fuzzylogician

I don't know if there are "stock phrases" really. It does happen to everyone that we get asked a question we hadn't considered before or that we just don't know the answer to. Often it's because the question is not exactly relevant (people will go to great lengths to mention their own work and try and connect it to what you are doing, even when the connection is rather flimsy) but occasionally it's a fair question that just hadn't come up yet in your research. Depending on the situation and how fast you think on your feet, you might be able to come up with something relevant to say, or you may just be out of ideas. It's legitimate to say that you don't know and not even try and guess, or to flag that this is a quick thought and that you'd need to think about it more. "That is a very good question which I had not considered before. Off the top of my head, I think that .... but again, this is just off the top of my head. I will definitely need to give this issue some more thought, thank you for bringing this up." "That is a very good question which I had not considered before. I don't know the answer right now but thank you, I will give this some thought." "I don't know the answer and I hesitate to venture a guess. Thank you, I will be sure to look into this issue in more detail later." "Hm, I'm not sure. I think that ...., (but I could be wrong). Thank you, that is a very good question." (So, flag that your answer is partial and not fully thought-out, tell the audience any relevant thoughts that come to mind, and thank the person who asked the question, even if you actually think it's a silly question.) For people who insist on not shutting up even after you try and answer their question: "I'd love to talk to you about this more after the talk." or "I'd love to get more information (or: the full details of that paper, etc.) after the talk."

I would take it very seriously if I thought I couldn't get support from my (potential) advisor when I run into difficulties or just had a question about my project. For me, that would be cause for concern. Not everyone is a good teacher and teaching is in my opinion quite a separate skill from advising, so the big question is not whether this person can't do a good job explaining something to students, but how they will handle situations where you come for advice on something you can't look up in a book afterwards. I don't know what kind of relationship you have with this person at the moment, but I'd ask myself if it seems possible to work on a project together through all its stages, from design to implementation to writeup. If you're unsure or think you'll run into similar difficulties that will seriously slow you down or cause frustration, I would probably choose to look elsewhere. Your working relationship with your advisor is extremely important, so I don't think you are overthinking this.

I'm with lewin for 1-2. For 3, it depends on the skills and whether they are (i) something anyone would care about, and (ii) something that it's not already clear that you know based on other parts of your application. For 4, I agree it shouldn't go on your CV, but when I was applying I created a list of relevant coursework for an application that required it and then submitted it as a supplementary document whenever an application allowed it. I don't know if anyone looked at it, but I don't think it hurt. It's especially helpful if your transcript shows courses like "LING 288" or "Special Topics 2" which the adcom has no way of interpreting. However, if your transcript shows informative names and the list is not adding anything new, I'd leave it out. The idea is to only provide helpful/useful information and not anything redundant.

I wouldn't. It doesn't add anything relevant to your application, since these are just random jobs for short periods of time.

I went to a few school wide orientation events before my first year (not at UCLA). Honestly, they were pretty meh. There was nothing they said there that I didn't already know, and no one I met there became my friend. I wouldn't risk losing my job (and a few hundred potential dollars in salary) for that. If there is a department-internal orientation, I think that would be much more beneficial. There are other (better) ways to get familiar with your school and environment and meet new people that don't involve the orientation events.

There is actually a fair amount of linguistics PhD students with backgrounds other than in theoretical linguistics, so your situation may be less unusual than you think. I think it's fine to tell the story of the conference that got you interested in linguistics and how you've worked since then to study as much linguistics as possible. I don't think it's necessary to explain the structure of Italian degrees or grades. I don't think this alone would merit a whole paragraph. It should be just a short few sentences, and although it could be a fine opening paragraph, I can imagine it coming somewhere later in the essay. You might start with what your interests and future plans are, then circle around to your background and preparation, and how you got into linguistics, then explain why the school you are applying to is a good fit. (Alternatively, background - development of interests - current/future plans - fit - also works.) I'm not sure what you mean by personal style. This should be a polished serious document. It's the main place where you get to show yourself and address the admissions committee, and they take it seriously. Treat it as your professional calling card, but you can inject yourself into it and make it personal by talking about your interests and background, which will be unique to you. Essays and articles in linguistics are often written using 1st person pronouns, so that's a fine choice. I think it's fine to mention theories or streams of thought that interest you. If you are applying to a school where X teaches, you could mention more specifically works or ideas by X that you find exciting. I would not do too much of that, though, and I would try and find ways to connect these detailed ideas to a more general interest of yours - e.g. an interest in bringing new sources of information to bear on traditional theoretical research, such as data from aphasia patients (and other examples, if there are any that are relevant), which can teach us new things about [blah] that theoretical research alone has not been able to solve, or an interest in studying and comparing overt and covert movement [in whatever type of construction/language]. I don't know how much an adcom would like references to papers by researchers who are at other schools; I think it would show better fit if you could tie the kind of work you are interested in to something that researchers at the school you are applying to are engaged in. Presumably you will choose schools that fit your interests and can support your research plans, so this should not be an impossible task.

Assistant professors (as opposed to visiting assistant professors) are on the tenure track so aren't at greater risk of leaving for another job than associate or full professor. The main risk is that they may be denied tenure and asked to leave, in which case their students will be in some kind of trouble. Another down side to working with an assistant professor is that they are new and inexperienced, which can sometimes lead to more difficulties with advising. On the positive side, assistant profs are more driven to work and publish than their tenured colleagues, so working with them could help your own productivity. However, if choosing an assistant prof on the tenure track, I think it's highly advisable to make sure that there is another, tenured professor in the department who could serve as a secondary advisor and who could take over in case your advisor leaves (because they got denied tenure or because they moved to another job). It sounds like the professor you are describing is only now starting on the TT, so is less experienced but may therefore be around for the duration of your studies, because her tenure case won't be up before you graduate. Normally (in the US), tenure and promotion go hand in hand, so associate professors are tenured. However, there are exceptions to this rule. Most professors will have a CV on their website, which will list their appointments and whether they are tenured. I'd look that up to make sure. If this information is not readily available, I think it's fair to write the prof and ask about this (politely and gently, and keep in mind that as someone who hasn't even applied yet she may not tell you if she is going to be looking for a new job next year--but that's true of anyone in this situation, not just assistant profs). Full professors are always tenured. They are by the nature of things older and more experienced, and therefore will have more connections, but may also be slowing down their research programs and heading towards retirement or alternatively taking on administrative positions with less direct contact with students. It's important to make sure that a full professor who is nearing retirement age will still be around 4-6 years from now, when you will be graduating, or else you may need to switch advisors mid-way through your studies. The moral of the story is to find departments with more than one possible advisor whose interests are a ok-to-good fit with yours, because it's possible, for all kinds of reasons, that you may not be able to complete your studies with the same person who you had initially thought would be your main advisor, so it's important to give yourself options when you start.

Read the website carefully. Make sure the question you have is not already addressed there. Often there will be contact information for someone who is in charge of admissions, or for the Director of Graduate Studies (or similar title). If you can't find anyone in particular and this is not a question for your potential advisor that you can ask in an email to them (e.g. 'what positions have your students had post-graduation?'), I'd email the administrative staff. Someone there will either know the answer or know who to ask.

Glad it's helping -- I've been really enjoying it. I'm a lists person so having them organized and always with me is great, and being able to search, hide/unhide entries, and share them is a nice bonus.

<rant> I wish more people who are into sentence processing would do it through a linguistics department instead of a psychology department. You are trained to ask different kinds of questions in those two places. So much of the work that's out there now is, to me, nothing more than 'look, this cool thing happens!' but it doesn't tell us anything about how we should then think of the language faculty with relation to these findings. It's not related to any theory, doesn't serve to restrict or reshape the theory. If you end up actually thinking about it in that way, you realize that the design of many experiments is such that you could explain the results in several different ways and important factors that would distinguish between the predictions of different theories were not controlled for in any way...it's just very upsetting sometimes. I just wish more people did good theory driven experimental work. (Sorry, this is a passion of mine. I got into processing through a linguistics program and reading the literature can be very frustrating.) </rant> If you're into processing, I'll just mention places where I know at least one good person in linguistics doing that kind of work. Maybe you already know them, but anyway, here goes (note: I don't know the phonologists/phoneticians everywhere). Harvard (Jesse Snedeker, Masha Polinsky); UChicago (Ming Xiang); Maryland (Colin Phillips, Jeff Lidz); UMass (Brian Dillon, Lyn Frazier); MIT (Martin Hackl, Edward Flemming, Adam Albright); UC Santa Cruz (Matt Wagers); McGill (Michael Wagner, Morgan Sonderegger). Good luck with your application!

I don't think having too much experience is ever a problem. It's all about how you present it. Given your extensive background, you should be able to discuss how your experiences have helped you narrow down your research interests and how you are prepared to undertake whatever research topics you have in mind. If you present a coherent set of interests and relate them to your background, I doubt anyone will worry because you also spent a year in some other lab. It's not uncommon for undergrads and even graduate students in early years to take some time zero in on their interests and to dabble in several different subfields. I'd make sure to talk about the more relevant research experiences in more detail in your SOP and spend less time on the less relevant ones, since it does seem like you have a lot to say and it could get long, but I wouldn't worry about mentioning those other experiences in the SOP, as needed, and in your CV. As for your school selection, I only know the linguistics side so my advice can only be limited to those schools, but at least on the linguistics side, the schools you have chosen have widely different ideas about the right approach to language is. Maybe it doesn't matter for what you want to do, but I am certain that you will end up with completely (like, utterly and entirely) different projects if you study at MIT BCS as opposed to UCLA linguistics. I personally think MIT BCS is doing it all wrong and MIT linguistics is a much better place to be trained to study language, but I suppose that depends on the kinds of questions you want to ask. Brown and Penn have strong theoretical linguistics, but Berkley and Rochester don't as much. You might want to also look into NYU linguistics, since they do have a strong neurolinguistics program alongside a very good theoretical program. UMass Amherst might also be an interesting place to explore, and also Maryland linguistics. I couldn't tell you if you're aiming too high -- my guess is that not -- but it really depends on how your research interests fit with the schools you listed, and since you didn't really tell us about your interests, it's hard to know.

My PhD is not going to be officially conferred for a bit longer and it's caused me some trouble at my new job, though nothing I couldn't overcome. The person to address your questions about this to is not your advisor -- they probably know nothing about how this part of the bureaucracy works. You need to contact the registrar at your school to ask when you can expect to have the degree officially in hand. You may not get the diploma for a while longer (some schools only do that once, or just several times, a year), but often it will be reflected in your final transcript before then, or else the registrar can issue you an official letter attesting that you've been awarded the degree (and will receive the diploma in the next commencement ceremony, on date X).

Not every field has grant money to cover students' travel expenses for conferences, etc. I've also encountered some people paying out of pocket to run their own experiments, to advance their research (usually small experiments in the social sciences). I haven't heard of anyone paying to have their paper published in a journal--I suspect that this kind of funding scheme just wouldn't be sustainable in a field where there isn't a lot of grant money--but I really would not be shocked to find that such a field does in fact exist.

My field's large society conference is in January so I try and go there. Aside from that, I may do some travel for the holidays and take a few days off to relax, hike, or take a vacation, but otherwise I use the time to work. I think you'll discover soon enough that you do most of your work (especially writing things up) during breaks, and much less is accomplished during the semester.

You are asking about three completely different types of programs and it really makes me wonder what you mean when you say you've discovered that you are "very interested in linguistics." Your question sounds like "I've discovered that am interested in history. Should I apply to a Classics program, study military history in 17th century Europe, or concentrate on 11-13th century China?" These are all good choices for someone interested in those fields but there is no way we can tell you which one to choose -- it depends on your interests. If you don't know, I think it's pretty safe bet that you should not be applying to a PhD in any of these fields. You'd get vastly different education and have different job opportunities, and in any case unless there is a good reason to go down this route, most jobs you might want to do in the future would not require a PhD in any of these fields.

Not full professors, but tenured associate professors or untenuerd assistant professors? That would make a big difference. If it's two months away you could do your quals and then look into changing advisors, but I don't know if it makes sense to wait for your PI to leave. I'd say you could take this semester to deal with quals and writing up publications, but by the second half of your third year you should be starting to seriously think about your dissertation project. Suppose it takes your advisor another year to find another job and leave--that would put you in the beginning of fourth year scrambling to find a new advisor and thesis topic. Suppose he doesn't find a new place this year but only next year--then you'll already be in your fifth year! The more advanced you are in the program, the more difficult it will be for someone to take over as your advisor and for you to finish a dissertation project on time. I worry that there is more to this story than you're telling us (or than you know). Full professors don't just lose their entire research group and funding out of the blue for no reason, and they don't get re-motivated to write grants for no reason. I'd suspect serious life or health problems that have led to this situation. Is there no way for you to discreetly talk to some of the former students from your lab and find out what they think is going on? Talking to other students is not something that should alarm your PI.

I've been known to get sick right after moving to a new place. I guess it's how my body (mis)handles adjusting to a new environment/climate, etc. When the move was to new country and required getting used to new everything (including the water, food, etc.), this usually took longer than when it was just a new city in the same country. But even after my body physically adjusts to the new place, it takes much longer to feel mentally adjusted. There is just so much to take in, you don't even really realize it. But suddenly you don't know how to pay on the bus, or how the money looks, or what kind of toilet paper you like, or whether you wait to be seated at a restaurant or not, or what the name of the local drug store is, or where any of the local/university services are, and so on. It's a lot to take in. I think it's normal to feel weird about it, and I've come to expect it. I think it's actually made my most recent move this summer much easier.

Thanks! Update: Got email and access to departmental mailing lists, internet (still with some glitches), access to course management system. Will get soon: paycheck(s) (or so they say), access to library. Remains unclear for 2-3 more weeks, at least: access to health care. But on the bright side, people are doing their best to help, and also I've met most of my students, my first lecture is tomorrow, and I am excited enough to let some of this slide! (For now.)

Go to class. You will not be the only one excited, slightly confused, and overwhelmed. You can do it!

As I recall, some but not all applications asked about your past criminal record. If you are not asked about your past, I see no reason to bring it up. You are not lying, and bringing it up will do you no good. If asked, you should be truthful about your past. In that case, I think it is vital to address this issue in your SOP (or in an addendum to your application, if you can submit 'additional materials' along with the required documents) with a brief statement along the lines of what you said above -- this happened a long time ago and is firmly in the past. I would also consider having one of your letter writers address your current behavior/reliability, if there anyone who you trust with this information. The question on adcoms' minds, which you will need to answer, is whether they can trust you, given your record. You want to prove that the answer is yes.

Along the lines of what TakeruK says, I think you need to find a way to combine your interests with things that are marketable/desirable. This is somewhat tricky because no one can guarantee that what's sexy now will still be what people are looking to hire 2-5 years from now, or even next year. That said, there are trends and there are usually areas of concentration where there are routinely more jobs. You can tell e.g. from specialized workshops or conferences on particular themes, as well as from job ads. I think it would be naive to ignore that and choose a project based solely on what you are interested in. Your dissertation does not have to be the ultimate project, or the place where you solve all of the major problems that interest you. It serves as a springboard to start a research program that will define your post-dissertation work and what you study as a researcher/professor. I think it's healthier to think about it this way. You want to find a problem that will teach you some useful skills or expose you to some literature that you can then use to define a whole set of questions of interest. What you choose needs to connect with what other people find interesting and exciting, so that you can communicate why they should care about your work. It would be good if it is also something that develops skills that are useful for a variety of questions, or that will allow you to teach courses that routinely need teaching, as those things too are appealing to search committees. The dissertation is a means to an end, not really a goal in and of itself. I've personally never encountered the question you raised because fairly early on (=in the summer after my first year) I started picking up skills that are currently trendy in my field. There are some things that don't interest me and I didn't choose to specialize in them, but I learned that there are others that I'm actually good at and that I enjoy. These are skills that I had never intended to study before starting school, based solely on my interests at the time. However, having expanded my research area and technical expertise, it's become easier for me to craft research statements that have a broad appeal, and therefore to have relevant expertise for more jobs than most of my peers who graduated in the same year as I did (or, in fact, my friends who graduated 1-3 years ahead of me). I've gone out of my way to learn these skills and integrate them in my work. This is partly because I've discovered it actually interests me, but in all honestly it's also because I know it's beneficial to do this. I am still studying questions that interest me, but my dissertation project was just the first chapter in a larger research program, and the questions I asked are only a part of what I hope to study in later years. There were questions that I chose not to address, even though it would have taken the project in directions I would have enjoyed, for practical reasons of time and access to data (and because some questions I just couldn't solve in the time that I had!). And there are parts that are there because they demonstrate my technical skills and the breadth of my research, more than anything else.

I don't know what the process in your school is like, exactly, but it seems to me that it is both very unlikely and inadvisable for your to finish your PhD in your advisor's lab. He ran out of money, is actively looking for another job, and has a small and diminishing group, which I assume will also reflect on his publication rate and perhaps on the quality of any reference letter you could get from him. If he is not tenured, I am sure that this difficult time will cause him great problems. Unless things change radically, he is unlikely to get tenure. It sounds like he is (rightfully, from his perspective) concentrating on salvaging his own career, and less on his students. You probably didn't need to have that conversation that you describe--I can't imagine reacting well to my student kicking me while I'm down, pointing out all the problems I am having and criticizing my decisions, since it's really not their place. However, the problem is bigger than this conversation. Your leaving will hurt him, but you need to take care of your own interests, and that includes being in a active and productive lab that will still be there a few years from now, and having an advisor who is doing well and has a good reputation. For all of these reasons, I think you need to change advisors at some point. Whether it's better to do it now or later is harder to tell. My instinct is to say you should do it as early as possible, to allow yourself the most time to settle into a new lab and get started with new projects, but I understand that for technical reasons changing now may not be ideal. I suggest you talk about this with someone at your school. You can probably find out about the technical aspects of switching labs from the administrative assistant in your department or from the Director of Graduate Studies. You could also ask the other students who left your lab how they went about doing that. It's also going to matter what your new advisor thinks, so if there is someone whose lab you want to switch into, I suggest you talk to them about it and get their help figuring out how and when to switch.

I am not familiar with the new scores so I had to look the percentiles up. Unless things have changed a lot since I applied (which is possible, it's been a while), 95% and 72% aren't bad at all, and I think should get you past any cutoffs. 4.0 isn't great, but that alone is not a good enough reason to retake the exam, in my opinion. Are there universities you are applying to that have officially posted cutoffs that you do not meet? If not, I would choose to concentrate on other aspects of the application, as well as on your research and/or thesis. What will determine your outcomes is not so much the GRE but the SOP, writing sample, and LORs.

I think you should try and find an advisor this quarter too. Keep as many options open as possible. And if you like the advisor you rotate with now, I would spring into action and try and secure a position in their lab rather than continue to rotate.

I don't think that's common at all. What you sometimes see is people with a linguistics PhD whose research concentrates mostly on a particular language or language family get a job in a language/lit department that specializes in that language, and offer a few linguistics courses there. Off the top of my head I can think of people who have done that with Japanese, Russian, German, and English. I'm sure there are others. It's not always something people want to do because it means that you may get isolated as a scholar. You won't have (m)any other colleagues who work within the same theoretical framework as you, and you won't have (m)any students who come to do a linguistics PhD with you. But you could certainly introduce students to the study of your language within a theoretical framework and send off good students to do a PhD in other departments, and some people are content with that.