rising_star

Graduate school isn't really about the teaching that you receive. It's far more about research and the qualifications of the person you will be working under. So, what you need is to meet with them, determine if their personality as an advisor is one you can tolerate, and to talk to their current graduate students about their advising style, mentorship, etc. Good luck!

There really is no need to sit on a class, as fuzzylogician has already indicated. I've only ever sat in on graduate seminars after being admitted and each time the professors sent me the readings in advance so I would be prepared to participate. If you want to meet with faculty, email them explaining your interests and ask if you can arrange a meeting or meet with them during their office hours. But, honestly, you need a real reason for meeting with them other than hoping they'll remember your face when reading your application.

Your university should have an Ombudsman Office that you can consult on how best to protect yourself under the circumstances. I would go see them first, so that you can CYA in the event of something shady happening with your funding/advising/etc in the department.

How much more time would it take for you to finish your PhD? How do you know that you won't spend 2-4 years in med school, only to realize you don't want to be a doctor?

Don't retake the GRE! Your scores are plenty high enough to get you into MA programs!! Save the money and time and use it on your applications.

No, it won't. If you want something to look good, take the course for credit and do well in it.

Okay, I'm going to give a bunch of schedules because I've done things in different ways since I started grad school. I'm in the social sciences and on the semester system. *Note: I did my MA at one university and am now at a different one doing my PhD, though I'm still in the same discipline. 1st year MA: four classes per semester, 16 hrs/wk research assistantship. Three of those four courses were graduate seminars and the fourth each time was a grad/undergrad course on methods (stats first semester, qualitative methods during second semester). Luckily, my RA let me do my own work so, even though I felt like I had a ton of work to do, I wasn't completely overwhelmed except at the end of each semester when I had to write three massive papers (one per seminar). 2nd year MA: two courses in the fall semester, one course in the spring semester. I didn't actually need to do any coursework since we needed 24 hours of courses and I did that my first year. I also got a job off-campus that I worked at 8-16 hours per week. The schedule was fairly flexible, and a lot of my work was weekday evenings. It helped me structure my time so I could write my MA thesis, which I mostly wrote in 6 weeks. Oh, and I decided fostering dogs would be fun so there was dog walking and training that helped structure my time too. 1st year PhD: four courses in the fall with a 10 hr/wk assistantship where I helped put together a multi-million dollar grant with 6 co-PIs and organized a two-day workshop. Two of the courses were grad/undergrad, two were grad seminars. In the spring, I decided to stop the insanity and only take three courses. 2nd year PhD: three courses (two grad seminars) in the fall, two courses (one grad seminar) in the spring. In the fall, my TAship required attending lecture twice a week, a weekly TA meeting, and leading four discussion sections. 3rd year PhD: one course, one reading group, teaching my own course this semester. In terms of my actual days, I have the seminar on Monday from 4-6:30pm and the reading group on Tuesday from 1-3pm. I teach T/Th 3:30-4:45. (And, I train capoeira T/Th 7-9pm.) Our department's colloquium is Friday from 3:30 to 4:45 and I go to that every week that I'm in town. Next semester, I won't be taking any classes and have no idea what my TA assignment will be. They've all been challenging. The key for me is having one day (this semester it's Wednesday) that I dedicate to working on my research, writing fellowship applications, etc. I won't meet with students. I'll only meet with faculty by necessity then. I also try to preserve Friday mornings to handle the little crap that crops up throughout the week.

You've been there like a week or two, right? I'd say give it some time before making a decision. To answer your questions, it's not totally unacceptable but it is strange to leave so quickly. It will definitely be a black mark on your record and lead to burning some bridges. Unless you explain things very well and very gracefully, it likely will affect your future admissions to other programs. But, if that's what you want to do, then you should do it. Personally, I would finish the first year so that you have something to show for your time in graduate school. And, depending on the way TA positions work at your university, they may not be able to find someone else to fill your shoes. In my department, we can hire from outside the department because there's a lot of crossover with other disciplines. But, depending on what you're TAing, there may not be other qualified students on campus (moreso if your department already has everyone working as a TA). Keep in mind that I think your happiness is first and foremost. You're probably going through a lot right now, having moved away from your partner and starting something totally different. Take some time before you make a decision that you may come to regret.

I have an older version of Acrobat Pro (7.0) so hopefully this problem has been fixed. And the problem is that in scanned PDFs, you can't underline, highlight, etc. without going through text recognition on each page. If it can't render the text, then all you can do is put in pop-up notes. I actually use the free version FoxIt Reader on my netbook, which lets me underline, highlight, and add notes. I've never tried to draw a box so I don't know how that works. It works fine for me.

It shouldn't be a huge problem, provided you're working in a related field. I changed disciplines for graduate school and all of my letters of recommendation were from profs in the dept I studied in for my undergraduate degree.

I wouldn't tell anyone to see a recommendation letter since they are going to read the letters anyway. I would only mention that you worked with "Dr. X" if it's important for explaining your research interests or independent research experience. Otherwise, it's taking up space you could be using to be persuasive. Also, if Dr. X is writing you a recommendation letter, presumably he or she will say in it that you two worked together and explain the extent of that work.

I know of a few famous professors in my discipline that refuse to fly. You'll be fine. Get there however you want to get there. FWIW, my advisor has never asked about my travel plans for conferences. I just get there how and when I want to get there.

There's no need to tell the professor that you're going to include it in your SOP. Just say something like "After speaking with Dr. X, I feel that my research will be a great fit in your department."

With work-study, you get paid for the hours you work. The allotment is the max you're allowed to earn due to federal rules but your actual earnings depend on the hours you work and the wage at which you work those hours. Hope this helps!

Maybe I was unclear in what I said before. I only emailed graduate students when either the DGS or the person I emailed suggested that I did and, each time, they included the names and emails of students they thought I should contact. As far as asking about advising style, I think it's very similar to asking if someone is accepting students. If someone's style is that a postdoc runs their lab and they are never there, isn't that good to know sooner rather than later? Maybe this varies by discipline (or because the profs I worked with in my MA know everyone I emailed about working with for my PhD) but no one seemed put off by the question and everyone answered it just like they answered all the other questions. To be fair, I'm in the social sciences. Our department admits and funds students generally, since hardly any professors have major research grants. But, a student can be admitted with funding and not get their first choice advisor if s/he has not previously been in contact with that person. Our incoming cohorts are about 15 students. My advisor will maybe work with 1 student per cohort. You don't get to be that one student by waiting until you've been admitted and then emailing. I should know. I became that student because I basically told my now-advisor in an email that I was only coming to the university if he agreed to be my advisor. So while he doesn't fund me, he did agree to take me on if I came.

By asking directly. I usually wrote something like "how would you describe your advising and mentoring style with your graduate students?" I got back a lot of really useful responses though, to be honest, some just referred me to a few of their graduate students and suggested I ask the students because they would have a better idea. Only if you have something pertinent to ask. There's no need to explain how their research interests relate to your job in an email, you can do that in your statement of purpose just as easily. If you don't have a reason to email, don't. Professors are busy people and already have plenty of emails to read everyday. I think you totally misunderstood my point. I'm not sure what "relevant" questions you could ask that wouldn't come across awkwardly. If you don't mention that you're a prospective student, it may come across like you are trying to steal their methodology, field site, etc. or that you're trying to get ahead without actually doing any research. Or that you're trying to poke holes in their research/theories, which may be welcome from another scholar but is often unwelcome from prospective students and/or random people on the internet with an email account. (BTW, I'm not saying that you have to 100% agree with your advisor's work. There is room for disagreement. But, you have to get to know the person's personality *before* you express these disagreements. For example, my advisor takes those critiques well, and often will tell us that such-and-such famous scholar told him the same thing. Others, however, get incredibly defensive when that kind of thing happens, which could easily jeopardize your entire application.) In my experience, there's no need to brown-nose by asking a bunch of questions about their research out of nowhere. Start by saying that you're interested in their research and are considering applying to the university: "Let me start off by saying that I really enjoyed your presentation at the XYZ Conference a few weeks ago and, after looking at your website and interests, think that we have some research interests in common." Then I went on to explain a bit about my interests and how I thought they might coincide. Then, more questions (but note: none really about publications, even though I'd read some of them in class and such): "First, are you looking for graduate students in the upcoming admissions cycle (to begin in fall 2008)? If so, what kinds of students are you interested in? Is it a problem if a student's regional interests are not directly aligned with your own?" Then some language about looking forward to a reply, apologizing for the length of the email, etc. And a thank you, always a thank you at the end to thank them for their time. I hope this helps! P.S. No one should use the language I used in quotes exactly as written since it's all taken from the same email I sent a POI three years ago when I was applying to PhD programs. FWIW, I got a very helpful response back from this person, and many others.

Yes, it's ok to email them. If they ordered textbooks through the University bookstore, the order was due weeks or months ago. (That doesn't mean the bookstore will have them in yet, just that the professor will have made at least a tentative reading list already.) I doubt it will seem like brown-nosing or anything like that, especially not if you explain that you're hoping to improve your Middle English before the semester begins or something like that. Just make sure you get the same editions as everyone else or else things can get confusing in class.

This must vary by university. I have twice had fellowships as a graduate student and have had state and federal taxes deducted from the amount I received. This, btw, was at two universities in different states. No paying estimated taxes for me! One of those fellowships paid out monthly and the other in a lump sum once each semester. I guess it just depends on how your university administers fellowships. In any event, I'm also interested to hear about tax-free fellowships as everyone I know with one has to pay taxes on theirs. Maybe it's some magical thing that exists for physical scientists and no one else?

I wouldn't do it before summer 2011, at the earliest. And, I wouldn't just ask random questions about their publications. You should be upfront about your reasons for communicating with someone, rather than trying to hide behind the guise of just being curious about their research. Honesty is key here, as in other facets of life.

State, federal, and local taxes are taken out. If you are a full-time student, you do not pay FICA.

Honestly, many programs do not begin reviewing applications until they are all in. I got into every PhD program I applied to (7) and I never sent my materials in more than 3 days before the deadline (as in, I used US priority mail to make sure they arrived on time). So I definitely don't think that when you submit your application has anything to do with not getting in unless the program has rolling admissions. Definitely send all of your application materials in together, as it minimizes the chance that something will get lost/misfiled/misplaced.

Are there opportunities you can get at either Hunter College or Columbia that you cannot get at the other?

It's never too late if you care enough!

I'm not quite sure what you're asking...