92nats

Hello Avinson, I don't know if you've already made your decision, but I have a few thoughts if you still have use for them. It's hard to comment on this situation without knowing more about your interests and such...and I am not super familiar with those two programs generally. Nevertheless, I would say that the funding ought to really tip the scales for you in almost every case. First of all, $25k (or $50k if you meant per year) is always going to seem like less money when you sign the paper than when you are making the payments for years. Second, you never know what life will bring...you could have a family emergency, or a serious illness, or even just a change of heart about what you're doing, all of which might derail your studies and then you're stuck with the loans and without a degree. Third, if you ultimately decide that you want to get a PhD, it will be easier to get funding if you already have funding. I know this seems silly, but it's really true. Admissions committees will see that you were awarded funding on your CV and put you in the more deserving pile for $ of all the applicants. It is possible that Tennessee has a little bit better reputation for Geography, but if you go to Alabama and there is someone there that you feel you can work with and that gives a crap about your future success, nothing about Alabama is going to keep you out of future opportunities as long as you work hard while you're there, get good grades, write a good thesis, and get good rec letters. So, I would say that unless the advisor of your dreams is at Tennessee, and that person has personally committed to your future success, AND there is no one at Alabama that does anything related to what you want to study...I really got to go with "take the $." Hope that's helpful.

For all you folks wondering about Rutgers, you might not be aware that the good people of New Jersey decided to elect republican governor, Chris Christie, who took office on January 17th. One of the first things he did was cut the higher ed operating budget $62.1 million (of which Rutgers needs to absorb $18.5). This decision applies to the fiscal year 2009-2010, so Rutgers is scrambling to make cuts half-way through the year. I don't think that this means that there won't be any fellowships for incoming Geography students, but I do think it is having an impact on the length of the process. I know Rutgers notified in February last year, but this year is a completely different financial landscape. Keep your heads up!

Hi Mabel, I think that UNC-CH and UIUC are both good programs. It really depends more on what you are interested in doing and who you are interested in working with at each place. Both institutions have some excellent people. $15000 in Chapel Hill is a good amount to get by even if you have to shell out $1700-1800 of that on health insurance. It is too bad that UNC won't guarantee anything beyond a year, but when I visited there it seemed that they had some creative ways of funding students through various institutes on campus (when not funded directly through the department) and all the students that I met seemed really happy with their funding and their program. North Carolina as a state is really progressive when it comes to funding higher education, so I would suspect that their funding situation is not as dire as some other places. I can't speak to Illinois so much in that regard. Good luck making a decision...

Hey Keylimekai, I just wanted to throw another set of subjective conjecture at you about this decision. I do believe that both Rutgers and Arizona would be wonderful places for you to end up. If you are interested in folks like Robbins, Braun, and Kosek, I will throw some additional folks at you who might excite your poststructural nature-society ambitions: Kevin St. Martin and Trevor Birkenholtz at Rutgers, Jody Emel and Dianne Rocheleau at Clark, Joel Wainwright at OSU, Joe Bryan at Colorado, Lucy Jarosz at Washington, Trevor Barnes and Karen Bakker at UBC, Wendy Wolford and John Pickles at UNC, and Cindi Katz at CUNY. What rising_star says is true about funding being messed up at Berkeley and Arizona. Funding is also messed up at CUNY and while it has its big names, it is a seriously underfunded program and it has proven difficult for some to get through it with all the traveling out to remote campuses throughout the boroughs to do teaching jobs that you have to shank one another to get. The city is crazy expensive and everyone is way too busy for there to be a very strong collegial community there. I have also heard recently from two sources that Minnesota still suffers from some internal boloney that makes being a student there a drag. If anyone out there can refute that, please do because I don't want to be disparaging, but I don't want to encourage folks to go there if it's a hard place to be still. Kentucky does have this social theory component, but a lot of that was the baby of JP Jones and John Pickles who are at Arizona and UNC now, respectively. It might still have a lot to offer someone with your interests, but you'd have to look at who is there. To attempt an answer at some of your other questions: No, you aren't aiming too high. Many of these programs have different rules for entering without a MA. CUNY says that they will accept you without one, but there is also the MA only program at Hunter and I am not sure what the crossover is there. Hunter does not seem to have any poststructuralist nature-society people though. Perhaps Marianna Pavlovskaya would be a good person to work with, but her interests do not seem to thoroughly cover nature-society stuff. And I am sure that the funding situation at Hunter is worse than at the CUNY Grad Center, so... Another question you had was whether or not going straight to a PhD program was advisable. I would say that some admissions committees might be skeptical of you being sure it is what you want to do for the next six years, so you might have to prove that. On a personal level, you might want to ask yourself that question and think about the MA programs that risingstar threw out. They would be a great way to make sure you're doing what you want while also making you more competitive when you apply again for PhDs. But even if you decide to do that and then end up in an MA program that also has a good PhD program, you might have a better chance at getting in and knowing what you want to do and who you want to work with. Good luck