rising_star

Why not do the tutor position in a later semester, once you've settled into graduate school and given yourself a chance to see if an additional 10 hours of work each week is manageable?

I wouldn't go into debt for a master's degree, particularly one that may not lead to you making the big bucks. It's not as if the NMU degree would somehow prevent you from becoming a technical writer.

Here's another idea: If you have friends that are knowledgeable about bikes (and it's likely at least one person in your new grad dept will be), ask them to go with you when you look. I got a decent commuter bike for $100 via Craig's List with the help of someone more knowledgeable who knew what to look for and ask about (and actually found the bike online for me and went with me when I went to get it).

In state residency varies from state to state. Check with the financial aid office at your prospective university.

IGERT is a totally different ballgame from GRFP. IGERT is a program that you participate in, not just a grant that you won (esp since the grant is won by the interdisciplinary faculty that serve as PIs and co-PIs, and not the graduate students they admit).

in my experience, the foot pedal makes a huge difference. You want to use transcription software too, something that automatically rewinds 1-2 seconds backward every time you pause. That helps a lot too.

If you don't have any questions, respond by thanking them for their email and letting them that you'll be in touch as questions arise.

You really shouldn't decide where to spend the next 5-7 years of your life without visiting first and meeting the people that are going to play a major role in your life and your future career.

"Thank you very much for admitting me into your department." Then, depending on what they've already told you, ask a few questions about visiting, funding, or advising or course offerings or whatever.

If you know you won't go, tell them ASAP. Don't visit, don't waste their money on recruiting you just so you can feel loved, and don't be rude about it. A simple "Thank you so much for admitting me to your program. After careful consideration, I have decided to attend another university." will do, though you can definitely elaborate if you want.

Go to Turkey. Seriously.

I think that depends on the wearer's physique and the overall outfit. Putting on a baggy t-shirt/sweatshirt with leggings is still going to look sloppy.

You need to visit the program and give it a chance. Beyond that, what do you expect will happen if you wait a year and apply? You'll get into another top 5 program? You'll get into a lower-ranked program that's closer to home? What is it you want?

At the end of the day, where do you want to work? What do you want to be doing? Figure that out and then you can figure out which supervisor and university will best prepare you for what you want to do.

I'm going to answer this from the perspective of having taught an upper level undergraduate course both during the regular semester and during the summer. Students in the summer course read less, write less, and generally get the material in less depth than the students that take it during the fall/spring. So yes, in a way, the content is dumbed down since there isn't time to present all the same topics and theories that I would during the fall/spring (and yes, this is the case even though the number of butt-in-seat hours is the same). The reason some of the theoretical material gets dropped from my summer course is because I find that students don't have the time to really think about the material in sufficient detail. That said, there are many state universities in Florida that require students to take summer courses. At FSU, students must take at least 9 hours in summer courses unless they entered with an AA or transferred in a bunch of AP/IB/CLEP credits. So I don't know that universities would look down on it. But, taking summer classes (which are often taught by grad students) may hamper your chances to write detailed research papers and work closely with the professors that you need to write you recommendation letters.

I'm not in a history department but, I can say that both my MA and PhD universities accepted a chunk of coursework from people that did their MAs elsewhere. In the case of my PhD program, I could transfer in up to 24 credit hours (so 8 courses), though I ended up not doing this.

No worries. 1) You don't need to worry about publications as a MA student. As StrangeLight has wisely said, those pubs will follow you forever so wait until you really have a solid grounding in the field and the literature to publish. 2) You don't actually wait until your last semester to do your thesis. Ideally, some of your coursework will lead to writing papers that can be incorporated into your thesis. If you're having difficulty finding courses that allow this, enroll in a few independent study courses instead of taking seminars. 3) In a lot of ways, applying is easier when you're in a MA program going for a PhD. If the program you're in grants PhDs, you're likely to be admitted there. Moreover, if you've been to conferences, you've met some of your POIs already, so you can spend less time trying to court people via email or googling people to find out what they're doing. I agree with all of this. I've used seminar papers for thesis chapters and conference papers but not for anything else. I only go to the regional and national conference in my discipline so that's where all of my presentations are. I don't really care about who I present with because I know that faculty will be in attendance either way (because they are the discussant or because their grad student is presenting or because they know me and want to see what I'm up to). As far as timelines, mine was pretty similar to what ticklemepink describes. Note though that I'm not a historian, I didn't TA, and I didn't have to study any languages (though I did audit one for fun at one point). Semester 1 - 4 courses (3 seminars, 1 required stats class). For two of my classes, I used the same final paper, with permission from both professors. That paper was a draft thesis proposal. Granted, it was very preliminary and got altered a great deal subsequently. Semester 2 - 4 courses (3 seminars, 1 how-to methods course); thesis proposal defense. I ended up taking an incomplete in one course and finish it over the summer due to personal matters that interfered with the course. But, I was able to start from the proposal draft I'd written the semester before to have a good basis for my thesis proposal. Summer 1 - conducted field research for my MA thesis. Semester 3 - Took 2 courses, both seminars. For one of the courses, the final paper I wrote was a thesis chapter. That helped because I only had to revise the chapter later. I also did my data analysis and read all the literature I thought would be relevant, taking notes on it to facilitate writing later. Oh, and there were memos about the data and the literature that I was later able to flesh out when writing my thesis. I also turned in a thesis outline (of chapters and their content) to my advisor and did 7 PhD apps. Semester 4 - Took 1 course, took in 2 untrained foster dogs, worked PT, wrote my thesis and visited programs. My MA advisor made me submit a full draft by February 1. I didn't really start working on it until Jan 3 or so, and found that I was able to write pretty quickly because I'd organized everything beforehand. I'd write for maybe 4-5 hours per day, which was enough to have 75 pages by Feb 1. Her logic was that I'd be visiting PhD programs (she was more confident about my chances than I was!) and would need to have a draft in pretty early so that I wasn't trying to write amidst the chaos of visiting. She was absolutely write. I would turn in a draft and she'd have comments to me within a week and then I'd have 2 weeks to revise before I had to turn it back in. I ended up handing my thesis in to the committee in late March and defending April 9 or so. The deadline to submit for May graduation was at the end of April and I had all my revisions done by then. Summer 2 - So, I ended up not actually submitting it in April because my dept offered me a summer TA position, which required being enrolled. This was awesome since I'd already decided not to do my PhD there and needed the money to pay for my cross-country move. I submitted my thesis in the summer, TA'd a course that lasted a month, and otherwise continued working my PT job and planning my move. Hope this helps!

There's a bunch of discussion of this over in the April 15th forum from past years. In general, be polite. If you want, explain your reasons for not choosing that school (funding, fit, etc.) but ensure you're polite since you will see those faculty at conferences and may be in the position of applying for a job there in the future.

Go with the best supervisor.

Yes, definitely! As a grad student, it's something I expect to be asked about by visiting students.

Chiming in because I have a literature degree from undergrad: - American literature, basically in its entirety. To give you an idea, we're talking Faulkner, Morrison, Hemingway, etc. - Chaucer - Joyce - Bronte or Austen, other than Pride and Prejudice - Dickens - Lord of the Rings The list goes on...

Whether to send them all at once depends on the topic. Are all 5 likely to need the same set of peer reviewers? As for when to send them, I'd get a colleague to review them and provide honest feedback on whether or not they're ready. Then, run them by your advisor. Then submit. If you need to add more literature, you will be told by your colleague, your advisor, and/or by the peer reviewers and the editor of the journal. Good luck!

First, let me say that it is normal for Canada. Canadian schools don't offer tuition remission, though they do offer scholarships to cover the cost of tuition like what you've been offered. Second, it seems like you should be considering the financial package like this: $13K/year for the first two years then $25K/year for years 3 and 4. But, I'd also say the following. You want to investigate the average time to degree for McGill students (I'm guessing since it's a Canadian program many students come in with a MA so it may not take the 6-8 years that US PhDs in history typically take). The real question is if McGill is the right program for you to do the research you want to do and receive the advising and mentorship you need.

Basically, what bgk said. We're having to do a bunch of work behind the scenes to keep this place up and running. (And, while you're at it, make a donation to thegradcafe please!)

Ummm... go with the place where you can have the best advisor and the best committee. Go to the place that gives you conference funding and has support for doing whatever research you need. I'm sort of perplexed that you don't mention anything but money in location in your post, OP.