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I'm an international student finishing a PhD in Business in the US. I have attended the major conferences in my field regularly and would love to continue doing so. My top choice outside of the US is a business school in Mexico and I believe it would allow me to continue collaborating with US colleagues and regularly attending conferences. What do you think, does anyone have or know anyone with a similar experience?

I know of PhD graduates who moved back to China and then struggled to remain connected. However, China is much further away from the US than Mexico - Latin America in general. Nevertheless, if it was much easier it would be more common... and at least in my field, I have no reference of it. Most international academics that come to the conferences are Europeans, not from Latin America, but in most cases it seems like it can be traced out to someone that went back.

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There are many top quality researchers who maintain active relation with the US academia after leaving the US - via collaborative work, regular visits, participating in conferences, and publishing in top research journals (which are mostly US, UK and Europe-based.) So I'd say it is more of a rule than an exception... but one needs to do a sufficiently high quality research, which is not the case for many PhD graduates (whether they come from outside of the US or not doesn't matter.) So the problem is not so much being outside of the US, as being appreciated in the one's field.

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    It is of course also a question of having the resources to continue attending international conferences. Flight + hotel + conference registration these days adds up pretty quickly to $3000 or more.
    – Wolfgang Bangerth
    Commented May 6 at 10:54
  • @WolfgangBangerth True. Though, in some cases collaborating with the US is actually a way of getting one's trips paid and even additional salary (typically for people from less economically developed countries, but with high scientific level - notably former Soviet Bloc.) As far as more "western world" is concerned - they may be spending a whole conference/summer season in the US, or taking a sabbatical year.
    – Roger V.
    Commented May 6 at 11:01
  • Thank you both, that's very instructive. So it is indeed possible, a rule more than an exception for academics seeking to do high quality research, but being able to seek that does require resources / institutional support; which again is easier to justify if indeed doing HQ research and collaborating with the academic community in the US.
    – ImplingDig1
    Commented May 6 at 13:48

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