Sethe

The tagline Streyer uses is “Accredited Online University”. A quick search reveals that us a for-profit institution and that it has 78 us campuses. I think it’s important to note that it’s important to interpret data very carefully. It’s possible that the University only invited 12 students onto campus. It’s possible that they sent out their 6 invites and 6 waitlists and that some of their acceptances had offers elsewhere. I think it’s dangerous to assume that this was the only acceptence that people had. As such, I think it’s also possible that only 5 people accepted their offer and others chose to go elsewhere. As for the design research, the full title is Digital Humanities Research Designer. Digital Humanities is huge right now so that naturally caught my attention especially because SMU doesn’t list it under faculty interests so I’m wondering how well supported that individual felt. I think different universities have different strengths that they do very well at. I think it is up to the applicant to consider which schools they’d like to be placed at and have them look at recent hires. Look at what they’ve done on their CV and consider how they can play to their strengths to maximize their strengths. I don’t think rankings should play a role anywhere but some universities think otherwise. But I don’t think it’s as much the university as it is the access to know what certain universities are looking for. There isn’t a single university that would allow you to be considered equally for all jobs because the way you build your CV will differ. I think it’s also time we stop looking at high school and community colleges as backup. Both require a dedication to teaching which may be hard to do if you’re focused on research.

I think that depends. And I think in this case, they might rely on the overall reputation of a school, rather than their PhD rankings. If there’s a specific region you’re interested in being in, I’d recommend going to a school that is highly regarded within the area and one that supports life outside the academy. There are a number of schools that will see non-ac jobs as lesser than and will not give you the support you need because they fear it will tarnish their reputation. There are also some schools that have awful relationships with the town they reside in and I think that’s another important thing to consider. We won’t ever know how many people are interested in a specific type of job but it’s a lack of placement which is especially concerning at any school or when a school considers a “scanning specialist” to be a successful placement. There are many jobs which would benefit from a PHD but there are many who a BA Or MA would suffice. I think that’s the difference between good and bad placements.

I think it’s also important to realize that perception of programs change over time. Chicago used to be number 10 and is now considered the top school. It’s made a lot of strides to improve its standing amongst the 12 percent of so that participate in those surveys. On the opposite end, Iowa used to be ranked 36 or so and new business moves have caused the university to suffer a bit. I think it’s also important to take a look at who its peers are around the same ranking and how well their placements have been recently. There is a huge drop from 40 to 50 in terms of recent placement. (Part of it might be where priorities lie though. Georgia and Nebraska are both great for creative writing and pour a lot of their resources into them. Both have great literary magazines. The University of Houston also has a great lit mag but I think placements for Lit majors suffer as a result. If your interests are interdisciplinary, I think it could even be advantageous to attend a school not only in the top 50 but one that has a strong undergrad ranking as well because you’ll never know who you might be interested in working with as well. It’s possible that there is overlap between an admissons and hiring commitee and as such, I think, it’s important to be regarded well in both categories. It’s possible that some professors could connect you with different people within the field. I’d carefully examine all schools and see how where their grads are going. I looked up SMU quickly and struggled to find a placement rate but learned that the program was started in 2007. After some fumbling, I found that one of their students were placed at Strayer University which is an online for profit university. I found a few others that had instructor positions and a few interested in design research. A number of them had nothing listed which is concerning given the short history of the school’s program.

I'm a fourth year in an MA/PHD program. Has your PhD so far been what you expected it to be? Everyone is on fellowship during their first two years; it’s a great time to learn the ins and outs of everything the university has to offer. There have been some seminars which I’ve enjoyed greatly and others which I’ve enjoyed the material less but I learned a great deal from. The professors here are the best I’ve had and they really do want you to succeed. The style is a fair mix of lecture and conversation. Reading for comps was mixed. The department gives you a lot of control over the process. You’re responsible for asking people to serve on your committee. You’re responsible for choosing which books go on your list. I know that there are other schools that have pre-sorted reading comp lists and I think it is something that you should consider how much flexibility you want. I think there are perks to both cases. What are you impressions of your program? If you come with an MA, you can get up to 6 credits to be applied towards the Ph.D. degree. As a result, you really get to know people very well from your year and the year below and above you. Has anything about your program surprised you? People here are very friendly and your cohort really does become an extended family at times. But because it is a such a small cohort; you’ll get to know people very well. If your goal is to remain anonymous, I think it becomes really hard to do that especially with individuals that share similar interests. There are monthly meetings where people can share updates and concerns. And the department really does listen and does the best to implement change as best as they can if they have the ability to do so. It can be difficult at times because of how complex the Washington University system can be. How are you feeling in general about your experience? I’m feeling mixed here. My cohort was 6 people. The new incoming cohort will be 5 people. Traditionally, they've done a wonderful job of placing people and generally has more requests from universities than they could possibly place. At times, I wish more people within my cohort were interested in a tenure-track position because I want to talk to open up that dialogue of not knowing where we’d be in a few years. A lot of people see it as a place to settle down and raise a family so they refuse to look outside of this city when they’re looking for jobs despite being absolutely brilliant and being capable of having multiple offers if they expanded their search. WashU does try to have a balance of people interested in tenure-track jobs and those who say they are interested in Alt-AC jobs. People in my cohort and the year below me have expressed an interest in obtaining an MFA degree, getting a law degree, teaching at liberal arts colleges, teaching at research universities, teaching at community colleges, teaching at independent schools, become a lobbyist, doing research for a university, and being a course advisor. It’s a wide range of interests and it’s interesting to know that not everyone is competing for a tenure-track position. Have you found your research interests changing? There is a lot of collaboration going on within the university. As a result, students have a lot of certificate options they can choose from. My original interests were focused on the 20th and 21st century. It’s a time period I’m still very much interested in but they’ve grown to also include a certificate in Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies. I’ve also managed to have taken classes in Sociology, Digital Humanities, Film and African-American Studies. I think the combination of classes really allowed me to gain a better understanding of things which I may not have known I was interested in otherwise and I think it contributes in a very big way to my final dissertation because it allows me to draw from multiple areas. Are there any hardships you've faced that you want to share? People here care a lot about you and will help you if you seek them out for advice on whatever you’d like help with. Coming from a smaller school I was used to professors being a lot more involved in your advising and professors just being assigned to you. It’s your responsibility here to choose who your adviser is so it puts a lot of pressure to you to get to know how each professor functions and how that vibes with you. Each professor likely has something that they’re really big on so I can see how each project can be shaped and influenced differently depending on who you choose. I don’t imagine this would be very different at most universities though. How about any successes you'd like to celebrate? I’ve been published at 2 very well-known academic journals, have won a few institutional awards and have presented at 3 conferences. I think the university cares very much about student success and supports both your critical and creative pursuits even if those interests are outside of the English office. I think my big question for current students is: what do you wish you had asked about or known when making your decision? Anything undergrads wouldn’t have the foresight to consider about PhD life when applying? I wish I didn’t bother retaking the GRE for a 2 point increase on the Verbal and a 3 point increase on the Math section. Everyone I spoke with at multiple universities told me that it wouldn’t have impacted my results either. I think that I knew this earlier I was fortunate enough to be accepted by various schools: Michigan, Brown, Harvard, WashU, and Tufts. I was rejected by Illinois, Colorado, Duke, Brandeis, Chicago and Nebraska. Cycles are a really interesting thing because they’re never quite what you expect. I had a lot of conversations with my mentors regarding stipends and experiences. I was concerned about placements because I wanted to teach at the university level. They assured me that their belief was that schools aren’t good because of their programs but because some people overbelieve in the rankings and so top programs have a wider selection of students to choose from. They mentioned that they believed that ranking programs didn’t matter and shouldn’t play a role when selecting a university because they don’t play a role when jobs are listed. What leaves to the misconception most often is likely due to the fact that universities that are “better-ranked” have traditionally had more Graduate Students and have been around longer than those which were ranked lower. Publications during Grad School (as a commitment to the field) and what your dissertation paper is on and how it fits what field the School is looking to hire at will always be the most important. A big name might get your CV a second glance but the name won’t matter at all if you have nothing extra to show from it. My undergrad college even mentioned that they won’t bother to look at someone who graduated from Harvard/Yale/Princeton because their experience has been that they don’t have the quality of teaching they’re looking for and they tend to leave as soon as an opportunity comes at a “better-known” school. As a result, I think good work is rewarded and that university prestige for admissions is unimportant. It might be easier to gain admission to a PHD program if you come from a more well-known school because they have more resources to help but I think the diversity of ideas is allowing the playing field to be more even. A great SOP with a great fit at a college will always beat out a bad SOP from an Ivy League college. I think it is very important to think about the city you'll be in and how you feel about living there. If the environment isn't right, you won't succeed, you'll be depressed and fail. Depression is a really real thing that impacts a lot of students and each student will have different things that make them depressed. Is the stipend enough to survive? Do you work better in a rural, suburban or city environment? How big of a city would you prefer? Would you be upset if you went to a large city but was unable to really explore the city? Would you be upset if there was nothing to do in the town? Location is really important and a big part of your overall health. If you're depressed, you won't do as well as you could have and I think that shows when it comes to the Job Market. Have any of you been able to negotiate your funding offers? I never tried to negotiate any offers. And I don’t know anyone in my cohort or in any cohort above mines that tried. The university is extremely generous with their funding package and the city is extremely affordable to live on with the stipend they provide. In the past year, they increased their stipend by an additional $2,000. There are also additional funding opportunities through various grants and summer programs available. I do know that some of my friends who did apply elsewhere did try to negotiate certain parts of their packages. Some of my friends managed to get a course-release at colleges which typically require you to teach 2 courses per semester. Others were more curious about the feasibility of living on their stipends and were connected to current students of the universities they were considering. Some wanted to know if they could match the offers from other schools; some universities did but requested letters from other schools they were admitted into so they could bring that back to the committee. Sometimes, schools were able to scrounge up additional funds; sometimes they weren’t.