rising_star

I've recently started using Zotero and I really like it.

You won't know if you're qualified for a summer job unless you ask. BUT, I think it is always a bad idea to work for free, particularly given all of the expenses associated with relocating for graduate school. You don't want to be carrying extra credit card debt for 3+ months until your fall pay and/or loans come in. Also, as someone that did start grad school in the summer (for my MA and I started 2 days after I got my BA), I don't recommend it. While it was nice to get to know the area, there weren't many grad students around in the summer and I really wanted to be able to relax and have fun for the last time in a while. Also, if you know you're going to commit, why not withdraw your other applications? It would be courteous of you to do so, both to those departments and to other applicants. Agreed wholeheartedly.

Invited presentations are often colloquiums or seminars given at the request of a department.

It really depends on what's in the email and what else I have going on. Today, I wrote my advisor back within 20 minutes of getting an email, but that's because I was checking my email and the response required me to write literally two lines. Other times, it may take me longer. I'm super bad when it comes to replying to student emails, especially ones that are grading-related. I try to reply within 24 hours but sometimes I forget and/or am not on campus where the papers in question are so I can't really answer.

I was my advisor's 11th (or 12th?) student when I arrived. I actually feel like he has less time for me now, with fewer students, than he had then. Whether 11 is too many is really person-specific and impossible for any of us to say. Luckily, you'll be able to answer some of your own questions while doing the rotation. You should also talk to the current students in the lab to get their answers to the questions you've posed.

Media mail was less than $0.50 per pound, and that was literally going across the USA. They said up to two weeks, but the boxes started getting there 5 days after I shipped them. Honestly, I shipped a bunch of books across the country via Media Mail that I haven't even looked at in the 2.5 years that I've been here. I've moved them across town a few times and now I'm planning to sell a bunch to the used bookstores here so I don't have to store them during my year of fieldwork. I wish I hadn't moved them out here in many cases.

I did something to Matilda_Tone last semester. I lived in a professor's house while he was on sabbatical and paid him rent. Consequently, this year that professor has been my advisor, my landlord, and my boss (I TA for him).

There are two places where making such a post might be helpful. 1) City Guide, under the city to which you will be moving. 2) Meet and Greet, under the name of the university you will be attending (or another university that's nearby maybe).

The timeline varies since each division has a different deadline. Email the NSF Program Officer and ask when the panel review is. That's when they go over and rank all the proposals that the reviewers have read individually. Decisions won't come out until after that 2-3 day session.

If I'd filled out a paper bracket, I would've lit half of it (the right side) on fire yesterday. I've got no shot on that side.

1) WAIT! Don't do that until closer to the summer, when your email will reach the other incoming students. 2) Always a good choice. There's an active thread in "The Lobby" about using Craigslist. 3) Not the best approach, imo, because if you can't find someone, you're on the hook for the whole lease amount. If you need furniture, look on Craigslist, go to thrift stores, etc.

It starts happening well before April 14. That's why everyone encourages people to turn down offers as soon as they know they won't go somewhere. Also, schools can issue acceptances with funding AFTER April 15 if they want to and many do if they still have spots available. But, in this economy, many schools are probably hoping that not everyone they accept enrolls because it will cause pressure on their budgets now and in the future. You make a decision based on the information available. If you change your mind after April 15, you have to get a written release (if the school is a CGS member and your offer included funding) before you can commit to another school. This is not particularly difficult to do, but must be done tactfully so you don't burn any bridges. If you check past years of the "April 15th" forum, you'll see questions and answers about this sort of thing.

When you register for classes.

If this is how you're thinking about it, then you need to live in a place without roommates. Honestly. If you are this worried that a roommate would steal from you and then leave town/state/country, then you are not cut out for living with someone you don't know. Or, you can live with roommates but you have to keep everything in your room and change the lock on the door (by going to Home Depot) to one that locks with a key that only you have. But, really, I wouldn't want to live with anyone that did that because it shows they don't trust you, and then you have to start wondering if you should trust them. Apartment ads do go quickly. Unless you want to start paying rent now or May 1, I wouldn't even start looking until late May or early June. Then, look for ads that have move-in dates that you want. You're going to have to pay a security deposit and first month's rent, at a minimum, to hold a place. If you cancel, you may not get all of the money back. So I would definitely NOT grab a place and investigate later.

This is only going to be somewhat helpful. I separated out by experiencing both. I was once infatuated with someone and that passed. Later, I met someone, thought I was infatuated, then realized it was something else over the course of several months. To contribute to this thread more generally, my old department had two profs that married their former graduate students and two other profs that married undergraduates they taught/TA'd when they were grad students.

I've probably used about 30 undergrad transcripts while in my MA and PhD programs. I've used them for PhD applications, fellowship applications, and random other things. That said, I still have some that I haven't used, but that's because I couldn't find them once when I moved and had to order more. (I have a bunch because my undergrad charged a one-time fee during freshman year to cover all transcript requests for life. They also don't charge for mailing them, which is really nice.) I don't recommend losing the folder of them if you decide to go this route, btw. I've used way fewer transcripts from my MA program, but that's probably because I've been applying for more and more things that just let you scan and upload your transcripts. Whether or not I would order in bulk really depends on how the school deals with them. And, as someone else said, often you have to have things sent directly from the university to whomever wants the transcript, so having a folder of them at your house wouldn't really help.

What Will Happen: You'll meet with that professor and likely others whose classes you will be taking and/or who might be on your committee. You will probably have the opportunity to sit in on a class. You'll go out to dinner or lunch with some of the current grad students. You'll get a tour of the department, the lab, and possibly of campus (if you ask). You'll get shown around town a bit so that you can start to get a sense of what there is to do outside of the lab. This would be a great chance to ask grad students where they live, where they recommend living, etc. and to possibly see these neighborhoods. What to wear: whatever you want, just don't look like a slob. You're already admitted with funding, so there's no need to wear a suit to impress people. Just dress as you normally would, and remember to bring comfortable shoes. Questions to ask: Do the grad students like it? Would they come there again if they had the chance? What, if anything, would the change about the program? What do they do outside of the lab/classes? What's the social atmosphere like? How is it working for your POI? etc. So basically the same questions you'd ask on any visit. If there are any red flags, don't go! Storage: I wouldn't bother with putting stuff in storage. It would be cheaper to keep it with you and move it when the time comes. It is totally crazy. Think about it. It's $25 to check a bag. A small storage unit where I live rents for ~$50/month. So, you're spending something like $200 to store a suitcase until you get there. Personally, I'd just mail it to myself, ship it, move it in a car, etc.

It's not so much that they treat you as if you will have parents that will pay, particularly since you don't even have to provide any information on your parent's income, assets, etc. But, it is based on tax returns. If they didn't base it on something they can verify, they would have no way to prevent abuse of the system.

Oh, my bracket is majorly messed up since St. John's lost and I had them pulling an upset over Florida... Not to mention the losses by Vanderbilt, Louisville, and ODU. I'm near the bottom of the pool already and only going to lower as the rounds progress. Hopefully tomorrow will go better for me and my poor bracket...

I didn't read all of the other responses, so I apologize if this is redundant. I've used Craig's List to find every place I've lived in PhD University city. In MA University city, I found my first place via the classified ads in the "alternative" weekly newspaper and my second place via roommates.com. Honestly, I've had one bad time with Craig's List (long distance searching, should've just waited until I got here) and got super-lucky with the place I was able to find on very short notice. (In a nutshell, I moved into a place, discovered that my roommate was crazy and did lots of passive-aggressive things that were annoying me, and gave my 30 days notice [month-to-month lease] a week after moving in. I then posted a "housing wanted" ad on Craig's List and got dozens of responses, most of which were probably legitimate. I eliminated all of the ones that obviously didn't meet my criteria, found a few I liked, checked them out, and was moving in by the end of the first week of class [so about 2.5 weeks after I arrived in town]. I lived in that place for something like 21 months.) If you're careful and cautious, then it will be fine. Use Google Street View to check out neighborhoods/houses to see if they look okay and if it looks kinda like what you see in the ad. Stay in a hotel for a few days or with other grad students so you have time to hunt for a place to live. If you can, line up a bunch of places to visit so you can hit the ground running when you arrive. I've seen as many as ten potential living situations in one day, which while daunting, is also useful for helping you figure out exactly what you must have, what you want, and what you can do without. Take copious notes and don't rely on your memory.

Are you suggesting that I'm somehow *not* being honest with the original poster? In my experience, people with NO background in physical geography whatsoever are assigned to teach physical geography labs on a regular basis. It all relates to the program's needs and who they have around. People teach outside of their area all the time, especially as graduate students. In general, you are admitted to the program first, then given funding by a TA or RA. It is only in the summer, after students have decided to enroll, that TA assignments are made so they don't really look at an applicant and go "This person could never teach a physical geography lab so we can't admit them". At least in my experience (with two different departments), it has been something more like "Oh, we need four lab TAs. Who has the most experience or took something even remotely related as an undergraduate?" If that doesn't yield enough people, then they might just ask if anyone is willing. This is why my advice was to just apply to some PhD programs and see what happens. The matching between students on TAs and TA assignments doesn't occur during the admissions process, so why eliminate yourself from the pool unnecessarily? That said, I think the OP should be creative and explicit about his/her experience relates to the work s/he wants to do as a geography student. That's really the key to convincing people that while you don't have a geography degree, you are capable of getting up to speed quickly and that your research interests will be well served by being in a geography program. At any rate, this is a ridiculously old thread (I originally replied to this over 11 months ago) and I'm surprised it's being brought back now.

What I mean is that the AZ state legislature has no desire whatsoever to fund public education, particularly higher education. You can Google for news articles in the Arizona Republic and the Arizona Daily-Star if you want to read more about it. Here's an example article: http://www.azpm.org/news/story/2011/3/17/1131-new-university-cuts-on-the-horizon/ Obama can't help the states without passing another stimulus package. The last package forced Arizona, and other states, to restore funding to like 2006 levels to receive stimulus funds for education. The AZ legislature almost didn't do this and the Board of Regents for the universities was going to sue them to force them to. The stimulus package staved off millions of dollars in cuts, however now those have to happen in addition to whatever cuts come out of further reductions in state funding.

I survive just fine. I just don't have a lot of extras. I stubbornly refuse to take out loans, with the exception of the ones I used to buy my car and move across the country. I don't have a lot of savings to live on, though I do have a mother that helps me out from time to time (and keeps my cell phone on her family plan, making it free for me!). FWIW, your ability to have an outside job is really program-specific. I was able to at my MA university and it wasn't a problem. I didn't do anything fancy though, just working in a box office and making a bit above minimum wage. There are two things I do that save a bunch of money. 1) I don't hang out in coffee shops like many of the grad students do. It helps that I don't drink coffee but, that's at least $2/day I'm saving over my peers. 2) I bring my lunch every day.

ASU is likely waiting to make decisions due to the pending budget in the state legislature that will cut tens of millions of dollars from each state university. The budget cuts will in turn affect programs and positions at ASU, which affects how many assistantships they can offer to incoming students.

You don't have to love your thesis topic. Just pick something that you can reasonably complete in the time you have left in your program and do it. You can explore other career options when you're almost done writing.