As an aspiring academic I have recently started looking at universities at which to pursue my PhD. While professors have generally advised me that the reputation of your doctoral supervisor is more important than the institution, I wanted to verify the claim. I aggregated data from academic staff from the School of Chemistry at the University of Sydney with the hypothesis that professors would disproportionately come from Cambridge and Oxford. There is certainly a bias for universities with world class chemistry departments, but it appears USyd values Australian universities; it also regards USyd PhDs the highest for both permanent academic staff — Professors, Associate Professors, Senior Lecturers and Researchers — versus temporary ones on a postdoctoral contract.
