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hupr

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Everything posted by hupr

  1. http://themonkeycage.org/blog/2012/05/10/congressman-flakes-remarks/
  2. So House Republicans (and 5 Democrats) in all their infinite wisdom, passed an amendment to cut political science from NSF funding: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d112:hz1094: Here's a breakdown of the vote: http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2012/roll243.xml
  3. It's called transferring, and it happens a lot. I don't see anything wrong with it.
  4. hupr

    Chicago, IL

    If anyone is looking for a sublet in Chicago this summer, please DM me for details. I'm leaving for field research this summer and have a 2 bedroom apartment off the red line (Morse) in Rogers park. It's perfect for Loyola, Northwestern and DePaul students. It's available anytime from mid-June to mid-September, but I'd prefer a 2-month or longer sublet...
  5. Hi all, I'd like to sublet my apartment in Rogers Park (close to the Morse stop and the NU Shuttle) this summer (preferably to someone at Northwestern), so DM me if you're interested. Re: transportation, most of my friends live in Rogers Park and either take the shuttle at Loyola, the El or bike to Evanston. The change at Howard from the red to purple line can be a bummer on the way up, but I've never waited more than 15-20 minutes. Usually, the wait is between 5 and 10 minutes. On the way back, since Howard is the red line terminus, there is usually a southbound train waiting. If you can afford to pay a bit more in rent, you can also look in the Lakeview area next to Belmont, since the purple line runs express between Howard and the loop during rush hour. It's nice down there, and if you take the express train, it can be even faster than living farther north, but the rent is noticeably more expensive. Otherwise, since Chicago is so flat, a bike can be a great thing to have during the warmer months.
  6. Is it just Arabic that's taking so long to reveal site placements?
  7. Political scientists are not exactly known for thick ethnographic field research, so to my understanding most departments don't have any language requirements, and the ones that do are not very demanding. That said, if you're going to do field research, it's good to have the skill set necessary to facilitate your work. In many, but not all, cases that will require language training. In my department, you're expected to do language training on your own time, since language instruction doesn't count toward any of your coursework requirements. At Yale, for example, you either need to have taken two years of a language in undergrad, or you can substitute with some methods classes: http://www.yale.edu/...s.html#language So to answer your question, some departments will be happy to see that you have language training if it's germane to your research topic, but no one is going to care that much if you don't have any.
  8. This sort of resentment, I'm afraid, cuts both ways. Especially if you're asking your partner to make career sacrifices for your sake.
  9. This may be fine if you're talking about your college sweetheart, but if you're married, this is terrible advice. If your spouse is really unhappy, then you will be too. And a miserable home life is not very conducive to succeeding in a graduate program. I'm not saying that spousal issues should be your first or only concern, but they do make a difference.
  10. In my experience, schools were open to doing informal visits, which was in some ways better than the admit weekend, but in other ways not as good. I second the advice about not being a jerk and about meeting with more than just one or two people in the department. One thing I was surprised about, though, was that many of the campus tours didn't involve a tour of the library and carrels. I would ask to see where you'll be spending your study time. Do you get a carrel? Open or closed? When you're TA'ing, will you have an office? What are the places on campus where other students go to work? What does the computer lab look like, and do you have to pay to print and copy?
  11. The health care at UW is really generous and cheap. It's probably not as noticeable when you're on your own, but if you get married or have kids, then it can make a substantial difference. At my private school, it costs $5,500 a year to add a spouse and then another $2,000-$3,000 a year to add a child. This means that insuring a spouse and kid would cost me a third of my stipend. At UW, by contrast, the monthly insurance premiums go from $18 for singles to $41 a month for a full family plan (including spouse and up to 2 kids, I believe). If you think you'll get married or have a family over the next 5-6 years, this can be something to take into consideration. I suspect the premiums have increased given the political situation in Wisconsin (grad students get the same insurance as state employees), but even if they've doubled, it's still a fantastic deal. I think the best thing would be to go talk to UW students during the visit and ask how they made their decision and how they get by on the stipend.
  12. I just got word that I've been accepted for advanced Arabic, although they haven't told me which center that will be in yet...
  13. I'm not at NYU, but several friends of mine are. None in poli sci, though, but a lot of the funding issues are common to the graduate school as a whole...
  14. NYU has recently changed their funding system so that TAing pays in addition to the stipend, and teaching is no longer mandatory. This can mean a fair amount of extra money if you can get a TAship, but it also means that TAing has become more scarce. Another side effect of this is that in many departments, finding 6th year funding is more and more difficult. There's also the fact that NYU has done this to try to fend off graduate students' attempts to unionize. http://www.2110uaw.org/gsoc/ http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/28/nyregion/28grad.html
  15. U Chicago has really upped their offers in the last few years, since only 6-8 years ago, they were closer to the 12k-14k range. The 22k plus 2 summers sounds like a pretty solid deal to me. I think outside of schools like Yale that are closer to the 30k mark, you'll find that most well funded private schools will offer somewhere between 17k-24k, and most public state schools will come in anywhere between 11.5k-17k. But you need to look closer at what obligations come with that funding. And like someone mentioned earlier, think about where you'll be living: 22k goes a lot further in Chicago than 24k does in New York or DC. Here are some questions you might want to ask: Are you paid over 9 months or 12? How many semesters/quarters will you have to TA? How many years of the 5-year package are fellowship and how many include TA or RA obligations? How common is summer funding outside of the guaranteed summers? How are people generally funded after the 5th year? (UC folks routinely take 6-9 years to finish.) If you bring in full outside funding (NSF, etc.) can you get extra years of funding? If you bring in partial funding, will they "top you up", and can you buy your way out of TAing? If you have a spouse or kids, how much would it cost to add them to your insurance?
  16. Last year, the UW stipends were around 11k plus change for TAs and 13.3k for RAs, so you were expected to TA or RA right off the bat unless you got FLAS money (15k) or were awarded a first year fellowship.
  17. Last year, I had to fly out from pretty far away to make it to the prospective student events. If you have a few different offers and the events don't conflict, you can generally patch together a ticket there and back. I did 3 events on one trip and had enough to cover expenses. (It should be noted that they all sent out checks to reimburse me; none paid up front.) One of the schools had a much earlier event, so I had to talk to them to see if they'd pay for me to come out and have a more 1-on-1 experience. They were happy to accommodate me, so if you're flying out from abroad, I'd wait until you see what offers you get and when their events are before you make any decisions about whether or not to visit. In my experience, the visits really help to make a decision.
  18. I think this is right on. I remember seeing folks getting offers from several top departments that have very different ways of doing political science and very different strengths. There are so many applicants to places like Harvard, Princeton and Yale that they can afford to make offers to mostly people with pedigrees from peer schools, which is one way of whittling down the applicant list. In other words, fit isn't nearly as important at that level as it is for schools in the 10-30 range. This is not to say that you shouldn't apply to those schools, but unless you've got the right background (and these days, even then), putting all of your eggs in that basket is a pretty risky bet.
  19. Does anyone have any idea if it's possible to postpone your ticket back to the US if you'd like to do some travel or research other places before coming back?
  20. If you're at all interested in India, Brown is a good place to be, especially with Varshney attracting a lot of people. And more generally, like Penelope said, comparative politics seems to be a lot stronger than their overall ranking would suggest. That said, it's a small department, and you might run into problems if you go there to work with just 1 person who later ends up taking off somewhere else...
  21. Just got a letter yesterday about advancement to 2nd round for advanced Arabic. It says I'll know something by mid-February.
  22. Folks at Chicago have a reputation for taking a long time to finish. I'd talk to the secretary or DGS to get a better feeling as to why that is and whether it's avoidable.
  23. I would suggest spending time on your actual application instead of on stuff like this.
  24. It looks like the eligibility criteria have changed this year. I'm pretty sure I looked into it last year, when I was applying, and one could be eligible if there was a 2-year gap between current and previous graduate work. Now it looks like that only applies if you didn't earn a degree during the previous graduate work. So if you attempted but didn't finish an MA, you'd be eligible so long as it was at least 2 years ago, but if you graduated, then you're ineligible. How much sense does that make?
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