TripWillis

Good luck! You are faced with such tough and awesome choices. Envious...

How was the Cornell visit? Are you pretty much decided at this point, are you maybe holding out for Princeton?

Just declined UMass Amherst. Got this wrenching feeling in my gut as I was doing it. I know it was the right decision, but I also hope it was the right decision. Good luck to all you waitlisters! BTW, I'm 20thC/Af Am/Queer Studies if that helps anyone in terms of field.

I had one contact with Rutgers after the initial e-mail and I was assured that I was very high on the waitlist and likely to get in. I was also told that they'd be in regular contact. The person I spoke to said to ask if I had questions and said to send them by e-mail if I did. I sent a few questions about three weeks ago, but no response. Sent a check-in e-mail earlier this week also with no response. I'm confused as to what it all means, but I think I just have to be patient. Either they're no longer interested in me or they're waiting until they can tell me definitively that I'll get in.

Just bumping this to see if people are still visiting and what they think. Also to see if more people have declined.

Still waiting for Rutgers to contact me. Ugh, this better be resolved within the next week. I don't want to go through two more weeks of waiting!

Raymond Williams' Marxism and Literature is highly undervalued these days, even though it is very readable and hugely important to modern literary study. Just sayin.

I had a good trip. The department is excellent, but I won't be attending. Should be sending in my decline either tomorrow or friday. Will let y'all waitlisters know when I do. BTW, Stately, based on a lot of stuff I heard, I couldn't help but feel it would be an excellent fit for you... 7 year guaranteed funding for people coming in with a BA, professionalization and highly guided teaching experience, the Renaissance Center and ELR... yeah... I dunno. Not gonna tell you what to do, but if I were you I'd go there. I will have a more detailed report soon. If you want to hear any negative things (there are very few), PM me. I don't want to broadcast them all over the internet like this is a Yelp review, but I want to be honest.

I'm visiting tomorrow. Will let you guys know what I think.

This guy keeps posting this on the results board: "A couple months after I was accepted to the BU PhD program, I tried to switch courses due to what I thought was a personality conflict with a prof. The grad program director seemed on board with this switch. To my face, the grad program director said the switch was ok if I found another course. I found out subsequently that the grad program director was warning the other professors against letting me make this switch to their courses. He told some professors he wanted me out of the program. It seemed to me at the time just bad timing, not a coordinated denial. The grad program director later made up some flimsy reasons for warning me about my performance in the program. One allegation related to my partial grade from the dropped course which didn't factor into my GPA. The other purported reason was student comments on my grading, which I was not actually shown evidence. The grad director also gave several graduate students a work overload. The number of undergrads to grade was capped at 70 per semester, but the grad director assigned overloads of several hundred students to multiple grad students. Several years ago the dept received a formal warning about using this type of overload, but regardless of that warning the use of the overload was repeated during my terms." Oh my god dude, get over it!

This actually sounds really awesome. Congrats, antecedent!

UGH, are there really 3 potential weeks of this left? I'm hoping it's more like 1, 2 at the most. Really tired of this.

I don't know any professors who express the "best job in the world" sentiment, but I do know plenty who find their job very fulfilling.

Also, expect to: -Find internships/positions to help you gain professional experiences -Get on the English Committee, or whatever equivalent your program has; get involved in service opportunities -Get acquainted with CfP sites and attend a conference -Meet regularly with professors and advisors; find reasons... seriously... you want to ingrain your face in their minds. -Prepare drafts early to get extra academic style help and feedback (this is their job and you have a right to use them!!) -Join professional organizations; smaller ones tend to be better. MLA is not particularly impressive. -Become immersed in your focus; think about it day and night and as you're falling asleep; be tortured by Deleuze & Guattari. -Make the library your home -Annotate all things ever -Become aware of the most recent developments and conversations; hone your focus down to the most specific thing possible -Take said specific interest and make it understandable to as many people as humanly possible across disciplines. Make it so a 4 year old can understand it, even if it's "Rhizomatic ecclesiastical offerings in the postmodern world as explored through H. Rap Brown's Die Nigger Die!"

You both seem like very bright, level-headed, and articulate people and you're just coming out of undergrad. Consider the position you'll be in if you throw yourself full force into an MA, Silent G. You're going to be like a superhero the next time you apply to PhDs.

I graded a paper last semester about affirmative action where I took the student to task for factual inaccuracies and logic errors. It was NOT because he disagreed with me; I explained to him that there was a logical argument to be made against AA, but his was not remotely logical. He also obviously hadn't brushed up on the topic at all before choosing to discuss it. I agree about objectivity being a fiction, but I also try hard not to wade into murky political waters with my students; I don't want to take away all of their autonomy, and being a teacher is such an authoritative position. I feel bad enough crushing their creativity when I'm teaching them how to write formal research papers. BTW, you can talk like a grad student all you want; I think you got this one next year. Let me know if you need an SoP/WS reader when it comes to it.

"Even an invisible man has a socially responsible role to play." - Ellison. Of course, in this case, we're not invisible, just in danger of become aloof aesthetes, alienated from society (we're definitely already perceived that way). The sad thing is that I'm torn, because I don't want to feel like I'm indoctrinating people, but I feel they have the right to be informed and no matter what my intentions are, biases come out of my mouth. I took a cheap shot at the GOP today in front of my comp class... not proud of it. Some day I will snap and rant on and on about third-party viability. One of these days, Alice... Edit: At least I can teach my comrades in the working class the importance of being able to code switch in front of the bourgeoisie. God, could I take myself more seriously right now?

In reality, the powers that be probably don't mind us containing ourselves in institutions instead of marching in the streets. The only way they maintain a semblance of social control is by funneling conscious working-class people into niches where they'll be happy and stay quiet. Sorry, I realize how pessimistic and conspiratorial that sounds. At least I'll get to brainwash up to 75 kids a semester in the future. Edit: The future American subaltern is who they'll really have to worry about in the future, that is if the economy stays bad.

Divorced alcoholic auto-worker and alcoholic waitress here. Former had a college degree from an art school in the 1950s; other went to community college and never finished. Extremely unlikely that I'd be in this position. Edit: I am, however, a white male... I understand the significant privilege there. Not proud of it.

Thanks hiphop! PM'd you back. Some people have told me they declined. Really want to email the DGS, but restraining myself until at least next Wednesday.

*raises hand* First time for everything, I suppose.

Anyone go to the prospective open house yesterday? How was it?

I'm confused; is it an intro to composition and rhetoric theory course, or just a composition course? Last year, I used the 50 Essays portable anthology and supplemented it with a packet of additional essays I liked. We also require Diana Hacker's A Writer's Reference, though I didn't teach that much stuff out of it; I more taught them how to use it themselves and did some of the lessons from the beginning very early in the semester. I would've used The Writers Presence, but since I work at a commuter campus, we are encouraged to use less expensive books, and that one is kind of a monster. In English 2 I have been using The Craft of Research, some essays, some poems, a short story, and a novel.

If that were your goal, it seems like a M.Ed might be more valuable to you, no? Community college professors teach much more comp than lit, in which case you'd want to make your specialization comp/rhet. Just a thought. Edit: Point being that, again, I'd lean toward Washington State.

Short answer: funded M.A. I think when it comes to M.A.s the prestige of the program isn't as important as it is at the PhD and BA levels. That's my two cents anyway.