Questions to Ask During a Grad School Interview
50 questions for a graduate program interview or visit day, covering advising, funding terms, time to degree, exams, authorship, and what current students would change, with notes on who to ask what.
Want questions from the whole vault instead? Try the random question generator.
The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
What are you working on right now, and where does that work need new hands?
Why ask it
An easy opener that faculty enjoy, and it tells you whether there is an actual opening on the project you applied for. If the answer is about work that wrapped up two years ago, the lab you read about may no longer exist.
How do students here find an advisor, and how often does that first match change?
Why ask it
Programs run on very different models: admitted to a lab, admitted to a department with rotations, or left to arrange it yourself. The rate of switching tells you whether the system is forgiving of an early mismatch.
What does the funding package cover, how many years is it guaranteed, and what is it tied to?
Why ask it
A five-year guarantee contingent on teaching assignments that may not materialize is not a five-year guarantee. Ask what happens in year six, since that is where funding gaps actually show up.
What is the median time to degree in this program, and what usually slows people down?
Why ask it
The published figure and the lived one diverge. Faculty who supervise regularly can name the specific bottleneck here: a slow committee, a hard-to-schedule instrument, fieldwork seasons, or thesis chapters that stall.
Of the students admitted in the last five years, how many finished, and where did the others go?
Why ask it
Attrition is the number programs are least eager to volunteer and the most useful predictor of how the place treats people under strain. A department that tracks it and can describe it honestly is a good sign in itself.
What does the first year actually consist of: coursework, rotations, teaching, or research?
Why ask it
The load in year one determines whether you arrive with time to build a project or spend twelve months on requirements. Ask how many courses are genuinely required versus recommended by custom.
How much teaching is expected, in which years, and is it paid separately from the stipend?
Why ask it
Teaching is either training or unpaid labor depending on how it is structured. Four sections a semester with no mentoring is a different job from two with a faculty observer and feedback.
What do qualifying or comprehensive exams involve, and what happens to a student who does not pass?
Why ask it
Ask about the retake, the timeline, and whether a failure ends funding. Programs vary between a formality and a genuine cut, and knowing which one you are entering changes how you spend year two.
How often do you meet with your students, and how do you prefer to give feedback on writing?
Why ask it
This is the single largest variable in a graduate experience. Weekly standing meetings and returned drafts is one advising style; three emails a year is another, and neither is universally worse, but you should know which you are choosing.
How is authorship decided on work a student leads?
Why ask it
Ask before you arrive, not after a paper exists. Look for a stated convention in the group rather than a case-by-case judgment, because case-by-case tends to favor whoever holds the grant.
What happens if a student's interests move away from the work the grant funds?
Why ask it
Funded projects have deliverables, and intellectual freedom is limited by them in practice. Honest answers describe the constraint. An answer of you can study anything you like is worth testing against what current students actually work on.
If an advising relationship stops working, what does a student do about it?
Why ask it
You want to hear a named person or committee outside the advisor's chain, because otherwise the only route runs through the person you are having trouble with. Departments that have handled this before will describe how.
What is the stipend relative to rent here, and where do students actually live?
Why ask it
A larger stipend in an expensive city can leave you worse off. Current students will name the neighborhoods, the commute, and whether people take second jobs, which is the practical measure of whether the funding works.
What health coverage do students get, and what mental health support is available through the university?
Why ask it
Ask about dental and vision, dependent coverage if that matters, and the current wait time for a counseling appointment. Coverage that exists on paper with a two-month wait is worth knowing about in advance.
What is the working culture between students: do people collaborate, or is it mostly separate?
Why ask it
Best asked of students without faculty present. Cohorts that read each other's drafts and share code make a hard program survivable; a competitive or scattered cohort leaves you with only your advisor as support.
What do students here complain about most?
Why ask it
Almost everyone answers this, and the recurring complaint is usually structural: a required course nobody rates, a building problem, an administrator, or a funding process. Complaints repeated by three separate people are real.
Which parts of this program would you change if you could?
Why ask it
A faculty member who cannot name anything is either new or being careful, and both are useful to know. A specific answer, especially one about a reform under way, tells you where the program knows it is weak.
What have your last few graduates gone on to do?
Why ask it
Ask for the last three or four by name rather than for placement statistics, which are often calculated generously. If most left the field, that is not a verdict on the program, but you should hear it before deciding.
What distinguishes a student who thrives here from one who merely gets through?
Why ask it
Pushes past general encouragement toward the specific habits this environment rewards: independence, persistence with an instrument, comfort with cold-emailing collaborators. It also reveals how much structure you would be given.
What would you want me to have thought carefully about before I accept an offer?
Why ask it
Closing with this often produces the most candid answer of the interview, because it invites a warning rather than a pitch. Whatever they name is the thing they have watched students underestimate.
How does the process work from here, and when would I hear?
Why ask it
A safe opener that yields real information: whether this is one of several interviews, whether a committee vote follows, whether offers go out in waves. It also tells you when to stop refreshing your email, which matters more than it sounds.
Am I being interviewed for a specific lab or advisor, or for the program as a whole?
Why ask it
This one distinction changes the meaning of everything else you are told. Admission to a named advisor means your funding and your project are tied to one person; admission to a cohort means a rotation or a first year search, with its own risks.
If I were admitted, who would I most likely work with in the first year?
Why ask it
Ask for names. A confident answer means a plan exists; hesitation usually means the program admits more students than it has advisors ready to take, which is a common and under discussed problem.
How many students are you taking this year, and are you taking any into your own group?
Why ask it
A department can be admitting while the professor you came to work with is not taking anyone. Ask early, because the answer changes which questions are worth your remaining time.
How do you decide which students you take, and what are you looking for?
Why ask it
Advisors have a type, and most will describe it if asked directly: someone who can be left alone, someone who wants close direction, someone with a particular technique. Whether their description sounds like you is the point of asking.
Is there anything in my application that gave you pause?
Why ask it
Direct, and worth asking near the end. It gives you a chance to address a weak quantitative record or an unexplained gap while someone is still listening, and the answer tells you where you stand better than any pleasantry will.
How many years of support come with an offer, and what happens in the year after that runs out?
Why ask it
Programs that fund five years while students routinely take six or seven are describing a gap someone has to fill. Ask what students in that position actually do: teach, take a fellowship, or pay their own way.
Is the summer funded, and what is expected of students during it?
Why ask it
Many packages cover nine months and describe summer support as usually available. Ask what students actually did last summer: a research assistantship, teaching, a fellowship, or an outside job that cost them a season of research.
What happens to a student who needs to take a leave, and does funding pause or stop?
Why ask it
Illness, caring responsibilities and new babies all arrive during a six-year degree. A department that can describe the mechanism, and name that it has been used, is a different proposition from one that has never considered it.
How do you fund conference travel for your students, and how many do they go to each year?
Why ask it
Conferences decide who knows your work, and the money for them comes from a specific pot. Ask who chooses which conferences and whether a student can go somewhere the advisor is not attending.
How long does it take to get reimbursed for something, and who chases it?
Why ask it
A small question that predicts a lot. Departments that take four months to repay conference travel are asking students on a modest stipend to lend them money, and it is a reliable sign of how administration works here.
How much freedom do students have to shape their own question?
Why ask it
Some groups hand out well-defined pieces of a larger grant and others expect you to invent the project. Neither is wrong, but the mismatch between expectation and reality is a common reason students leave.
What happens when a student's project stops working?
Why ask it
This is normal in research and the response reveals the culture. Healthy answers describe pivoting, a second project, or a committee stepping in. Answers implying it does not happen mean either a very applied program or an unrealistic one.
Who else would I be working alongside day to day, and how senior are they?
Why ask it
A lab with three senior students has people who can teach you the equipment; a lab where you would be the only student means direct access and nobody to ask at eleven at night. Ask how much the group works together rather than in parallel.
What would a student in your group typically have published by the time they defend?
Why ask it
The concrete version of asking about output, and it tells you the record this advisor considers normal. Compare it with what the jobs you eventually want actually require, since the two are often different.
What do you expect a first year student to have accomplished by the end of the year?
Why ask it
Expectations that are precise are usually fair; expectations that are vague become impossible to meet. This also surfaces unwritten norms about hours, weekends, and summers that never appear in a handbook.
Has the faculty in my area changed much recently, and is anyone close to retiring or moving?
Why ask it
A subfield can empty out in two hiring cycles. If the people who could supervise your work are two retirements away from being one person, that decides whether you could still finish here in year four.
Is this program course-based, thesis-based, or a mix, and can I change track after starting?
Why ask it
The two versions are different degrees with the same name. A thesis track needs a supervisor and usually an extra term; a taught track is closer to structured teaching. Ask how many people switch and at what point it becomes too late.
Who teaches the core courses: permanent faculty, adjuncts, or doctoral students?
Why ask it
It is a fair question and the answer varies widely. Adjuncts working in the field can be the best teachers on a professional program, but a core taught entirely by people with no office hours is a different purchase.
Which required course would you drop if you could, and why?
Why ask it
Gives permission to be specific about the curriculum without asking anyone to criticise a colleague. Repeated answers mark the part of the program that has not been revised in a while.
Can I take courses from other departments, and do they count toward the degree?
Why ask it
Interdisciplinary flexibility is easy to endorse and often hard to arrange. Ask who approves it and whether anyone in the current cohort has done it.
Is there a placement, internship or practicum, and who arranges it?
Why ask it
There is a large difference between a department that places you and one that requires you to find your own. Ask how many students last year were still looking a month before the deadline.
What is the total cost including fees, and what am I expected to pay for on top?
Why ask it
Tuition is the headline. Ask about mandatory fees, software, fieldwork, travel to a placement, and health cover, then ask what a student spent last year in total. The gap between the two figures is usually significant.
What funding is available to master's students: assistantships, scholarships, or fee waivers?
Why ask it
Master's funding is far thinner than doctoral funding and is often awarded after admission rather than with it. Ask what proportion of last year's cohort received anything, and when decisions are made relative to the deposit deadline.
How does the program support students who decide against an academic career?
Why ask it
Most doctoral graduates work outside the academy, and programs differ sharply in whether that is treated as a normal outcome or a defection. Listen for concrete support, internships and industry contacts, rather than a statement of open mindedness.
Could I talk to one of your current students on their own?
Why ask it
The request itself is a test. Programs that arrange this readily are confident; hesitation or an offer to sit in is informative. Ask the student what they would want to know if they were choosing again.
If you were choosing again, would you come here?
Why ask it
A hesitation before the yes is worth more than the answer. Ask it of a fourth or fifth year rather than a first year, since the people near the end have seen how the program behaves when something goes wrong.
What did nobody tell you before you accepted?
Why ask it
Asked plainly, it usually produces the most useful sentence of the visit: the cost of parking, the two-hour commute from affordable housing, the term when everyone is expected to teach.
If I get multiple offers, what would you say makes this the right place for me specifically?
Why ask it
Asking for a case about you rather than about the program forces them to demonstrate they read your application. A generic answer about resources and community means they did not, which is worth knowing before you accept.
If I accepted, what would you want me to read or do before I arrive?
Why ask it
A concrete answer tells you the level they expect and gives you a head start. It also reveals whether anyone has thought about your arrival, and the reading list itself is a fair preview of the first year.
Using a Visit Day Well
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Ask the Right Person
Faculty for the intellectual questions
Current projects, where a student could contribute, authorship conventions, and advising style. They will not give you a reliable read on stipend adequacy or on which required course is a waste of a semester.
Current students for everything about conditions
Rent, workload, whether the guaranteed funding held, how the advisor behaves in year three rather than at recruitment. Ask senior students in particular, since first-years have not hit the difficult stretch yet.
The graduate coordinator for the rules
Exam timelines, leave policy, health coverage details, what happens administratively if funding lapses. They usually know the exceptions, which is where the real policy lives.
Recent graduates for the outcome
Email one or two whose work you found, and ask what they would do differently and how long the final year took. People who have left are noticeably more direct than people still enrolled.
How to Ask Without Sounding Like You Are Auditing
- Attach the hard questions to something specific you read: I saw the 2023 paper on this, is that line still funded, rather than a bare question about money.
- Ask numbers questions of the coordinator and students, and judgment questions of faculty. Asking a professor about attrition rates usually gets an estimate rather than a figure.
- Ask the same question of three people separately. Where the answers diverge is the interesting part, and it is the only way to find out what is not being said.
- Keep two or three questions in reserve for the awkward end of a meeting, since that is when people say the most useful things.
- Take notes between meetings, not during, and write down the exact numbers you were given so you can compare offers later.
Common Mistakes
- Asking what is on the department website. It reads as no preparation and costs you one of your few questions.
- Treating the interview as one-directional. Programs that are recruiting expect to be evaluated, and a candidate who evaluates carefully is usually read as serious.
- Deferring every question about money and time to degree until after you have an offer, when the people who would answer candidly are no longer as available.
- Judging the program by how impressive the interviewer is. Your daily experience will be set by advising style, funding terms, and your cohort, not by anyone's reputation.
- Skipping the informal parts of a visit day. Dinner with students produces more information than any scheduled meeting.
After the Interview
- 1Write down, the same evening, the funding terms exactly as they were described to you, including years, contingencies, and summer support.
- 2Send a short note to each person you met that references something specific they said rather than thanking them generically.
- 3Email one senior student you did not get to speak with, since a private reply is often more direct than anything said on the day.
- 4List the two things about the program that concern you, and ask a specific person each one before you decide.
- 5Compare offers on the same four axes: advising fit, funding through completion, time to degree, and where recent graduates ended up.