Sigaba

I agree with the previous posts that recommend you have discussions with members of your committee. Before you have any conversations, I recommend that you first sit down and have a very long conversation with yourself.

Ask yourself brutal questions and reply with the utmost candor. As written, your posts suggest some potential questions.
Why were you not prepared to pass your qualifying exams?
Are you simply "at least partly to blame" or were there steps you did not take that were the difference between passing and failing?
[*]Why did you accuse anyone of anything?
[*]Why doesn't your department want to go to bat for you when it has done so for other students?
[*]Did you exhibit behaviors in this experience that you have in the past? (That is, is this set back indicative of a broader pattern.)


Again, be as hard on yourself when you're answering the questions as you can endure. Look at yourself unflinchingly, without offering any excuses. And then take ownership and responsibility for what you see. From these, and other questions, consider developing a "lessons learned" list that you can refer to down the line. To be clear, this exercise should not be about self flagellation, but about self discovery.

The reason why I'm suggesting a brutal self-appraisal is so that if/when you talk to members of your committee, you'll be prepared to take their comments to heart then and there--without denial or evasion--even if some of their statements may be tough to hear.

Hello everyone,

I'm applying for phd's at the moment, and I was wondering if any of you has had problems with inflexible (although I would like to call them something worse) administration offices, specially regarding in-person interviews.

I live overseas and I cannot afford to spend 1000+ dollars on a trip to be interviewed. I'm pretty sure that some people may have trouble getting a visa for just the one day and, like me, would be excluded from doing the research they want to do in a specific university, not because they are not good enough, but because they have no money or they have been born in a country where visas are not easy to come by. I think the actitude of universities that behave in this way is quite discriminatory, more so considering they do pay the travel expenses of nationals (evidently, they pay those because it's cheaper, but it puts us internationals into more of a disadvantage).

What do you think about this and how have you dealt with it if at all? Emailing the department only got me a "that's your problem" answer and if I weren't so interested in working with one of the professors I would have already sent them packing with a curt email of my own. I really want to apply to this uni, but at the moment it seems less and less likely. That the only thing stopping me is that I wasn't born with some thousands under my arm to spend on trips makes me pretty sad at this world.

Honestly, it depends on the school and how well you can convey your academic interests in the field - I'd probably err on the side of caution and not mention you being transgender. Not b/c of any political correctness or making people unfamiliar but because of: What does this side bit of information tell us, academically? Ultimately nothing - it isn't relevant.

For example, someone wanting to study queer theory and explaining why in their application by saying because they're a homosexual - coming from talking to undergrad adcoms at least, such a move comes across as trying to play the diversity (or race, gender, nationality, etc) card to your advantage. You wasted space saying something that really wasn't needed. As I've had very liberal adcoms tell me, they don't care what gender you sleep with so taking the space to talk about your homosexuality is often seen as tacky, crass, and (as stated above a couple of times) irrelevant. I would be concerned, especially in an academic science program that the Adcom would reply "I don't care what gender you identify as, it's no relevance to your application."

Also, if you're going to be applying to conservative programs along the likes of Loma Linda (or people like Keith Ablow) (just an example) -- stay away from controversial subjects like transgender

1) try to get into a program at your school that allows you to complete a senior or honours thesis. this will be based on primary research and you will have a mentor that works with you on your interests, not the other way around.

2) don't spend too much effort trying to find a professor to let you work on their project. they won't. you're not trained in that work yet. a prof might approach you if they think you'd be good for a position, but you have to wait for them. everyone i know who got a research assistantship job as an undergrad (myself included) was approached by the prof, not the other way around.

3) focus on your language skills. figure out what your geographical or thematic interests are and then ask yourself what languages you'd need to know to do that work. interested in latin america? learn spanish and either portuguese or french. interested in subsaharan africa? french and portuguese are probably your best bet. modern europe? german and french. this will help you get into a PhD program. i swear, languages make or break applications.

A concern that I had writing my initial SOP was that the focus of my undergraduate coursework would not be immediately evident on my transcript. On a lark, I figured out the percentage of courses I'd taken related to the Cold War and wrote a brief comment about it. The purpose of this comment was to get the attention of specific faculty members without naming them.

Later, I had to write another SOP as a requirement to keep a fellowship. The graduate advisor did me a huge favor by confirming what I guessed when I handed it in to him--it stunk. I knew what was wrong with it without him saying (but he said it anyways--too much angst). The second version was much more upbeat.

In the second version, I positioned myself on a trajectory that began with the exact moment I was sitting in a lecture and I decided I wanted to specialize in American diplomatic and military history. The essay briefly traced the arc through the rest of my undergraduate career, and elaborated on the work I'd done my first year of graduate school, and where I saw it going for the next twenty plus.

This projection included comments about the types of monographs I intended to write. These comments were off beat in time and tempo. They went from the very general to the specific in a way that suggested I somehow knew where the cutting edge of scholarship would be in ten to fifteen years. The projection also discussed the types of courses I would like to teach as a professor. The essay ended with the hope that, one day, I could provide similar inspiration to an undergraduate sitting in a lecture hall.

IMO, the projections of my future work as a professor resonated because I did not tip my hand. At the time, I was much more interested in teaching than in doing research. Instead, I presented myself as an aspiring academic who would enthusiastically do both.

An additional comment. When I think back to writing SOPs, what I remember more than what I wrote (or what I did not write but should have) is how much fun the experiences were. The fun came from two sources. The first source was my ability to distancing myself from the notion that I am competing against others and to realize that in these kinds of situations, I am competing against my own potential as a human being and as an academic. Second, was the realization that I wasn't writing for a group readers who had a lot of power over my future and that I needed to impress them. Instead, I understood that I was writing for an audience that included potential peers and that I needed to earn their respect. If I wrote a SOP worthy of their respect, every thing else would take care of itself.

One last comment. When it comes to writing SOPs and similar documents, I am a notorious procrastinator. In retrospect, I do not recommend this method. It is one thing to wait until the next to last moment to write that five page review essay on a book you've not yet touched. It is quite another to roll the dice on documents that will figure prominently in the trajectory of your life. YMMV.

HTH.

obviously. More applicants, less funding for state schools.

It's like you're implying that you don't trust their judgement. When you ask them in the first place, you should ask them if they can write a STRONG letter, and if they say yes, you're trusting them to do so. If you don't trust them, then maybe you should find another letter writer. I know this isn't easy, and I struggled to get references at one point in my undergraduate career, but have quickly learned how important they are.

As maeisenb pointed out, it seems that you've asked professors from such a wide variety of subjects if you can help them with their research. It would probably help if you could identify the time-periods, regions or types of history that you are most interested in studying and focus more on finding research projects that directly relate to your interests and previous coursework.

One thing I've noticed from experience is that a professor is more likely to want to help you and give you a research project if they know that you are specifically very interested in their field and that you have the background knowledge and skills needed to do serious work in that field.

If you have only taken one survey or first-year course in some branch of history, say African history, and suddenly ask that professor if you can work with them it's likely that they will think you are not ready to primary source research in that field until you have completed upper level coursework and have a much more solid understanding of the relevant historiography. As maeisenb also pointed out: in many fields primary source work requires extensive language preparation and often requires random other skills. Medieval history research, for example, often requires training not only in the Latin language but in medieval Latin paleography as well.

Depending on what field you want to go into, it might be more valuable for you to spend your extra time learning some languages as opposed to doing research in a field which is vastly different from the type of work you would want to do in graduate school.

I don't know whether or not you've been doing this already, but if you haven't, another thing you should do before asking professors if they might be able to use you as a research assistant is read their published work (the more recent the better). Reading their actual work should be able to give you a really good idea of what they really research and what their primary sources might be. If you notice that all the primary sources are in a far away archive, or are written in a language you don't speak it is less likely that they are going to have a need for you. It still wouldn't necessarily hurt to ask them if they have other projects going on that are more accessible, and it will probably impress a professor more if they see that you are interested in their work and not just in finding research experience.

And you are definitely not falling behind. Research experience is important for a graduate school application but it isn't the only important thing. It's more important to do one or two solid projects in a field you love than to do five or six in a bunch of random subjects you don't care for.

I agree with the previous posts that recommend you have discussions with members of your committee. Before you have any conversations, I recommend that you first sit down and have a very long conversation with yourself.

Ask yourself brutal questions and reply with the utmost candor. As written, your posts suggest some potential questions.
Why were you not prepared to pass your qualifying exams?
Are you simply "at least partly to blame" or were there steps you did not take that were the difference between passing and failing?
[*]Why did you accuse anyone of anything?
[*]Why doesn't your department want to go to bat for you when it has done so for other students?
[*]Did you exhibit behaviors in this experience that you have in the past? (That is, is this set back indicative of a broader pattern.)


Again, be as hard on yourself when you're answering the questions as you can endure. Look at yourself unflinchingly, without offering any excuses. And then take ownership and responsibility for what you see. From these, and other questions, consider developing a "lessons learned" list that you can refer to down the line. To be clear, this exercise should not be about self flagellation, but about self discovery.

The reason why I'm suggesting a brutal self-appraisal is so that if/when you talk to members of your committee, you'll be prepared to take their comments to heart then and there--without denial or evasion--even if some of their statements may be tough to hear.

who voted this post down? seriously?

thanks all. i know that all programs are competitive. but i guess i need to find a way to find some obscure schools and see if my interests match. just because they are all competitive doesn't mean they will all only accept 4 new students out of 600 applicants

FINALLY, I just took the GRE and I got the results I was expecting.

I got 740-800 in MATH and 630-730 in VERBAL.

I think this scores are probably enough for the Programs that I want to apply: MEM in BERKELY, CORNELL, COLUMBIA, DUKE adn ILLINOIS

Donnyz89--

For me, there's nothing like the bone crushing force of an impending deadline. The edge of terror can be heightened with an ice cold can of Coca Cola chased by a cup of coffee, and a snicker's bar.

Reading the autobiographies and memoirs of established historians also helps.

I agree with the previous posts that recommend you have discussions with members of your committee. Before you have any conversations, I recommend that you first sit down and have a very long conversation with yourself.

Ask yourself brutal questions and reply with the utmost candor. As written, your posts suggest some potential questions.
Why were you not prepared to pass your qualifying exams?
Are you simply "at least partly to blame" or were there steps you did not take that were the difference between passing and failing?
[*]Why did you accuse anyone of anything?
[*]Why doesn't your department want to go to bat for you when it has done so for other students?
[*]Did you exhibit behaviors in this experience that you have in the past? (That is, is this set back indicative of a broader pattern.)


Again, be as hard on yourself when you're answering the questions as you can endure. Look at yourself unflinchingly, without offering any excuses. And then take ownership and responsibility for what you see. From these, and other questions, consider developing a "lessons learned" list that you can refer to down the line. To be clear, this exercise should not be about self flagellation, but about self discovery.

The reason why I'm suggesting a brutal self-appraisal is so that if/when you talk to members of your committee, you'll be prepared to take their comments to heart then and there--without denial or evasion--even if some of their statements may be tough to hear.

Do you feel comfortable having a candid conversation with your advisor (and later, with other committee members potentially writing your LoRs)? If s/he has already volunteered to write a "positive" letter, it seems as though s/he would be open to a discussion in which you ask these very questions. I think it'd be very reasonable to ask how/why your advisor would be able to positively recommend you for another program, given your history.

As to your chances for funding, I think that the sort of advice often offered here on the boards to first-time applicants is also applicable: it might be worth it to check with the DGS of potential programs.

But I do agree that you'll never really know the answers for sure unless you apply. So I think you should take some time to really think about how badly you want your PhD. For instance, let's say that we on the board (or your advisor) told you that your chances for funding were limited, and you decided not to apply. Would you always regret taking a chance on it? I know that if it was me, I probably would. While $80 isn't insignificant for a grad student, it's also not much in the grand scheme of things when we're talking about your future.

if the department is telling you they won't let you retake the exam because they don't want to set that precedent, but they have done just that in the past, it's a sign that they're not interested in keeping you on as a student. unfortunately, grad programs are not fair and they play favourites. they bend and break the rules for students they like and enforce the rules for students they don't want to keep in their program. this also suggests that their LORs to other history programs will not be as positive as you'll need them to be. you would probably have better luck in different fields, like public policy or education.

The general philosophy on writing samples is that you should submit your best piece of writing. It's ideal to have a writing sample that also speaks to your research interests, of course, but I think that it can be a bit more important that it's your best writing.

That said, you don't want to submit something that's out in left field, content-wise.

Since your sample is in your subfield, I think it's fine that it doesn't exactly speak to your proposed research interests. Does it at least demonstrate your methodology or style in some way?

This is totally the weirdest trolling post I've ever seen... I mean, it's not even funny! It would be like going onto a pet adoption site and being like "Kittens are stupid! I sure do hate kittens! I mean who do they think they are with those cute little faces! I used to love kittens, but now I realize that they're pointless and dumb!"

If you want to start a flame war, you have to at least say something controversial. This is just... weird.

O_o

Might I suggest you do the same for my response?

IDK, there's just something about:


that doesn't really hit my sarcasm radar. Then again, this is the internetz.

Or maybe you're just pathetic.

Fair enough. Sigaba, I apologize for misunderstanding the shorthand and jumping to a conclusion based on gender insensitivities I've encountered too often. Again, I misunderstood, and I apologize.

Sigaba,

Check your offensiveness and insensitivity. (And believe me, that's the censored version).

bedalia

GC--

Check your PMs.

S

GC--

Check your PMs.

S

Donnyz89--

For me, there's nothing like the bone crushing force of an impending deadline. The edge of terror can be heightened with an ice cold can of Coca Cola chased by a cup of coffee, and a snicker's bar.

Reading the autobiographies and memoirs of established historians also helps.