thepoorstockinger

Mandatory daily physical education for college students? Mandatory unpaid TAing? Mandatory arts and sports requirements? What kind of bizarre university did you get your undergraduate degree from?

Where did you apply in Canada? (I assume UBC, UofT, maybe York and SFU?) I have been pretty much flat out told that getting a PhD in US history from a Canadian school is a red flag now days on the Canadian job market. There are so many unemployed academics with PhDs from good American schools looking for work that it can be a deal breaker to try to get a job up here in US history without American credentials. I would also rather be somewhere with a large number of faculty and other students working on modern America, be closer to my archives, and quite frankly there aren't a lot of people working on what I am working on in Canada. (or the US for that matter)

What field are you in? Are you applying to MA or PhD programs?

So it sounds like Northwestern is it, eh? Bummer as it is a poor fit for me. I am aware of the fact that Canadian PhD programs do not require the GRE, but I study modern American history so I will be heading south for the doctorate. I have a plan to study for the GRE starting next semester to write it in the fall of 2010. I will probably go with the Kaplan or Princeton review book but not take classes due to my current school's location. I am not terrified of the test, my math skills are not good but I think I can score well enough on the verbal. It's less me expecting to do poorly than it is me being aware that I just don't know how I will score and wanting to be prepared with some decent non-GRE-requiring options if things go poorly, but it doesn't seem like there are any. Just added incentive to make sure I don't do poorly, I guess. Thanks for the input guys/gals!

I don't think it matters unless she/he was in the department you're applying to or know people in that department. Simply having attended the same school some decades ago in a different department will give him no additional credibility.

Anyone have any suggestions? I am a Canadian who isn't used to writing standardized tests so I have no idea how I'll fair when I write the GRE (I am at least 12 months away from that as I am in a Canadian MA program at the moment) so I want to make sure I apply to some schools which don't require it. So far all I've been able to find is North Western. Anyone know of any other schools?

He also may want to try not being an asshole. The guy might very well be an "underachiever" (in so much as a person with a PhD from an Ivy League school and a tenure track university job can be deemed as failing to achieve) teaching at an R2 school but if that is true then it means coyabean should be aware that if the school is crummy and has shitty professors then she/he is attending a crummy school full of underachieving faculty.

My experience is that it breaks down along some lines (like who has class together, who is TAing what class and who is sharing an office with who) but mostly according to personalities. Other than one person everyone hates there isn't a lot of divisions in my cohort. We don't even know who most of the students in other years are however. Some of us go out and get drinks together/eat/see movies together and we try to invite everyone but some people just choose not join us. I think it's important to realize that with grad school compared to undergrad people are on wildly different schedules (I have three courses this semester, some people in my cohort have one) and are at wildly different points in their lives (we have married 22 year olds, part timers in their 40s, a bunch of 30 somethings who left careers to pursue grad school, a 55 year old who thinks she's a faculty member).

If they're not even done graduate school then they're not a good option for a LOR.

I feel kind of annoyed that you sent me a private message asking me to vote in this poll. If I had any interest in (or even the slightest bit of knowledge about Poli Di Milano University, European universities, engineering, computer science or anything related to this) I would have already voted. I gather you probably PMed a whole pile of random users. Not really cool or particularly polite in my opinion. Also not very smart: my opinion on this matter is less than worthless.

University of Alberta if you're willing to go North.

It's not a significant academic accomplishment: it's a degree requirement.

God, how rich are you that $5000 isn't worth ordering a set of transcripts and asking for two reference letters?

The number of people in your program won't have a huge impact on whether or not you get it. My understanding is that OGS and SSHRC ( don't know about NSERC) both use the 80%/3.7gpa in last two years cut off as a strict, hard and fast sorting tool so if you are below that mark you're flat out of luck. That said, if you are applying to NSERC or other external grants anyway if your school will let you. (Although you should ask first, because they may also toss the application if it doesn't meet their grade cut off).

Not very viable at all.

I feel like "carjacked and assaulted on way to college" is a reasonable excuse for one poor semester. (but what do I know) I'd just mention it as "I was the victim of a serious crime at the beginning of the semester" or something similar and ask a professor I was close to to also mention it in a LOR.

No. No one cares if you answered phones for angry Verizon users who had a miscalculated bill, slung chicken from a street cart or day traded stocks on Wallstreet unless it's directly related to your field of study. If you are asked to submit a CV or resume and you do include stuff like lifeguard, bus boy or whatever then you're not doing it right. You only have to list academic/related employment. No one need ever know that you were unemployed.

How on earth are they going to know you were unemployed?

Again, concentrating on your reasoning: It depends on your field, but transferring to your hometown U may in fact hurt your chances of staying with this guy for two reasons: 1) If there is a big difference between the reputation and quality of the two programs then attending the better program may give you more options in the future to determine where it is you end up living. The life of an academic involves not getting to choose where you live, having better graduate training makes it slightly more likely that you will have multiple job options. If you take a significant step down you may be in a situation where you're forced to take a job in the middle of nowhere, far away from your partner because you don't have other options. (This is not a "OMG go to the big name school!" recomendation, this is a suggestion to go to the school that will train you the best and which offers the best job prospects) I would also suggest that if the guy isn't willing to understand that being romantically involved with an academic means moving around all the time then this relationship simply won't work unless you abandon the pursuit of academia. 2) If you switch schools and end up hating being in the PhD program at Hometown U then you're going to transfer that disappointment onto your partner. I would, at the very least, take a year at the new school and see how you like it before even considering the switch.

Congrats! That must be a huge relief.

Is it baseball and the civil war? Because there is an unholy amount of literature on that field.

Sociology folks are doing a lot of sports stuff now as well as econ (mostly doing statistical and business side stuff obviously) and obviously people in the phys ed and kinesiology departments are working on some historical stuff. The problem is that I am interested in doing the social history of sports as a field (but not writing my dissertation on a sports related topic) but most of the people working on sports history are either working at schools where I would never, ever consider doing a PhD for various reasons and/or writing stuff about sports that is just straight up terrible. Elliot Gorn at Brown is the exception (although I don't think he does much sports history any more). I guess my two biggest problems are that I don't have enough of a desire to do it as a field to make it a primary factor in picking a school and I think that a lot of what is being written in sports history isn't very good.

Really? The deadline to notify OGS about take up of the award wasn't until June 30th.... so if she did hear then she is definitely in the minority.

re: SOP - Try to get your hands on a variety of recent, successful SOPS in your field and read them. That really should be the first step, since people often are completely off on their first few tries. I would also make sure you check and see when internal deadlines are for things, and make sure you know exactly where and when you need to send documents outside of your control like transcripts. I definitely scrambled to get transcripts from places where I was a visiting student ordered in time to meet internal deadlines at my school for some external scholarships and it cost me a bit extra to get rush delivery on them.