Egalitarianism, Democratic Equality, and the Significance of the Choice/Circumstance Distinction
Yes
UNC Chapel Hill, Master of Library Science
Non-thesis option
No
U.S. Military
Non-thesis option
No
Private Sector
Non-thesis option
No
Private Sector
Non-thesis option
No
Private Sector
 
 
2006
 
Scientific Realism and the Periodic Table of Chemical Elements
Yes
Duke University.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Wisconsin.
Visiting Graduate Fellow
Yes
University of Toronto.
On the Moral Legitimacy of States and the Morality of Killing in War
No
Private sector
Non-thesis option
No
U.S. Military
Non-thesis option
No
Virginia Tech, Veterinary Medicine
Non-thesis option
No
Teaching at New River Community College
Non-thesis option
No
Public sector
 
 
2005
 
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Toronto.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Washington.
Non-thesis option
Yes
Teaching at Ulster County Community College
Understanding Dead Languages
No
Private sector
Non-thesis option
No
Public sector
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of British Columbia.
Experience and Pictoral Representation
Yes
Washington University, St. Louis.
Non-thesis option
No
Public sector
Non-thesis option
Yes
Virginia Tech, ASPECT Ph.D.
 
 
2004
 
Animating the EPR-Experiment: The Case for Objectivity in the Search for Bell Violations
Yes
Columbia University.
Objectivity in Feminist Philosophy of Science
Yes
Duke University, Classics Ph.D.
Non-thesis option
Yes
Emory University.
Non-thesis option
Yes
Virginia Tech, STS Ph.D.
Pragmatic Epistemology, Community, and the Problem of Solipsism
No
University of Indiana Law
Non-thesis option
No
University of Kansas, Law School
Non-thesis option
No
U.S. Military
Non-thesis option
No
Private sector
 
 
2003
 
Non-thesis option
Yes
Cornell University.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of California, Irvine.
Respecting Citizens, Protecting Capabilities: The Role of the State in a Liberal Society
Yes
University of Maryland, Education Policy Ph.D.
Non-thesis option
No
Private sector
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Educational Policy Ph.D.
 
 
2002
 
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Texas.
Non-thesis option
Yes
UC San Diego.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Notre Dame.
Non-thesis option
Yes
CUNY Graduate Center.
The Argument from Species Overlap
No
Private sector
The Moral Status of Non-Human Animals
No
Private sector
Non-thesis option
Yes
STS Ph.D, Post-Doc at Max Planck Institute for the History of Science
Non-thesis option
No
Ethics Faculty, West Point
 
 
2001
 
Contractarianism and Moderate Morality
Yes
University of Maryland.
Rawls, Liberalism, and Leisure
Yes
University of Virginia.
Non-thesis option
No
Private sector
The Ontology of Persistence
Yes
Syracuse University.
A Solution to "The Problem of Socrates" in Nietzsche's Thought: An Explanation of Nietzsche's Ambivalence Toward Socrates
Yes
DePaul University.
Nietzsche’s Notes, Nietzsche’s ‘Philosophy’
Yes
Private sector
 
 
2000
 
Sextus Empiricus and the Skeptic’s Beliefs
Yes
Ohio University, English Ph.D.
No Degree
Yes
Uniiversity of Washington.
 
 
1999
 
The Tension Between Falsificationism and Realism
No
Private sector
Socrates' Conception of Knowledge and the Priority of Definition
No
Cato Institute/George Mason University, Economics Ph.D.
Explanations of the Success of Science
No
Private sector
Royce and Perry on Idealism and Realism
Yes
University of Utah.
Kant's Doctrine of Schemata
No
Virginia Tech, MPA
 
 
1998
 
Situated Cognition, Dynamicism, and Explanation in Cognitive Science
Yes
Washington University, Ph.D.
Soldiers, Self-Defense, and Killing in War
No
Ethics Faculty, West Point
Empirical Meaning and Incomplete Personhood
Yes
University of Illinois, Chicago, Anthropology Ph.D.
 
 
1997
 
Non-thesis option
No
Private sector
Kant's Critical Attitude Towards The Only Possible Argument
Yes
Emory University.
Quality and Competence: An Analysis of the Role of Mill’s Qualitative Hedonism on his Conception of Representative Democracy
Yes
University of Virginia Law and Philosophy, J.D./Ph.D.
Non-thesis option
Yes
University of Kentucky.
Hyperadaptation: Another Missing Term in the Science of Form
No
Private sector
 
 
1996
 
Meaning, Functions, and the Promise of Indicator Semantics
Yes
Declined acceptances in favor of the private sector.
Autonomy and Neutrality in Liberal Political Thought
Yes
University of Illinois, Chicago.
 
 
1995
 
Regarding Descartes' Meditations as Meditational
Yes
Purdue University.
Descartes and Tradition: the Miracle of the Eucharist
Yes
Virginia Tech, STS Ph.D.
Ludwik Fleck and his Concept of a Scientific Fact
Yes
Northwestern University.
The Role of Welfare in an Egalitarian Metric
Yes
University of Kentucky.