I could be wrong, but if policy is your underlying goal, even if you do want to attend graduate school you might be better suited in a different program. A lot of history students can (and do) transition to that, but I would think a political science/IR/public policy/ etc. kind of program would be easier from a time/cost/prestige(?) standpoint if you're sure that's what you want to pursue regardless.
That said, I'm not an expert by any means so take this with a grain of salt, just offering my personal opinion, if I am wrong feel free to correct me!
Do you honeslty want to do the following:
1) Read over 200 books within 3 years?
2) Write grant/fellowship applications every single year for research funding? (numbers vary depending on dissertation topic itself)
3) Work 40-60 hours a week (Reading, classes, grad assistantships, department semianrs, lectures) including weekends?
4) Write a 200+ page dissertation that involves tons of drafts in the process?
If you say "no" to the last one, then PhD is not for you. It is essentially a research degree.
As for teaching, it's doable if you don't love it but you may surprise yourself when you actually give it a try. College kids can be an interesting bunch (I have a love/hate relationship).
I'll add my 2 cents. PhDs are grueling in every way. Mentally, you go through the wringer. Intellectually, you're pushed beyond what you thought possible. Physically, you're exhausted from all the work and the fact that you can never really shut it off because most of that work is going on in your head and it never stops, plus I legit got a UTI from sitting for 10+ hours a day in archives at one point--yeah, it actually happens. Besides all of that, even at the better funded schools you'll probably have to do some teaching. Whether that shakes out to 1-2 years or 4-5, doesn't matter if it's not your thing. TAing in GEs when you love teaching is rough...if you don't like teaching, you can get through it, but you'll probably be miserable. Now that I'm doing comps, I finally realized that I can reach a point where I loathe reading. Thankfully, I reset pretty quickly, but that's because I'm a sicko who loves all this crap. But I naively figured once I was out of coursework I would feel fabulous. Joke's on me Just be prepared for every stage to be hard.
If you truly love research, I think you totally could do well and even be happy at a PhD program--even if you aren't interested in teaching. My concern is that, if it isn't something you need for your career, the PhD could very well be a demoralizing process for you. It could also put the brakes on you beginning to build the career you want. I would suggest you do some more research on the typical trajectory of people going into your dream jobs (like Prof Plum said) while you wait for application results, and also do some soul searching. Who knows, you may find that with your first acceptance it really is what you want.
A quick piece of advice I dispense a lot this time of year: Spend some time researching people who currently hold the positions you'd like to hold in five to 8 years, and see what you can learn about their career trajectories. How many hold advanced degrees? How many hold PhDs? What fields are their degrees in? How competitive are the programs? What does an entry-level position look like in the organization? How did people gain entry into the field? What else besides advanced study do they have on their CVs? A lot of this information is available online, so if you set aside a few hours each week you can learn quite a bit. If you're very serious about a particular kind of organization, there's no harm in e-mailing people who are at the 5-8 year mark asking if they have any insight to share with someone who is hoping to get a foot in the door. Not everyone will have time to respond, but people rarely respond badly to a message like Hey, I'm really impressed with the career you're putting together and would like to have one like it myself someday.
Other advice: Going to graduate school simply because it seems like the next logical step is, in my experience, almost always a bad idea. Your apps are in, so you have a nice window here while you wait on replies. Use it to clarify your goals and how the degree will get you closer to them. That way you'll be better prepared with the right answer in the spring as answers come back. People who go because it seemed like the next logical thing frequently drop out, so if you can determine that a PhD is not for you (or is not for you right now) before you enroll, so much the better.
About your dog: I think that depends entirely on you and your program. I am in a social science program where the majority of my analysis and writing can be done from home, and I prefer to work from home or from a library (as opposed to my cube in the windowless cube farm). When I was taking classes I was generally there from 9-6 or so, but now that my coursework is finished I am rarely at the school itself. I go for meetings, seminars, interesting kinds of things and I do most of my work remotely. My time is verrry flexible, and if my building didn't prohibit it I would get a dog in a heartbeat. Another thing to keep in mind: a dog can be a great comfort when you're all stressed out over graduate school.
Advice?
Age:
-Don't feel like you have nothing to offer just because you are younger. I was 22 when I started graduate school. You got accepted to the program for a reason, and chances are you are just as equipped as any older students are to successfully complete the program, just in a different way.
-Your older classmates may be just as terrified as you. Talk to them. You have a lot in common. You are, after all, in the same place.
-You will feel like an imposter, like you don't belong, or like you are constantly behind. Or all three. It's normal. It will pass. (Well, sort of.) People of all ages go through this.
Adviser related:
-If you are lucky enough to get both research interest fit and personality fit perfect, congratulations! But sometimes, personality fit is more important than research interest fit as long as the research isn't too different. A great adviser is interested in your career development, likes you as a person, advocates for you, and wants to hear your ideas. Even if his or her research is quite different from yours, they may give you the autonomy to work on your own projects and just supervise you. A bad personality fit will drive you nuts, even if you love his or her research. Consider that when evaluating your adviser fit. (This will vary by field: research fit may be less important in the humanities, more important in the natural and physical sciences. Social sciences are somewhere in-between.)
-Don't be afraid to be straight up blunt with your adviser when it comes to asking about your progress. Ask if you are where you should be both academic program wise and getting-a-job-after-this-mess-wise.
-Be proactive. Advisers love when you draw up an agenda for your one-on-one meetings, come with talking points and progress to share, have concrete questions to ask, and have overall shown that you have been thoughtful and taken control of your own program. Of course, this won't immediately come easily to you, but in time you will work up to it. Every semester I type up my semester goals, and at the beginning of the year I type up annual goals. I show them to my adviser and we talk about whether they are too ambitious, or whether I need to revise them, and how I can meet them.
-Don't expect your adviser to actually know what courses you have to take to graduate. They will know about comprehensive exams and the dissertation, but a lot of professors don't really keep up with the course requirements, especially if their program is in flux. Get you a student handbook, and find out what you need to take. Map it out in a grid, and check off things when you finish them. Show this to your adviser every semester. You may have to explain how such and such class fills a requirement.
-Nobody loves you as much as you, except your mother. Keep this in mind as you take in advice from all sources, including your adviser. Your adviser is there to guide you, but that doesn't mean you have to do everything he says.
Studying:
-You will have to read more than you ever did before, in less time than you ever have before, and you will be expected to retain more than you ever have before. The way that you studied in undergrad may need some tweaking. Be prepared for this.
-Corollary: you may find that your methods change with age or interests or time. I preferred to study alone in college, but in grad school, I prefer to study in groups. It keeps me on task and the socialization keeps me motivated. You may find that you shift from being a more auditory learner to a visual learner or whatever.
-You will feel behind at first. This is normal.
-At some point you will realize that your professors don't actually expect you to read everything they assign you. This, of course, will vary by program, but there will be at least one class where the reading is actually impossible to do in one week. The point is to read enough that you know the major themes and can talk intelligently about them, and then pick some of the readings to really dig into and think more deeply about.
-For most programs, don't worry so much about grades. If you stay on top of your work and do what you're supposed to, you will probably get an A. How much grades matter varies from program to program. In some programs, a B is a signal that you are not up to par, and more than a few Bs will warrant a discussion with your adviser or the DGS. My program isn't like that - A, B, it's all meaningless. My adviser doesn't even know what my grades are. But at almost all programs, a C means you need to retake the course, and two Cs means you have to convince the DGS not to kick you out.
Extracurricular activity: What's that? No, seriously:
-A lot of your time will be unstructured. You will have coursework, but most grad classes meet once a week for two hours and you may have three classes. You may have meetings with your adviser every so often and some seminars or things to catch (like we have grand rounds and colloquia that are required), but a lot of time will be unstructured. However, since you have so much more work than you had in undergrad, you actually will have less free time than you had in undergrad. This may initially cause you great anxiety. It did for me. Some people love unstructured time, though. (I don't.)
-Because of this, you'll have to be planful about your non-grad school related stuff.
-TAKE TIME OFF. DO it. It's important for your mental health. However you do it doesn't matter. Some people work it like a 9-5 job. Some people take a day off per week (me) and maybe a few hours spread across the week. Some people work half days 7 days a week. However you do it, there needs to be a time when you say "f this, I'm going to the movies."
-Find your happy place, something that keeps you the you you were when you came in. I love working out. It gives me energy and I feel good. I stay healthy. I also love reading fiction, so sometimes I just curl up with a good book, work be damned. You have to give yourself permission to not think about work, at least for a couple of hours a week. You may also discover new hobbies! (I never worked out before I came to graduate school.)
-Your work will creep into all aspects of your life, if you let it. This is why I hate unstructured time. You will feel guilty for not doing something, because in graduate school, there is ALWAYS something you can do. ALWAYS. But since there will always be more work, there's no harm in putting it aside for tomorrow, as long as you don't have a deadline.
-You may need to reach outside of your cohort for a social life. None of my close friends are in my doctoral cohort. I've met master's students in my program, master's students in other programs, and I know a few non-graduate students I hang out with, too. Go to graduate student mixers. (If your university doesn't have any, organize some, if you like planning parties.) Join a student group that doesn't take up too much time. I had a doctoral acquaintance who kinda laughed at me because I joined some student groups other than the doctoral student one, and I was usually the only doctoral student in those groups, but I met some close friends (and future job contacts) and had a good time.
-DO NOT FEEL GUILTY FOR WANTING A LIFE OUTSIDE OF GRADUATE SCHOOL. This is paramount. This is important. You are a well-rounded, complex, multifaceted human being. NEVER feel bad for this. Everybody wants some kind of life outside of work. Yes, you may loooove your field, but that doesn't mean you want to do it all day long. Some other doctoral students, and perhaps professors, may make you feel bad about this. Don't let them. Just smile and nod. Then disappear when you need to.
Career:
-This is job preparation. Remember that from Day One. Always be looking for ways to enhance your skills. Read job ads and find out what's hot in your field, what's necessary, what's in demand. For example, in my field statistics and methods are a hot commodity, and they're not a passing fad. I happen to really like statistics and methods, so I have pursued that as a concentration of mine.
-Don't be afraid to take on volunteer work and part-time gigs that will give you skills that will be useful both inside academia and out, as long as it's not against your contract. Your adviser may be against it, but he doesn't have to know as long as it doesn't interfere with your work.
-If you want to work outside of academia - if you are even *considering* the possibility - please please definitely do the above. Even if you aren't considering it, consider the possibility that you won't get a tenure-track job out the box and that you may need to support yourself doing something else for a while. You will have to prove to employers that you have developed usable, useful skills and this is one of the easiest ways to do it. But don't overdo it - get the degree done.
-For more academic related ones - always look for opportunities to present and publish. Presentations look good on your CV. Publications look better. When you write seminar papers, wonder if you can publish them with some revision. Write your seminar papers on what you maybe think you may want to do your dissertation on. Even if you look at them three years later and think "these suck," you can at least glean some useful references and pieces from them. Discuss publication with your adviser early and often, and if you have the time and desire, seek out publication options with other professors and researchers. But if you commit to a project, COMMIT. You don't want to leave a bad impression.
-If you can afford it, occasionally go to conferences even if you aren't presenting. You can network, and you can hear some interesting talks, and you may think about new directions for your own research. You can also meet people who may tell you about jobs, money, opportunities, etc.
-Always try to get someone else to pay for conference travel before you come out of pocket. Including your adviser. Do not be shy about asking if he or she can pay. If he can't, he'll just say no. Usually the department has a travel fund for students, but often it's only if you are presenting.
-If you are interested in academia, you should get some teaching experience. There are two traditional ways to do this: TAing a course, and teaching as a sole instructor. If you can help it, I wouldn't recommend doing a sole instructor position until you are finished with coursework. Teaching takes a LOT of time to do right. You should definitely TA at least one course, and probably a few different ones. But don't overdo it, if you can help it, because again, it takes a LOT of time. More than you expect at the outset. If you are in the humanities, I think sole instructor positions are very important for nabbing jobs so when you are in the exam/ABD phase, you may want to try at least one. If your own university has none, look at adjuncting for nearby colleges, including community colleges. (I would wager that the majority of natural science/physical science students, and most social science students, have never sole taught a class before they get an assistant professor job. At least, it's not that common n my field, which straddles the social and natural sciences.)
-Always look for money. Money is awesome. If you can fund yourself you can do what you want, within reason. Your university will be thrilled, your adviser will be happy, and you can put it on your CV. It's win-win-win! Don't put yourself out of the running before anyone else has a chance to. Apply even if you think you won't get it or the odds are against you (they always are), as long as you are eligible. Apply often. Apply even if it's only $500. (That's conference travel!) Money begets money. The more awards you get, the more awards you will get. They will get bigger over time. If you are in the sciences and social sciences, you should get practice writing at least one grant. You don't have to write the whole thing, but at least get in on the process so that you can see how it's done. Grant-writing is very valuable both in and outside of graduate school.
-Revise your CV every so often. Then look and decide what you want to add to it. Then go get that thing, so you can add it.
-The career office at big universities is often not just for undergrads. I was surprised to learn that my career center offers help on CV organization and the academic job search, as well as alternative/non-academic career searches for doctoral students. In fact, there are two people whose sole purpose it is to help PhD students find nonacademic careers, and they both have PhDs. This will vary by university - some universities will have very little for grad students. Find out before you write the office off.
-It's never too early to go to seminars/workshops like "the academic job search inside and out", "creating the perfect CV," "getting the job," etc. NEVER. Often the leader will share tips that are more aimed towards early graduate students, or tidbits that are kind of too late for more advanced students to take care of. This will also help you keep a pulse on what's hot in your field. It'll help you know what lines you need to add to your CV. And they're interesting.
Other:
-Decide ahead of time what you are NOT willing to sacrifice on the altar of academia. Then stick to it.
I'm serious. If you decide that you do NOT want to sacrifice your relationship, don't. If it's your geographical mobility, don't. I mean, be realistic, and realize that there will always be trade-offs. But you have to think about what's important to you for your quality of life, and realize that there is always more to you than graduate school.
-If you don't want to be a professor, do not feel guilty about this. At all. Zero. However, you will have to do things differently than most doctoral students. Your adviser will probably never have worked outside of the academy (although this may vary depending on the field) so he may or may not be able to help you. But you have a special mission to seek out the kinds of experiences that will help you find a non-academic job. Test the waters with your adviser before you tell him this. My adviser was quite amenable to it, but that's because I told him that my goal was to still do research and policy work in my field just not at a university, AND because it's quite common in my field for doctoral students to do non-academic work. If you're in a field where it's not common (or where your professors refuse to believe it's common, or it's not supposed to be common)…well, you may be a little more on your own.
-Every so often, you will need to reflect on the reasons you came to graduate school. Sometimes, just sit and think quietly. Why are you doing this to yourself? Do you love your field? Do you need this degree to do what you want to do? Usually the answer is yes and yes, and usually you'll keep on trucking. But sometimes when the chips are down you will need to reevaluate why you put yourself through this in the first place.
-To my great dismay, depression is quite common in doctoral students. Graduate work can be isolating and stressful. Luckily your health insurance usually includes counseling sessions. TAKE THEM if you need them. Do not be ashamed. You may be surprised with who else is getting them. (I found out that everyone in my cohort, including me, was getting mental health counseling at a certain point.) Exercise can help, as can taking that mental health day once a week and just chilling. Don't be surprised if you get the blues…
-…but be self-aware and able to recognize when the depression is clouding your ability to function. Doctoral programs have a 50% attrition rate, and this is rarely because that 50% is less intelligent than, less motivated than, less driven than, or less ambitious than the other 50% that stays. Often they realize that they are ridiculously unhappy in the field, or that they don't need the degree anymore, or that they'd rather focus on other things in life, or their interests have changed. All of this is okay!
-You will, at some point, be like "eff this, I'm leaving." I think almost every doctoral student has thought about dropping out and just kicking this all to the curb. You need to listen to yourself, and find out whether it is idle thought (nothing to worry about, very normal) or whether you are truly unhappy to the point that you need to leave. Counseling can help you figure this out.
-Don't be afraid to take a semester or a year off if you need to. That's what leaves of absence are for.
Lastly, and positively…
…graduate school is great! Seriously, when else will you ever have the time to study what you want for hours on end, talk to just as interested others about it, and live in an intellectual community of scholars and intellectuals? And occasionally wake up at 11 am and go to the bank at 2 pm? Sometimes you will want to pull out all of your hair but most of the time, you will feel fulfilled and wonderfully encouraged and edified. So enjoy this time!
I think there are two separate issues here.
1st, it may be the case that there are not many historians, at institutions where you would want to apply, who are taking students, who are also working on things like the war on drugs — I assume you mean in the 1980s, which is recent enough that historians may not have really turned their attention to it yet, hence why your searches come up empty. But this isn't really a problem. Applicants get hung up about needing an advisor who studies their exact project, but it's not as important as making sure that your broad, overarching interests align, so I would, as you already have, look for departments where there is an established contingent of people, not just one or two, thinking about criminal justice and race and social policy in the US. On this point, have you considered Rutgers? I'm a Europeanist but I know that race in the US is something we're very strong in.
2nd, and this is what @Sigaba is getting at if I understand correctly, is that searching for faculty is not the same thing as searching the literature. Just because there are not many historians at institutions where you want to apply does not mean that there is no work going on in the field, so if you make that statement in an application you'll raise eyebrows, because of course the war on drugs has been studied by people. Law professors and sociologists and anthropologists, yes, but that's all highly relevant for you, and probably what your own work will build on in the future.
The value of searching the literature is two fold. First, you might actually find the names of more historians that you can work with. Faculty pages are notorious for not being updated to reflect what people actually do. Second, you'll see, across a variety of fields, who is studying what aspects of your topics, the contributions they have made, where there are still gaps, etc. You don't mention if you have institutional access anywhere, but you are in Des Moines — my hometown, actually! — and Drake has a good library and law library that you can use if you have an afternoon free. See what books are available on your subject there and leaf through them, looking at footnotes and introductions, what people have written about, what people are saying to each other. You may be able to get a guest or community pass that will let you use their computer systems, for the purpose of looking at articles.
I don't think at this stage you need to have a huge understanding of the literature; I certainly didn't. But you should have an idea of what's come before you, even if it's not historians per se, and absolutely you ought to have an idea about what you want to say about your topic beyond the fact that you want to study it. Usually, reading the literature helps you clarify this point, because once you see what other people have done, you can articulate what it is you want to do differently. That is valuable not just for your SOP but for yourself as a scholar.
Absolutely. You are always inadvertently building on your own knowledge, skills, and research, even if themes look apart from each other. In my case, I have incorporated work from undergrad into MA and then into PhD by reading my past paper, pulling a face in disgust, and then improving my past self.
Build on OP's question, have you tried or thought about elaborating, developing or incorporating your past and recent seminar papers into your future research or publications, especially if they are irrelevant to your field or dissertation topic?
I'm in a similar situation as you. I graduated December 2016 and will be going to grad school fall of 2018. One thing I've found wildly helpful is to keep a running list of articles, books, passages, etc. that are applicable to my desired research field. I just keep a spreadsheet on Google Sheets with the title, link, a short explanation and the date. For passages out of books that I want to be able to refer back to later, I have a running note on Evernote with all necessary biographical information.
I've also found a couple projects to work on to keep my writing sharp. I blog about every other week and while it doesn't have high readership (my mom likes it though ) it gives me space to craft an argument and present evidence like a mini research paper. And I can write about anything I want! Just remember that graduate schools are likely to do a social media check so keep your footprint PC. I've also found a project that is working to get biographical sketches of over 2500 suffragists across the country. They'll give you a couple names and a few months to come up with 500 words on the woman. They give you a by-line as well so you can claim the credit for the writing and research you do.
As everyone has said before, read, read, read. Find new areas that you aren't familiar with and put yourself through your own introductory course. I have been focusing on the War on Drugs and mass incarceration for my graduate school topic, but I've found that Australian history can be illuminating on this issue, though I know nothing about Australian history. So, I've taken it upon myself to learn the basics. On this same note, I usually carry a journal with me everywhere I go so that if something comes up and I think, "Huh, I'd like to know more about that," I can write it down and look it up later.
I think it all comes down to staying active in your learning and finding new ways to be excited by the process. Hope this is helpful.
I'm in a similar situation as you. I graduated December 2016 and will be going to grad school fall of 2018. One thing I've found wildly helpful is to keep a running list of articles, books, passages, etc. that are applicable to my desired research field. I just keep a spreadsheet on Google Sheets with the title, link, a short explanation and the date. For passages out of books that I want to be able to refer back to later, I have a running note on Evernote with all necessary biographical information.
I've also found a couple projects to work on to keep my writing sharp. I blog about every other week and while it doesn't have high readership (my mom likes it though ) it gives me space to craft an argument and present evidence like a mini research paper. And I can write about anything I want! Just remember that graduate schools are likely to do a social media check so keep your footprint PC. I've also found a project that is working to get biographical sketches of over 2500 suffragists across the country. They'll give you a couple names and a few months to come up with 500 words on the woman. They give you a by-line as well so you can claim the credit for the writing and research you do.
As everyone has said before, read, read, read. Find new areas that you aren't familiar with and put yourself through your own introductory course. I have been focusing on the War on Drugs and mass incarceration for my graduate school topic, but I've found that Australian history can be illuminating on this issue, though I know nothing about Australian history. So, I've taken it upon myself to learn the basics. On this same note, I usually carry a journal with me everywhere I go so that if something comes up and I think, "Huh, I'd like to know more about that," I can write it down and look it up later.
I think it all comes down to staying active in your learning and finding new ways to be excited by the process. Hope this is helpful.
Steph Smith got a reaction from VAZ in Graduating undergrad taking a break from history...how to stay sharp?
Steph Smith got a reaction from Kismine in Graduating undergrad taking a break from history...how to stay sharp?