TMP

I'm going to guess it's for BU because I'm pretty sure that the FLAS at Ohio State doesn't give THAT much...

It doesn't hurt to get the experience, feel of what it's like to be a historian. At the same time, it's not going to help with admissions. Be prepared to do it for free as many history professors do not have money like their science counterparts to pay. I'd rather that you spent time reading books in your field to get a firmer sense of the landscape of facts and debates.

Don't be afraid to ask graduate students if they think their stipend is enough for them to live on. Make sure you also ask whether or not they have cars or pets, as those do take a bit of chunk out of your income! Since I have neither and have a roommate, I don't complain much about the stipend as those who have cars and/or cats and/or live alone(landlords do often have "pet fee" around here).

A real classic and influential work, I think, is Yosef Yershulami's Zakhor http://www.amazon.com/Zakhor-Jewish-History-Lectures-Studies/dp/0295975199 He does cover the ancient period, medieval period, early modern, and modern.

http://history.tamu.edu/faculty/kim.shtml Just may be your dream guy. You might e-mail him for suggestions. I suspect that he trained with David Blackbourn at Harvard (before he moved to Vanderbilt).

OSU hovered around 200 or so for this year. It's definitely a drop from 2010-2014 but have been told that this 200 range is actually normal when there aren't tons of people freaking out about finding something during bad economic times

I'm a first time (female) TA. Here's the situation: The (male) prof doesn't really take attendance but he wants students to e-mail the TAs with an excuse for absence. The syllabus DOES set a limited of how many unexcused absence students can have before their grades suffer. I'm the female TA for half of the class. The other TA is a male. I've received a healthy number of excuses, mostly from male students. I asked the other TA if he's received any e-mail from the students. He said not really and was a bit surprised to hear that I had n students e-mail me today. I suspected that something might be in the works here. But the problem is that the prof has told us "As long as students have legit excuses, just say 'ok'." I had a student who claims to be running a fever and "is worried" if missing two classes would be a problem. I forwarded the e-mail onto the prof as I didn't know the answer and the prof said just let it go and wish him to get better. Has anyone been in this situation before where their gender actually mattered? How did you deal with it? One of the female colleagues told me that she's very strict about excuses. But when students uses illness (and it is winter after all), it's hard not to excuse them. The prof didn't say anything about needing a doctor's note (and I did have one female student who took an extra step to attach a note).

Congrats to the Ohio State acceptances! Feel free to PM this Buckeye with any questions

Age doesn't really matter but immaturity can shine in an awful light and it's more prevalent among younger graduate students. First years regardless of age come in fairly naive about a lot of things and that's perfectly acceptable. However, to horse around, be loud or recounting awful Tinder dates (when you say in the same line that you're looking for a relationship) in the TA room are some examples that can annoy others who are treating their PhD as a job and/or meeting with students (who themselves see their TAs as "adults" and not undergrads like them). Within the classroom, no advice as the professor facilitates the discussion and is age-blind (usually....).

Each program is different. Usually if it's terminal MA application, those are considered after the PhD applications have been reviewed. The programs have an interest in maintaining a sustainable graduate program. If it's a MA/PhD application, then those are considered along with PhD applications.

I don't recall having an application asking for such information except for Wisconsin. In fact, unless you want loans, there's really no reason to be filling out FAFSA or any other financial forms. Funding is determined on merit, not need at all. You get what they offer.

If you are offered full funding, do not work on the side if you want to be safe. Professors do expect you to focus on your studies and work obligations (as part of your funding). I get my paycheck once a month during the academic year. Don't worry, when you are offered the package, the details will be outlined.

Agreed with above. I had a very winding... frustrating road to the PhD. I went from BA to MA and then got rejected for the PhD. In the two years I was out of school, I spent the time looking for jobs, living in Europe studying a language, volunteered in a therapeutic center, worked as a camp counselor (and working alongside 16 year olds at ripe age of 25!), and interning in a museum in a fabulous city. My life is richer for those experiences and puts better perspective on what kinds of historical and historiographical questions I'm most interested in. Don't be afraid to step out for a bit.

Believe me, most professors wouldn't mind students backing out of a commitment that would otherwise have zero benefit to them (most of the time, they don't get credit for independent study/research toward sabbatical/tenure/promotion the way we do toward graduation). The key is just going about it in a very gracious way as the above posters have mentioned. Don't panic over this, she'll be fine.

In addition to all the excellent suggestions above, consider reading more books than you think you can. Or at least, the next time you take your finals, imagine studying for and doing 50 of those at once. *crawls back to the hideout where books for comprehensive exam await*

http://phdcomics.com/comics.php?f=1652 And this http://phdcomics.com/comics.php?f=1673 Sorry, no idea what happened.

AGREED I relate to a lot of the comics relating to the adviser (Jones or Smith) but these are my true-to-real-life: My adviser gave me a similar conversation at the beginning of my second year: Here My adviser and I have this conversation every once in a while (research or exam preparation) Here (It's not to say that my adviser isn't great (she's amazing, really) but more to illustrate that what Smith and Jones do are fairly typical of many advisers and you'll understand why they do what they do over time.) I can relate to dealing with Tajel (the anthropologist) and her desire to campaign on behalf of the "oppressed" as I know quite a few colleagues just like that.

Well, I was told today that for my subfield, the applications dropped from 22 from last year to 11 this year. I was told that most of those applications weren't great. I wouldn't be surprised, really, if it happens across the board, across programs. It doesn't mean admissions will get easier; professors do want strong and compelling applications. Besides, with unemployment rate below 6%, it's not so bad to make real $... compared to the kind of life PhD students have for 6-8 years.

I've considered doing the same but... I'm no longer such a morning person My peers have told me that they have taught both mornings and afternoons and didn't really see much of a huge difference in student quality or enrollment (students here schedule whatever fits in their schedules). When you schedule office hours is a different story, apparently.

One of our graduate students purposely scheduled his office hours at 8 AM (or something like that) so no students would want to show up and he could get his research done. Bam, he got an article published this way. When life gives you lemons....

Is the TAship part of your funding package upon acceptance/ Or did you accept the offer without funding and found this TAship over the summer? That is the most important question you can answer...

I used to get frustrated with my class discussions as well. I don't think it's a case of changing fields/disciplines. So many factors are at play: personalities, interests, life experiences, level of preparation, and present moods. I've had my fair share of great and "meh" classes at grad level. The best class I've ever taken at my present university was a history class that had students from all over the campus, different ethnic groups, degree-level, and life experiences. The professor was very open and had the right moderating style. The worst class had (mostly) first years straight out of college who touted their anti-patriarchy reading of the texts and the professor generally supported their participation when I wanted to focus on other aspects (I still have nightmares of it). In both cases, I was a second year PhD student with a MA in hand. Unless the master's program is part of the department's PhD program or in a well-ranked university, you just aren't necessarily going to get the same level of rigor. Like college degrees, master's degrees mileage vary.

Sometimes a very quick e-mail immediately after seeing the original e-mail letting your supervisor know that you're out of town and have no access to the materials that she needs until Monday goes a long, long way. I agree with others about keeping your adviser posted. Though my adviser is very organized, she does appreciate knowing when I'm in and out, and where (often times there are archives near my relatives and she would reasonably expect me to do a little research).

You'd likely have better luck with private and charter schools than public schools. Public schools, like universities, want to be able to hire on the cheap to start with and raise the salary from there over the years. A PhD is worth far more than someone with a BA who will learn a masters in education along the way.