bibliophile222

I just had to bump this seven-year-old thread because I have never in my life read sentence that more exquisitely summed up my chronic procrastination problem (or my life in general). Sparky, if you're still on Grad cafe, kudos.

If you do a separate post-bacc program before applying for grad school you have a chance to further raise your cumulative GPA, giving you a better chance than applying to a 3-year program. Showing admissions committees that you can get As on CSD courses can help you a lot. Post-bacc courses are also typically cheaper than taking pre-reqs through a grad program, and they're pretty easy to apply to. My undergrad degree is in Linguistics. I did a two-semester online post-bacc through Pacific University and really enjoyed it.

Yep, it was pretty annoying to find an apartment that was reasonably priced with everything I was looking for and then read "no pets" at the bottom. I also could have snagged an apartment that was about $200 cheaper than the one I got. However, some places might say no pets but actually be okay with it, or at least willing to add a pet deposit. My current lease said no pets when we moved in, but my boyfriend brought home a kitten one day and I freaked because I thought we'd get evicted. I made him call the landlord to see if it was okay and it turned out the landlord didn't care at all. I must also add that cats can be expensive. We have two cats and spend about 60 a month on cat food and another 60 a month on pet insurance, which is much better than having to pay a $2000 vet bill but can still put a sizeable dent in a grad student budget. Still totally worth it, though!

On a practical note, I do absorb the information better if it is in a physical book, and it's easier for me to study for tests by spreading a few open books around me and referring to them as needed. That's totally not the reason, though. I'm a book person (see username!) and I've just always wanted a huge library (like Beauty and the Beast huge). I love the idea of having an office filled with reference materials, so practical or not I am lugging all my books with me wherever I go. By the way, is it bad that I am so addicted to gradcafe that I'm methodically going through every single relevant post and responding to ones that are 4 years old? Oh well.

I second the Lenovo Yoga as a fairly cheap but still nice option. I absolutely adore mine. It's very thin and light with great battery life and good speed (solid state drive!), and it has made me very happy. I do recommend getting the 14 inch screen, since the 11 inch can be kind of hard to read.

if any schools you're looking at use the CSDCAS application, then even if the deadline is due in December you can add your fall grades to your transcript once they become available. If you're willing to submit close to the deadline, it might be worth waiting for your fall grades to be sent--however, that might be too risky if they must be sent by mail. Even if you need to submit before the fall grades are posted, check and see if you can send an updated transcript that can be seen before they start reviewing applications.

That sucks! I'm glad my program didn't mandate that observations be done through an official course/university, and I think it's discouraging to hear they're becoming harder to get because it makes it that much harder for nontraditional students. I did my post-bacc online, and they did have an observation course with online videos, but I only got 11 hours out of that and needed to get the rest on my own. A change to course-only observation hours provides yet another difficult hurdle for non-CSD majors. Here's hoping that trend does not continue.

I've been making the most of my income while I still have it. I got a new computer and phone for Christmas, and a few months ago I tried to buy all, or almost all, of the clothes I will need for the next two years, leaving as little to buy as possible once I'm in school. I bought almost nothing but clinic-appropriate clothing, including shoes, since I'm a sneakers and sandals person.

I know programs vary greatly in structure, credits, etc, so my situation is certainly different from yours. That being said, I will be taking 14 credits a semester for the first year of my two-year program (not going above and beyond, this is required for the program) and will also be doing on-campus clinical work, so I think 30 credits in a year is certainly doable with some sacrifices. You probably would not be able to work much and your personal life will most likely suffer, but it depends on your priorities. If getting out a year earlier is worth it to you then go for it. If you are not pursuing a PhD then your GPA is not super important, as long as you maintain the minimum. Of course, finances also matter. If taking too many credits at a time affects your finances then it would probably be better to hang on for the extra year.

I was planning on taking handwritten notes to begin with, since when I make a typing error it drives me nuts and I have to correct it, making typing actually take longer than handwriting. I also read this article and now I am even more sold on handwritten notes. Go with what the evidence tells you!

Have you tried looking for listings in local papers? I got my new apartment through the listing in the local free alternative paper. Out-of-towners might not think to try there so there could be less competition.

I think the template from The Speech Blog seems to cover everything needed. The more information the better, since programs differ. My program required I specify between child and adult, and treatment vs evaluation, which meant I couldn't use some of my hours and had to shadow longer.

I don't want to discourage you from volunteering, since it does look good on an application and is just a good thing to do in general, but if you can't find anything it probably won't be a deal breaker. I had no volunteer experience because I was working 60 hours a week, so I made sure to put my weekly hours on my CV to help explain my lack of other extracurriculars. Of course, the lower your GPA/GRE, the more you'll need to emphasize relevant experience, so try to focus on your stats as well.

I've been thinking about this exact question for the SLP I've been observing. I know observation hours aren't the same as an internship, but I'd still like to give her a card to show how much I appreciated the opportunity. I've looked on Reddit, etc and the consensus seems to be that a card is greatly appreciated but a gift is not needed and if desired should be chosen with care so it's not awkward. It might be uncreative, but I think a gift card could work if it's something that reflects their personality, like a Starbucks card for a coffee lover or Barnes & Noble for a bookworm. Other people have mentioned getting things from Etsy, Peachy Speechie, or a gift card to Teachers Pay Teachers.

I've pretty much flip-flopped from my original idea, which is that I would work about 20 hours a week, to only working the 5 or 6 hours a week allotted by work study. I know we have to keep our schedules flexible, with evening classes starting in the second semester, and time is at a premium. My partner and I will be sharing a car so I feel like the extra time and energy expended on an off-campus job isn't worth the most-likely low-wage position I could get. I'm going to bite the bullet, take out more in loans but live more sanely and happily, with real vacations. Fortunately my partner will be working, which will help with money. I actually feel like I'll be less stressed and burned out in grad school than I have been this last year, when I was doing my full-time post bacc and working 60 hours a week. I'm sure I'll regret it later when I have to pay the loans back, but for now it will be amazing to only have to focus on school.

I took the GRE over a year before I began applying. I picked schools I thought I was interested in and sent scores to those schools. You definitely don't need a CSDCAS account, since I hadn't even heard of it yet!

Minus the military spouse and kids, I was in a similar-ish position. I dropped out after my first year of college, took a 9-year hiatus, and did the rest of my undergrad degree and post bacc online due to my busy work schedule. If anything, the time off from school lets you gain real world experience and shows grad programs that you can handle responsibility. As far as LORs go, it might depend on the program, but every school I applied to required at least two LORs from professors. If you can get a recommendation from your kids' SLPs that would be great, but ideally try for at least one professor who can speak to your classroom abilities. It is harder to connect with online profs, but there are ways (which I didn't properly utilize). They might have online office hours through Hangouts or another program. Ask questions or even just share what interests you in class. If there are discussions, write thoughtful posts and connect to real world experiences. If they get a sense of who you are, not just how well you write, they can write a decent recommendation even without the face to face experience. As far as a leveling program, I did a 2 semester post-bacc at Pacific University and recommend it. It's shorter than many leveling programs, it has a good selection of courses that would cover most schools' pre-reqs, the professors are good, and it's a certificate program, which enables you to get federal loans if you need them. It was about 10 grand for the whole program. Good luck! I think even with so-so LORs you have a decent chance. I used three online Linguistics professors that didn't know me very well and still got in. Stress your experience and work hard on your personal statement!

Sorry, I guess I came off as a little flippant. You do make a good point about not using emails that are controversial or prone to a spam filter. However, you also never know--a personal email that is clever, related to speech-pathology or language, or is otherwise positive might make you noticed in a good way. As long as the email isn't noticeably inappropriate I don't see what grounds an admissions counselor would have to disregard an application. It's true that the application process is a sales pitch, and that in this profession appearances matter and professionalism is paramount, but I guess I'm just annoyed that this whole application process is so difficult and competitive that we even have to worry about trivialities, like email addresses, that have nothing whatsoever to do with our experience and abilities. Sorry again. I really don't know why this is bugging me so much. I'll stop ranting now, I promise.

I didn't know Magoosh existed at the time, so I used a free app which I think was Ready4 GRE. I did one or two sets of questions a day (10-20 minutes total) for about six weeks. I actually was stressing the whole time because the app predicted that based on my performance my Quant score would be 149, so I worked really hard on the math questions. The night before the test it still was only predicting a 150, but I ended up with a 164, so although it did a bad job at predicting, the extra effort it made me put into it really helped! The night before the test, I also took a free downloadable practice test (sorry, can't remember the name or where I got it) for the verbal and quantitative sections that mimicked the real test pretty well. I didn't practice writing because I feel comfortable with my writing ability, but I did look at examples of essays that scored a 3, 4, 5, or 6 just to get a feel for what they're looking for. Ultimately, how much you study depends on your learning style, test-taking abilities, and how comfortable you are with the material. I'm the type of person who tests well without studying much, and I still prepped for six weeks. The good thing is there are tons of different ways you can study, and worst-case scenario you can always retake it. I know it is a huge stumbling-block for a lot of people, so also make sure to make the rest of your application as strong as possible, just in case. Good luck!

Personally, I don't see why it should matter what email you use as long as it doesn't contain profanity, drug references, hate speech, or anything else blatantly unprofessional. For application purposes the email may be used to set up your application portal or to contact admissions, but I doubt that it would have any part to play in the admissions process, nor should it. I guess I also just dislike the idea of having to suppress my individual personality just to sound like a professional drone. Too much conformity creeps me out! On the other hand, I also just watched four back-to-back episodes of The X-Files and I think it made me a little rebellious and paranoid. ?

I completed an online post-bacc which was 4 classes per semester ( although one class per semester was a one or two credit course that didn't require as much work) while working 50-60 hours per week. Yucky, but doable. If I didn't have to work I probably could have done 6 courses at a time. If you can get away with working part-time or not at all, and you're a fairly quick learner who doesn't need huge amounts of time to study or complete papers, I think you can do it. You might fry your brain in the process, so try to take it easy the next semester!

I second the other advice as well, but especially the Moscow Mule, and its cousin the Cranberry Mule. ?

Fellow out-of-fielder here--my undergrad was in Linguistics. It looks like we have pretty comparable stats. I completed a post-bacc through Pacific University's online program and got into 2 out of the 5 schools I applied to. You also have much more relevant work experience and better LORs than me, so I would be pretty optimistic about your chances. I got into NYU's online program with all of my prereqs completed, but with your stats and experience I feel like they'd be willing to take you on for the foundation coursework. If you do go the post-bacc route it will be cheaper than a year of grad school and allow you to get your feet wet without committing long-term. The downside is you need to pick your program carefully, since different grad programs have different prereqs. For NYU, there were two foundation courses that I would have needed to mix and match syllabi from my post-bacc and Linguistics classes (Language Development combined with Intro to Communication Disorders, and Language Development combined with Language Disorders) which I'm not sure they would have accepted. For UVM, I'm going to have to retake Aural Rehabilitation there because it was combined with Audiology in my post-bacc and they would only let it cover one course, but overall it worked out okay. I know admissions decisions can be capricious, so I'm not saying you'll definitely get in, but based on our similar stats I think your chances seem decent. Good luck!

I can't help you out personally, but I recommend that you post this in the SLP forum (scroll down until you see Professional Programs). You will vastly increase your target audience! If you haven't checked it out yet, it's also a really good place to bond, obsess, and waste time. ?

1) Speech-language Pathologist (what I'm actually going to school for) 2) curator of ancient manuscripts (Not really to do anything with them, just take them out and touch them because I can) 3) someone who works for a film studio and reads books to decide whether they would make good movies (not sure if this is a real job because I read about it in a young adult book) 4) some fantasy job where all I have to do is lie on a tropical beach reading books (lottery winner?)