TenaciousBushLeaper

To the OP & to others, as an undergraduate who's about to finish up his BA I'm curious, if you could go back in time with the knowledge you have now, what would you have done upon graduation(with a BA or BS)? 

The essence of lying is in the deception, not in the words. 
 
1) What is the actual average time to the degree? 
2) What are the placement numbers (not only re-placements that are listed as unique placements) but how many people sought placement, how many years it took them to find placement, and what they did to make a living? What are they doing now? (this tracking needs to account for the 2008 collapse) 
3) What happens when you run out of funding? 
4) How do outcomes for students change based on their individual funding situation? For example, how do multiple-year dissertation fellowships correlate with time to the degree and placement?
5) What is the truth about a given faculty member and his/her actual reputation within the department? What was the average time to the degree for his/her students who finished the degree? How many started but did not finish?
6) How many dissertation students have had to adjunct because they ran out of funding? How much does an adjunct make? 
7) What are the opportunities for funding if you're making good progress but have run out of time writing your dissertation?
8) What have been the experiences of advanced graduate students who are on the market? 
9) What were the experiences of students who left the program, and why did they leave it? How many students on average leave the program?
10) What is the average reimbursement for conference travel?
11) How do full-time faculty member salaries compare to adjuncts if broken down by the number of courses taught? 
12) How competitive are job candidates for postdocs? What has been the program's record with placing postdocs relative to "peer" programs?
13) What are the mechanisms in place for redressing problems with faculty members ? Is there an institutionalized system that holds faculty members accountable?
14) On average, how long does it take a given faculty member to return work, dissertation chapters, and respond to e-mails?
15) What has been implied but not promised about the support ? What could change that would dramatically affect a student's ability to complete the degree?
16) What are the teaching duties required for funding? Does this teaching allow the students to develop a pedagogy and curriculum or does it prescribe one (i.e. a writing program)?
 
These are some of the questions that I imagine most prospective students will not ask and that most programs will not volunteer to answer. 

Hilarious, you are exactly the type of person my post was directed at. 

I just lost a whole post for no good reason whatsoever, so this is going to be more terse than I originally intended.
 
This is not tit for tat. You cannot balance the scales by adding inequality to one side as a counterweight to inequality on the other and achieve justice thereby. When someone provides an anecdote to illustrate how they felt injured, ignored, or discriminated against because of some inherent feature they happened to possess (race, sexual or gender identity), the correct response is not to provide a counter-anecdote which shows that you, too, have once been injured, ignored, or discriminated against. 
 
The correct response is to listen to that person's story and try to understand how their worldview differs from yours, why this might be the case, and how you might act in the future with their personal experience in mind.

Hello ashwinvprabhu,
 
I hope that these comments help you prepare.
 
Writing: In the intro, I think that you mean "tendancy to depend on technology" or "increased dependence on technology." The sentence is confusing as is. Write out numbers from one to ten (so "two" instead of "2"). Instead of "Many a times," try "Often," or "Many times." You mean "dependency on calculators" in the third body paragraph. If you take a few minutes to review your essay before submitting it, I'm sure you will catch some of these writing mistakes.
 
Structure: Your introduction talked about how important technology has become in the modern world, but I couldn't figure out which side of the argument you were on! You say our ability to think deteriorates, but you also say that now we can address more important issues. It's all right to develop a complex argument that considers both sides, but you need to make that position clear. The body paragraphs were all reasonable. The conclusion began off-topic, and it was only at the end that you restated your argument. Make sure that the conclusion is clear and relates to the argument you're making.
 
Arguments: Your first two body paragraphs showed how technology is incredible and helps people, but nothing in those paragraphs discussed people thinking for themselves. The third body paragraph and conclusion said that technology does not affect humans' ability to think for themselves. I couldn't follow your argument through these paragraphs. I think that you were trying to show how technology reduces trivial tasks and makes it easier for people to focus on more important things, but this only became clear at the end of the response.
 
Suggestions for Improvement: The issues with this essay were the unclear position, confusing examples you provided, and conclusion that didn't relate back to the prompt. Try making an outline before you write your next response: list your position and the key arguments you'll make to support it. That way, it'll be easier to write a straightforward response. Finally, take a look at these official answers to the prompt to see what got a top score: https://www.ets.org/gre/revised_general/prepare/analytical_writing/issue/sample_responses

I too made a point similar to the upper portion of this quote, I'm biased in this because I'm perfectly happy with my GRE Q score. Coming from what I think would fit in the category of a "disenfranchised" background and having friends who also come from this background who haven't done so well on the GRE Q section(friends who I would argue are far more intelligent than I am) I see it as a bit of a cop-out.

Also, faculty from 2 universities have explicitly told me, if the applicant isn't at least at the 50% mark on either the GRE Q or V sections most of the time they aren't even considered. Usually it takes a faculty member who's championing for these students to have them considered along with everyone else who did well on the GRE sections. 

Amen brother. 

Side note, moving forward can we not down vote people who are willing to admit physical attraction is important to them. 

Anyhow, 

 
 
Yea I wonder if there's some type of implicit bias that we're not fully aware of based on certain standards(which we may not be fully aware of) or maybe ideas we've continually been exposed to.

Chiming in with a male perspective here:
 
I definitely tend to be physically drawn to someone first, then as I get to know their personality, it can either make me more or less attracted to them. There have been cases where I was "meh" on someone's looks but liked them more over time as I knew them better, but if I find them unattractive from the start, nothing is going to change that. I could be great friends with them, but it would never go beyond that. So basically I have a baseline level, and once someone is there, their persona becomes much more important.
 
As others said, our "scales" may be totally different! Example: I rarely find thin/petite women attractive, sizes 10-16 are the ideal for me. I'm a big, hulky dude (6'2", 220 lbs), so anyone really small I feel like I'd hurt them in the bedroom. Plus hips and butts are my thing.

It also depends on your own personality, too; that is, whether you tend to place a lot of emphasis on physical beauty (however you define such a trait). 
 
For example, I know some people who truly don't care about looks in any traditional sense. I also know people who won't even want to talk to an "unattractive" person.

Side note, moving forward can we not down vote people who are willing to admit physical attraction is important to them. 

Anyhow, 

 
 
Yea I wonder if there's some type of implicit bias that we're not fully aware of based on certain standards(which we may not be fully aware of) or maybe ideas we've continually been exposed to.

Gosh...... I thought graduate students / young adults who are considering a career in academia would be mature, respectful people.
 
Mods please delete or lock this thread.

Hey don't worry one of my first posts was about finding a husband in grad school and a large number of people on here were totally douchey to me.  You want what you want and grad school takes up a lot of time and effort which can suck for people who want to be married and have families before they are old and gray! Good luck!!

To me physical attraction is the most important thing. Like I'm probably not going to pay attention to you if you don't attract me with your looks. All that depends on the person as to whose attractive and who isn't though. I try to avoid going below a 6 in my dating scale

I called my mom and told her. In a blase fashion she said "of course you got in, dear. I had a dream that you would."
 
All rejections have just been texts to them though.

I was living at home at the time and just went into my parents room and told them I had been accepted at my top school.  They actually weren't excited at all and questioned how I would get around without them to help me.... Then I told them I got a full scholarship to my third choice and they were super insanely excited and told everyone haha so I guess I just told them normally.

You could buy them a sweater from where you are planning to go I guess.
 
I was planning on just disappearing and 4 years later returning with a degree.

I have no idea what will happen after graduation. I keep telling myself if I just continue working hard something good is bound to happen. As someone who's family never made more than 26k a year in a fairly expensive state, all I really want is to be able to have my own apartment for a year or two before I head off to graduate school. While in the mean time studying and continuing to work towards my goal (PhD). 

As a male - human, here are my two cents on this. I don't necessarily care what my would be partner did, so long, as wildviolet pointed out she's happy, and really not necessarily "happy", but happy enough so that whatever the job is/would be didn't make her miserable. Other things I look for in women, let me quote or maybe paraphrase?  "her looks, physical attraction,smile,laugh,sense of humor,way she makes me feel". 

One other thing I'd want is, or rather this is more of a requirement, I wouldn't like/want to be with someone who I felt I was "intellectually superior" to. For whatever reason, that is the main  "thing" with me and it's what could make someone who I deem a 5 on a scale of 1 to 10 an 8 or 9. My would be partner would either have to be on the same level as or smarter than me. 

No, it is quite clear in your post that you see yourself as taking the moral and intellectual high ground. You don't see how condescending your entire tirade was because you think you are there.

I, for one, remain underwhelmed with that -.08 correlation!!!
For such a high-stakes exam, I think it is reasonable for one to expect stronger correlations. It looks like things get a little funky after 1st year GGPA, too.

The financial burden argument makes no sense... There's a simple solution: universities can scrap the general GREs and use the subject GREs. Such a policy change would save students $35.

Consider also that women and minorities have lower means on all subscales of the GREs. If the GRE truly predicts graduate success, then wouldn't it be a lost cause to let women and minorities into graduate school? How can one justify having nonwhites and women in higher education?

Because (to reference one program I got into) their website didn't show how dysfunctional the department is and how unhappy the students are? Larger elements of fit (culture and values) can't really be communicated via a website, either.
I was extremely picky/limited with POIs, and so I blantantly disregarded other factors when applying to programs.


Perhaps your experiences were different, but I learned A LOT from site visits and interviews that were not communicated on the program's website. I even had one POI badmouth another program and other professors without prompting.

I can keep the reasons coming, if you'd like.

Just chiming in with a slightly different perspective...
 
I'm older and married, and will be starting a M.A. program in the fall, after completing my B.A. in May. I recognize that I am uncommonly old to just be finishing an undergraduate degree, but so it goes. In any event, my wife is a fairly successful professional in the non-profit arts sector, and we have a great relationship etc., but she doesn't talk much about her work, nor does she ask me about my studies. I'll often start to talk about a paper I've been writing, or a particularly enjoyable course etc., but the specifics don't really interest her too much beyond the fact that she knows that I am enjoying what I am doing. More importantly, however, she is 100% supportive of my future goals, just as I have been of hers...and that's really the key. It doesn't bother me much that she doesn't take an active interest in my studies, because I definitively know that she encourages me, supports me, and "has my back," so to speak. In other words, in all the ways that truly matter, she's there for me.
 
My advice is to examine whether or not your partner can fulfill that same role. Before I went down the path I'm on, I had a few menial (but decent-paying) jobs that I had ZERO desire to talk about with anyone, let alone my wife. Likewise, some people just see work as a necessary part of life, and no more worthy of comment than the eight hours spent sleeping. (I, for one, could care less about hearing about a dream someone had...) Ultimately, even though a large part of your life may be tied up in your academic work, remember that your partner is likely with you for broader reasons, and so long as he reciprocates in the "support and encouragement" aspect of things, you might be just fine.

I have a family, own property, have a stable job and I still don't have my shit together.  Sure, those things are nice, but they are not the be all and all (yes, even the family).  Of course, my family thinks I have everything a person could want and wonder why the heck I'm messing it up to pursue "yet more school."

When I already put everything I had in my application? What could they possibly ask me at this point? I had made it very clear on my application why I chose the program, research interests, career choice, accomplishments, etc. This skype interview is supposed to make decision about funding but I'm not sure what to prepare? Thanks.