coyabean

I am old. I am coming from a decidedly unstellar career at a crappy UG. I do not have a BA in my doctoral discipline. I do not have an MA like most of the people in my program. That is to say, why yes, yes I do feel like this is all some kind of cosmic joke. But I take solace in knowing that I've proven time and again in my life that if I can do nothing else I can think, I can read and I can do whatever is necessary to figure things out. I may have to do that more than some in my cohort but at least I know I can do it. Oh, and I have developed a manic laughter condition. Think Heath Ledger in Superman. ETA: You know what really gets that laughter problem started? The idea of TEACHING people. BWAHAHAHAAAAAA! I mean, I don't have to do it my first year (maybe not even my second if I don't want to) but, still, there will be real live people expecting me to answer questions and impart knowledge. Oh God. LOL Are they crazy?!!!! I want to call and ask them, "are you crazy?!" Our country is in dire straits and you are trusting our future to ME!!!! I just figured out that reindeer are real, like, a year ago. And one time, recently, I poured coffee on my oatmeal because I spazzed out on what milk looks like? I just really think they should have been more thoughtful. BWAAHHAHAAAHAAAHHAA

I had 5 of 9 and I have to agree with Nibor. In the end it all came down to the department that made me feel welcomed. At some point every school you applied to should have strong faculty, facilities, etc. But feeling wanted, to me, means someone will invest in my success. That's immeasurable. My only booo moment was with Carolina. I just had a horrible experience with some faculty there. But other than that it went better than I could have dreamt.

...

...

Pastiness has always been acceptable, lack of soul however is a deal-breaker. Sorry. You can always do the John Mayer blues-minus-any-actual-soul thing but you strike me as nowhere near douchy enough.

I am going to be the voice of dissent. Follow the rules. Follow the rules. Follow the rules. Some schools are sticklers about this and others are not but the fact is you cannot know which is which. And what a horrible way to be eliminated -- on a technicality.

I, too, am going to pass on responding to the OPs particular circumstance. However, my understanding is similar to soxpuppet. My mentors who are in the know say there is an element of "will this person accept" during the consideration phase. This is even more true as funding gets tighter. My most "in the know" mentor has said, explicitly, that he could tell that a candidate was really gunning for Harvard instead of his own top 10-but-not-harvard program so he didn't feel badly about passing the candidate over. I thought I was being very realistic about my application's chances when I chose schools across the spectrum. I bypassed most Ivies for a variety of reasons but one of them was me being realistic about my numbers. Yet, I got into the schools I considered reaches and got horrible offers or outright rejections from the lower tier schools on my list. I got the definite impression from one of those reach programs that admitted me that they thought they were in competition with Harvard and Columbia for my affections. LOL I think that was part of their decision process. It was very interesting, certainly.

One of my favorite english profs told me once that all of her 50+ years of living had taught her one piece of invaluable advice that she felt obligated to pass along to me: marry a plumber who loves poetry.

Actually, UNC is one of the most diverse student bodies among schools of its tier. I have been told by some of my folks there who should know that the grad school has one the largest black and latino populations of any non-HBCU graduate school. In my experience, I have never felt out of place on campus or within Carrboro. Granted, I'm not the kind of person who often feels out of place anywhere but, still, I've been out there socially and professionally and always feel comfortable. There is a sizable LGBTQ (did I get that right? I always mix up the T and Q! My gay husband would kill me.) that seems to be very active and vocal. I've attended drag shows, drag bingo and one interesting art installment involving strap-ons that would be at home in NY or San Fran. Chapel Hill is just one of my favorite places. I love a diverse population, too, and I feel like it has that but in a very manageable size with the benefit of southern hospitality. It's a weird juxtaposition for sure -- southern gentility and raging black/queer/latino/punk/goth/whatever communities -- but somehow it works in Chapel Hill. You'll find just about any kind of ethnic food you're into as well as a community of folks for every niche sub-population. I really cannot imagine a lifestyle or identification that would make you feel unwelcome in the area.

Every time I get a communication from my school I laugh hysterically at the thought of them taking me seriously. Like, manic laughter. Not sure what you'd call that? LOL Oh God. That "LOL" was that laugh. It could be my nervous reaction. I just cannot believe that I am expected to be some serious scholar in 90 days. I mean, in 90 days I'll be the same silly dork with a cowboy boot fetish that I am today. There's definitely some cognitive dissonance there. But I'm excited! LOL Oh God.

WHAT?!!! I am now headed to IKEA's website. I shall blame you for any damage that is done. What I'm thinking on the how to get it transported and set-up is maybe renting a guy for, like, 3 hours? Just pick it all out online and pay for it. They have it all together at IKEA when you arrive. If I rent a guy with a truck, tools and some basic mechanic skills for a few hours I figure he could pick it up, deliver it, and set it up. Yes, this is what the world has come to. A passably attractive chick must rent a man. LOL Still a better deal than buying sometimes, though. And are you in Charlotte for your program?

LOL!!!!!

I will be doing some part time research work for play money. I'm thinking of Key West. I'd prefer the Bahamas but someone keeps slacking on getting her passport. :/ But I figure it's the same water! LOL I say I'm going to do some foundational reading but it's more likely that I'll be reading trashy romance novels. I have my first "revise and resubmit" so I'd like to get that done before school starts as it isn't inline with my doctoral focus. Resting, planning my move and managing my excitement are also on the list. I'm so excited I can barely contain myself when I'm not too exhausted from this last push of my last semester at a school I hate!

Yes.

Ok, I'm not a guy so feel free to discount everything I say. It wouldn't be the first time. :/ With that said I am stumped by the idea of "keeping" someone. What, exactly, does that entail? As you have described it this wonderful boyfriend doesn't require keeping. And even if he did I am of the belief that a person can only keep themselves. Also, it looks like you are borrowing trouble. Based solely on what you have said here the boyfriend is not resentful or feeling like the loser to your superstar. If he doesn't feel that way why worry about what might never happen? And back to this "keeping" thing and your success. Would you want to keep someone while managing a successful career? The way I imagine it in practice keeping actually sounds like a job unto itself. I imagine you mean something like how do I not let my awesomeness dwarf my boyfriend's meager, by comparison, accomplishments, right? Well, you don't. You don't and you can't because what you accomplish is just that -- an accomplishment. It is not a judgment or a feeling or an indictment. How you interpret those accomplishments through your words and actions and how your boyfriend interprets your accomplishments makes an issue. And there's not much you can do to prevent someone from internalizing something short of not having that something. So, if you are prepared to accomplish less to prevent any hypothetical perception of failure your boyfriend might one day experience then be prepared to do that. But be aware that even doing that won't prevent him from feeling spiteful or jealous. Not to mention accomplishing less or pretending like your accomplishments don't exist sounds less like "keeping" him and more like keeping yourself, the only person, after all, over which any of us have any control.

This is discussed in "Getting What You Came For" so it must be a common enough occurrence to be a valid concern. If your concern is investment from professors then I think you that can be researched and used to help you make your decision. Funding, however, is probably weighted towards PhDs in almost every program just due to the nature of that relationship so I'd maybe be less concerned about that. I definitely cosign the earlier suggestion email current master's students to get their take on it. Thanks to "Stumbling on Happiness" that is now my suggestion for everything in life. LOL

I cannot pinpoint exactly why but your comment tickled me mightily. LOL It has an air of possibility to it, your vision of the immediate future. It's cool now but it's also kind of clunky and it doesn't fit in a purse! And it's the technology we already have but in a different box. It's not this huge game-changer yet. I'm with you -- give me the air writer thingy that downloads directly into my brain. That's impressive and grad school worthy.

Tried the iPad today and the first issue I had with it was the typing function. The alpha keyboard is the default and the most commonly used symbols require you to shift to the numeric keypad. That is a hassle for the most popular symbols of them all -- the @. It makes entering an email addy cumbersome. And are you thinking of taking notes on it with some kind of stylus or something? (oops! you already addressed that!) I was talking options with the mac genius and this did not come up. I still would think it cumbersome. Cool? Surely. Practical? I'm voting no on this for anything academic. It is quite obviously first and foremost a media/entertainment device. For cataloguing heavy text info, note-taking and document manipulation it is not functional.

No problem. A couple of things: You will need a car in Durham to best enjoy it and I made a comment in a post about Durham in the City Guide thread a couple weeks ago that has some places that I enjoy.

disclaimer: I have professional ties to Duke's MPP program Having said that, I think it would be insane to PAY for GW and the cost of living in DC when you have financial aid at one of the best ranked programs at one of the best ranked Universities in the country. Whether rep matters depends on what you plan to do post-program. If you plan on doing government/think tank/policy work then it matters. Granted, in D.C. you can network in the power center of the country. I do not discount that. However, I don't think the difference in profile and alumni connections warrants the cost! You will still have peers and alumni at Duke working for all the big agencies plus financial aid. I think the emphasis at this point is about how many people does that school have places in positions and organizations where you want to work. Ask the DGS for a list of recent grads and their placements. Go through the faculty list and see what kind of names they have on their CVs. Also, ask about your cohort -- that is very important -- to see if there are valuable resources there that will benefit your work and your career trajectory. And don't feel so down on Durham. No, it's not D.C. and, trust me, I'll be happy to move on. However, your money goes rather far and there really is at least one of most things that you will need and want.

Ditto. I think it's just impersonal enough. LOL To the OPs question I have been thinking about this, too. I'm very much an internet person so it's my preferred method of communicating. However, it is rife with potential landmines. I don't see putting anyone on my FB. I am...very much myself there. And all the filtering gives me headaches. However, I do like to send along CFPs, grant, fellowship, conference information and the like. I currently keep an "academic" email list but I've been thinking that it would be great if that could be in one central location online. I am thinking of doing a more public FB page but something about FB invites you to be reactionary and to overshare. I don't know if I could resist. Plus, if I have to choose an account to login to every time I can see myself just never logging in OR getting the purpose of each screwed up. So, I don't know. I definitely cannot imagine a scenario where I'd ever add a student. I have a former prof who has become a true real life girlfriend: we gossip, we share secrets, I'm in her wedding, we know each other's families but we're still not hooked-up online.

Basically. LOL And as long as no one who purports to care about me lets me become the Rolling Bag Student. You all know them. LOL I had a TA last summer that had one and I use to give me hell over it. He took it in stride. Get it? STRIDE!!! HA!

Yeah. Check the sig.

My experience: I applied to two programs but with one research project -- I think that is key. Both departments said that would be fine. At the end I got a call for an interview from one department and then an email from the other a few days later wanting another copy of my GREs. The first dept had done the same thing before extending the interview so I was pretty sure that was what it was for. The prof even alluded to that. Then nothing. After my interview with the first dept. the prof from the other basically told me that they decided I had a good shot of being accepted and, thus, figured it best to conserve tight resources by offering the spot to someone else. :/ I mean, it ended up just fine but a rejection is a rejection. I chose that school so I'll end up working with all these people. In a larger school perhaps it would be less of an issue? In my experience it was clear that the departments were either in communication or the graduate school notified them of the potential duplication of interest.

I cannot imagine too many situations where no funding beats full funding. Partial funding? Mayyyybe. But no debt versus hella debt?!!! And aren't they in the same hemisphere? Can't you go to the free one and drive by the expensive one from time to time? Attend a conference? Use the bathrooms and steal some coffee like you go there? Almost no one suggests paying for graduate school if you have the option.