MrsG

I see there's another question I didn't address -- while I am open to teaching as needed or beneficial, I do not want to be pigeon holed into teaching full time for the rest of my career. I would rather be working in a student support capacity.

All good advice! I am also considering Ed.D. programs, and I am in the process of meeting with several professionals who are in jobs like my vision so that I can learn more about their perspectives and experiences. I have found that a few of these people have Ph.D.s in Higher Ed, so that seemed like a sensible route to go. The jobs I have been applying for lately have actually been academic advisor positions. I figured this would be the easiest way to get a foot in the door with administration. Although working while studying is something I would like to do, it is by no means a deal breaker if I can't. I want to do whatever will make me the most marketable in the field. To be clear, I'm not looking for a job at a huge research university. My ideal school for work is actually a small private college, which is where I am working as an adjunct now. I'd like to be able to transition over from faculty to administration here or at one of the other smaller colleges and universities in our region. Not all are private; one or two are state universities.

Absolutely. I think I might have been a bit vague in my intentions. Because I have some time before I begin study, I really want the job in order to get more experience and savings (which never hurts), but I understand that the job may or may not be conducive to the studying. Without going into too many details on the situation, if I studied at UK, I could possibly make it work with an outside job at the school where I am working now (although I am totally open minded to not having things go the way I planned). If I studied at Peabody, that wouldn't be possible just because of the required commute. UK's program is (from my understanding) a great chunk done online, which (I hope) may allow for strategic commuting. But again, Peabody would be an obvious first choice. Thanks for the suggestions and realistic perspective.

I've never dealt with this much until this semester as an adjunct instructor. I have worked in the past as a TA, even as a full-time instructor at other schools, and this is really just starting to rear its ugly head now. When I was a TA, my faculty mentor told us that if we are female, unfortunately, we will likely have to work harder to keep order in the classroom and to command respect from tough students. I believe this is true. My first strategy to combat this is to always show up looking like a professional. Some people would disagree with this advice, but I try to always dress at least a level higher than my students seem to, and I always wear makeup and style my hair. These simple strategies do go a long way. (I'm 5'4", 30 years old, and recently I was asked by a student if I just graduated from undergrad -- insert eye roll here). Secondly, it's always better to start off the semester by being strict and you can always loosen the reins as the semester goes on. Third, if a student questions my authority, I always let them know that they have an avenue to air grievances with the administration. However, I try to always make sure that I am being fair and offering clear instruction before using this backing. It makes me feel safe knowing that I have my bases covered and that they have someone to complain to in a way that they feel as though they are receiving fair consideration (not that I don't give them fair consideration, but sometimes they need to hear the hard truth from an unrelated party). Finally, when all else fails, commit to having confidence in yourself. If you know you are doing the right thing, ultimately that is all that you can do. Good luck!

I should probably add that because my husband is a 100% disabled veteran, funding isn't really an issue for me because I get 100% tuition paid at most public universities.

While many here are celebrating, grieving, or waiting, I thought perhaps you could give a newbie some advice. I graduated in 2009 with an MA in English. I was a TA in the English department and graduated a semester early. However, my GPA was pretty crappy because of some personal circumstances -- a 3.45. I have worked for two years as a full-time Instructor of English and Foreign Languages at a public university since then. I have also worked as a Technical Editor at a Fortune 100 company. My husband recently retired from the Army, and we have moved back to our hometown, a place where there is one traffic signal in the entire county. I was lucky to find work as an Adjunct Instructor of English, and have worked at this for the past two semesters. Obviously, working part-time doesn't cut it. I want to do important things. Teaching is VERY important, but it is not something that I want to do for the rest of my career. I have considered getting a Ph.D. in Rhetoric and Composition, and I believe I could be very successful with that, but teaching writing forever is just not what I want to do (even though I do like teaching writing). After a lot of soul searching over the past few years, I have come to the conclusion that I want to move toward Higher Ed administration, specifically something in the student services realm. I'm currently trying to get my foot in the door as a full-time academic advisor. I'm finding that changing my career focus has been difficult, but I am hopeful that with perseverance, my big break will come. I would like to start in a full-time position before I start doctoral study, but either way, I am beginning to prepare applications for Fall 2017 admission. One very specific limitation I have is that I must choose a program within close proximity because I have two children (5 year old and 3 year old) and my husband and I just really love Kentucky <3 With that being said, the major schools in proximity include the University of Kentucky, Vanderbilt, and the University of Louisville. There are also several smaller universities that may or may not fit the bill (Bellarmine is one). Because I want to end up in the upper tier of Higher Ed administration later in my career, I believe that UK's Ph.D. in Higher Education may be my best choice. There are a multitude of Ph.D. and Ed.D. programs available, and I'm having a hard time making sense of them in terms of my interests and experience. I have absolutely no interest whatsoever in K-12 education; I am only interested in Higher Ed, and although I have experience as a teacher and I don't mind it as a side gig, this is not what I would like to focus on. I feel my shortcomings are that I could use more experience and I have that pesky GPA haunting me. I have to take the GRE over again, and I struggle with math. I think I have plenty of time to study for the GRE and get acceptable scores. I don't remember my scores specifically from the last time I took it, but the verbal and writing section scores were fantastic and the quantitative score was just short of abysmal. I also haven't had an opportunity to attend or present at conferences, so that's not good either. I reached out to one of the program directors in UK's graduate school of Education, and was encouraged that applicants are considered holistically and the GPA wouldn't necessarily break my chances for admission. I guess I'm looking for advice on how to proceed from here, maybe some reassurance that I have a chance? I would love to study at Peabody, but I am afraid I'm not good enough to make the cut. UK looks like my next favorite choice. I'm not a fan of applying to a multitude of programs in hopes of getting an admission. I would rather target my applications and work on ensuring that my applications are as good as they can be. Has anyone heard anything good about UK's Ph.D. in Higher Education program? Would anyone like to share a timeline they used in the application process? If applications are due at the beginning of February, when would be a good conservative time to submit the application? When would you think should be the last date to take the GRE and get scores in time for application? If you've made it this far, thanks so much for reading!

As someone who is just beginning to get material together for application to programs for Fall 2017, I can't give you a lot of specific advice there. However, as a person who is the spouse of a retired veteran, I can tell you that sometimes relationships are a give and take. After I graduated from my MA program, he asked me to move across the country with him (he was then an Active Duty Soldier). This required me to do some serious thinking about whether I was comfortable with having my career take a back seat while he focused on his, a career that demanded most of his time and attention that left me to focus on taking care of our children. I'm not saying that your situation is quite this extreme. I had very little opportunity to do anything that would have furthered my career choice in any way. However, I am saying that sometimes you take one for the team so that the other person can focus on a critical part of their career for a bit. Now that he is retired, I'm back at it, and he is taking the hit so that I can fully focus on my career. This is all to say that if I were you and your significant other is not on board with sacrificing a bit in order for you to move to wherever would be most beneficial for your career, perhaps it is time to decide whether it should be your turn, and if it should, whether the relationship is worth pursing in terms of relocating together vs. long-distance relationship.