kobie

I interpret 9-5 as a steady work schedule (it could also be 9/80, or 4/10, or some kind of 40 hours/week give or take) where you show up for a period of time, work, and go home to enjoy your free time (which i likey much), while in grad school that number is definitely north of 40h/wk (with much higher standard deviation, which I guess is what is referred to as "freedom"), and that salary is waaayyy south. that said, having autonomy in the workplace (which I agree is a huge perk of grad school) and having a 9-5 aren't mutually exclusive. some of the most successful companies with some of the happiest employees have 9-5 schedules, and part of their strategy is to allow some kind of freedom for their employees to do whatever they want work related during some of their work schedule. 3M is a great example in that they allocated 10-20% of their employees' schedule to think about ideas that are completely unrelated to their current projects. This was how the post it note was developed.
Here's the thing.. at least in my field, you need to be there in person to communicate with your team, and anything worth accomplishing is most effectively accomplished through teams or groups, not through individuals. so unless the job can be done completely individually, most jobs will require you to show up when others do.
Also, not everything that's interesting to work on is necessarily worth working on. the people paying you money expect to see a return on their investment. that goes for academia too. in that regard, you will never have true autonomy to work on what you want, and expect to be compensated for it. 

dude, I'm just happy to have this gig I'm in right now. I was basically shut out by grad schools twice (to this day, I have no idea why), and wasted 2 years of my life in a job that I absolutely hated. It did paid well, and I grew a lot, but not a great deal for me. the third time, I applied to one school, not sure whether I'd get in or not. I hustled around to about 4-5 different professors, to their offices, and one of them gave me a chance. It's not the best group, we struggle with funding, and I'll probably stay here longer than if I were in a different group. But I'm still glad to be here, because I could've ended up like one of those salary slaves. For me, it's not about worrying about getting the best draw of the cards, but more about playing my best hand, and working my ass off to earn what I have.
 
do I think about what if I had gone to a different college where there were more opportunities that are better aligned with my interests, or wish I could have a 4 hour conversation with my 17 year old self? sure. but you live you learn. not all the lessons will come easy.

Why does this question come up almost every season?
What is the perceived benefit to calling Professor Jones by her first name? Is she less likely to stand on your head in seminar or bleed all over your essay because you call her Janet and have coffee now and then?

PB is gross.

I feel like you're mixing together things that aren't a big deal with things that are. 
The male student forming friendships with faculty is not an issue- in fact, it's a large part of what grad school is about. 
The issue, as I would read it, is that there's such a strong connotation of impropriety for female graduate students forming friendships or doing things with male professors, and that's a hard one to change. I can't quite read from your comments, but do you actually want to form strong 1 on 1 relationships with your male faculty? Or is this something that you would also consider inappropriate?
Overall, this is something I've had to struggle with a lot as a young male professor. I'm generally informal with students, and I have a lot that I would consider friends. I find myself having to be a lot more cautious and reserved with female students than male students, largely due to the worry of what it looks like from the outside. I try to interact with groups, and all of the students doing research with me are (currently) female. 
But I could easily take my male students out for the weekend and go camping or fishing, and no one would think anything of it. Doing the same thing with my female students would invite a lot of scrutiny, and likely have negative effects for both them and me. Similarly, I've let my (male) students crash with me if they need a few nights here and there between, say, semester and summer housing. Again, having female students stay with me (even though I'm married) is a line that would likely get me in a lot of trouble. 
It is a double standard, and I do find that it hurts my female students, as there are fewer people they can "appropriately" form close mentor relationships with, but I'm at a loss for solutions short of "broad sweeping change in perceptions and opinions". I feel this is an issue that needs a lot more attention (broadly) in the academy, where the general rule seems to be that male faculty should be very cautious around female students, but that male faculty/male students and female faculty with either male or female students can be a lot more personable. It's not something I see openly discussed much at all, but it's something that does worry me. 
I would say that you and your predominately female cohort could do a lot of good brainstorming ways to open up the social behavior of the department- I second the ideas of inviting faculty out for drinks after seminars, etc. as small groups. That said, as mentioned, I wouldn't think it would be productive to try to disrupt the relationships the male student in your department has formed- the idea is for you all to be able to form similar relationships, not for no one to be able to!

This argument doesn't make sense to me. Just because there are repercussions for something you say doesn't mean someone is making it illegal for you to say it. Law and social acceptability are two different things. If you say something and another person deems it inflammatory, insensitive or hurtful, they have the right to react to you in any way they see fit. Nobody is infringing on your rights by reacting to the things you say. 
You have the right to say whatever you want--but your right to speech does not trump others' rights to speech in reaction to your speech. You can say whatever you want--but you can't force other people to put up with you for one to two years so that you can get the degree you want. We are all adults, and we have to behave in socially acceptable ways if we want other adults to spend time with us. That means knowing what to say in an interview or to potential bosses, colleagues or friends. Being an adult also means accepting that applications for jobs and graduate school isn't based solely on your portfolio--your attitude, work ethic and personality are hard to put on your CV but are easier to figure out in an interview. You don't get into a program just because you think you deserve it--it has to do with whether people want to put in the effort to work with and for you and to have your name associated with their program.
Also, who told you the state "runs" public universities? They might have some public funds, but they are not state run. State officials do not run universities--they hire their own presidents and chancellors and make their own decisions. 
 

In 2008, I was 50 yrs old, with one year of college from 30 years back, managing a horse farm in Texas. I had virtually no financial assets - a small savings account and a few stocks.
I started at a community college, then quit my job and did my last 2 years of undergrad as a full-time student on Pell grants and scholarships. I packed up or sold 20 years of accumulation, my two farm dogs, and moved into a rental.
After graduating with honors, I applied to 13 graduate programs, and was offered funding by two of them. I moved what little I had to an efficiency apartment in a new state, dogs and all.
Now I am about to get my MA (at the age of 57) and am preparing to begin my doctoral training (on fellowship)
I still have no assets, but me and the dogs are healthy and happy. There have been many moments of panic, feelings of being an imposter, but the doors keep opening, so I just keep walking.
 
You'll do fine!

It is horrible to visualize people like 2bphd as a PhD candidate.

It is horrible to visualize people like 2bphd as a PhD candidate.

I could not agree with this more, especially if you have some other debt or burden (mortgage, credit card, undergrad loans, car, children's college fund, etc.). I know a dream is a dream, but sometimes you need to consider your post-graduate happiness--the cost of a dream in a time when your "dream" job's funding is cut via most university budget plans.

Maybe it's because I've chosen one of the most non-lucrative fields imaginable unless you write mass-market trade fiction (literary arts...poetry...indeed), but I would never, ever take out more loans (beyond maybe 5K) for a degree in my field. It's just not worth it, to me, especially because I have around 20K in undergraduate loans already. My goal is to teach creative writing and undergraduate English courses OR work in editing/publishing. Realistically, I will not make enough per month to pay for loans beyond the loans I already have (if I can find a job within a reasonable amount of time) within the first five years (at least!) after graduating.

I'm not saying that miracles don't happen, but you can't count on them in the humanities or even social sciences. It depends on the field, but consider this: even professional degrees don't always pay off financially. Lawyers, for example, have a difficult time in a bad economy. Now consider how the funds for many humanities and arts programs suddenly become expendable, especially for schools with low endowments. Even science programs need to endure drastic budget cuts--after the school is done reminding humanities people that their work doesn't matter, of course.

I know someone with a degree in Urban Planning (which, I think, the recession hit hard). He was the only student accepted to a particular two-year Harvard program and could not find a "professional" job upon graduating (with, I believe, about 200K in debt). You can imagine how talented he must be--to be the one student accepted to this program--and he's currently teaching at a community college and living with his parents. Now imagine how much the name recognition of "Harvard" (no matter how prestigious the individual program actually is) helped him get his community college job. On top of that "Harvard" name, he also attended Cornell (with a Horticulture degree from the Agriculture school). None of that made much of a difference when the economy didn't want or need his work. He's making money in the academic realm, obviously, but the loans are not as easy to pay.

I don't mean to be harsh. Lord knows I'm not the voice of reason re: financial success in life, with my MFA in poetry! (LOL, right?) But consider how worth it this debt and stress is. Working during your graduate program can make it difficult to fulfill your academic obligations to the best of your abilities, and doing so--being brilliant and relentlessly thorough in your brilliance--is usually crucial to landing a decent academic job. More, people need to note your brilliance; people need to know and respect you. It's not impossible, but it is hard to mentally deal with the intellectual rigor your paper/project/dissertation demands after some hours working retail or whatever. That said, if you find it easy to write academic work after working retail or coffee slinging for 5 hours, you can probably meet those demands.

And also, obviously, there is no way to pay for all of tuition and living expenses with a part time job. I think people sometimes look their gift horses in the mouth. Yes, TA positions might take from 15-20 hours a week and pay poorly on paper, but 1) you can make your own hours, and 2) as low as stipends might seem sometimes, the school is also paying your tuition, which means even a 10K stipend w/ tuition remission can actually be a 30K-50K paycheck! I complained about my low stipend in my master's program, but it's really not that low (it was about 11K) when you consider you don't have to pay for school.

I'm all for following dreams and investing in non-lucrative areas for which you have passion, but the years spent in grad school (versus taking a more traditional route and getting a decent paying job) is enough of an "investment"--don't add a very real financial burden to that. Public loans are one thing. Private loans are another entirely. They're brutal, and usually not as kind to their borrowers when their income is below poverty level.

Of course, I don't know your field, so consider this an open letter to anyone considering taking out a great deal of loans (I'd say more than 5-10K, depending on your saving and job prospects) to pay for a non-professional (or at least non-science) degree.

I just finished up my first semester of grad school, no assistance whatsoever. I work at a store, the same place I worked while an undergrad. It is sometimes difficult to balance work and school since I NEED the money but I also need to get all those papers written and whatnot. I am used to it since this is how things were all through undergrad. I would suggest looking for a job that is student-friendly. One that allows to have a weird availability that changes each semester. If you can find a job where you can work weekends, then that helps. That way you can dedicate more time during the week to your studies.

Luckily (or at least I hope so at this point, things are a bit wishy-washy) I will have a TA position for next semester. You never know, you might find something after one semester as well. At my school, mass e-mails go out to all of the grad students about things that are going on. If a professor has suddenly found themselves without a TA, they will often send out an e-mail in order to fill the position fast. You just have to keep your eyes peeled and reply to stuff as soon as it hits your mailbox (yes, I check my e-mail like 20 times a day).

While the Barron's 3500 word list is great for increasing one's vocab, it is insufferably tedious to plod through that whole thing! It's great that it provides sentences to contextualize the vocab but the alphabetical presentation doesn't really work to anyone's advantage. I've gotten through a good chunk of it but have decided to avail myself of other more fun resources. Definitely consider using a book that presents vocab words along with their synonyms because you're more likely to remember them that way (i.e. a list of words dealing with criticism, servility, death and mourning, etc.). You can also make such lists yourself. Yet another great strategy would be to make flashcards. If the thought of having piles and piles of index cards isn't your cup of tea (and it isn't mine either) you can do like I've been doing and use flashcard-making software and study vocabulary on your computer. I use a free program called MemoryLifter (http://www.memorylifter.com/) that has really helped me to retain a lot of words!

One amazing book I've been using is called Fiske Word Power. It has 100 chapters with 10 words each. Every chapter is structured around a fun and quirky theme, like "Am I Timid? Or Are You Intimidating?: Words for the Brave and the Cowardly" (e.g. craven, pusillanimous, timorous, tremulous, rebarbative, redoubtable, etc.) and "How Deep Is the Ocean, How High Is the Sky?: Words About Heights and Depths" (e.g. apogee, acme, apex, zenith, nadir, etc.). The Fiske book offers two unique sentences per word, a chapter quiz after every three chapters, a longer test after every nine chapters, a final exam and fun activities in the postscript which add to the practice (gosh, I must sound so nerdy). Here are some cool examples of that fun practice I mentioned, in the form of funny thought experiments:

"If you asked a laconic herpetologist why he or she chose that line of work, what might the person reply?" "Mary asked an oenologist to recommend something potable for those who are frugal. In simple terms, what has Mary done?" "Frank is an itinerant numismatist. What might we find him doing?" "What might a lepidopterist put in his highboy?" "Do you find ribaldry risible? Why or why not?" "Which of the following superheroes might be seen as a virago: Spider-Man, Wonder Woman or Batman? Explain."http://www.amazon.com/Fiske-WordPower-Edward/dp/1402206534/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1289417310&sr=8-1

Another efficient way to memorize words is to make up your own funny phrases. To remember the meaning of winnow (which means to separate grain from chaff) I use the following mnemonic: "separate the winnowz from the los-owz" (the winners from the losers), which I concede is utterly ridiculous, but it helps me remember it which is all that matters! Here's a reference that might go over your head if you've never played one of the Super Smash Bros. games. Since I have, I find that conjuring one particular image in my mind is a great mnemonic for remembering the word toady (synonymous with sycophant, or a servile flatterer). One of Princess Peach's defensive moves is to pull out her retainer (a servant) named Toad to parry her opponent's attacks. Clearly that makes Toad a toady because he puts his neck on the line to flatter her majesty.

Here are some links so you can actually picture what I'm talking about:
http://seemslegit.com/_images/4c8a715d3518a38c479005ab28080c60/686%20-%20bowser%20nintendo%20peach%20ssbb%20toad%20video_games.jpg http://www.motifake.com/image/demotivational-poster/small/0902/dont-shoot-super-smash-bros-brawl-samus-peach-toad-demotivational-poster-1235532735.jpg http://www.halolz.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/halolz-dot-com-supersmashbrosmelee-toad-hastheworstjobever.jpgThere you have it, another silly way to remember a word, but I really will never forget it! And after preparing assiduously - dare I say, sedulously - for the past few months, I've got hundreds more where that came from! I hope you find my suggestions helpful. Good luck!

It is horrible to visualize people like 2bphd as a PhD candidate.

Cappa - lots of good points being made but if you don't feel ready to go to grad school then don't go. It's not unethical and you certainly shouldn't go just because a perfect job isn't waiting for you right now. Admission committees will not look on it unfavorably later - they'll either be indifferent to it or, in some cases, impressed by your discipline of turning down a good school to go get some work experience.

Like others have said, there's nothing inherently wrong with going to graduate school without work experience (obviously, since you just got into your top choice), but a lot of people (like myself) find it instructive to have been in the 'real world' before going to graduate school as it can have a major effect on what you decide you really want to do. The MPP is a fortunately versatile degree (though not as versatile as some), but you may find that in the next few years that you actually want to go into neuroscience or business or physics - who knows?

And being unemployed can be just as instructive as being employed. As many people with social science undergrad degrees have discovered, specialization and specific skillsets are crucial to getting work, especially in today's economy. Many people who might have gone on to getting IR or pub policy degrees have turned to public health or economics - or some other growth industry - because of their time in the job market (or not).

What I'm trying to say is that if you don't feel like you're ready to jump into graduate school, it's ridiculous for anyone to tell you that you're wrong. Go when you're ready - you'll do better and you'll be better set up for employment because you'll be closer to knowing (most likely) where to focus your interests and career path. Feel free to PM me if you want to chat more.

Unless you have a specific job lined up, go to grad school. You can explore what you want to do just as easily, and you'll come away with a degree at the end of that time. It will be a lot harder to get those references to write the second time around and a few years later, and you have no idea what the pool of applicants will be like or if the programs change or close.

There are a lot of threads on here from people questioning whether they are doing the right thing. I think most of us have cold feet or anxiety about starting in the fall, so you're not alone in that. If you have funding, go for it! If you don't have funding, try it for a year and leave if you don't like it. And you can always seek out internships while in school.

but that's just my two cents. Good luck!

With all due respect, what makes you think you can get a job? If you don't have one lined up, you are now in line behind hundreds or thousands of other graduates (both current and decades old) who had apps in months ago, some of whom have years if not decades of experience. I don't say that to be rude so much as to make sure you know what you're getting into. This is *the* worst job market in decades. In fact, your grandparents may not even have seen it this bad. I can promise you one thing, flipping burgers at McD's will be no way to figure out what you want to do than grad school. And I would almost put money on you flipping burgers in a month, unless you have something sweet lined up.

Again, sorry to be harsh, but please make sure you know what you're doing and not just that you've got the cold feet we all do right now

It is horrible to visualize people like 2bphd as a PhD candidate.

It is horrible to visualize people like 2bphd as a PhD candidate.

It is horrible to visualize people like 2bphd as a PhD candidate.

Thanks for the advice. It does help put me at ease. The reason why I asked is because I'm transferring into a phd program from another. I was the only gay person in the department and the only one that was doing work on sexuality (there are others that are doing sexuality, but is predominately about heterosexuality), and it felt weird talking about my project. I'm now going to a bigger mid-western city and hopefully it would be better.

There are a lot of things to consider here. How far you are into the coming out process in general, where you are location-wise (Southern U.S., New England, west coast..), etc. Of course some social climates are more accepting than others.

For me, it was very clear from my personal statement that I identify as queer, so in that respect it's a relief that I can go in without the burden of having to "come out" to the department.

Most likely there will be gay grad students wherever you go, so you won't have to worry about being the only one. Many schools also have gay grad student groups. I met several queer students when I went on one campus visit who were eager to tell me anything I wanted to know about the community.

It's always a personal choice whether to come out in any situation, but in my opinion it would be a heavy burden to have to stay closeted for 5-6 years in grad school.

It is horrible to visualize people like 2bphd as a PhD candidate.

You're an asshole

BJeeeeesus!!
OMG

Honestly, I find it a bit difficult to understand the outrage in your post when I keep in mind that you had already accepted another offer a month before this email exchange ever took place. Your not informing this department of your status quite possibly made funding decisions harder on the adcom and as a consequence on other waiting applicants. Money has been tight the last two years and funding decisions sometimes rely on outside factors like state funding, university-wide allocations and the like, so they have tended to be decided later than in previous years. Now, it's possible that your department is simply full of lazy people who couldn't decide on time what the funding+projects were going to be (and aren't you glad you didn't end up deciding to go there?), but it's also possible that the delay is not (wholly or partially) their fault.