stanford math phd program

Graduate Students

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PhD Admissions

Main navigation, doctoral program.

• Admission for autumn entry quarter only
• PhD applicants may indicate areas of academic interest for informational purposes only (there are no specialized tracks as a part of the PhD application)
• PhD Admit Day Events will be held April 4-5, 2024. Admitted students will receive information about attending our Admit Events shortly after their offer letter.

See the  application deadlines page for important dates.

Applicants to the ICME graduate program may apply either to the MS program or to the PhD program, but may not apply to both. 

• Admission to the PhD program is much more competitive than to the MS program, therefore students interested primarily in a Master's degree should apply to the MS program. 
• ICME does not offer the choice for applicants not admitted to the PhD program to be re-considered for MS program admission.
• See the   application deadlines  page for important dates

Please direct all questions regarding programs and admissions to [email protected] (ICME Faculty Director and Affiliated Faculty will not be able to respond to admissions inquiries.)

ICME Application Submission

The Mathematical and Computational Finance Program at Stanford University (“MCF”) is one of the oldest and most established programs of its kind in the world. Starting out in the late 1990’s as an interdisciplinary financial mathematics research group, at a time when “quants” started having a greater impact on finance in particular, the program formally admitted masters students starting in 1999. The current MCF program was relaunched under the auspices of the Institute for Computational and Mathematical Engineering in the Stanford School of Engineering in 2014 to better align with changes in industry and to broaden into areas of financial technology in particular. We are excited to remain at the cutting edge of innovation in finance while carrying on our long tradition of excellence.

The MCF Program is designed to have smaller cohorts of exceptional students with diverse interests and viewpoints, and prepare them for impactful roles in finance. We are characterized by our cutting edge curriculum marrying traditional financial mathematics and core fundamentals, with an innovative technical spirit unique to Stanford with preparation in software engineering, data science and machine learning as well as the hands-on practical coursework which is the hallmark skill-set for leaders in present day finance.

Doctoral Program

Program summary.

Students are required to

• master the material in the prerequisite courses ;
• pass the first-year core program;
• attempt all three parts of the qualifying examinations and show acceptable performance in at least two of them (end of 1st year);
• satisfy the depth and breadth requirements (2nd/3rd/4th year);
• successfully complete the thesis proposal meeting (winter quarter of the 3rd year);
• present a draft of their dissertation and pass the university oral examination (4th/5th year).

The PhD requires a minimum of 135 units. Students are required to take a minimum of nine units of advanced topics courses (for depth) offered by the department (not including literature, research, consulting or Year 1 coursework), and a minimum of nine units outside of the Statistics Department (for breadth). Courses for the depth and breadth requirements must equal a combined minimum of 24 units. In addition, students must enroll in STATS 390 Statistical Consulting, taking it at least twice.

All students who have passed the qualifying exams but have not yet passed the Thesis Proposal Meeting must take STATS 319 at least once each year. For example, a student taking the qualifying exams in the summer after Year 1 and having the dissertation proposal meeting in Year 3, would take 319 in Years 2 and 3. Students in their second year are strongly encouraged to take STATS 399 with at least one faculty member. All details of program requirements can be found in our PhD handbook (available to Stanford affiliates only, using Stanford authentication. Requests for access from non-affiliates will not be approved).

Statistics Department PhD Handbook

All students are expected to abide by the Honor Code and the Fundamental Standard .

Doctoral and Research Advisors

During the first two years of the program, students' academic progress is monitored by the department's Graduate Director. Each student should meet at least once a quarter with the Graduate Director to discuss their academic plans and their progress towards choosing a thesis advisor (before the final study list deadline of spring of the second year). From the third year onward students are advised by their selected advisor.

Qualifying Examinations

Qualifying examinations are part of most PhD programs in the United States. At Stanford these exams are intended to test the student's level of knowledge when the first-year program, common to all students, has been completed. There are separate examinations in the three core subjects of statistical theory and methods, applied statistics, and probability theory, which are typically taken during the summer at the end of the student's first year. Students are expected to attempt all three examinations and show acceptable performance in at least two of them. Letter grades are not given. Qualifying exams may be taken only once. After passing the qualifying exams, students must file for Ph.D. Candidacy, a university milestone, by the end of spring quarter of their second year.

While nearly all students pass the qualifying examinations, those who do not can arrange to have their financial support continued for up to three quarters while alternative plans are made. Usually students are able to complete the requirements for the M.S. degree in Statistics in two years or less, whether or not they have passed the PhD qualifying exams.

Thesis Proposal Meeting and Dissertation Reading Committee 

The thesis proposal meeting is intended to demonstrate a student's depth in some areas of statistics, and to examine the general plan for their research. In the meeting the student gives a 60-minute presentation involving ideas developed to date and plans for completing a PhD dissertation, and for another 60 minutes answers questions posed by the committee. which consists of their advisor and two other members. The meeting must be successfully completed by the end of winter quarter of the third year. If a student does not pass, the exam must be repeated. Repeated failure can lead to a loss of financial support.

The Dissertation Reading Committee consists of the student’s advisor plus two faculty readers, all of whom are responsible for reading the full dissertation. Of these three, at least two must be members of the Statistics Department (faculty with a full or joint appointment in Statistics but excluding for this purpose those with only a courtesy or adjunct appointment). Normally, all committee members are members of the Stanford University Academic Council or are emeritus Academic Council members; the principal dissertation advisor must be an Academic Council member. 

The Doctoral Dissertation Reading Committee form should be completed and signed at the Dissertation Proposal Meeting. The form must be submitted before approval of TGR status or before scheduling a University Oral Examination.

 For further information on the Dissertation Reading Committee, please see the Graduate Academic Policies and Procedures (GAP) Handbook section 4.8.

University Oral Examinations

The oral examination consists of a public, approximately 60-minute, presentation on the thesis topic, followed by a 60 minute question and answer period attended only by members of the examining committee. The questions relate to the student's presentation and also explore the student's familiarity with broader statistical topics related to the thesis research. The oral examination is normally completed during the last few months of the student's PhD period. The examining committee typically consists of four faculty members from the Statistics Department and a fifth faculty member from outside the department serving as the committee chair. Four out of five passing votes are required and no grades are given. Nearly all students can expect to pass this examination, although it is common for specific recommendations to be made regarding completion of the thesis.

The Dissertation Reading Committee must also read and approve the thesis.

For further information on university oral examinations and committees, please see the Graduate Academic Policies and Procedures (GAP) Handbook section 4.7 .

Dissertation

The dissertation is the capstone of the PhD degree. It is expected to be an original piece of work of publishable quality. The research advisor and two additional faculty members constitute the student's dissertation reading committee.

Explore Graduate Programs

Doctoral Admissions

Use this page to explore admissions data for Stanford's research doctoral programs. While the most common doctoral degree across the university is the PhD, the JSD in Law and the DMA in Musical Arts are also included here. The MD and JD are considered to be professional degrees and are not included. Note that any year referenced in this dashboard refers to the academic year in which the applicant was intending to enroll. For example, an application submitted in September 2018 for the 2019-20 academic year would be counted under 2019-20. These data are limited to new, external applicants only. If you are interested in the Biosciences programs in the School of Medicine, please read the important note below the dashboard.

More information is available about  doctoral program enrollment and demographics , as well as  doctoral degree conferrals, time-to-degree, and graduation rates . Note that local variation in policy and practice regarding admission, matriculation, and degree conferral may affect the departmental and school-level metrics below.

Methodology & Definitions

Application counts.

Applicant counts are based on the number of applications to doctoral programs from new applicants only. Current students who are transferring into a doctoral program from another graduate program at Stanford without submitting a new application are not included. If an application was transferred between programs during the admission process, the application is counted under the final program for which it was considered, not the original program.

Application Years

Applications and offers of admission are counted in the year in which the applicant was intending to enroll. The year in this case encompasses the summer quarter through the following spring, so the 2018-2019 application year would include students who intended to matriculate in Summer 2018 through Spring 2019. If an applicant was admitted and decided to defer their enrollment, that application and offer of admission are counted in the later, deferred year instead of the original year. The majority of new doctoral students matriculate in either autumn or summer. As these dashboards are updated annually in the autumn, the data for the most recent year will not include applicants or admits for winter or spring.

Admit Rates

The admit rate is calculated by dividing the number of offers of admission by the total number of applications received.

An Important Note about Stanford Biosciences

Prospective students may only apply to a single doctoral program at a time, with the exception of the  14 programs in Stanford Biosciences . Beginning with the 2022-23 application period, prospective students in Biosciences are permitted to select up to two programs for consideration as part of their application. (Prior to the 2022-23 application cycle, students were able to and would commonly select up to three programs for consideration.) A successful applicant will only be offered admission to one of these programs, which may result in an artificially low admit rate for some of these programs.  These programs include:

• Biochemistry
• Biomedical Informatics
• Cancer Biology
• Chemical and Systems Biology
• Developmental Biology
• Microbiology and Immunology
• Molecular and Cellular Physiology
• Neurosciences
• Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine
• Structural Biology

Visit the  Graduate Admissions website  for more information about pursuing graduate study at Stanford.

The data are available for download in Google Drive .

• Data Source(s): PeopleSoft Campus Solutions, Institutional Research & Decision Support

Stanford University is committed to providing an online environment that is accessible to everyone, including individuals with disabilities. If you cannot access this content or use any features on this site, please contact  [email protected]  to obtain alternate formats.

You may submit feedback on this dashboard through the  feedback form .

MATH-MS - Mathematics (MS)

Program overview.

The Department of Mathematics offers programs leading to the degrees of Bachelor of Science, Master of Science, and Doctor of Philosophy in Mathematics and also participates in the MS and PhD degree programs offered through the Institute for Computational & Mathematical Engineering.

Sebastian Fernández

We then relocated to the U.S., eventually settling in Alpharetta, Georgia, but I continued to spend my summers in Cusco until I was about 16. Some of the things we take for granted here in the U.S., such as the stove always turning on or reliable lighting, was not a given in that region. As a child, I believed that scientists and engineers could fix these problems, and it was that belief that helped motivate me to pursue a technical education.

I’ve always loved math and science, but I also love the violin, and I even considered applying to Juilliard. But a summer opportunity during high school – the Georgia Governor’s Honors Program – involved a chance to do a research project that asked me to use everything in my academic arsenal to tackle a problem that didn’t have a textbook solution. It was a turning point for me, and I realized I wanted to do this for my professional life. Later, as an undergraduate at Georgia Tech, I found my passion for nanotechnology and semiconductor devices, which I see as the perfect marriage between physics, chemistry, math, engineering, design, computer science, and materials science.

I came to Stanford for my PhD to pursue that interest, and today my research in the Congreve Lab focuses on developing the next generation of LED technologies based on perovskite nanomaterials, which are an emerging class of semiconductors that have the potential to dramatically improve devices such as solar cells, lasers, and LEDs. I’m looking at applications in quantum computing, solid-state lighting, and displays used in computers, TVs, watches, and phone screens. These materials have the potential to be simpler and cheaper than current technologies, and could have big implications in exciting areas including virtual reality, water purification, and surface sterilization, the importance of which has been made clear by the pandemic.

I still love playing the violin, and as a student here I’ve taken private lessons from Joo-Mee Lee, a faculty member in the Department of Music. But I’m also very interested in equity issues. Studying both the violin and advanced mathematics in high school, I found fewer and fewer Latinos in those communities; often I was the only one. I was lucky throughout my education to have wonderful mentors who recognized the strength that diversity brings to a community. Here at Stanford, they include Professors Dan Congreve and Thomas Jaramillo. Unfortunately, not all underrepresented students are afforded such great mentors during their academic journey. So in my third year at Stanford, some other students and I started Stanford Engineering Research Introductions , where I serve as principal founder and president. Our goal is to prepare underrepresented first-year and sophomore students for potential graduate and doctoral degrees. We want to show them – very early on – that there’s a pathway for them, and that there are people who look like them who are actively supporting them. Many of our participants have gone on to conduct research here at Stanford and at other institutions, and are gearing up to truly diversify engineering academia. I believe it’s been one of the most important and rewarding aspects of my time here.

Because I have a strong passion for research, teaching, and service, and because I’d like to inspire the next generation and be a mentor, I hope one day to become a university engineering professor. I’d like to uncover new directions that could change my field of nanotechnology and semiconductor devices as well as engineering academia. I’m excited to see what the future holds.

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How Can Universities Prepare Tomorrow’s Leaders to Use Big Data for Social Good?

Commentary / 20 March 2024

A rapidly-growing Stanford major aims to equip students with a combined fluency in data science and social science

Data science is evolving faster than we can even imagine. 

At the intersection of math, statistics, and computer science,  data scientists use large data sets to uncover insights , patterns, and trends to make decisions and solve real-world problems. New tools, techniques, and applications are emerging all the time, transforming the way we live and work. As the world sees–and industries respond to–new breakthroughs in artificial intelligence and machine learning, universities are also feeling a growing demand for big data professionals.

Data science can be a powerful tool for tackling societal problems by providing focused and relevant  insights that can be harnessed to drive the creation of more effective, efficient, and equitable interventions – as we see in cases like using  data to combat world hunger or working to  reduce bias in AI-supported decision-making .

With the advent of large language models, it’s now easier for beginner coders to execute programming languages—like a calculator can perform basic and complicated arithmetic. As the data science world evolves, the people training new scientists are homing in on what it takes to build the critical thinking skills of the person behind the calculator. Learning how to unpack the scope of societal problems, figure out where data can add value, and translate solutions are becoming vital skills needed by data scientists today, according to  Mallory Nobles .

“Knowing the basic mechanics of how to code probably will become a less valuable skill going forward. There’s more emphasis on being able to identify what the problem is that you’re trying to solve and how you will use data science as a tool to solve that problem,” Nobles said.

Nobles is the Associate Director of the  Data Science & Social Systems (DSSS) program—a new major launched in 2022 by Stanford's School of Humanities and Sciences and incubated in  Stanford Impact Labs (SIL). Since its inception, DSSS has brought more than 200 undergraduate students into the fold, training students on how to incorporate data science and social science approaches in their thinking. This dual approach creates avenues toward contextualizing data, understanding the underlying motivations and biases that shape it, and making data science relevant to real-world problems.

Through DSSS coursework and projects, undergraduate students build a triple fluency: expertise in statistical and computational methods, domain knowledge across the core social sciences, and a deep and interdisciplinary understanding of an important social problem. For Nobles, social science frameworks are essential for data science because they provide a lens through which to understand and interpret data. 

“If you’re trying to solve a really hard social problem, like climate change mitigation, equitable health care, or political polarization, you’re not going to be able to do it alone. It’s going to require a lot of different folks coming together and understanding how data science can fit into that larger context.” Nobles said.

A Growing Demand

Outside of Stanford, researchers trained as both data scientists and social scientists are filling important niches in the policy world, underscoring the need for more programs like DSSS. In Nobles’  Data Science @ Work course , Stanford’s DSSS students hear from data scientists working in industry, government, and the nonprofit sectors. During the class, former White House Chief Data Scientist  DJ Patil advised students to explore those intersections between data science and social change.

When a wave of COVID-19 infections hit California, Patil began working with the state to turn data scientists into new kinds of  first responders . By collecting hospital and community data, developing surveys, and modeling the potential impact mass infections could have, his team helped inform real-time responses and scenario planning for policymakers.

“One of the most exciting things we’re starting to see in society is how interdisciplinary everything is. Medicine needs data, astrophysics, and the collection of data from new telescopes, the way we interact and understand diseases—all of these things,” said Patil.

Using data-driven approaches in tandem with public health knowledge, his team worked to scale up the model toward other states. Now Patil's career in data science has taught him that the challenges that face the country—whether in healthcare, environmental sustainability, or national safety— pose persistent threats to society and are impossible to solve through only one perspective.

This tradition dates back even to the beginning of the field. One of history’s earliest data scientists,  John Snow , also became the father of modern epidemiology in 1854 by mapping London’s cholera outbreaks and tracing them to public water pumps in the area. Patil calls these  massive multidisciplinary problems that need data scientists coming from multiple disciplines and backgrounds to fully understand them, let alone solve them.

“How do you build things that are going to power the world forward and in an interdisciplinary way and responsible way? How are you going to share what you’re building for everyone? That’s data science,” said Patil.

Data has great power to inform policy, but data alone can't speak for itself, especially when it comes to social challenges. Analyzing data requires the context needed to understand why a problem exists in the first place. By taking classes in concentrations ranging from education to global poverty, language, or the environment,  DSSS students develop a focus on major societal challenges and the social systems that we need to understand to make progress. By developing greater fluency in the social sciences, students are learning how to apply data science skills to complex social problems and bring interdisciplinary perspectives to their own work.

“When you ask and answer causal questions about a social problem, you’re deepening your understanding of the underlying causes, which can give you clues about how you might go about solving it,” notes SIL Faculty Director Jeremy Weinstein.

A Growing Responsibility

From the rise of advocates for algorithmic justice to the introduction of an  AI Bill of Rights , the field and the wider public have begun to recognize the need for responsible data science practices. The world needs solutions-oriented data science to overcome pressing challenges. But what's become clear is that ethical frameworks for how to navigate the data science world are now more important than ever. Stanford's next generation of data scientists is arming themselves with this knowledge by delving into these complex challenges and unearthing new insights in their studies.

“There’s a lot of work being done right now on the question:  How can we make algorithms more transparent and auditable and ensure that they are applied appropriately? That is a massive need and this program aims to fill that need by training folks in both data science approaches, and how to think about problems more deeply, consider the context for them, and develop skills around what it means to be responsible with data science or machine learning,” Nobles said.

As a machine learning scientist,  Ehi Nosakhare leads a team at Microsoft using AI solutions to solve business challenges across the company. To Stanford’s DSSS students, she said it was an exciting time to be a data scientist, especially when the field feels like it is constantly changing. To make a positive impact on social issues, she advised students to keep up with the way the field is evolving and critically examine their own perspectives as data scientists.

“You should think very critically about what you're doing … It's a privilege to be able to use data to create technologies and systems. Do it in a way that is inclusive, and do it in a way that you are taking in the perspectives of others around you and from different fields,” Noskhare said.

Embarking on Stanford’s Data Science major has helped undergraduate student Esha Thapa find her middle ground between technology, the social sciences, and humanities. After completing the major’s gateway course, Solving Social Problems with Data, she developed the skills needed to frame problems, choose appropriate research designs, and interpret data while understanding its social and political environment. As she pursues a future career as a data scientist, her lessons from the major are guiding her forward.

"Human rights and ethical behavior are embodied in my career as a main priority rather than an afterthought," Thapa said. "In a world ripe with technological growth, it is more important than ever that we confront the consequences of it with both criticism and empathy."

Reema Saleh is an independent writer, journalist, and digital media producer. Her work appears in the Chicago Reader, South Side Weekly, Chicago Review of Books, and other outlets.

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Opinion: How to skip the college admissions rat race and still get a degree

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College admissions in the United States have evolved into a rat race.

Seniors will be getting their acceptance and rejection notices in the next few weeks. They will have spent years cramming for grades, toiling at college-level courses, prepping for entrance exams and spreading themselves thin with clubs, sports, the arts and volunteer work, all for the singular goal of being admitted to their dream schools. At the same time, their equally anxious parents have been scrambling to figure out how to finance their children’s education if they are fortunate enough to be admitted.

This leaves many, including admissions consultants such as myself, to rightfully question whether our higher education system is broken.

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There is an alternative to the shockingly low acceptance rates and high-priced tuition that mark the college admissions sweepstakes in the United States: international universities. Studying abroad for a semester has long been a rite of passage for college students seeking to explore the world. But attending an international university to obtain an undergraduate degree is becoming increasingly popular as well.

Storied universities abroad offer strong preparation for postgraduate employment or graduate school, and their admissions process is often more straightforward, their acceptance rates higher and their tuition costs lower than comparable schools at home.

Let’s take Oxford University as an example. You might suspect it would be just as difficult to be admitted to and as expensive as, say, Harvard or Stanford. But depending on what a student wants to major in, acceptance rates can reach up to 17% , compared with 3% to 4% for equally highly regarded universities in the U.S. At Oxford, like most international schools, you can’t tap U.S.-style financial aid packages, but the cost is lower all around. Tuition for many programs starts at 33,000 pounds for international students. That’s about $42,000, significantly less than what many private universities in the United States charge.

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The cost difference looks even better when you consider that most U.K. programs are completed in three years, not four. And for American high school students and their families, the process of applying is much less cumbersome and stressful.

Most British schools straightforwardly weigh applicants’ college entrance exams and their demonstrated interest in their intended fields. This holds true for well-regarded options in Canada, Ireland, France, Spain and other countries, where universities publish test score requirements , removing the guesswork about what it takes to be admitted. In addition to increased transparency, these universities do not obsess over personal essays and extraneous extracurricular activities.

You may wonder if attending college abroad will limit your job prospects at home after graduation. With few exceptions — primarily programs such as nursing or accounting, where students use their undergraduate education as part of a licensing process in the U.S. — the answer is no. Employers and graduate schools appreciate applicants with diverse perspectives and experiences that can help them navigate an increasingly global workforce and marketplace.

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I speak from experience counseling students to ensure that their college choices will help them achieve their long-term goals. One student was passionate about motor-sports engineering, but he was not excited about pursuing a general mechanical engineering degree, which is typically offered in the United States. Instead, he was admitted to a program at Oxford Brookes University tailor-made for his interest in performance automotive engineering. When he graduated, he had job offers in the U.S., U.K. and other countries, including from Formula One teams that recruited at his university.

Regardless of what a student studies, many find developing foreign language skills and an international perspective to be invaluable when applying for jobs or grad schools. This matches my own experience. I applied for investment banking positions on Wall Street prior to graduating from college, and the only offer I received was from a bank that valued the semester abroad I spent in Argentina; it was looking for a Spanish-speaking analyst to assist with South American clients.

Going abroad for a college education is far from the norm among American students. But thinking outside the box is a skill that will serve them well in the admissions process wherever they decide to apply, not to mention for the rest of their lives. Why not employ it to escape the rat race of U.S. admissions?

Greg Kaplan heads a Newport Beach-based college admissions advising firm. His book “The Journey: How to Prepare Kids for a Competitive and Changing World” will be published in May.

More to Read

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March 5, 2024

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NRMP® Celebrates Match Day for the 2024 Main Residency Match®, Releases Results for Over 44,000 Applicants and Almost 6,400 Residency Programs

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Today, the National Resident Matching Program ® (NRMP) is excited to recognize Match Day for its 2024 Main Residency Match and release key results for educators, stakeholders, and policymakers focused on graduate medical education. Match Day, a time-honored tradition, signifies a pivotal moment in an aspiring physician’s medical education journey. After months of applications and interviews, applicants across the world learned today where and in what specialties they will train. This year’s Match included 44,853 applicants who certified a rank order list (“active applicants”) and 41,503 certified positions in 6,395 residency training programs.

“The NRMP is proud to deliver the results of another successful Main Residency Match, and we congratulate all future physicians and training programs on this momentous occasion,” says NRMP President and CEO Donna L. Lamb, DHSc, MBA, BSN. “We are especially proud of applicants this year, many of whom began medical school the fall before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and had to quickly adapt to and thrive in a radically changed academic and training landscape. Their experiences and success speak to a remarkable resilience and dedication they will carry with them into practice.”

Record High Applicant Participation. A total of 50,413 applicants registered in the 2024 Main Residency Match, an all-time high and increase of 2,257 or 4.7 percent over last year. The rise in applicants was driven largely by an increase of 1,986 non-U.S. citizen international medical graduates (IMGs) and 623 osteopathic (DO) seniors over last year.

Among all registrants, 44,853 certified a rank order list of training preferences, the highest number on record and an increase of 1,901 or 4.4 percent over last year. Of the applicants who certified a rank order list, 35,984 matched to a post-graduate year 1 (PGY-1) position, an increase of 1,162 applicants from last year. The PGY-1 match rate was 80.2 percent.

U.S. MD seniors remain the largest applicant group participating in the Match, and in 2024 numbered 20,296. This represents a decrease of 21 applicants compared to the 2023 Match; however, the number of U.S. MD seniors certifying a rank order list increased slightly to 19,755, seven more than last year. 

Applicant Match Rates Remain Steady. Match rates remained steady among each of the four main applicant types with less than a one percentage point difference compared to the 2023 Main Residency Match.

• U.S. DO seniors achieved a 92.3 percent match rate, an all-time high and an increase of 0.7 percentage points over last year. Since 2019, the DO senior match rate has increased 4.2 percentage points.
• U.S. MD seniors realized a 93.5 percent match rate, a decrease of 0.2 percentage points from last year. The U.S. MD senior match rate remains within the historic 92 – 95 percent range that has been steady since 1982.
• U.S. citizen IMGs realized a 67.0 percent match rate, a decrease of 0.6 percentage points from last year.
• Non-U.S. citizen IMGs realized a 58.5 percent match rate, a decrease of 0.9 percentage points since last year.

Increased Program and Position Participation. The 2024 Main Residency Match included 6,395 certified programs offering 41,503 PGY-1 and PGY-2 training positions, the largest number in the NRMP’s 72-year history. Increases afforded applicants access to 125 more programs and 1,128 positions which is 2.8 percent more than the 2023 Main Residency Match.

“Upward trends in participating program rates and positions offered and filled demonstrate the success with which the NRMP ably and consistently grows to meet the needs of the undergraduate and graduate medical education communities,” said Dr. Lamb. “To support that growth, the NRMP is committed not only to expanding its data analyses and offerings for those in our community but also to leveraging Match data as a critical bellwether of the future physician workforce, informing national conversations about specialty and physician geographic distribution to improve population health outcomes.”

• Of all positions offered, 38,941 filled for a rate of 93.8 percent, a 0.5 percentage point increase over last year.
• Of the 6,395 total certified programs, 5,608 filled at a rate of 87.7 percent, an increase of 1.1 percentage points over last year.

Fluctuation in Primary Care. Concerns remain about a shortage of primary care physicians across the U.S., and NRMP data offer insights into trends.

The 2024 Match offered 19,423 primary care positions, the largest number on record and 46.8 percent of all the positions offered in the Match. Primary care specialties are defined as categorical PGY-1 positions that provide the full training required for board certification in Family Medicine, Internal Medicine, Internal Medicine-Pediatrics, and Pediatrics. There were 719 more primary care positions offered in 2024, and the fill rate for the specialties combined was 92.9 percent.

While strong, the primary care fill rated fell slightly in 2024 by 1.4 percentage points, largely due to changes in Pediatrics.

In the 2024 Match, Pediatrics offered 3,139 categorical and primary positions, an increase of 93 over 2023, and filled 2,887 resulting in a fill rate of 92 percent compared to 97.1 percent in 2023. After the algorithm was processed, 252 Pediatrics positions were unfilled, an increase of 164 over last year. Notably, the percentage of U.S. MD seniors that matched to Pediatrics categorical positions in 2024 was 47.6 percent, a decrease of 7.2 percentage points from last year.

Rebound in Emergency Medicine. After a two-year decline, Match data reflect a resurgence in Emergency Medicine fill rates.  Emergency Medicine achieved its historically high fill rate of 98 – 99 percent in the 2017 – 2021 Matches. By 2023, the fill rate had dropped by 17.9 percentage points, driven in part by the strain the specialty experienced during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.  In 2024, Emergency Medicine offered 3,026 positions, an increase of 16 positions from 2023 and filled 2,891 to earn a 95.5 percent fill rate, an increase of 13.9 percentage points. There were 135 positions unfilled after the matching algorithm was processed compared to 554 unfilled positions in 2023.

Continued Strength in Obstetrics and Gynecology. The specialty had another very strong Match, even with the two-year anniversary of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization Supreme Court decision approaching this summer. Only six categorical positions remained unfilled after the matching algorithm was processed.  OB/GYN achieved a 99.6 percent fill rate in the 2024 Match, continuing a strong trend of filling over 99 percent of positions offered every year for the past five years and filling at least 90 percent of positions with U.S. MD and DO seniors.

Specialty Highlights and Competitiveness. The results of the Match can indicate the competitiveness of specialties as measured by the percentage of positions filled overall and the percentage of positions filled by U.S. MD and DO seniors.

• The specialties with 30 positions or more that filled with the highest percentage of U.S. MD and DO seniors were Internal Medicine/Emergency Medicine (96.8 percent), Thoracic Surgery (95.8 percent), Otolaryngology (95.8 percent), Internal Medicine/Pediatrics (94.6 percent), Orthopedic Surgery (92.1 percent), Interventional Radiology – Integrated (91.4 percent), and Obstetrics and Gynecology (90.7 percent).
• The specialties with 30 positions or more that filled with the highest percentage of U.S. citizen IMGs and non-U.S. citizen IMGs were Internal Medicine (38.6 percent), Pathology – Anatomic and Clinical (37.4 percent), Family Medicine (31.8 percent), and Neurology (28.3 percent).

Supplemental Offer and Acceptance Program ® (SOAP ® ). Eligible applicants who did not match to a residency position participated in the NRMP’s  Match Week Supplemental Offer and Acceptance Program (SOAP)  to try to obtain the 2,562 positions in 787 programs that went unfilled after the matching algorithm was processed, 123 fewer positions than last year’s Match. A total of 2,575 positions were placed in SOAP, including positions in programs that did not participate in the algorithm phase of the process. There were 83 fewer positions in SOAP in 2024, a decrease of 3.1 percent compared to last year’s Match. Detailed SOAP results will be available in the 2024 Main Residency Match Results and Data Book, which is published in the Spring.

View the  Advance Data Tables ,  Match by the Numbers , and Match infographic  for additional data and information.

The National Resident Matching Program ® (NRMP ® ) is a private, non-profit organization established in 1952 to oversee The Match ® . The Match was established at the request of medical students to provide an orderly and fair mechanism for matching the preferences of applicants for U.S. residency positions with the preferences of residency program directors. In addition to the annual Main Residency Match ® for more than 48,000 registrants, the NRMP also conducts Fellowship Matches for more than 70 subspecialties through its Specialties Matching Service ® (SMS ® ).

To schedule an interview with NRMP President and CEO Donna L. Lamb, DHSc, contact [email protected] .

Jean Maria Arrigo, who exposed psychologists’ links to torture, dies at 79

She helped reveal collusion between american psychological association officials and defense department leaders, who had turned to psychologists for help with brutal interrogation programs after 9/11.

Jean Maria Arrigo, a psychologist who blew the whistle on her profession’s secret ties to the torture and abuse of war-on-terror detainees, helping expose collusion between American Psychological Association officials and Defense Department leaders after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, died Feb. 24 at her home in Alpine, Calif. She was 79.

The cause was complications from pancreatic cancer, said her husband, John Crigler.

A social psychologist and oral historian who focused on ethical issues in national security, Dr. Arrigo was “an unexpected and unassuming whistleblower,” said colleague Roy Eidelson, who worked alongside her in a group called the Coalition for an Ethical Psychology . She participated in peace marches in Central America during the 1980s but considered herself an introvert at heart, saying she would much rather be reading poetry than campaigning to overhaul the American Psychological Association (APA), the world’s largest professional organization of psychologists.

“What she wanted to accomplish, and what she continued to work on, was in a sense saving the profession from itself,” Eidelson said in an interview. “Making sure that ethical red lines would keep psychologists from becoming involved in things that were wrong. That’s an ongoing struggle that she now serves as an inspiration for.”

Dr. Arrigo had been studying national security issues for about a decade, interviewing intelligence experts and weapons developers about their moral concerns, before being appointed to an APA task force in 2005. The group was assembled to issue guidelines for psychologists involved in national security interrogations, in the aftermath of news reports about military and CIA abuses at overseas detention centers.

Pictures emerged showing military personnel taunting naked prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, and a front-page story in the New York Times documented a leaked report from the International Committee of the Red Cross, alleging that psychologists at Guantánamo Bay were involved in interrogations that were “tantamount to torture.”

Over the next decade, reporters and Senate investigators continued to document the use of “enhanced interrogation techniques,” including waterboarding, as part of a program that was run with help from two former military psychologists , James Mitchell and John Bruce Jessen.

Dr. Arrigo and her allies were horrified by psychologists’ involvement in the interrogations, which they found to be an abdication of the profession’s fundamental principles of “do no harm.” During task-force meetings, they pushed to adopt stricter ethical constraints, including by following provisions of the Geneva Conventions instead of standards set by the George W. Bush administration.

But the 10-member task force, which held its meetings in secrecy, was stacked with national security insiders intent on maintaining the status quo, according to Dr. Arrigo. The group’s final report concluded that it was fine for psychologists to remain involved in interrogations, and argued that their work ensured that the process was “safe, legal, ethical and effective” — language that was later shown to have been provided by officials at the Defense Department.

Convinced that the task force was “a sham,” Dr. Arrigo took her concerns to the public, sharing the group’s private correspondence and meeting notes with journalists and members of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

At the APA’s annual convention in 2007, she shocked colleagues by criticizing the task force in a speech that was recorded by the news program “Democracy Now!,” recalling how the group seemed to have an overriding concern for haste, with an aim “to put out the fires of controversy right away.”

Colleagues responded with silence, denials or highly personal criticism.

Gerald Koocher, a former APA president who was involved in the task force, wrote an open letter in which he attacked Dr. Arrigo for having “personal biases” and a “troubled upbringing,” alluding to a task force meeting in which she had discussed her contentious relationship with her father, a career Army officer who, according to Dr. Arrigo, was involved in torture while doing undercover work during World War II. Koocher also claimed that Dr. Arrigo’s father had died by suicide; in fact, he was still alive.

Over the next several years, Dr. Arrigo continued to criticize the organization’s approach to national security interrogations, alongside other dissident psychologists who argued that the organization had set aside professional ethics while seeking to expand its footprint through ties with the government and military.

Many of her criticisms were vindicated by the release of an independent review report , commissioned by the APA after the publication of Times reporter James Risen’s 2014 book “Pay Any Price: Greed, Power, and Endless War,” which alleged that the APA had effectively been providing cover for abusive interrogations.

Prepared by former federal prosecutor David H. Hoffman, the 542-page report found that the APA’s ethics office “prioritized the protection of psychologists — even those who might have engaged in unethical behavior — above the protection of the public.”

“The evidence supports the conclusion that APA officials colluded with DoD officials to, at the least, adopt and maintain APA ethics policies that were not more restrictive than the guidelines that key DoD officials wanted,” the report said, referring to the Defense Department. It added that the “APA chose its ethics policy based on its goals of helping DoD, managing its PR, and maximizing the growth of the profession.”

Later that year, the APA voted to ban psychologists from assisting in national security interrogations. The group’s ethics chief was removed from his position, and three other senior officials resigned or retired early.

“In a story full of villains, Arrigo emerges from Hoffman’s report as a hero — and a martyr,” the Guardian declared .

Dr. Arrigo was awarded the 2015 Scientific Freedom and Responsibility Award from the American Association for the Advancement of Science, which praised her “courage in continuing to stand up and speak out for the ethical behavior of members of her profession.” She was also presented with a plaque by the APA’s governing council, which called her the group’s “ethical, moral conscience” and “the finest possible role model for us in the profession of Psychology.”

“I’ve spent 10 years of my life that I wish I could have back,” she said .

The oldest of three daughters, Jean Maria Arrigo was born in Memphis on April 30, 1944. Her mother was a schoolteacher, and her father spent part of her childhood overseas, with military stints in Japan and Taiwan.

Dr. Arrigo graduated from high school in San Francisco and initially studied mathematics, receiving a bachelor’s degree from the University of California at Berkeley in 1966 and a master’s degree from UC San Diego in 1969. She taught mathematics at San Diego colleges and universities for more than a decade while developing a growing interest in human rights, which led her to retrain as a social psychologist.

Enrolling at Claremont Graduate University, she received a master’s degree in 1995 and a doctorate in 1999. Her oral history work led to the creation of archival collections at the University of California at Berkeley in 2004 and Stanford University in 2005. Collaborating with her husband, Crigler, a composer and musician, she also adapted some of her oral histories into theater performances, which she described as attempts to “stimulate public moral discourse.”

In addition to Crigler, her husband of more than 25 years, survivors include two sisters.

When she received the APA honor in 2015, Dr. Arrigo said she was simultaneously “very touched” and “very wary,” skeptical of an organization that had been “dedicated to looking the other way” after years in which it was “interlocked with the national security establishment.”

Interviewed by Claremont the next year, she reiterated her skepticism, noting that she was not convinced that ethical issues around national security would not arise in the future. “That’s like believing that when the Russians shot down [Francis] Gary Powers’ spy plane in 1960 that the U.S. gave up espionage,” she said.

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Gse undergraduate programs highlight benefits of studying education.

When Neel Kishnani, ’21, MS ’23, started as a software engineer at one of Silicon Valley’s biggest tech companies, he found himself in a bit of an identity crisis.

He had excelled at his computer science classes at Stanford and was a teaching assistant while pursuing his master’s degree — a position where students came to him for help. Now he was working with colleagues with more experience, and suddenly he was the person in the room without all of the answers.

What has helped him adapt to his new environment is embracing opportunities to learn and, when he can, teach — practices he says he honed while pursuing the education minor through Stanford Graduate School of Education (GSE).

“In my job I need to communicate with iPhone users about how to utilize their machines, so distilling the technical knowledge I have and teaching only what’s necessary is a useful skill,” said Kishnani, who works at Apple. “The end goal is for them to be able to problem solve and learn the material.”

Neel Kishnani (left) receives his honor cord for completing a minor of education with the GSE. (Photo: Ryan Zhang)

Kishnani is one of dozens of students each year who participate in undergraduate programs at the GSE (informally abbreviated UP@GSE). The programs introduce students to the field of education through research, theory, and practice while they pursue their bachelor’s degrees in other subjects.

Choose your own adventure

UP@GSE has two degree programs: the education minor, which is led by Senior Lecturer Jennifer Wolf , and the undergraduate honors program, headed by Professor Ari Kelman . Between the two, about 136 minor and honors degrees have been conferred to undergraduate students at Stanford.

“Every once in a while we would get an undergraduate who would go around knocking on doors in the GSE until someone answered, to express their interest in education and the desire to know more,” said Wolf, who originally proposed the minor to Stanford’s faculty senate committee. “Our thinking was that if we offered a minor, students could begin to explore an interest in education, then decide if they want to be a teacher, or pursue education further, or use their study in education to enhance whatever their major field of study was.”

To complete the minor, students are required to take a minimum of six education courses, which include options such as Introduction to Teaching and Learning, Educational Neuroscience, and History of Education in the United States, among others. Over the past 14 years, more than 200 students have graduated with the minor.

Jennifer Wolf (left) and Ari Kelman (right) at the 2023 UP@GSE honor cord ceremony. (Photo: Ryan Zhang)

Alternately, the honors program, which has been around since 1982, requires that students take a minimum of three courses, study their own research question, and submit a thesis in order to complete the research degree.

“Our honors program attracts students who are really interested in their research question, whatever it is,” said Kelman, who has led the program for the past five years. “For most students, the honors research is the first time in the course of their career as students where they’re answering their own questions about their own topic.”

Christian Sanchez , who will graduate with a bachelor’s degree in English this year, centered his education honors research on examining student experiences with the transfer credit evaluation process, as a direct result of his own experiences.

“As a nontraditional student who went through community college, I saw things I wanted to change and ways I wanted to make the process better for older adult learners,” said Sanchez, who would eventually like to serve as a community college president.

“I’ve really enjoyed my experience in my higher ed courses,” he said. “And while it’s a little intimidating to be in a room with students who are at a perceived higher academic level than you are, the experience has been really validating for me in that I feel confident in my own next steps after graduation.”

A symbiotic relationship

The GSE is the only graduate professional school at Stanford that offers a minor, bolstering the school’s connection to the undergraduate class.

“It’s an invaluable way to have fresh perspectives in our graduate-level courses and labs,” said GSE Professor Anne Charity Hudley, who is also the associate dean of educational affairs at the GSE. “Our graduate students are learning from undergrads as they work with them in the class, and our faculty get to connect with students coming in with a different lens.”

UP@GSE also works as a liaison between undergraduate students looking to learn more about education and curriculum, outside of the minor and honors program. An increasing number of majors and departments across the university cross-list or request to use GSE courses for degree completion.

 “It’s our mission to reach out to students, invite them into the world of what we do, and prepare them to be citizens of our educational democracy,” Wolf said. “Having these programs encourages not just undergrads but all the other departments to learn about teaching, learning, and education.”

A connection to community through public service

In addition to coursework and research, students who pursue UP@GSE often participate in public service initiatives through the Haas Center for Public Service.

“There’s a real synergistic relationship between the Haas Center and the GSE in that we do a lot of work supporting undergraduates to connect with youth-based programming here at the Haas Center,” said Paitra Houts, director of community engaged learning, focused on education, at the Haas Center.

Opportunities for students to engage with the Haas Center as part of their minor or honors program include Preschool Counts, a service-learning program in which Stanford students help children from East Palo Alto develop their math skills; Ravenswood Reads, where Stanford students tutor children in kindergarten through second grade in reading and language; and summer fellowships, where students intern for local and national organizations to learn more about the fields that they want to enter.

“This public service component is integral, because education is messy,” Houts said. “Theories are amazing, and they create a really incredible foundation, but when you actually go and get out into schools and nonprofits, I think you’re just much more prepared to go into the world and support the change that you learned about, that you want to be driving forward.”

Foster Cournoyer Hogan , who graduated from Stanford in 2021 with a bachelor’s in Native American Studies, said that his summer fellowship connected him to his current job as an operations manager for a Lakota Immersion school in his hometown.

“I realized that, with the combination of my degree and minor, I’d be able to work with this initiative after the fellowship and apply what I learned to continue the momentum that was already going,” Cournoyer Hogan said. 

Students who participate in UP@GSE learn skills that extend outside of the education space, such as how to form a convincing argument and how to improve their own learning.

“I think one of the big things that I walked away with as a result of the minor was a certain amount of respect and reverence for the profession of teaching,” Kishnani said. “And that a good learning outcome is only possible with the help of good teachers. It doesn’t just happen by chance.”

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