Completed a Master's at a program with a bad reputation and no tuition waiver. Will that be judged post Ph.D? [duplicate]

Question

I am a soon to be fourth year doctoral candidate this coming academic year. I previously completed a Master's in Experimental Psychology (now called Psychological Sciences. No Ph.D program there) that had assistantships which would pay a salary, yet did not have any tuition waived at all for being a lab manager. It should be noted that no tuition waiver was standard for all students in the program as well. Thinking that this was the norm for MAs based on what I read and through connections I had at the time, I went through with the decision. Both my Master's and Ph.D programs are in the U.S.

Unfortunately, I did not learn until midway through the program and after I finished it that it had an extremely bad reputation despite the university's good reputation as a whole. There were also multiple red flags I ignored other than the fiscal aspect at the time in the middle of the program (which I won't state here).

I realize I am making this post with the risk of others downvoting me based on paying tuition at a state school program, but I only knew what I knew from those who I thought I could trust at the time. I just want to know at this point, despite graduating with my Ph.D soon (fully funded there and my Ph.D program accepted my Master's and my thesis no less even though it was from another program), will my no tuition waiver program look bad to others post Ph.D? I should note that my current Ph.D program also has MA students, but they are totally unfunded by the department itself. Instead, advisors pay them from dedicated lab funds without a tuition waiver. This created some tension between MA and Ph.D students, unlike my MA where everyone had the same treatment, thus no resentment.

Edit: Shortened the title and post length a decent bit.

Answer 1

I think you‘re asking the wrong question. No one but you and your bank will know whether or not you had a tuition waiver. And I'm certain no one else will care.

PhD's (at least full-time ones at reputable places) are usually funded. But there are lots of variables there. I wouldn't pay for a PhD (4-7 years of tuition + living expenses? I have a bridge to sell you…) but, depending on the field, some people do. I don't think it's all that unusual to start unfunded in the hopes of finding funding down the road. Whatever the case may be, a lack of funding may indirectly indicate something about the program but alone it is not a measure of quality. Certainly there are fields where one would not expect funding at all - for example some professional or "clinical" doctorates. Yours is funded, so no worries there.

On the MA side of things, I have not come across many fully-funded masters programs. Graduate support like the one you describe is fairly common though. This really has nothing to do with the quality of the program. I would not expect most people to have a tuition waiver for any MA program and, again, I can't really imagine a scenario where someone would care about that specifically.

I should note that my current PhD program also has MA students, but they are totally unfunded by the department itself. Instead, advisors pay them from dedicated lab funds without a tuition waiver. This created some tension between MA and PhD students, unlike my MA where everyone had the same treatment, thus no resentment.

I'm not sure this is relevant. Are you saying that some MA students paid more or less, since it depends on the lab/professor's budget? In any case, this has nothing to do with the perceived or actual quality of a program. This sounds pretty normal in terms of funding for masters degrees anyway.

So, where does that leave you? Well it means that you don't have to worry about having paid tuition for your MA. The bigger issue is that you say your former program has a "bad reputation". Whether or not this follows you depends on just how bad that reputation is. A program having a "bad reputation" could mean anything ranging from "Not the best program out there" to "literally a degree mill". As long as it doesn't hit the "literally a degree mill" end of the spectrum, I would think that it will be overshadowed by your PhD.

Answer 2

The question cannot be answered because

1. the qualifiers: "good reputation" and "bad reputation" are not specific, and quantified enough.

2. There is a confusion between MA and PhD. You are asking about your MA. But actually you are going to be judged by your last degree, which is PhD. If this is the case, then of course, nobody normally cares for what you did prior to the PhD.

Explanation: You say that the university has a "good reputation overall". That's a plus. But the program has a "bad reputation". That's a minus. But how bad the reputation of each is?

If MIT has a badly reputed program, it still is going to be not that bad of a program, right? But if a QS-ranked 300 university has a badly reputed program then it's going to be detrimental to your success.

So we need to know the approximate "numbers" of bad/good associated to your qualifiers "good/bad".