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Grev

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Everything posted by Grev

  1. Grev

    Boulder

    I'm excited/nervous about moving out too. I'm from Oregon, and our school systems run later than most places (Fall term starts mid/late September), so looking for summer housing in April? Feels crazy! I've been to Boulder before, but that was a day trip a few years ago and I stayed with family in Denver. I'll be going out to meet the department in person in April, and was wondering if anyone had any recs/horror stories for campus area hotels. Also- what are people excited about doing in/around Boulder (besides research )?
  2. In your case, you could easily email the Graduate Coordinator and tell them you're happy to accept. Also ask if there's anything you need to do to formalize your application. My school had an online portal where I had to click a few things and submit a deposit in order to formalize my acceptance. Your department will be very happy to help you through the process. And also, congratulations!
  3. Does anyone have advice on how to evaluate an apartment sight-unseen? If you can't make a trip out for home-hunting, what questions should you ask and what should you look out for?
  4. Grev

    Boulder

    Anyone else moving to the mountains this summer?
  5. If you know who the hosting professor is, it should be fine to send them a quick email asking if it would be appropriate to bring a small host/ess gift. If you're more comfortable bringing something than not, you could consider bringing something small that's local to where you're from. Coffee or chocolates are good options, as are mugs/magnets or small novelties from your area. I don't know what kind of travel you're looking at, but last time I flew with a bottle of wine it was a bit of a pain on the airplane.
  6. Hi SSJ, I did my BA and MA at UO in a different field, but I can answer a couple of your questions. First, your questions about the transition to Portland are probably best directed to the UO Architecture department directly. I promise you're not the first person to ask them, and that they'll be happy to clear things up! UO operates on the quarter system, that means 3 trimesters of 10 weeks each (Fall, Winter, Spring) during the academic year. You'll spend September through June of the first year in Eugene, and then transition to Portland for the remainder of the program. I have no idea how competitive that transition is, but the department can inform you. Eugene is about 2, 2.5 hours south of Portland on the interstate. The logistics of moving within the valley aren't that difficult. Graduate housing in Eugene is competitive, and not significantly cheaper than finding your own place. I think the typical wait-list is about 8-12 months, so probably not worth it for you. If you look between 3/4 of a mile, an 1 mile from campus, housing gets much cheaper. Sharing a two bedroom with a roommate is a great option. Duck's Village and housing developments near Autzen Stadium (the football arena) are "lovingly" called the Sophmore Dorms, and tend to be expensive and noisy. Best of luck!
  7. In a semi-related question, how do you all feel about publishing with your first name, or with an initial or what? I have what I feel is a very "little girl" sounding first name, and a very common last name. My first name isn't a diminutive of anything, but it sounds a little bit fluffy and has an alternate spelling I'm always having to explain. Think "Pansie Smith". I've had problems in informal settings where people don't take me as seriously (between the name and being short, it's a pain), and I wonder how much of this might carry over into my professional life. I've considered initialing, "P. Smith", but I'm not sure I like that better. Anyone else have thoughts on this?
  8. I picked up Catalan living in Barcelona for 3 years, which is an AWESOME way to get a language but not viable for everyone. Once you've got two Romance languages (say Spanish and Italian) reading the others comes pretty easy. I can understand written or spoken Portuguese without much trouble. French is the least phonetic one I've found, and IMO the hardest if you need more than just reading knowledge. The "fastest" way to pick a language up, if you can swing it, is really an immersion experience. Talk to your program about doing a summer of intensive language study in an appropriate country. Generally speaking, passing 2nd year with a B or better seems to fulfill the requirement at most schools. In general, certain Asian languages are considered to take longer to master, and may require you to take up to four years to achieve reading mastery. Japanese, for example, isn't much worse than Latin or Hebrew grammatically, and isn't hard to pronounce (from English or Spanish), but the way it's written requires you to memorize thousands of symbols and that takes time.
  9. I'm curious about the height/heels thing here. All the tall girls and women I know talk about how heels make them too tall.
  10. Borrowing Antihumanist as the example: I wonder if there's a quantity/quality thing happening here? I mean, you need to be able to work with a department as a whole, but you only get one adviser. What do you folks think- is it better to have a tight match with one faculty member, or a looser match with a few? And does that change if your applying to an MA, or after having completed your MA?
  11. For me, it depended a bit on each recommender (I had four). The one I was closest to got a quick email as soon as I'd made my decision. I then followed up with nice hand-written thank you cards mailed to my other recommenders (I am poor and physically far from my old campus). The one exception was one of my recommenders who's retired and doing a LOT of traveling. He was kind enough to write me a letter between international trips last fall! I just sent him a longer email because I don't have a physical address for him. In the notes I mentioned where I was accepted, and where I decided to attend. I also tried to say some personal kind of thanks to each recommender, both for the letter and for help I got from them during my BA/MA. There's basically no wrong way to do this, so be as excited and positive as you can/want
  12. So last time I was in grad school was a few years ago and I was the only person in my program comfortable scanning books into PDFs. Based on a couple other forum threads times have changed for the better My question to all of you- do you have recommendations for e-readers and/or PDF annotating software that is foreign language friendly? Also, which e-readers seem to have the best library of non-English e-books? My personal interest is in Spanish/Catalan/French/Portuguese friendly devices, but if you know X reader is better than Y for Arabic (or Japanese or whatever) then please jump in too!
  13. I know this is a bit of a long shot- but does anyone have a rec for folks doing a lot of reading in foreign languages? I've been out of the PDF annotating loop for a couple years, but I've had special characters (ñ, á, ç, etc.) give me trouble with word highlighting and annotating programs before (since they're expecting English).
  14. First, I'm going to have to disagree with this statement- 3/4 credit hours of graduate level work is hard whatever discipline you're in. Math is neither inherently easier nor harder than Literature, etc. My MA was on the quarter system (4 credits/class generally) and the recommended pace was two graduate seminars, plus a few credits in Pedagogy related to the mandatory TA component. I took three seminars one term, and while it was do-able in the short run I was also spending 8-10 hours a day in the library working on coursework or preparing/teaching my class. On another occasion I did an independent research project in addition to my other two courses. My supervising prof let me turn in a (longer) joint paper for the project and one of my seminars, and without that I think it would have been way too much work. Grad school is about quality of learning, not quantity, I've found. Also, the term you take exams think of the exams as being at least a full class' worth of work and stress. Definitely don't double up that term if you can help it.
  15. I like to think there's a subtle difference between a name-dropping paragraph, and a fit paragraph. The first one might be a bit more "[insert PoI name here]" and "[university name]" there, the second talks about your research interests and how they should, obviously, line up with things the department is doing. Adcoms for lit programs are guaranteed to be able to tell the difference. The Biggest Application Hack I Know: Form a relationship with the professors you're likely to be working with in your MA/PhD. Pitch a project to them, and get feedback before you even start the application process. Only talk to professors that are doing something you genuinely find interesting, and build a relationship from that shared interest. THAT was the biggest thing I did, and I did it when I applied to both MA and PhD programs. Then when I mentioned someone's name in the SoP, it wasn't just name dropping Fancy Professor McAwesome, it was saying "Hey, go talk to Dr. So-n-so next time you see her in the mail room and ask her about this kid from Oregon. She thinks I'm cool." It's a bit like having a secret extra LoR, except it's a faculty member who may even have some influence on what kind of funding you get offered. As a bonus, I feel super confident about my decision because I already know I have an ally in the department, and we've talked about the program and the field.
  16. Because I love the work I do in my field, teaching and research both. Every time I've tried to do something else I've hated it, so who am I to blow against the wind?
  17. I think these two are on to something. I know in my case a big part of why I was accepted was compatible research interests with my PoI. I'm into a sort of obscure sub-field, and when I mentioned this to one of my LoR writers, he suggested I look into working with Professor So-n-so. I got in touch with her to see if she'd be interested in my (very roughly outlined) research project, and she was very exited about it. In my SoP I outlined my proposed project, and then talked about how that professor's research and interests would support my own. This was all backed up with a writing sample presenting research in the field, and (I presume) at least one of the LoRs. The up shot was an acceptance and a lot of enthusiastic positive contact with the department and my PoI. TL;DR: Connections with LoR writers help find the right PoI, and an interested PoI is a strong ally with the admissions committee/university. The whole package is connected.
  18. If you're at all suited to it, you might look at babysitting/nanny work for the summer. Sales jobs (and bookstore gigs in particular) can be surprisingly competitive, and yes your MA will have most employers deeply leery of hiring you for entry level work. Try looking for work that's already seasonal, like with a summer camp/school program, and mention your intentions in your cover letter. You may or may not find something, but learning to apply to, and interview for, non-academic jobs is a skill worth having in itself.
  19. I applied to four after a great deal of prodding from my LoR writers. They all suggested this as the bare minimum, so I suspect I'm on the low end of my field.
  20. When I was in high school I got into teaching math pretty heavily. I TA-ed for Algebra and Calculus classes, set up a remedial summer school program for some 7th graders, and made spare money tutoring kids. Somewhere in all of that I decided I wanted to work on open-source math learning materials so schools wouldn't have to buy a new book every two years. Oh to be young and naive again. Anyway, I figured I was headed for a PhD in Math Ed. When I got to college I double majored in math and Spanish (the natural extension of immersion/living abroad). And in my junior year, when I started freaking out about masters programs, my mom asked me about my in-major GPAs. ~2.7 for math vs. 4.2 for Spanish. And then I realized what I should REALLY be doing with my time and the rest is history. TL;DR- I knew I wanted a PhD in high school, but in a wildly different subject than I'm actually GETTING one in.
  21. Thanks for the recommendations guys! Since I'd only had contact with the DGS, and our contact was always a bit formal, I went for short and to the point, but a little less curt than my first thought: Dear Professor X, Thank you very much for University School's generous offer of admissions, however I'm sorry to report that I have decided to accept an offer from another school. Best Regards, -Grev Seems to have gone over all right.
  22. So I've made my decision and notified my top school that I'll be accepting their offer. Does anyone have any advice on how to politely decline offers from other schools? I was thinking of saying something like this, but it feels SUPER curt: Dear DGS, Thank you very much for your offer of a position with University X, however I'm afraid I must decline. Best Regards, -Grev Thoughts?
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