mandarin.orange

Where do they live? Would you have to drive to campus? Huge drain on time, maintenance, and money...UCLA is very much disincentivizing car-commuter traffic to campus.

I got word of my acceptance (3 years ago) when I called the student affairs officer at the program I'd applied for, and inquired outright. If a similar staff person has been the primary contact in handling the app process for you (and, will ultimately handle much of your paperwork when you're enrolled), that is a good person to contact.

Rant: this whole week. • watching a proposal we (a service committee) worked 6 months on turn to dust, by way of a shit storm of group emails. • admitted students are visiting. We (me + roomie) volunteered to host and were set up with someone who ultimately flaked...crashed at another grad's place after out drinking? Wasted confusion and time on our part. • samples that took twice as long to process as the ones before were set in an oven w/ temp. set too high. Finding their shriveled-up, useless forms when I opened the oven Fri afternoon pretty much summed up the week. Worst is, to make time for all this, I put off a few real interesting emails from outside collaborators re. research. I should've spent my time there, happily chasing down their questions and perusing new data. And I am never, ever volunteering for service again while in grad school...whatever job after this, any service I even consider had better have a measurable benefit towards tenure.

Abysmally bad idea. My favorite article about it is here. The line that gets me most: "we are...being sold the lie that Alberta tar sands oil is conflict-free oil, gotten by scraping away the boreal forest of Canada - the great lungs of North America, one of our last hopes for temperance against rising CO2 levels." I did fieldwork in the Ft. McMurray area about ten years ago, in winter. While I never care to repeat the experience of -38 ˚C on unnamed lakes, I've yet to see another landscape so pristine.

Agreed. This is my pat response to any of those "FacebookIs10" movies:

I too was trying to think of a clever way to reference that thread...

"There's some old-ass lake sediment in them thar hills."

So I submitted mine and it's not posted yet; I'm confused because I thought it was the funniest ever. I don't know how this works, if they are actually moderating/approving these things, or doling them out in carefully-spaced intervals, but great, one more site for me to constantly refresh and be obsessed with.

Anyone else following @lolmythesis? Seems to have taken off over the holiday break. I submitted mine. This just may be my latest favorite distraction. WhatShouldWeCallGradSchool still holds a special place in my heart, but then again, those .gifs just take so long to load...

I agree with everything Usmivka has said. I'd recommend posting your concerns about living independently on reddit, and see what you get...or, at the very least, browsing that site. You'll probably find lots of likeminded posts already there, and greater volume of folks willing to offer some valuable advice.

One of my favorite rebuttals to this (inaccurate, not scientifically proven) idea is the following article. Love, love, LOVE that she uses a Tiny Fey, Amy Poehler et al. SNL bit as part of her supporting evidence: How Long Can You Wait to Have a Baby? Awesome! I am secretly hoping that she lectures exactly like she writes/blogs...would be hilarious.

This blog post (from today) reminded me of this thread and (grudgingly) roused me to participate again. Love her no-holds-barred language about having a baby while in academia. Five Things I Say to Career Women Who Tell Me They Want To Have a Baby

WOW. ...and you're going into social work...?

On the contrary, I've been amazed at the response generated in the 24 hours between the posts I've made this weekend. There are many here (a few quite long-time grad-cafers) who've taken the time to write incredibly articulate responses, about experiences close to home for them (i.e. their romantic life) in the hopes that it will help shift your perspective. Four pages of replies in a week is quite voluminous for gradcafe. Sorry it hasn't been helpful for you.

What an interesting (and, ahem, telling) follow-up question...I actually just passed the 5-year mark with my fantastic BF. I guess describing myself as "unmarried" means I'm single/alone/no prospects...and anxious about this? Of all the things in life, I have always felt that planning marriage, love and a relationship is the stickiest. I have many friends who would make great parents, and were eager to do so, and it just didn't work out. Your degree, staying fit, travel, career, and generally being awesome: barring any family or health crisis, that's largely up to you.

Actually, the woman eagerly raising her hand was me outing myself as a (quite happily) unmarried, child-free woman in her 30s.

If that's your true mindset, though, isn't it best to be up-front? Why jump through hoops to hide your true eagerness to have a husband and family, just to get more responses, hits on the page, and dates? At some point any blossoming prospect will have to be aware of your fixed timeline as things get serious, and then it becomes blindsiding or "crazy-making" if this is something you previously tried to "play it cool" or conceal as "too crazy." Hence the "I don't want a girlfriend" or "I don't want to maintain this long-distance" exits. I'm all about full disclosure. There are men out there equally as eager to start families.

If this is what you want and your mindset, I encourage you to put exactly this, verbatim, into your online dating profile.

Thank you both. I do try to vary activity now, but my morning section really drags. I stare at them for long intervals and wait for someone to speak after I pose questions...works somewhat; generally someone can't take the tension and speaks up. Will check out these resources!

This year I'm a TA leading discussion sections, after a two year break from any sort of teaching after my stint as a high school teacher. Thus far I've run my sections with a combination of slides w/ pics to reinforce lecture topics, discuss these ?s with small groups of peers, me leading a follow-up discussion, going over rubrics for next assignment, and video clips. However, I fear this is the same "mode" I'd used when planning the days for my HS courses. Students today in particular were drifting off or a bit passive, after they felt they'd made their 1 or 2 contributions for their participation points for the day. This may reflect a deeper-seated fear of having to be "on" for the entire 2 hour duration, which strikes me as an awful long time. So, how can I be a better discussion facilitator? Or, any ideas for activities, prep, additional prep students could do (instead of 1 page pre-writing responses) that are more appropriate for college students?

I applied to two schools. Rejected by one, accepted (with bells on) from the other, which has been an excellent fit and with someone I'd wanted to work with for years who's now my advisor. Throughout the process, I was 75% sure I'd have to follow my plan B, which was to continue working for two more years, and then apply to a wider swath of schools. If it feels right for you, do it. I personally was gobsmacked to read the "how much did you spend on applications?" thread that was kicking around here a few years ago, and seeing four-digit figures.

I like juilletmercredi's advice a lot. In fact, you could get yourself this t-shirt as a constant reminder of that fact:

Sure! If she can attest to your writing, ideas, and promise as a scholar - and has offered - this sounds like a no-brainer. I had spent time away from academia, and I actually only had one academic/professor LOR when I (successfully) applied to the school I wanted...the other two were from former supervisors, who could attest to my work as a teacher/educator, and in a government job. As far as writing your own, I think I would avoid. I've proofread my own LOR from my MS advisor (he was quite dyslexic so I was used to his requests to serve as editor), and I now "ghost write" the LORs for undergrads that work in our lab that my advisor signs. But I haven't heard of someone, esp. an undergrad, writing their own letter outright. I would imagine the similarity in writing styles between that and SOP could be recognized.