Paloma

I am going to echo bio-archfan and recommend you look into Alabama and Emory. Alabama has a specific PhD track in biocultural medical anthropology. However, Alabama requires you to have a master's before entering their PhD program, just as a heads up. A good chunk of the professors at Alabama also got their PhDs at Emory and Case Western, so you've got good contacts to those programs if you decided to attend here for the MA and then go elsewhere for a PhD.

My male MA advisor hugged me when I passed my defense and when I dug up a particularly important piece of evidence on a forensic case we were working. Neither triggered any alarms for me. They were friendly, excited gestures.

Alabama and Emory are both programs you should check out, as well. Alabama fully funds pretty much everyone who gets accepted, including MA students.

Hi all! I know I'm crazy late responding to your advice, but I wanted to come back and say thanks for the help. I took a lot of the advice given to me here and managed to get everything done and graduate on time! Thanks again!

My advisor will not give me substantial feedback on my thesis. I've been sending him chapters and portions of chapters since spring break, meeting with him as often as he will let me (about once or twice a month), and I've gotten a total of 10 pages of text edits out of him. In most meetings, it is clear that he hasn't read any of it, and will give me very vague advice about making sure that I'm asking the right questions or that I'm not letting the topic get too "big". Other times, he will have read the first couple pages with edits focusing mostly on word choice or formatting, and then nothing else. I'm not looking for line-by-line edits, but I'd like for him to actually read what I've written. I've heard nothing about the actual content of my thesis; I have real questions about the "meat" of this project. Now, it's getting to be crunch time. I need to have this out to my committee by the end of next week. I've leaned on some other colleagues to help with my edits regarding grammar and clarity, but my thesis topic is quite specialized and I need my advisor (who is the only other person who has done this sort of work in my department) to address questions I have about my content. Plus, he has to approve the draft before it can be sent out. That's pretty hard to do when you don't read it. Scheduling a meeting with him is impossible as of late. He will either cancel for some mysterious reason, go out of town, or show up to the meeting having read nothing that I've given him. He then spends an hour talking vaguely about my overarching topic, dodges my specific questions (because he hasn't read the portions I'm discussing), or spends an unnecessary amount of time reiterating how he would like my data tables to look. He will ask me to correct things that have already been corrected or point to a suggestion that he made and tell me that it was no good. I want to pull my hair out. I've been aware of his tendency to be a "hands off" advisor (to put it nicely) since I arrived at this program, and I found ways to alter my behavior to work around it in the past. However, he has gotten worse and worse as time has gone on. It's getting to a point where I cannot do anything else on my end to help myself. I'm also not the only student having this problem, either. There are at least two other students of his attempting to graduate this summer that are getting the same treatment. There are also students of his in the past that have had these same issues, many of which had to stay extra semesters because he neglected to read and approve their work by the required deadlines. My largest concern is that I start a PhD program in the fall. I am under the impression that my MA is required to enter the program, although my admission letter states that I have unconditional admission. I am worried that I will not graduate on time, and my position and funding at this PhD program will be revoked. I've already put in a notice to move from my current apartment. I won't be here in a month, no matter what happens. What should I do in this situation? At what point should I and the other students go to the dean? What is the most professional way to discuss my situation with my PhD advisor if I cannot make the deadlines?

Two colleagues of mine ran into this same problem last year. One began attending her PhD program in August, finished the last draft of her thesis around September, and flew back to defend last November. The other was in a program that didn't care if he finished his master's or not, so he simply dropped it. If my advisor keeps having to go out of town, I might be in the same boat. It seems like a pretty common occurrence for those transitioning from master's programs to PhDs. The downside to not finishing the MA/MS is that if you end up ABD, you have nothing but a bachelor's degree to support your job search.

I had the same experience, so I'm always confused when other TAs encounter these problems. Most of my students were no more than 2 or 3 years younger than me when I started as a TA and I'm not particularly tall (5'5"). I dress pretty casually as well (dark jeggings, blouse with cardigan, flats). Students would sometimes ask me about why they received the grades they did and always seemed satisfied with the explanation, even if the grade was poor. It could potentially be a body language issue? Ten or so years of martial arts have made me a pretty confident person in the face on conflict. That may cause me to subconsciously assert my authority more in my physical presence than some other women do. Above average height might cause others to do this without trying, as well.

It might depend on the field, as well as the level at which your institution operates. I attended a terminal master's program, so all graduate students that received funding were either GTAs or GRAs. I was the GTA for my advisor, which included independently designing and teaching a supplementary lab course to his introductory biological anthropology course. If you want funding at the master's level, terminal programs are your best bet. That's part of the reason I attended the program I did.

Thanks for the replies, everyone! Most of you are echoing my own thoughts, so it's good to know that I'm not too off base. I just got off the phone with CWRU, and they are only able to offer me a half stipend right now. I was told it was likely to increase to a full stipend (which is marginally less than the offer from Alabama), but there were no promises. Both are offering funding for the same number of years. I'm going to be talking to some of the grad students to see about how they like the environment there, but the discrepancy in funding offers is making this choice much easier.

I've been accepted into PhD programs at both University of Alabama and Case Western Reserve University. My research is in the subfield of biocultural medical anthropology. The two schools are basically night and day. CWRU: Private, located in major city, northern (cold), older and more prestigious program (and faculty) within my field. Alabama: Public, located in small college town, southern (warm), newer and more vibrant program with young faculty that are consistently publishing (but don't have a "legacy"). It seems crazy to me, but Alabama seems so much more appealing. I did my MA thesis research at the natural history museum associated with Case Western, and disliked the area around the school (nothing really within walking distance except Little Italy). My potential advisor there has made no contact with me outside of sending me a letter notifying me of my acceptance and letting me know funding decisions will be made in late March. I have not yet heard about funding. On the other hand, my potential advisor at Alabama gave me a personal phone call to let me know of my acceptance, during which he discussed my funding offer and the research projects that he was currently conducting in which I would be able to participate, if I was interested. He then got funds to fly me out for three days to meet the entire department, discussed at length the success of the program's graduates (nearly all have industry or tenure track positions within a year of graduating), and invited me to have dinner with him and his family. The department is brimming with positive energy and motivation. My choice would be easy, if I had not been told since the beginning of my master's degree that the name of the university on your PhD matters a lot. I was even advised by one professor not to attend a program that admitted me unless it was on a list of top graduate programs in my field. CWRU is on that list. Alabama is not, probably due to the youth of the doctoral program (only 10 years old). However, I have a sinking feeling that I will be unhappy at CWRU. I know that I will be happy at Alabama. I feel very torn. Advice?

I was accepted to Case Western Reserve University and University of Alabama, both for biocultural anthropology PhD programs. Although CWRU is more prestigious, I'm leaning much more heavily toward Alabama. Their department is so vibrant, and my potential advisor there gave me a personal phone call to let me know of my acceptance. The department offered me a generous funding package, and paid to fly me out for three days to meet everyone and see the campus. Still no contact from my potential advisor at Case outside of letting me know I was admitted through a form letter. I should be hearing about funding in the next week. I'm not sure what Case could offer me to change my mind yet, but I'll give them a shot.

Feeling really down, as of late. I'm just starting the second year of my master's program and was getting all pumped to start looking into PhD programs, and out of the blue, I feel like I've lost all direction. I don't know what I want to study anymore. Nothing seems to catch my eye for more than a few months before I am bored with it. I've decided to put off PhD applications for this year, because it seems ridiculous to be looking when I don't even know what topic I want to study. On top of it, my undiagnosed health problems are leaving me in pain 24/7, which is making everything else pretty hard. Maybe I'm not cut out for this, but I can't see myself doing anything else.

I've heard that Purdue (West Lafayette campus) has a decent molecular anthropology program, so you may want to check that one out. Within the Purdue system, I believe that IUPUI had a decent program at some point, however, the professor that was involved with genetics over there recently took a job teaching at my university. I have a class with her, and she's one of the best professors I've ever had. If there are more like her over there, it may also be worth checking out.

I'm currently in the process of applying to masters programs, and my number one school is University of Tennessee at Knoxville. If any of you know anything about that program, you've probably already guessed that my interests are forensics and taphonomy. However, I don't know if I stand a chance of getting in, or even getting funding. I feel like I have a strong application, but a couple things are bothering me. I'll be graduating with two degrees in the spring (one in anthropology, the other in Spanish), I have a 4.0 GPA for my anthropology courses and a 3.7 overall. My GRE was a 308 (or 1130 on the old scale), verbal 159 and quantitative 149. My writing score was low (4.5). I've done a bit of independent research on how freezing effects the appearance of trauma on bones, and I'll be sending that project in as my writing sample. I'm also getting inducted into Lambda Alpha this spring. My main concerns are that I haven't been involved in anything. I've been very invested in one particular RSO since my freshman year, and have neglected to do anything with Anthro Club or anything of that sort. So, my extra-curriculars in regard to anthropology are pretty much non-existant. My other concern is that, while I do have a good GPA, the university I currently attend isn't on par with UTK. It's a rather large, research based public university in Illinois (not U of I, unfortunately), but it's not known for its academics. How much do you think my lack of extra-curriculars and my undergrad institution will affect my chances of getting in and/or getting funding?