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How can a professor avoid becoming a manager?
My former postdoc has a new position at an R1 as an Assistant Professor. He is horrified at something I myself once struggled with: he is discovering that his job is a form of management. The individual contributor skillset he succeeded with in my laboratory is one he can no longer indulge as much as he desires...
'Is this avoidable?', is his question. He is asking in the context of leaving, potentially.
I myself have minimized this, mostly by being well published, bringing research dollars, and using the resulting leverage in refusing almost all service within my department. However, I am yet much more a manager than he wishes to be.
What are viable strategies to remain an individual contributor and also remain competitive for tenure?

In some fields it is easy. Mathematicians can just say no. In other fields, lab science, perhaps, it is part of the job itself.

If you have grants and students and labs you will, of course, have to manage them. It often surprises me that students, while hanging around universities, somehow are surprised to realize just what professors do, as if they had not bothered observing...

It is called the "Peter principle" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_principle) - often the qualities that get you promoted at one level are not the skills you need to succeed at the level to which you are promoted.  Being good at research does not imply that you will be a good research manager.  The best thing to do would be to find a research topic that doesn't require grants or research assistants.

@DikranMarsupial When you find such a research topic, can you let me know where you can find a unicorn and like 6 Bitcoin?

No worries… An academic manager who has hands on technical parts, publications, and scientific details is never a general manager. They have a very specific position. Something like engineering managers, whose role can never be carried out in projects by experienced engineers and general managers; since the latter group have not enough knowledge on technical aspects.

@AzorAhai-him- try machine learning (mostly works for me)

@AzorAhai-him-, already as a kid the remarkably minimal resources needed to "do math" were a non-trivial aspect of its appeal to me. At an earlier point, even a modest county library could be adequate. The same low-resource-requirement aspect of mathematics does persist, substantially. On another hand, the non-need for resources can be juxtaposed with the deceits of spending resources "doing something extravagant", regardless of outcomes or improved knowledge. :)

With the recommendation to find fields that require little funding there is definately something to be careful of: In many universities you will be measured by how much grant funding you bring in, even if your field doesn't require funding, but particularly if you work in a field where some topics require funding and others don't. E.g. a bioinformatician in a biology department will find themsevles bottom of the pile, unpromoted and given lots of teaching if they take that attitude that their work requires minimal funding.

This new assistant professor might have been less surprised by his new management role if, when he was a post-doc his PI had given him some entry-level management responsibilities, such as supervising junior grad students.

What @IanSudbery writes is very true, but it would be an indication of poor senior management - looking at metrics rather than judging the true contribution made by that member of faculty.  The Peter Principle in action?  Of course what should matter is not research input (grants) but research outputs (papers, software, patents), but it would be naive to expect that, rather than going with immediate economic considerations.

I should also point out that the promotions committee acting that way would likely be discriminating against faculty that have difficulties with management jobs (e.g. some people with autistic spectrum disorders).  If they are producing good quality research output and good teaching, why should they be denied promotions?  Doing so might be illegal.

@DikranMarsupial - I'm yet to find a university that is not poorly managed ;). I think that university management makes much more sense, if you regard grants (and other income) as the output, and things like papers as things you need in order to generate income. But supervising PhDs isn't even that. The founding mission of universities is as educational institutions. Training PhDs is part of that. There is a reason our job description is "Lecturer" (UK)/"Professor"(US), not "Senior Scientist/Researcher"

RE: discrimination - my job description explicitly recognises my duties as being three fold - "Lead a program of research", "Prepare and deliver high quality teaching", "Contribute to the running of the department". Discrimination law states that reasonable accomodations must be made to allow people to perform there roles, but does not cover situations were people are not able to carry out their role irrepsective of the accomodations.

@IanSudbery (i) indeed (ii) I think that is a perverse way of looking at it.  The money largely comes from the tax payer - I don't think they would be happy with the idea that they are paying to keep faculty and RAs in their jobs. (iii) I've been in post long enough that I don't really have a job description, but you can lead a programme of research without having research assistants (and have "internationally leading research").  I have administrative roles that contribute to the running of the department, but they are not directly managing people.

@DikranMarsupial "an indication of poor senior management - looking at metrics rather than judging the true contribution" while I do not like the money-focused sentiment of the universities, neither, saying the "true contribution" is only research at a university is rather misguided and narrow-minded. I would also add that in most fields teaching and research itself is a managerial job at the professor level, not some solo act.

@Greg ""true contribution" is only research at a university is rather misguided and narrow-minded" I don't think anybody said or implied that.  I'd also say teaching and research are more "collaborative" than "managerial", but then I am only a senior lecturer.

Embrace the power of no
There are plenty of junior to mid-career positions in academia that do not have any serious management component.  Consequently, it ought to be possible for an academic to remain in a position without any management responsibilities, so long as they are willing to accept a lower ceiling on academic promotion and pay.  Most of the senior positions in universities have some management component, and the "higher" you go the larger the management component.  Of course, there are some highly-paid and highly-esteemed academic positions that are pure research positions, but these are extremely competitive.
Like anyone else in an organisation where you begin in a technical capacity, academics need to recognise the realities of how a university functions.  Like any other large institution, the higher level positions almost all involve heavy management responsibilities and a corresponding reduction in individual technical work.  If you don't want these positions, you have the freedom to apply for lower level positions where the expectations of the role are more concentrated on research, teaching, and other individual technical work.  If one were to restrict attention solely to positions that lead to tenure then obviously this leaves less variation in roles, and it entails accepting the roles that are generally present in those positions.
Your colleague/friend may need to look around for another position until he finds one that has role expectations that are compatible with what he wants to do.  This should be possible in principle, but there are some obstacles to be aware of.  There is an unfortunate tendency in some universities to have an "up or out" mentality where they expect all their junior and mid-career academic staff to work towards higher-level professorial positions that entail large administrative and management roles, or large funding expectations.  This can sometimes manifest in a bias against older highly-experienced academics who apply for lower-level positions to avoid those roles.  Nevertheless, some university admissions panels appreciate that experienced academics may wish to remain in lower-level roles that do not have a large administrative and management component, or which have lower expectations with regard to bringing in external funding (which is also somewhat of a management-like activity).  Attitudes vary a great deal across different disciplines; in highly techincal fields (e.g., mathematics, etc.) it is not unusual for academics to turn down management and administrative work and still remain as workers in good standing for their teaching/research work.
I agree with your point that it is useful to have some leverage, such as having a strong research record and funding.  Remember that this is also relative to your academic level, so if you are willing to take a lower-level position, the research and funding expectations are lower, so existing accomplishments will count as more leverage in this context.  Ultimately, if he can obtain a position where the role itself does not have a high management component, and where he is "overperforming" relative to research expectations, he should have enough leverage toturn down managment and administrative roles he does not want to do.

Its almost impossible in some fields to avoid some management duties. In the majority of biology departments, for example, getting a grant with a postdoc funded on it, and sucessfully supervising PhD students are requirements for passing probation for even the lowest level faculty position. And few or no position below faculty level are permenant, or offer security.

The OP is asking in the context of tenure. Are there any tenure-track positions that do not have a strong management component and are research focussed?
The closest things I can think of (in North America) are a staff scientist (which as far as I know are not tenure track positions) or a professor/lecturer at a teaching university (where research is a secondary consideration).

Some consider supervision of PhDs to be a burdensome form of management, but others consider it a (quite enjoyable) form of teaching.  It is not clear from the question which category OP falls into, but most academics I have encountered have no gripes with supervision activities, so I have not addressed that here.

From what I have seen in North America (I am at a post-doc level), the job of a professor (especially at R1 universities) is to manage grad students/post-docs, teach, write grants, communicate research (via papers and conferences), and do admin work. Personal research seems to be essentially a side job/hobby. I am not sure if this is the actual job description, but it seems to be the job that most professors at research-oriented universities actually do.
The closest exception I can think of is that I have heard of a professor who essentially spends all day (i.e. eight hours) at a blackboard with one or two grad students working on math. I presume the professor's other duties I mentioned above are done outside of this time. While this is personal contribution and a possible strategy, it also still includes managing/supervising the student(s).
Outside of tenure, there are staff scientist positions in academia and many research positions in industry. Though, one may need to search carefully as many of these positions may involve supervising/managing junior employees (a PhD-level position in a company is often already rather high up).
There are also national lab positions, but again, one would have to look carefully as my impression is that these positions can easily have  management/supervisory aspects to the job.

How can a professor avoid becoming a manager?

They can't, because it's an intrinsic part of the job. A significant component of "management" involves looking after people, and so one starts becoming a manager the moment they take on a post-grad student, and certainly when they hire a postdoc. Possibly a researcher could sidestep this by becoming an eternal postdoc (lifetime on fixed-term contracts) or a one-person CRO in their garage, but then they wouldn't be a professor any more. Notice that "management" isn't the same as "administration" or "teaching".
Has your postdoc got a sustainable work-life balance? Is the project ethical? Does your post-grad have a proper desk and computer? Is the lab equipment safe? Is your postdoc being harassed by a colleague, or is she bullying the students? All these, and more, are your problem as the professor.
As recounted in the Wellcome Trust's "What researchers think about the culture they work in" the research sector is particularly rife with exploitation, bullying and harassment; that report is in line with my own experience and observations. There are plenty more specific examples on this site. My (jaundiced) view is that this is partly sustained by the culture in academia having a somewhat idiosyncratic notion of responsibility and the common notion that anything like corporate management is abhorrent. I don't see how things will improve as long as the present sink-or-swim / if-they're-good-enough-they'll-survive-anything attitude is presented as being normal: people internalise it and just behave the same way to the next generation.
(Note that I drafted this off-line - in the meantime Scott Seidman has made a similar point independently, and more gently.)

Outside of universities, there might exist such positions: Independent researcher, competitive level, permanent position, good payment, collaborations with industry or other research groups, visiting conferences, writing papers, but not having to manage a group, not doing teaching (sometimes optional), less dependent on grand money.
In Germany these are research institutes like Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft or Max-Planck-Gesellschaft. Two researches from MPG won Nobel prizes in 2021.
Not sure how much the position there would suite, but I think comparable institutes exist in France (INRIA, CNRS) and the US (United States national laboratories like Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory).

At institutions such as CNRS a researcher is most often free of teaching duties. But for the rest, there are groups and institutes. Someone has to manage them, or the part of his/her competence as well as PhD students and post-docs.  What it can be true, is that the management part involves less individuals, and at the beginning of the researcher career one has quite some time - even full time - for the lab or active research.

If you're teaching, you're managing a class.  If you do research, especially funded research, you're managing a project or a grant (or more than one), and all the personnel contributing to that effort.
If you're well funded, bringing in research dollars, and have hired a postdoc, you are in a management position.  You have not managed to minimize that, but if that's the way you feel, it might just be because you're good at it.
If this postdoc feels overwhelmed by the prospect of management, you might consider mentoring your next postdoc so as to introduce them better to the idea and train them to do it well.
While there are academic pathways that involve less management, starting as an Assistant Prof is not necessarily the best way to find those positions.  It feels like that would be a backwards career step.

The best way to avoid doing too much management is hire someone to do all the parts you either find uninteresting or aren't good at. I know a quite successful academic who said he did this out of his own junior-faculty salary and just starved a while rather than limit his time on true academic tasks. Other options are working in countries that give you administrative assistance and of course writing it into grants. Often just 5-10 hours a week even performed by masters students can make a huge difference.
When I started my first junior faculty job, my university literally gave me a book on managing, which basically assumed you'd just been promoted to managing a few of your drinking buddies in the construction industry. It was nevertheless a surprisingly useful book.


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If I quit a MSCA ITN PhD in my second year, do I have to pay back all the fellowship I received in the past?
If I quit a MSCA ITN PhD in the second year (of a three-year program), do I have to pay back all the fellowship I received in the past 1.5 years? I am having very large problem with my professor. I'm considering quitting this PhD. This is the clause in my contract:

If the S.V. after starting the planned activity, does not continue it without justifiable reason, regularly and uninterruptedly for the entire duration, or becomes responsible for serious and repeated failures or proves that he does not have sufficient aptitude for carrying out the research activity, she will be declared forfeited from the further use of the grant following a motivated decision by the Director of institute, on the proposal of the research manager.
If the S.V, for supervening personal reasons, cannot complete the planned activity and therefore renounces the fellowship in advance, it must notify the Director of institute and the research manager in writing with thirty days' notice.  In this case, it remains understood that S.V.  will have to return any sums received and not due.

I am not a lawyer and not involved with the Marie Curie program, but this seems to say that you will have no problems about money paid in the past unless you have been given an advance for work yet to be done. The latter money needs to be returned, but not that paid for earlier participation. "return any sums received and not due" is the important clause.
If you are paid monthly then you probably have nothing due to return, but if you are paid annually in advance but only complete half the year, you probably need to return half the stipend.
Few funding agencies would have stricter rules, I think, and collecting large sums from doctoral students seems like an impossible task.
But you can ask the funding agency for clarification on the rules.

Yes they are paying me monthly stipend.

"return any sums received and not due" It means that i have to return the amount, which i have received in the past and also the advance money ? This is the meaning of the that sentence or advance money needs to be returned, but not that paid for earlier participation.??

I don't know the rules, of course, but I'd assume that the only thing you could be asked for is money paid "in advance" that you haven't actually earned. For example, if you were given a grant and got the money, but immediately quit, you would owe it all. But if you were paid in advance for a year's work and quit after half a year you would likely owe half (at most), since you hadn't earned it yet.

They haven't paid any amount in advance. They are paying per month (end of the month). So it's not anything in advance. So do i need to return the past month amount ? Thanks

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What is the the history of Qualifying Exams in the US?
I've been trying to do some research on the history of Qualifying Exams in the US; but, unfortunately, I've not been able to find anything other than the occasional quote, and nothing before the 1950s.
What's going on here? Were they not common practice before the 1940s and 1950s? If not, why? What instigated their creation? I'm just speculating here, but were they a response to GIs returning to academia after the war?
In short, I'm asking... what is the history behind the Qualifying Exams in the US?

You should clarify your terminology. In my department, qualifying exams are written exams on the basics of large areas of mathematics, and preliminary exams are oral exams on the area the student will specialize in. There are other departments that have the same exams but call the first ones "preliminary" and the second "qualifying". And there are other departments with an entirely different exam structure.

Welcome to Academia.SE, and great first question! I slightly edited your last paragraph, as we don't allow resource recommendation questions (though a direct answer may cite sources of course).

@AndreasBlass Funny. I always thought they were two terms for the same thing. We do "prelims," and then "orals" for the specialization; which isn't an exam at all but I suppose you could technically fail it.

I would suggest you start with the general catalogues of various universities.  Some of these have been scanned, but many will only be available in paper form in university archives.  If you want more than general rules and regulations about exams, you will definitely need to look at paper.  This does not seem to me to be the kind of subject that can be researched without travel.

One small piece I know from reading in this field is that a lot of graduate programs were reformed for the sake of rigor in the post-war period. (Academics worried that graduate education was becoming watered-down, and the GI Bill in the US also provided an influx of college students.)  I wouldn't be surprised if adding qualifying exams was a way to make sure that admitted graduate students knew their stuff before attempting a dissertation.

@TaliesinMerlin Agreed.
My understanding is that a push began around the turn of the century to improve the reputation of US institutions. And after WW2, another reform began in response to failures in our education system more broadly. Both reforms seem to be likely candidates for when the practice of giving Quals began.
The only reason I'm asking is that I've been invited to speak before the Quals Committee in my department to present arguments for why we should reconsider their format and suggesting potential alternatives. I thought knowing their origins and history would be helpful.

I'm still reading it, but the NSF has an article on the history of the US Doctoral programs that's interesting:
https://wayback.archive-it.org/5902/20160210224027/http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/nsf06319/chap2.cfm

Probably just an urban legend, but I heard the story that a Harvard student had written a Ph.D. thesis on commutative Banach algebras  and, when asked at his thesis defense for examples of these, could only come up with the real numbers and the complex numbers. He passed anyway, but Harvard's math department instituted qualifying exams shortly thereafter.

In the United States, Ph.D. qualifying exams or quals (also called comprehensive exams or comps, preliminary exams or prelims, and other terms) date back to the late 1930s and proliferated in the postwar period, according to Leonard Cassuto (Chronicle; also noted in the "Comprehensive Exams" chapter of his book The Graduate School Mess):

Comps seem as old as graduate school itself, so that tampering with them might appear the equivalent of rewriting the sacred scrolls. But comprehensive exams in the United States date back only to the late 1930s. They proliferated when graduate populations grew too large after World War II to manage by dissertation alone. Between the GI Bill and Sputnik-related research spending, the number of Ph.D.'s tripled in the 1960s. Against that backdrop, the dissertation defense became more of a formality, creating a need for so-called barrier exams beforehand.

Comprehensive exams had already existed in some departments for undergraduate students, but there was a lack of standardization for curricula at different colleges. For example, a graduate of another university who wanted to earn an MA from Princeton would have to take their senior comprehensive exam covering the undergraduate curriculum at Princeton. Economics professor Richard A. Lester, in "A Critique of Our Colleges" (The American Scholar, 3(4), 1934), uses this example to attack the insularity of graduate education at the time, which favored students from its own institution.
Still, occasional evidence for earlier PhD qualifying exams can be found. In a review for Jacob Viner: Lectures in Economics 301 in Journal of Economic Literature 52(2) (2014), a footnote cites PhD qualifying exams found in the Albert G. Hart papers at Columbia. "Hart had been a graduate student at Chicago from 1931 to 1936," indicating that PhD exams were in place in the economics department at the University of Chicago. That does not indicate that PhD exams were widespread, but only that deep dives into institutional archives might uncover earlier examples that Cassuto may not have been aware of.

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Software recommendation for software for scheduling appointments with students
Due to the pandemic I need to make some appointments with students for teleconferencing. Ideally I want to plan 3 students in half an hour intervals. The idea is that I want to :

have some group oral exam,
I want them to organise themselves into the groups (instead of making a provisional table and then having to make schedule changes).
I would like ideally a group of 3 people per 30 minute interval (the idea is that if somebody is late, I can start with the others and optimize my time).

I've used doodle in the past, but for this scenario is not suitable. I think although it has an option for 1 allotment per person, it does not have an option where I can set a group size per time allotment.
Ideally, I would like the service to be free (in the same sense as doodle). I've found this link which lists a few similar sites like:

YouCanBook.me.
Acuity Scheduling.
SurveyMonkey.
Google Forms.
Calendly.
TimeTrade.
...

I was wondering if anyone had experience on the software listed or another suggestion.

Check to see what type of software your university uses. Many schools use Google's G-Suite or Microsoft's Office. Both of these have features for booking times:

Google's Calendar has an appointment feature (link here)

Microsoft has similar tools (link here).


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Concerns after Submitting Abstracts to a Special Issue
I am a PhD student in social sciences, currently based in the UK. I came across a CfA from a special issue published by an esteemed US university Press last month, which was quite relate with the philosophical base of my research. I submitted an abstract on 15th of March and received the reply immediately from ediors saying that they had received my abstract and they would be in touch soon.
In the CfA notification we were informed:

"Authors invited to submit full length papers will be notified by April"

Does it mean I have to wait till the end of the April for the result of whether my abstract is accepted or not?
Should I write an follow-up email asking about the reviewing process?
And whether will I be informed if being rejected?
Another concern is-- the word limit of abstract should be under 500 words, and my submitted abstract was less than 200 words, which seems quite far away from 500. Will this impact the acceptance/rejection of a CfA?
This is the first time I submitting an abstract for a special issue. Really with I could get a satisfied result.

I would interpret that to mean end of April if not mid-May depending on number of submissions.


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How will the COVID-19 pandemic affect graduate admissions?
I have recently learned that all my internship offers were cancelled due to COVID-19, and I never felt this anxious before. People tell me I should not be worring since everyone is affected, but in my country research opportunites are very rare and nearly all of my previous experience is only vaguely related to my area of interest, in contrast to the offers I've  just been denied. This summer is also the most critical in my studies, since I'm more knowledgable than any time earlier and more likely to make an actual contribution.
I wouldn't be this worried if I could stay in the UK for my PhD (which is unlikely now due to Brexit), but I've almost finished my Fulbright application for graduate study in the USA. I would feel obliged to apply to US programmes if I were to be granted the award, but I'm not sure how I would compare with other students due to this gaping hole in my resume.
I guess what I want to know is if most students are in a similar position. Are other REUs and SURFs also getting cancelled or am I just unlucky? And most importantly, is there anything I can do to mitigate this and improve my chances for admission to graduate school?

If you're feeling really anxious, please go speak to your university's counselling service.  They can help.

We can't see into the future here. The current situation is chaotic. Pretty much anything could result.

I am not sure anyone here is going to be much help for your specific situation. There should be someone at your university you can talk with, a study counselor or someone similar. They can better gauge the current situation, especially at your own institute. And a bit more general advice: these types of situations can be very stressful, and I would advice to talk to someone about it. Just getting it out of your system can be very beneficial.


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Having children while at graduate school
I am finishing my first year of Masters and have always thought of going for a PhD in North America. I and my girlfriend are going to have a baby which is totally unexpected. The due day will be somewhere this december which I am still half year away from finishing my Masters degree.
I don't know under this circumstance should I still, or am I able to, apply for PhD positions overseas. This would mean I will have to leave them or bringing them together for my study. I am not super rich to afford a family personally and would need to rely on studentships, but I don't think graduate studentships are sufficient to afford the living expense and future education fees of my coming baby.
Taking on a PhD and a research career are definitely my dream and situation seems very difficult for these to come true. Anyone knowing someone carrying kids along grad school, or any suggestion to me? I just don't have a clue how to take care of everything.

http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive/phd101110s.gif :) That said, I defended my dissertation a few months before we had our 3rd.

Could you elaborate on why it is so essential for you that the PhD takes place in North America? As you write about applying for PhD positions "overseas", I take it you are not currently based in North America. On the other hand, "[t]aking on a PhD and a research career [being your] dream" in itself does not invariably mean you must go to North America, unless you are in a very specific field that can only be studied there for some reason. It seems to me that quite some of the issues implied in your question (and also raised in ...

... Aymor's answer) just pose a major problem due to the particularities of doing a PhD in North America, or due to the fact that you are in North America while your family is elsewhere, rather than to the general situation of doing a PhD while having a baby. Where I live, starting a family while doing one's PhD is not at all uncommon; it sometimes seems to me like about 1/4 of the doctoral candidates around me have a baby at some point during their doctoral candidacy.

+1 on @O.R.Mapper's comment. To have a baby you're now going to need a welfare state, so not the US (and maybe not the UK).
I'd also ask which sector you'd graduate in, and which country you're from. In some countries, PhD salaries vary across disciplines a lot — for the case of Germany, see http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/42869/european-ph-d-student-salary-range-web-site#comment96100_42947

Thanks everyone. I have a Math degree and now in Geophysics field for masters. The reason why mention North America is that basically every faculty member in my country, well at least in Science, got their PhD from North America. I guess if I want to join the academia community in my home country I will need have that as well. Hope these background information are useful.

Go for it, if you are interested. Graduate life, if ever becomes boring, your kid can give you a change.

I, too, accidentally knocked up my girlfriend while in graduate school. Luckily, things have worked out fine so far; we have a baby boy, my adviser is extra accommodating when I need to meet her in person to discuss my work, and she even offers to meet via Skype, too. We've managed to afford raising a family so far, even though both of us are graduate students. We even have another new addition to our family - a Pomeranian, which you can read about here: http://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/65062/getting-a-pet-during-a-phd. Good luck :)

I'm a female PhD student and I came across this question from a woman's perspective, and I noticed that the vast majority of answers come from men. I know that fathers are just as important as mothers, but the experience of having a child is also very different if you are a woman (like pregnancy, birthing, feeding)...If any additional female grad students with kids would like to answer/comment, I think it would add a useful dimension to this question. Also I think it would be interesting to hear from students who do not have a stay-at-home partner, since that too is a different experience.

Anecdotes are not usually the right kind of answer on stackexchange, but you have specifically asked for them, so here goes...
My experience
I had two children in graduate school.  The first was born during my second year, and the second was born during my fourth year.  Most of my fellow students thought I was crazy.  I graduated (obtaining both a MS and PhD) in five years, with no debt and certainly no regrets.  Surprisingly, I found that graduate school allowed me to be more involved in my children's life than if I'd had a regular job.
Advantages
Some important and perhaps unusual factors worked in my favor.  First, and most importantly, my wife had already decided that after we had children she wanted to be a full-time homemaker.  Her support allowed me to focus on my studies, although I did change hundreds of diapers, stay up a lot of nights, and after the birth of the first I didn't get any research done for about three months (I did continue passing my courses).
The second important advantage I had was generous funding from the US DOE's computational science graduate fellowship (CSGF).  It is (or at least was) the highest-paid government fellowship in the US, at about $33K/year.  That was still officially below the poverty line for a family of four where I lived, and half my income went to rent, but by careful budgeting we had no problem getting by on only that income.  Could I have done it with less income?  Yes, though I would possibly have needed student loans, and the added load of being a teaching assistant would have been a challenge.
Finally, I found that I could get a lot of high-quality research done by focusing intensely for a few hours per day.  For me, that was (and is) a more productive strategy than trying to focus on research 24/7.  This made it possible to complete my thesis and care for my family simultaneously.  I was home by 5-6 p.m. almost every evening and spent most of my weekend time with my wife and children.  I did often do research for an hour or two after my kids were in bed.  I know that many grad students tend to spend a lot more time each day on research, which might make things more difficult.
Assessment
Having children during graduate school was a good decision for me.  The time I was able to spend with them as babies and then toddlers is precious to me.  After I graduated and became an assistant professor, I found that the time I could spend with my children was much more limited, due to the added demands of teaching, advising, service, and administration.  Indeed, with my third child (born 2 years after I got a permanent position) I changed a lot fewer diapers and really spent a lot less time with her early on.  I've reached a better balance since then, but it took years.
In short: with the right setup, having kids in grad school can work out very well.

+1 and I'd like to add that the right setup can come in very different flavors. Among my wider acquaintances is a couple who had their first child while they were both in the middle of their PhDs. They both graduated only one year late. The right setup included use of the universities childcare facilities, taking work home and the Prof organizing TA positions for an extra year for both, and this was in a country with "automatic" public health insurance. In my experience, while you might work more during a PhD, you're much more flexible with scheduling than later in your career.

I also had 2 children during graduate school, and my wife is also a graduate student. The flexibility really does help, however daycare costs are very high in the US, and are not affordable on two student salaries...I ended up having to take on some debt, and also consult on the side (delaying my graduation a bit) to pay the bills. I agree with you, however, that the best time to have children for an academic career is likely during graduate school, since time becomes more limited later, especially on the tenure clock.

This is quite inspiring. I expect to start my PhD soon and start a family in the meantime as well. May I ask whether $33K/year was the stipend provided to other graduate students as well? This amount may be different today due to inflation but many US grad schools now offer around $30K/year. Considering the complaints many grad students make about their salary being insufficient for one person, I find it almost superhuman that you managed to support a family of 4 with the same. Kudos!

@daaxix You mention that the "flexibility" of grad school helps. I believe daycare centers do not admit infants, so did you have any external support (from family for example) for childcare during the first year or so after birth and did the TA/class/lab schedules of you and your wife allow for enough time for childcare? I will be doing a statistics PhD myself so I expect there will be no lab hours although the TA schedule may be harsh.

Children are the purpose of life for millions if not billions of people. They are wonderful. A PhD degree is also a wonderful privilege, available to less than 1% of the population (at least in the US). However, a combination of these two experiences is a very significant challenge, both for the family (your relationship with your wife and child) and for the PhD study, or the chances of having a satisfying, engaging, and overall positive experience in the program.
I do not have kids yet but will share what I do know. I am aware of several peers in grad school who had to manage graduate study and a small child. Even with an older (say, school-age) child it is a difficult task. But with a baby the time commitment, unexpected as well as everyday expenses (diapers, food, clothes, medical care) present substantial added 'overhead' for a family. Perhaps the greatest demand a baby will impose is the demand for constant attention and time, which must be provided NOW, and cannot be postponed for a time and day that works best with your class schedule.
I don't know if you have a working spouse whose income can sustain a baby (including babysitting), or if you are thinking of studying and sustaining a family on a graduate assistantship (formally a 20hr/wk commitment, which in reality is often a 30-60hr/wk commitment, if done right). Add to that a 24/7 commitment to a baby...
Bottom line, yes, it probably can be done. But the odds are going to be against you. It will require immense time management, discipline, flexibility, lots of sleepless nights (both for the baby and for writing papers for classes), constant stress, and non-existent time for yourself and thus declining physical and mental health.
How is this different from having a baby with a regular job? A couple things.
First, the time commitment is different. Many jobs allow a fairly predictable 8-5 schedule. When you walk out of the building, you are DONE for the day. Not so with grad school. When you get home from the university, homework awaits! Budget 4-6 hours daily just on catching up on reading and writing for class, and either grading and preparing for lectures (if you are a TA) or doing research-related analysis/writing (if you are an RA). During my first 3-4 years of PhD study I rarely recall a less than 12-hr workday.
Second, finances. A full-time job that pays at least $50K a year, plus additional income from the spouse, can allow to raise a baby. It will not be a smooth process and will require sacrifices and trade-offs, but at least it is feasible, and the money can be stretched to cover some basic expenses for a baby (with frequent trips to the Dollar Store, Goodwill, and Salvation Army stores).
If you end up in a large university in a large city with high cost of living, you might make around $1400-2000/month for a 20hr/wk assistantship. The exact amount often depends on discipline (engineering/medical vs. business vs. social sciences vs. humanities). This is just around the official subsistence level (i.e. poverty line) income for a household in the U.S.
If you do something relatively unrelated to your program (e.g. an assistantship in a Writing Center or Career Center, etc.) then count on standard university assistantship. In a high cost of living large city, count on around $1500/mo. The figure is much lower if you end up in the middle-of-nowhere, small college town - think not much over $1000/mo. Usually, graduate students struggle throughout their time in school. I mean, carefully budget food and clothes, not to even dream of living in decent, clean, apartments with no roommates or having cars (insurance? gas?) or even considering pricey entertainment or travel. Those who afford these things usually have savings or rely on some other financial assistance ("free money" like scholarships/fellowships) or regular financial support from the parents.
Unless your wife plans to work and bring in substantial income (in the U.S., I would say at least $50-60K/yr), it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible and destructive to family financial situation, to try to raise a baby on a single graduate stipend. I strongly advise against even considering this as an option. A small medical emergency that is not covered by graduate insurance (which is often seriously lacking for dependent care) can put you in debt for years if not decades. This is before mentioning all the human cost of living below subsistence level. If you think the loving, caring, gentle relationship with a spouse will be unaffected by persistent financial hardship, this perception is incorrect.
I already mentioned the high demand on time and attention associated with raising a child. Well, graduate school by itself is like having a child. Your thesis, if you will 'survive' through the preliminary exams and enter the dissertation stage, will be just like another child that needs constant nurture and attention. It will be on your mind day and night, it will cause some stress and it will cause late nights. Many late nights.
Bottom line. Babies are wonderful. Doctoral study is wonderful. But in combination, they will require trade-offs and impose a substantially higher level of stress, and reduced quality of life, than if attended to separately. Since a baby is guaranteed for you at this point, my personal advice would be to focus on raising your child at least until school age (5-6), and revisiting the idea of PhD at that point. You will have a much more pleasant life as a parent with a baby, rather than a baby PLUS a thesis, to come home to every day. The PhD will be there and you can do it later in life, no problem. So, enjoy your baby, it's a wonderful gift. The rest is trivial in comparison. If an academic career is in your future, you will find a way to pursue it sooner or later. AT the end of your life, you will not wish you had spent more time in the lab or submitting grant proposals or conference papers. You will wish you had spent more time with your family. And I hope you do. Good luck!

+1 Fantastic answer, except that bit at the end. Family is great, but some of us genuinely do wish for more research time :D

Another important point to consider is that health insurance can be insanely expensive for a family. My university gives grad students health insurance for free. But to add a spouse/kid is close to $1k/month more. And... babies will require healthcare costs.

School can be a regular 9-to-5 too. The trick is to never, ever bring "homework" home, and stick like glue to a work schedule. Do it in a library or some other location, and don't ever spend that time period doing anything else. If you finish your work before the end of the time you allotted, then study your textbooks. Then when the end of the allotted workday comes, stop whether or not you are done

Having children while at graduate school is not very common, but is not very rare either (in particular for Asians like me).
My experience
I'm a CS student in the UK, and my baby was born at the beginning of my third (and final) year of PhD. This did not affect the progress of my PhD at all.
Now, at the middle of my 4th year, I'm waiting for my viva in a couple of weeks, and the delay is just due to my internship in Silicon Valley (when I brought both my wife and my baby to the US with me). I will go there again soon for a post doc.
Sure, my working time has been significantly shortened. However, the pressure also makes me much more motivated. Thinking that my family are waiting for me at home has helped me to eliminate (nearly) all the procrastinations.
I'm also much much happier. Just by holding my baby in my arms, I can forget all the depressions, paper rejections, disappointments.
I'm in London, so everything is expensive, and my scholarship is only less than 16k per year. However, heath service is totally free in the UK, so we still can manage it.

Well, certainly you are able to apply for PhD programs (which typically start in the Fall in the US).  As for what you decide to do, that will require a long thoughtful conversation with your girlfriend, but if both of you are open to the possibility, then you may as well send out a few applications and see what kind of offers you get.
It seems like your main question is about financial aspects.  Both as a grad student and faculty member in the US, I knew many people with kids during their PhD.  With international students, it can be harder when your significant other does not have a work visa, as indeed you will not be making a lot of money.  However, people get by, and if you want to come to the US with your girlfriend and baby and support them on a graduate stipend, you can too if you are frugal.  There are often opportunities for extra teaching/tutoring, particularly in the summer, to get a little extra money, and this is something you can ask about when you check out PhD programs.
Another aspect, which you may or may not be concerned about is that it may be harder to get family to help out with the baby if all of you are overseas.
By the way, if you start considering this, you should look into visa issues for your girlfriend, which will likely be more complicated than if you were married.  Oh, and congratulations!

After having been in an infertility program for three years, I found out I was pregnant two weeks before I started my doctoral program.  I had to take some time off during the first year, but I came back starting in summer session and managed to graduate in five years.  My son went to daycare on campus and so was near me at all times.  It was a real challenge, especially being the mom of an infant (dads are a little bit off the hook at that age).  But I made it through, and when I graduated he was four, and they read both our names and we walked across the stage together.  Good luck no matter what you decide --

If the job climate is anti-pregnancy for women, whether that's fair or not, it's your advisor's job to let you know that's the case. I don't think any woman at any time should be punished in any way for the decision to have a baby, but that's not going to change the job climate overnight either.
Different women react different to pregnancy too -- lack of sleep may leave them mentally unable to study for six months to a year or more. My wife didn't sleep for more than 2.5 hours or so at a time from about the seventh month of pregnancy to about the baby's fourth or fifth month. Yeah, she had a real hard time focusing. Two other female grad students who had a baby while in coursework had similar problems -- one left the water running in her kitchen sink and caused $400 worth of damage to the downstairs apartment, while the other said she couldn't even read a page of a magazine and stay focused (and this was a very high performing woman).
How the advice is framed makes a big difference -- the infantilizing and the feeling that you need "permission" to have a baby is ridiculous. But at the same time, giving someone realistic advice is not the same as telling them what to do. - See more at: https://chroniclevitae.com/news/549-should-you-have-a-baby-in-graduate-school#sthash.4zJlCYwe.dpuf

Since you asked for personal experience, I'll share mine.
I did the majority of the work for my Master's degree as a part time student while working full time. During that time, my wife and I had two kids. During the first pregnancy, there were some problems and my wife was put on bed rest. I had to withdraw from my classes to care for her over 9 weeks. Then, there was this totally helpless human baby that I had to do my part to care for. I didn't get back to school for a few years. I spent all the time I would have spent on education being a parent instead. When I did get back to classes, it was so much harder to block out the time for classes, studying and doing research. Then we had our second child and time for school was even more scarce. I finally completed my Master's when I was laid off during the financial crisis and no one was hiring. I finally graduated, 9 years after I started. I absolutely don't regret taking the time to focus on my family.
As to the idea that the PhD will always be there, it's true in a sense, but I think you will find that as you live your life and acquire other responsibilities, that your education will move down the priority list and going back will become less and less likely.
I think you should discuss the situation with your girlfriend. How does she feel about you leaving her behind to come to the U.S. for school? How does she feel about coming along? You should also look at what support any school you're considering has for grad students with families. I know that many have on campus apartments, daycare facilities, preschools and other types of support.

I found a program that offers PhD coursework during the summer, so I will only be away from my family for 2 months for the next 3 summers (with a week vacation when I'll return home). I'll be doing my clinical internship, reserach, and disseration at home. I wonder if that's an option for your career field? I'm in social work, and Smith College only has graduate work during the summer. I have been thinking about what to do while I'm away from her and I wrote a post about it: https://phdincoming.wordpress.com/2016/03/28/how-to-be-away-from-your-kid-while-in-grad-school/
Make the best decision for you and your family :)

I find the applicability of this answer quite limited. Most science Ph.D. program I'm aware of are full-time and involves course work all year around (for the first one or two years). Can you elaborate more on the structure of such part-time Ph.D. programs and how common they are?

This is a full time program. There are two semesters each summer, five classes each semester, for two and one half summers. My clinical placement runs from September to April. So I'm engaged in PhD coursework and knoweldge year round. No, it's not traditional. I do not know how common this structure it. Smith College has had this structure since the 80s. It would be great if more programs offered a program structured in this way to accommodate parents. But I will still dream that academia starts to bend to the needs of it's students.

There is no right moment for getting children. You will always have to deal with sleep deprivation, extra costs, less time , etc. The financial costs are easier to handle when you have a "real" job, but when you are younger the sleep deprivation tends to bite less, and gradschool can be more flexible than a real job. An important aspect is how family friendly your institution is. So, depending on your circumstances, gradschool could actually be the right moment for getting children, rather then a problem. Since the child is already on its way, viewing the situation from this perspectives, is probably the most productive way of dealing with the situation.
I would start with looking at what is offered by your new institution, e.g. childcare, flexible working hours, flexible childcare in case of illness or conference visits, etc. If a lot is offered and your adviser is supportive then you will be fine. If not, you can as a last resort consider looking at different institutions.

I have been the same situation and here is my suggestion:
Yes you can do it and do your PHD now. But plan to be on yourself for the first year (a year is the most – it can be somewhere from three to eight months). Bring your family after that, because by that time, you will have all  the information.

With proofreading and elaboration, this could be a very helpful answer.

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I still don't know my exact research question but I know I don't like the ideas my advisor pushes me to work on an publish asap. What are my options?
I'm three months into a fully-funded PhD programme, following on from an integrated Masters and two years in industry. I should also say upfront that after seeing more what academic research is around, I feel lukewarm at most about academia in general - which definitely contributes to any dissatisfaction I feel.
While I'm broadly interested in the subject matter of my advisor's field (I switched to work with him after my Masters), I don't feel too keen on exploring the exact research directions he pointed me towards. That being said I still haven't clarified to myself what my dream research question would be. I know what themes I'm interested in, but even though they reside in the same general field as my advisor's work, they don't match his desired themes (It's like we are both interested in cooking but I'm a vegetarian and he is keen on catering for this new hot bbq rib joint.)
So on one hand I have an advisor urging me to jump into this idea I'm not interested in, and putting pressure to find a conference to publish anything ASAP (because the idea involves a recently hot buzzword). On the other hand I'm three months into this and I still don't know what it is that I would like to research really and I'm questioning whether doing a PhD makes sense at all. Both of this sides of the problem are incredibly stressful and exert really negative effect on my mental health.
Is it abnormal / bad / embarrassing to still not know one's research question this far into the PhD programme? Would it be bad / embarrassing / disrespectful to turn down my advisor's idea even though I don't have my own to offer in exchange, and ask for more time for 'reading around'?

From your description, I can't figure out why you chose this advisor. If your "themes" and his don't align, why are you two together?

He was the closest I could get to what I was looking for (or at least it seemed so at the time). I had maybe like two weeks total to switch my supervisors after I finished my Masters. Usually people just stick with their Masters one but I had a major shift of direction.

From an outside perspective, you are just getting started. Three months is just a warm up period. One part of me wants to advise that the doctoral study period is limited and you should do what you need to do to get through it and move on to other things. The other part wants to advise that it isn't fun to work on something you aren't interested in for a few years. Dilemma.
But, if you intend to stay with this advisor, I suggest, pretty strongly, that you take his advice. He has more experience and a wider view than you do. It would be fine, in my view, to ask for more time to find a mutually acceptable problem to work on, but if you get push-back, I think you either need to yield or find someone else to work with. But, it may be that you can come up with an idea that he has some interest and competence in quickly enough that it works out.
You will get the best help from your advisor, assuming you need it, if you work on a problem he is also invested in. It is possible, but harder, to work alone, but you still need his approval at the end of the day. If you can get by with minimal help and final approval, you can probably make a go of it, though it will likely take longer than if you have strong help.
But you should look, also, to see if there is another local advisor available who has more compatible interests. You also want an advisor who will support your future career. Fighting with him won't get you that.

Thanks! While I agree that he has more experience and wider view than me one of the reasons for my hesitation is that his idea involves applying method X to his field Y. He doesn't know much about X but it's a hot new thing likely to generate a lot of citations. To me, being more aware of X, I see it as trying to fix a nail to a wall with a kitchen knife - you can do it, but it really doesn't make much sense. He dismisses my concerns quoting another paper which applied X but to Z and got published and cited lots. That paper also ignores the limitations of X but I can bring myself to do that.

It might be nice if, along the way, you could also improve X.

You can make a knife with a heavier, hammer shaped blade but why would you if hammers exist?

@KubaFYI your comment about making a knife with the wrong tool when hammers exist suggests that you know how to solve the problem in Y without using X. Is this the case? If so, have you told your advisor that you already know how to solve Y? If this is not the case, and you don't know how to solve Y, how do you know X isn't the right tool for Y?

It's perfectly normal to not know your research question three months into your PhD. Honestly, even if you knew it there's about a 99% chance it won't be the research question you'll write down in your PhD thesis.
Given that, I'd advise you to just go along with your supervisor since typically applying hot new method X to field Y works well despite all the misgivings of people who are well-acquainted with X.
You are also saying you feel lukewarm about academia in general, three months into your PhD. I would take that feeling really serious because that should not be the case. It might make sense to check back on that in a couple of months and if you are then still feeling lukewarm about academia, seriously consider moving to industry instead.

To follow up on your comment on the other response: so what problem does your professor want you to apply Machine Learning to (to pull a hot topic out of the air)?
It's awfully early in your PhD program for your professor to want you to be publishing a paper in a new area at a new (to you) conference unless that Master's you did leads naturally into an extension in a related area which could be written up and submitted quickly. This isn't a reason to abandon your PhD program, but it probably is a reason to have a frank discussion with your advisor about their expectations and about what your interests are. It's still very early, and you need more than just their orders about what to do, you need their advice. They are your advisor after all.

Is it abnormal / bad / embarrassing to still not know one's research question this far into the PhD programme?

You're working as a student. Your role is to learn not to publish. Publication is secondary to your studies, and no university can force you that. You don't even need a paper for your degree. You're not paid as a post-docs, your advisor or your university is in no position to force anything.
3 months is a short, learning a topic deeply at the PhD level generally take
much longer.

Several PhD programs have obligation to publish.

@Emilie In the first 3 months as a student?

It would be totally unreasonable for any PhD program to require student to publish in their first semester.  But the entire point of (most) PhD programs is to train researchers, and researchers publish.

@SmallChess no, indeed but your answer is not clear on that


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How much research funding do faculty members get in China?
In China, how much research funding do faculty members in physical science departments tend to receive?
What are the approximate grant sizes and grant success rates in natural sciences from the National Natural Science Foundation of China?
For example, would a 100,000-USD/year grant be considered a competitive offer?

I will state here what I know. Which is not too much, I am afraid. I am a postdoc in China since almost 2 years. I am not planning on staying longer as I did not identify with their work culture in the academia. Therefore I did not invest much of my time into learning about funding in China and applying for grants.
From my understanding there are several funding sources, the main ones being Province-level and National-level. They open calls for applications at different times of the year; e.g. September and March. Chances of success are highly dependent on your 'face' with your peers, the status of your college/institution, and nature of the grant call. Foreigners have an edge nowadays, particularly as there are grants specific for international projects. Currently in Biology the main topics being funded revolve around 'applied agriculture' and a few 'hot' fields such as STEM cells, CRISPR.
Currently (as of 2015-2017) there is a lot of funding available for research in China. Grants vary in amount of money they can provide, varying from what I've heard from mere 10k USD to much more. However one should be aware that grants come with specifications on what they should be spent on. For instance, there are grants which more flexible (usually modest) and more voluminous budgets for purchasing equipment, or others dedicated to "projects". I have heard of grants above 100k USD as you mention, for specific projects and head-start for fresh professors. The way it works, there are always workarounds in spending the money outside of the rules, but that will depend on knowing the ways and a lot of 'guanxi'. Beware of being caught redhanded as regulatory measures can be quite strict in modern China.
That said, it is my opinion that 100k USD per year sounds like excellent funding opportunity, but obviously the amount must be gauged in face of what it is, general context, and how it should be spent. If that includes salary, conference stipends, publication charges, and no significant structure or equipment is already available, this amount is likely not much. Keep in mind that because of careless handling and a lack of a maintenance culture, quite frequently equipment which appear listed as available at Chinese institutions actually may not be working properly... hence you may have to negotiate new ones.
I was attracted to my postdoc position by being shown pictures of heavy equipment such as a GC, centrifuges, PCR machines, microscopes, a lyophiliser, which in the end are not working but just sitting around.
My advice: visit first, take a long critical look around, and see through what is being promised and, most importantly implied between vague statements and contract lines. There is a lot of opportunity in China but one must be prepared for some intricate game.

+1 quite frequently equipment which appear listed as available at Chinese institutions actually may not be working properly..... like 90 % of times!!! so true

I am a professor in China, and for the typical individual application to the NSFC one may ask for up to 600,000 RMB for perhaps 3 years (a little bit less than 30,000 USD a year approx.). And not all professors get this. As a foreigner, you need to write the application in Chinese and learn about how to write a successful application according to the local requirements.
That being said, besides the typical individual application to NSFC there are lots of programs that can bring you many other types of funding. For example, the 1000 talent program or youth 1000 talent program for special talents coming to China can give you almost 1 million $ funding, distributed over 5 years.
Besides, depending on the province and city additional funding is available. For example, in Shenzhen, there is a lot of money for individuals and teams, as the city is generous to talents. Personally, I receive more than 8 times more funding than in Canada, which has been a major boost to my research.  Having said all of this, I think that 100,000 USD is good and you may be able to get more from city/province/NSFC.

thank you @phil for the answer, can I get a link to 1000 talent program or youth 1000 talent program ?

Do you have a source for NSFC grant applications needing to be in Chinese? The guidelines I've been given say that the abstract needs to be in Chinese but the main body of the application can just be in English.

The main website for the (young) 1000 talent in English is that one : http://www.1000plan.org/en/  But it does not give that much information on the English page. Actually, if you apply for these programs it must be through a university and the university will help you or give you more information about how to fill the form.

@bobgom My source:  last year I applied for the NSFC individual funding (surface project - 常规面上项目) and the form must be filled in Chinese. I had to write about 8 pages in Chinese to describe my project. On the website for submitting the form, you can choose English but the online form is only half in English (at least in 2017 - March).  Besides, when I applied for the Youth 1000 program in 2015 the project had to be written in Chinese, although during the project defense in Beijing, I could speak English.

But in any case, you can write your project in English and ask someone or pay someone to translate it to Chinese for you.

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What is the highest degree held by Freeman Dyson?
I recently learned that eminent physicist Freeman Dyson does not have a doctoral degree.  Does he have a graduate (magistrate) degree though?  Or can he be described as a highly successful graduate-school dropout?  The only formal degree listed in his official biography is an undergraduate (baccalaureate) degree in mathematics.

I posted it here actually more out of self-interest than academic historical interest.  I think it is inspiring that so much can be done without a formal advanced degree.  I haven't heard of that being done before in modern physics.  Regarding the second question, I did think of how much education has changed and probably should have specified "modern" scientists and mathematicians.

According to the link you provided, it says that Freeman Dyson has a Master's degree. I don't see any citation for that though, and it is not mentioned in his online biography. Michael Faraday was always one of my favorites too for being largely self-taught.

Would usually -1 a question about a specific individual, but the idea that a famous physicist might not hold a graduate degree's pretty interesting.

I'm not convinced that Dyson's case is "inspiring" in the sense that it's something one could or should try to emulate. As detailed in answers to this related question Dyson managed it because (1) he was blatantly a genius and (2) he came of age academically during a vast, horrific war which made such an unholy mess of the world that bureaucratic niceties were occasionally overlooked.

The mathematician André Joyal, now an emeritus professor, apparently doesn't have a PhD, and that wasn't due to WWII.

With respect to your (now removed) second question, see various answers and comments to https://academia.stackexchange.com/q/75991/22995

Dyson received honorary doctorates from several acedemic institutions around the world. While not everybody agrees that an honorary doctorate is a "real" doctorate, in some cases it is (legally speaking).

I think it might depend on finances as well.  A PhD provides financial support, the fact that Dyson went to a fee-charging boarding school during his early education suggests that this was not something he really had to worry about and that he had outside financial support for projects that he was working on.

According to both Freeman Dyson's homepage at the IAS and the accompanying C.V., he never earned another degree after his B.A. While unusual, this was much more possible at the time, since research in general was less well supported and organized.  A number of other notable contemporaneous researchers (e.g., Ed Fredkin) also never earned a doctorate.
In the modern world, this is much more difficult, though similar recognition can be obtained as, e.g., a Professor of Practice.

The Cambridge University Annual Register for 1968-69 (which is the only copy I have to hand) records just a Bachelor of Arts degree awarded in 1945 to FJ Dyson of Trinity College. (At Cambridge the BA degree is awarded for studies in sciences not just arts subjects.)
He would have been qualified for the award of the Master of Arts degree without any further academic work or examinations. The University website explains that "if you hold a Cambridge BA, you may proceed to the MA not less than six years from the end of your first term of residence, providing that you have held your BA degree for at least two years." Many BA graduates do not bother to take the MA degree. Nevertheless for formal purposes at Cambridge the MA degree is   regarded as ranking higher even than master's degrees awarded for actual academic work.


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What are the advantages/disadvantages of getting a PhD from China?
A Chinese university has offered me acceptance into its PhD program.  This university globally ranks 68th overall and 23rd for Computer Science.
Now keeping in mind the image Chinese universities have, I am confused whether it's worth it to pursue this opportunity. My potential supervisor has decent number of publications and experience, but he is not a well known personality in the field and just setting up a new lab. Now I am confused if going for a mid-level university in US or a top university in China is a good option in my case.
My background is in Robotics and I did my MS from Korea. My PhD topic is going to be an overlap of machine learning and robotics.

You don't get a PhD from a country. You get a PhD from a university.

Seems like this'll depend on a lot of personal factors, e.g., do you want to work in either the US or China in the future?  Then you'll probably want to consider your cultural/lifestyle/political preferences are your ability to thrive'll be heavily impacted by your compatibility with your environment.

Don’t rely on rankings, as they are highly subjective. Look at where the former students of your potential advisor, group, or department are now. Then ask yourself where you want to be in the future and how well it matches.


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What college education could help an experienced executive climb the ladder?
I’m an executive in digital marketing for a Fortune 100. I have 14 years of experience. But I am a college drop out. To grow in my career I’m competing with highly educated people.
What are my options academically to add to my resume?

Country may be relevant. This question is not really on-topic here. Regardless, masters tend to be the most relevant for managers, either in business or perhaps in a more technical discipline if that's useful for digital marketing. Many masters programs will admit you based on your experience and don't require a college degree. Best option is to find a program you like and talk to their admissions staff.

If you have 14 years experience, academic achievements are almost irrelevant.
Instead, look at professional certifications, experience managing teams or projects, business achievements etc. as these are what others will look at.
You could go for an MBA - that could be appropriate at the level you are at, but it may not be worth the time and money to go through it. I looked at an MBA 15 years ago and it didn't have anything then that I couldn't get from other avenues. I have revisited the decision now I am looking at some more Director roles, and while it is a bit more tempting, it doesn't give me much for the time and money, whereas my professional certifications and board roles are much higher value to me.

The obvious solution seems to be getting an MBA.
There're a lot of MBA programs that offer night/weekend classes so you don't have to abandon your current career trajectory to get the degree.  They'll often try to charge you more since they assume that you'll have the cash, but it may still be a net win for you.
There're also online MBA programs.  These are similarly convenient in that you might retain your current career while earning the degree.
You might check to see if your current employer offers educational assistance.  Some might help pay tuition for you!
Finally, if an MBA isn't right for you for whatever reason, you could also look into doing a Business degree at a local community college first.  I wouldn't usually recommend it as an MBA seems like the better solution, though it's still an option that may be available to you.

I agree MBA is likely a good answer.  Do MBA programs admit college drop-outs, or would completing a BA first be required?

@GEdgar Luckily for 'em, no BA would necessarily be required since many of these programs are tailored for current executives to get a degree like the OP's interested in.  For example, from MIT:  "Candidates usually hold undergraduate degrees and have at least ten years of work experience. We will consider candidates without undergraduate degrees or with fewer than the recommended years of experience if they have demonstrated exceptional capabilities through other endeavors.".