runonsentence
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Posts posted by runonsentence
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Ah, runonsentence, I was hoping you'd reply! You seem like the go-to guy/gal for rhetoric and composition on these boards.
Ha, well I hope some others show up as well to give you more than just my perspective on things, once we get into the full swing of app season!
Thanks for the MA suggestions! I think a generalist MA would be a possible option as well; I'm assuming such programs wouldn't expect their applicants to have everything figured out as far as subfield goes.
Do you know of any other funded MA programs? Or, alternately, strong rhet/comp PhD programs that *don't* require a MA for admission? I have found PhD programs that don't, but I know little about composition/rhetoric so I'm unsure as to which programs are strong, not-so-strong, etc.
Right. I mean, if you decide that rhet/comp was definitely the subfield for you, by all means pursue the master's—but I know that for myself, the broad background and chance to take some electives in a more generalist MA program in lit was really helpful.
My institution, the University of Cincinnati, funds master's students, though that funding is dwindling somewhat and we're not able to fund as many MA lines as before. But PM me if you'd like more info on UC.
I don't know of any BA-applicant friendly PhD programs off the top of my head, since I was applying with an MA this past season and not paying attention to that. But if you list some programs that were BA-applicant friendly, I (or some other R/C people) can possibly tell you a little about some of them.
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- Creatures (for when I feel the need to play God and kill things without guilt)
Seriously, Just Me, take the advice of the Grad Cafe consensus and see a therapist or counselor.
- Strangefox and 3fast3furious
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An interesting, if tangential, note from my days as a production editor for a publisher of academic journals: editors themselves are hardly paid for running journals. The editorial department awarded small honorariums to the editors-in-chief, which could not have been more than a couple thousand, and those on the editorial board performing the work of peer review, of course, received nothing at all....
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Glad to help, Zeemore!
If you try online dating, go with something free, like OKcupid. OKcupid used to have a really compelling argument for why paying for online dating doesn't make sense, mathematically. Apparently they've taken it down from their site since they were bought my Match.com, but someone archived a version on their own blog: http://interestingreads.posterous.com/why-you-should-never-pay-for-online-dating-ok
- the007expert and husky
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UnlikelyGrad is absolutely right. One of my colleagues came to town single just over two years ago and married her (now) husband yesterday. She met him by getting involved with a local church that had a young adult group that organizes regular get-togethers. Another colleague met a long-term boyfriend through a community yoga group.
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Eight isn't too many, IMO. I was advised by several faculty in my MA program to do no fewer than 6 or 7. The best thing to do is to achieve a balance between applying to a good variety of programs but not overloading yourself with so many applications that the quality of your app packet suffers.
I ended up applying to 10 last cycle: 3 tier I (reach) schools, 4 tier II (competitive) schools, and 3 tier III ("safety") schools.
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Great! You should always have some reach schools in your pool.
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Sounds like you need to start research blogging.
Has the benefits of writing for an audience and having to explain something you've just read, with the added benefits of searchable archives. -
The person who writes the letter should be the person who knows you best, IMO. Trust me, I know from experience: a letter from a famous person who only sort of knows you isn't going to look great.
If you want them to collaborate in writing the letter, the thing to do would be to have the post-doc write and sign, and ask the professor/PI to co-sign the letter. This is often what some people do who have taken a course where the TA knows them best but need a signature from the professor/doctoral-holding person to hep substantiate it.
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Thanks for the insight on Rosetta Stone. I was curious how helpful it would be with that kind of testing. I know some of the websites say "in a language related to your field of study," so that is why I was worried that they wouldn't let me get away with French. I do not plan to do anything comparative, so it sounds to me like I should just wait until (if) I get in somewhere, and then talk to my advisor about what I should do next. I'm totally down for learning Spanish if necessary, but if I can avoid that hurdle, I would like to.
Yes, unless it's super easy or free to take some Spanish before school, I'd wait before doing much. Again, not that my program is indicative of the field as a whole, but you may find that even if they wanted you to pass proficiency in Spanish, it would be super easy like my requirement. At my university we just take a reading class or two, and pass an open-dictionary translation exam. No fluency required.
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Off the top of my head, Ohio State (top tier) and Penn State?? (top tier) are both programs that are, more or less, MA > PhD programs. They offer funding to master's students.
Miami University of Ohio might also offer master's funding for comp/rhet, though you'd have to check on that.
If you're still sort of unsure about subfields at this point, you could also find a more generalist master's degree in lit at a school that offers PhDs in rhet comp and take rhet comp courses here and there as electives while you decide whether or not rhet comp is for you. It's honestly not super uncommon for rhet comp applicants for PhD spots to come in from a literature background, so I don't think such a move would hurt your PhD applications. If you get to teach comp and take some sort of teaching college writing course (fairly standard at most schools) you'd get some kind of introduction to the field. (My university, U Cincinnati, is this sort of program.)
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Oh, I've just thought of one more suggestion—if you didn't before, tailor your SoP to each school this time.
It is a pain in the ass. (I'm not going to sugarcoat it.) But it's really important.
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Sorry to hear that the last application cycle was so discouraging for you, but it sounds like you're doing all the right things to improve this time around!
The best thing that you can do this time around is find schools that are a good fit, not just a big name, and you're already doing that. You might want to try contacting faculty as well, this time around. I don't know about you, but I was never good at the "selling" myself thing; but, I've found that many faculty members are happy to answer some questions about the program, put you in touch with current grads, and tell you about what it'd be like to work with them, which can make contacting them less intimidating and/or artificial.
Also, when you choose schools to apply to: unless you already have a master's degree, you could also try applying to one or two funded master's programs to give yourself some more options once decisions come in. My first time through the application cycle I was rejected from all of my PhD programs, but I had an acceptance to a funded master's program and it was the best thing I could have done for myself. I didn't realize at the time how unfocused my research interests still were, and it enabled me to find a subfield (rhet comp) that I find even more rewarding and energizing.
But apart from choosing schools more strategically, I'd recommend you focus the most time on your writing sample and SoP. Those are so important for your application packet.
And as far as LoRs go, no need to feel embarrassed! You're actually asking for a smaller favor the second time around, since your writers already have a letter in place that they can just tweak in terms of dates. And plenty of people have trouble getting acceptances the first time around.
The only other suggestion I can think of is asking letter writers (when they tweak) to make sure they address specific strengths of yours that you think they can speak to. It's actually not a weird thing to ask; some of my letter writers asked me to specifically outline points I wanted them to hit, or asked me to proof a draft of their recommendation.
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I find it so bleak when so many humanities students jokingly make comments about their 'useless' degrees, and yet continue to pursue them in this half-hearted, ironic way. We all need to believe in the importance of what we do.
I'm happy to say that I've actually found it to be the opposite, in my department: because we know how shitty the market can be, all of the English grads I know are really serious and driven, have a clear idea of what they want to do with their degrees, and are committed to making their time in graduate school as rewarding as possible.
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Well, first I'd recommend you take a closer look at the language requirements; some schools may require two languages, but won't require that you be equally proficient in both. My program doesn't require two, but makes it an option (that is, one can either demonstrate in-depth knowledge in one language or basic knowledge in two).
Also, unless you're going into comparative lit, they may not mind that you fulfill your language requirement in French. You're right that it would be much more useful to have Spanish proficiency (unless you're studying Haitian literature), but unless you're doing comparative work and consulting original Spanish texts, I doubt programs will mind what language you know. For people not doing comparative work, the language requirement is often an antiquated requirement that schools are hesitant to phase out because no one else has. (Most students in my program take the French reading course to pass their requirement for no other reason than the prof is easier than the ones teaching other languages.)
BUT, assuming you do need to learn Spanish: I'd contact your advisor (or wait until you can speak with her/him face-to-face) before spending money. It may be that there's an easy option for completing your requirement (like the reading courses we have to take at my university—the exam is an open-dictionary translation of an original work pertaining to your field at the end of the term. That's it).
And as far as Rosetta Stone goes, I've been using Rosetta Stone for Farsi recently; my experience has been, while it's effective at getting you to speak and listen quickly, it's not going to teach you grammar as thoroughly or vocabulary as extensively as classroom Spanish would, and it may not be as effective at teaching reading. It's fantastic for immersion and conversation, but that's not what proficiency exams are usually testing you for.
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Pennepacker is more interested in doomsday mongering than actually offering solutions (especially in his Just Don't Go article in the Chronicle).
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Agreed. The prof and whether or not the material lines up with your interests matters more than whether the course has been taught before.
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Also, at my campus, the bookstore gives employees a 15% discount—and TAs are technically employees.
If I need a book in a hurry, it's often cheaper than paying for rush shipping (or at least it was before the days of free Amazon Prime).
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I don't think all of my experience is necessarily indicative of the humanities as a whole, but here it is.
I'm at a large public university with a medium-sized department, and I'm in a small subfield within that department. As a consequence, my advisor doesn't have a lot of advisees to keep track of, and is able to devote a large amount of time to mentoring me. It's not unusual for her to reach out to me occasionally and ask how things are going with this or that. On a personal level, she's someone I can confide in if I'm feeling overwhelmed or unsure how to proceed, and she's there to celebrate my successes as well. I occasionally socialize with her and other grads outside the department (on runs/races or happy hours) or babysit her kids.
My advisor is there when I have questions about the profession, to give me advice on coursework, and to look over drafts of proposals, applications, grants, etc. She doesn't require me to run things by her, but I usually seek her out before submitting things on my own so that I have her feedback.
When I draw closer to exams, my advisor will guide me through that process and help me draw up (and approve on changes I suggest to) my exam list.
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You're going to have no problem finding conferences with those cities nearby. Off the top of my head, there's a very grad-student friendly conference held in Louisville every year on literature post-1900, though I realize this doesn't align with your own interests.
And on second thought, I should mention that the ACLA is actually quite grad-student friendly. I presented there my first year as an MA student, as did another colleague of mine, and at least half the participants on the program were grad students as well (though probably mostly PhDs).
Good luck!
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Why not post a version of your SOP for critique? I don't know if many people do so on this forum (I think there was a livejournal group once upon a time). I'm sure there would be plenty of people happy to give you feedback.
Indeed, many of us would be happy to give your SoP a once-over. If you want to (when you have a draft in place), many post requests in the SoP sub-forum in the applications forum. (I'd avoid posting the actual draft, if I were you, and just post a request.)
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I think it's fine to state why you want to go to grad school, but only if by "grad school" you mean "graduate-level study in my chosen research area." Make sure you're going beyond why you'd be a good graduate student; you need to tell them why you'll be a good ___ graduate student. (What do you understand your discipline to be? What do you think it takes to succeed in the discipline, and how do you see yourself doing that?)
There's no one way to start an SoP, so you're not confined to starting with "why I love my discipline" if that's not what feels right for you. For instance, I've liked the way that several samples I consulted opened, by stating research interests. (E.g., "Teaching, in addition to the reading, thinking, and administrative work I’ve done in rhetoric and composition over the past year, has confirmed for me that this is the discipline where I can best combine my interests in pedagogy, rhetoric’s social and cultural implications, and textual analysis. ")
But really, I'd honestly worry about the ending last. I'd work on getting a draft (no matter how awful) down on paper, and then see what feels most natural or right for the opening.
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I can see why you're tempted to show an adcom that you've overcome something crushing, but here's why I'd still recommend you resist the impulse, even though you applied to this program before: I think that too many people get their SoPs bogged down with trying to explain away what they see as imperfections in their profile.
While the SoP is the ideal place to explain something glaring to an adcom, you really want the document (as others mentioned) to be a positive one that focuses on your accomplishments and potential. You don't need to tell an adcom why you're better than a rejection—you should tell them why you're a kickass applicant, period.
How do you record/store student grades?
in Teaching
Posted
For those of you who are responsible for keeping track of student grades for the classes they TA: what method do you use to record grades?
A paper gradebook? An Excel sheet? The gradebook function in your university's course management software (e.g., Blackboard)?
I ask because I'm in the process of going through my student evals and pulling out the useful constructive criticism. I've used Excel spreadsheets in the past, but have had one or two students comment that they'd like to see their current grades online.
Though I prefer using my spreadsheets and just telling students they can ask to conference with me anytime about their grades, something more transparent would have the benefit of simplifying homework grades (I could collect more electronic homework instead of having to hand back paper).
So, yes, curious to see what others do.