treya25

How do we accept the award?

Last year my university rejected my sshrc before it even got to the competition. This year 17.42 won CGS-D. Now I have a tough decision. The university is interested in me for Vanier but they said if I accept sshrc, even if I take one year for sshrc I hold Vanier...

I have 3 teenagers and my experience may be counterintuitive and different from many, but I actually don't find it that hard at all. PhD is one of the most flexible times of your life. Your first year is coursework and then from there you entirely create your own schedule. You can go to the university to get out of the house to help concentrate or you can work from home to attend to your child. I do it and I work multiple jobs and still have free time. Plus many people take 6-8 years to finish their PhD so if you need to take it slowly that's okay, where I'm from graduating on time in 4-years is actually out of the norm. You can also do your PhD part-time. To make your life easier, pick a dissertation topic that is straight forward and do all coursework assignments relating to that same topic, it'll save time.

Thank you for the encouragement and your kind words

I'm so scared about the future and I just need some solid advice as to how to build my CV for jobs. I have an MA in Women's Studies and am doing a PhD in Women's studies right now focusing on queer health. I am also doing an MA in Religious Studies at the same time. I've TA'ed, RA'ed, and have several papers in review. Once I finish my second MA, I was thinking maybe I should do a third in Sociology, Political Science, Education, Epidemiology, or Art History to make myself more marketable so I could apply for professorships in those fields focusing on gender. I'm happy with my life and what I'm studying but when I think about job prospects it scares me. I want a job in academia. I'll survive if I need to go back to my previous social service sector work (I have a ton of work experience) but I'd like to take advantage of the flexibility I have during PhD to publish in an area that will increase the chances of me being able to stay in academia. Any suggestions as to how I can best use my time in PhD to be more marketable. I'm very bad at math but I could perhaps take stats online a million times until I can force myself to learn quant. I could do a third masters--if so, any suggestions? I could start doing another research focus in a more marketable area. I can handle and balance a lot if need be. Any help is welcome. I just want to not feel hopeless anymore. Or should I just accept that an academic job will never happen and commit to some internal motivation to do PhD?