RefurbedScientist

In a somewhat awkward moment with a potential future advisor at one of my top choices, I asked what I could be doing between now and September to prepare for grad school. The professor responded, "Read things that are as far away from sociology as you can get." Great advice, but I'm way too neurotic to do that. I feel incredibly under-prepared, and will be trying to teach myself to use network analysis software over the summer (yes, I realize this is impossible, but I HAVE TO TRY )

I'm notoriously indecisive. I can't pick a restaurant, never mind a grad school. But it's pretty much between two programs, one of which has me on the wait-list (and is a far, far-shot). But this board will be first to hear!

So I think that the insider vs. outsider strategies in occupy (and movements in general) is both a great research topic AND a perfect example where activism experience can be framed as a resource for research. The key is to adopt the jargon and debates dealing with this topic to signal that you're a serious scholar and then frame your activism as "informal research" or something. P.S. Check out Andy Andrews for insider/outsider strategy stuff and environmentalism organizations. Edit: I would also add, and take this with a grain of salt, that language and style is paramount in statements of purpose when dealing with activism. Avoid at all costs any cliches like "Participating in Occupy Tulsa changed my life, made me a more empowered citizen, and enlightened me about the possibilities for sociological praxis...." That's all well and good for the introduction to your first book, but your SoP should used more measured language when it comes to personal experiences. Always frame the personal as a contributing factor to your potential as a scholar. Of course, there is a lot of debate about my claim. I think that the best writers among us may be able to pull off that "life changing anecdote" angle in the SoP. For the rest of us, it's safer to include personal experiences insofar as they shape academic questions and insight.

I agree with this statement. If you've been so involved in activism/advocacy for so long, you would be remiss not to mention it. That being said, I would not frame it like academia is a logical next step from activism (as in, you want to study X topic in order to help change the world). Rather, I would frame it as your experience in these fields will make you a better academic. For example, starting and participating in various advocacy organizations would be highly relevant to your research as an organizations scholar, insofar as you've done participant observation of orgs. and you can gain easier entree into them for future research purposes. Or if you do frame analysis, then talking about your experience developing and employing strategic action frames is relevant. Or use a methods angle, such that your activism experience will make you a better ethnographer or your policy analysis experience will make you a better statistician. Adcomms want to hear that your goal in life is to be a sociologist. If activism is an "extracurricular", then don't mention it. If activism is a resource that will make you a better scholar, then definitely mention it. But scholarship comes first (as least in your SoP. In practice, do what you want).

I think this sounds like a really great plan. I had wanted to travel a bit, but I've been working so hard doing the job + grad school application thing that I haven't had the opportunity to really take advantage of all the my city has to offer. Seeing as I'll be moving away from friends and family for the next 5-7 years, I think maybe it will be nice to just spend time with people close to me. BBQs, 4th of july fireworks, museums, music festivals, all that jazz.

Hi Stelle, I PMed you about my situation.

I've been to thee open houses so far: In New York, the South, and the West Coast, so I've pretty much covered the "fashion spectrum" of the country. I'm a man and have worn a reasonably nice button down, khakis, and simple dress shoes (i.e. the brown leather shoes I wear to work). At no point did I wear a tie or sports coat. I was at each event on the average- to better-dressed side of the curve. At no point did I feel over-dressed, but I am generally comfortable in business casual because it's what I wear everyday to work. At the same time, I never once felt underdressed. If you elect to wear a skirt or dress, then I expect that a modest business casual outfit is appropriate. I've also seen women wearing khakis with a blouse/shirt or sweater. I personally would not wear jeans or sneakers. Nor would I personally wear a tie or sports coat. Most of your time will be spent in the department among profs and grad students. Professors can run the gamut, but I think I've only seen one ever wear a tie. Grad students typically range from polo shirt and khakis to jeans and sneakers. At social events with grad students, feel free to loosen up and dress down a bit. But like has been said elsewhere, you're more likely to be "noticed" (not in a good way) for being way too dressy or being too underdressed. Better to just always play to the middle.

It's not necessarily a question of "terrible" placement. I'm curious to see if UNC's placement record is comparable to other top 5 programs, or if it's more similar to lower ranked programs. It's useful information for me because I'm comparing it to a number of other programs that are ranked lower but might place as well (or better).

No, very helpful indeed. Thanks for your response. I have the impression that UNC might not place quite as well as the other top 5 schools, but it probably does as least as well when compared with top tier schools at large. You're right that they do well with demography post docs and RWJ post docs. I think that the program may lack the resources and networks available to the similarly ranked private schools, which of course has an impact on its PhDs getting coveted assistant professorships as a first job. On the other hand, it's possible that UNC grads prefer to do a postdoc that leads into a top R-1 TT job (for which they are doubtlessly well trained) rather than accepting a "lower status" first job, and this preference would be reflected in a sort of delay in the placement record. Anyone else heard anything through the grapevine on UNC an job prospects? I'm curious to see if UNC places grads below its punching weight, so to speak.

Do you, fert, (or @anyname or anyone else) know if UNC places grads as well as its counterparts in the top 5? The website actually does a great job of listing recent placements, but it's not clear how those stack up against Harvard/Stanford/Chicago. Has UNC's placement record, and it's reputation as a whole for that matter, been on the ascent or decline recently or does the forecast look stable?

I am from New England originally and live in Boston now. My girlfriend is from Sacramento, though, where winter is 50 degrees. She has spent about five winters here. Here's the thing: The cold, per se, is not what you have to worry about. Yes it sucks to not be able to read outside or go on long walks. But the cold is easy to ignore if you're prepared, as dhm0219 pointed out. Being prepared means investing in a great coat, good boots, and long underwear. Yes, that's a couple hundred dollars. Consider it an investment. You will thank yourself every day when you walk outside. What you do have to worry about is the emotional strain of 4 months with minimal sunlight, constant cold dampness, and trudging through snow and ice. Seasonal affective disorder (or something on the spectrum toward it) is common among many of us. The month of February is the most miserable time of year for me, and always has been. The antidote, however, usually lies in having a strong social network, things to keep you occupied and distract you from the weather, and regular exercise. I wouldn't pass up a great opportunity just because of weather. If you really think that the winter will affect you emotionally (which is perfectly legitimate), then that's cause to reconsider. The good thing about Boston is that things are close together, the public transportation is decent, and there's plenty to keep you busy indoors. People don't just hibernate through the winter. They go to bars and museums and concerts and cafes. And look on the bright side: At least it's not Chicago, Madison, or Montreal.

Yes, that was my attempt at "the short answer."

I think this question is valid, and the various possible responses are perhaps beyond the scope of this thread (yeah, I've been on the conference circuit ). The short answer is this: I speculate that the same issues with broader social stratification are present too in academia. So if we were to adopt a conflict theory paradigm, for starters, then it follows that the inherent contradictions of the stratified system lead to conflict that in turn leads to breakdown. I think we see this starting to happen with the over-valuation of higher education in general, whereby the presumed return to investment in higher education (cultural capital) is not really that liquid with other forms of capital (financial capital). If we didn't have a highly stratified society, then it may be more reasonable for people to pursue jobs that did not require higher education (if we assume that these jobs pay better in a less stratified society, or if income is moot). But people do pursue higher ed. because it promises a return; the return is increasingly only guaranteed at higher levels of academic stratification; more people clamor to be in the upper tiers; upward pressure is unsustainable; the market can't bear the oversupply of highly educated labor; so on and so forth. So that's one problem Other problems include the Foucauldian critique I intimated at before. That is, discourse rationalizes the system of control. So we end up doing bad science because what we think/find/argue is colored by the rationale/epistemic values particular to our system, which likewise rationalizes and reproduces the system, moving us farther away from anything resembling truth (think of the role of many professional economists pre-financial crisis as a simplified illustration). We can also take a management perspective that lack of diversity in collective work stifles innovation. So any field where people have an incentive to be more alike than different (which is conducive to moving up the academic hierarchy, because you need to play ball with big names and there are only a handful of conversation-setting departments), you will have a lack of innovation and a reproduction of old ideas. (For literature on this, check out a recent orgtheory post on group projects and innovation.) The list could go on and on. Note that I haven't made a normative argument yet that "stratification is just plain bad." I think it's easy to find evidence and theory arguing that stratification in any field has deleterious effects on the field and negative externalities elsewhere (e.g. academic stratification reinforces status quo at subordinate levels, such as college and high school, which are likewise affected by social stratification at large, especially race, class and gender. So if we believe that race, class, and gender inequality are normatively bad, then it follows that academic stratification is pragmatically bad at resolving those social problems.)

Returning to the OP's very well-stated original point: Yup. I agree. We make the proverbially bed, and now we gotta lay in it. Since we're talking reproduction, let's talk Foucault. Any discourse which occurs within a system of social control will reproduce that system, even as it challenges it. Discursive challenges to a system bounded by the logic of that system only rationalize it. In academia, for example, if we try to disassemble the strict stratification through a more meritocratic hiring system, we will reward according to merit defined by the logic of the current academic field, which has an observable Matthew effect. If we say, "I need to go to a top tier school so that I'm in a powerful position to end this hierarchy," then we are likewise reproducing the hierarchy by concentrating power in ourselves as elite. The solution may be a greater diversity of academic counter-public spheres, whereby a degree from a top tier program may count for a lot in the conventional sphere, but not mean a whole lot in an alternate sphere. If you think this is impossible, look at the current state of journalism. Earning journalistic credentials means very little in the age of citizen journalists, smart phones, and twitter. You can argue (as professional journalists do) about credibility issues, but those issues are epistemologically bound to the logic of the current system. By subscribing to and enforcing the epistemic value of credibility, you reproduce the very same hierarchy. As an illustration, look at how quick we are to use Wikipedia. I bet the publishers of Encyclopedia Britannica might object, but we've determined that the collective intelligence of a bunch of anonymous wikipedia contributors is more useful to us than the credibility of a conventional encyclopedia publisher. I think socieconomist may have hit the nail on the head: for academics to stop being so obsessed with hierarchy, they need to abstain from participating in the hierarchy altogether. I would argue that this is not, in the long run, a bad thing. It's a deficit of imagination that leads us to believe that knowledge can only be produced by a strictly hierarchical academic system.

And rejections should come in the form of exploding cigars. "Congratulations on your...BANG!"

I'm especially amused that I have to wait for the letter in the mail. I work at Harvard and live not 15 minutes walking distance from campus... they could have sent a carrier pigeon and it would be faster than UPS.

Agreed. I just think that, when you have two pages to capture all the reasons a program should accept you, tutoring in your department is probably less useful than, say publications and conferences and RAships (and all the other baller stuff in splitends' app). Nonetheless, those "service-oriented" things are important to do insofar as they allow you to build strong positive relationships with faculty. This is even more true at a big school with big name profs, like Berkeley, where it could be easy to get lost, but getting those LORs from top scholars will have a big return. I think this says something interesting about strategy (if you were to think strategically about getting into grad school during your UG years, which I, for one, did not). That is, I went to a small school without "big name" professors in my department. Because classes were small, developing a relationship and "sticking out" was fairly easy, but the return was smaller because my profs weren't well-known. So from a purely self-interested rationale, tutoring and doing departmental service would not have helped my app much. Instead, I could have done more to look outside my school for conference and publication opportunities. Because I went to a small school, we don't have UG journals or UG conferences or opportunities to RA (departments are so small, they rarely need UG RAs because they had grad students for that). So this is not by way of wishing I had done otherwise as a UG, but rather speculating about how one should think about planning ahead depending on individual strengths and external circumstances, such as available resources, size of school, etc.

I try my best not to rant or complain, but I hope you'll all excuse some minor "venting": Rats. This one is a bummer. Phew. Ok, find my inner peace.

I started reading this site regularly more than a year ago. Having not studied sociology nor even considered pursuing a doctorate as an undergrad, this site helped me be the strongest possible applicant I could be (considering I couldn't go back in time and do more things like get RAships, try to publish, etc.). That being said, yes, surrounding yourself with over achievers will always stress you out and, sometimes, push you to excel. It's all about balancing pressure to "keep up" with the necessity to be yourself, know your limitations, and find a place (personally and professionally) that fulfills you. I think gradcafe may be a little sample of grad school, in fact.

Splitends, it's no wonder you got into so many top programs. I also wouldn't underestimate the importance of the close relationships you had with professors in your department. (I assume you studied sociology from your tutoring). Getting strong letters of recommendation is critical and separates you from the pack of other students with similar GPA/GRE numbers. So while activities like peer advising and tutoring may not add value to your applications, per se, they might go a long way toward getting that glowing letter of rec. Way to go!

Congratulations on a stellar round, Splitends. With a scorecard like that, I'm sure "luck" has nothing to do with it. I'm especially curious about your research interests. What do you want to study?

Anyone else just get a cryptic rejection email from Harvard?

Splitends, please excuse the potential stalker quality of this, but you were accepted at Harvard and Princeton, too, right? And where else, if you don't mind my asking? I ask on behalf of those of us who may be waitlisted at this or other programs. Thanks and congratulations!

I'm in the same boat with UCSB, a school where i felt like I was a strong candidate and where I had positive exchanges with a POI. Speaking from only my perspective, I imagine myself on a sort of de facto wait list. Acceptances went out a while ago, so I assume rejections have been mostly made as well. I like to locate myself in limbo somewhere in between. Perhaps they're waiting till after recruitment day to make final cuts when they'll have a better sense for the matriculation rate and cohort size.

Alternatively, we could be selected based on the quality of our participation on grad cafe. Sounds fair to me.