Canofbeans

Most universities do, and this is actually done in order to balance out funding so that students who didn't get an OGS or SSHRC get a (somewhat) equal amount of funding from the department. Different universities have different policies about how much they will retract from funding if an external scholarship is received.

Oh yes, and it's going to take some time before it "becomes real". Everything is so different, people look and talk to you differently and they expect different things from you, I get invited to a bunch of departmental gatherings, other graduate students talk to their profs as if they were buddies or colleagues. It's hard to just switch mode when you're used to life as an undergrad with a clear hierarchy between profs, graduate students and undergrads. I think it will take quite a while before I will get used to it, it's quite strange actually and sometimes I wonder if I will ever get used to it -- I'm still having a hard time just calling my profs by their first name (this was a BIG nono at my undergrad institution)

Goodness, I have been here for about 1.5 weeks and I am so depressed and right about ready to quit and just go home. My program is great and the research is great, but for some reason, my depression is making me hate it here. I miss knowing people and the department and where to go. I live alone which makes it harder and I don't know anyone here and still haven't made any friends. I feel like I constantly have to remind myself why I am here and what I am doing, and sometimes my explanations are not so convincing. I really hope this feeling goes away because it's having a negative effect on my work. I just want to quit, pack, go home to my old room and cuddle in bed.

So I'm getting ready to apply for a SSHRC doctoral award and I need some help from those who have already applied and won. I'm just wondering if the structure is supposed to be similar to that of the MA or grad applications (i.e. just a page detailing research interest and past research..) Or should it have a specific structure (i.e. Program of research, objectives, methodology, context, etc.). If anyone has a sample to share, that would be extremely helpful. Thanks

Every school has different policies on external funding. In most cases, you get to keep any types of external scholarships or they may simply take away an assistantship if you had one that was guaranteed. I would speak to my department to get their policies on the matter

Instead of getting them a gift certificate, I would just get them a box of chocolate and a nice card. That shouldn't cost you more than $20-$30 and it's a bit more personal.

I have a medical condition associated with a really bad anxiety disorder. I never told any of my professors because I never wanted to make an issue out it and I hated feeling like a whiner. At times it got really bad where I couldn't show up in school for a few days or even a week (this was during undergrad), if I had to turn in a paper late, I just did and accepted the consequences. However, recently in my last year as an undergrad, grades were crucial to me and these were seminars that I couldn't just skip, and was forced to tell one of my professors about it. I only brought it up because I felt the need to as I couldn't get my paper done on time, he understood and I've never asked for anything else. From my experience, I wouldn't bring it up unless it becomes an issue that is affecting your work in an extreme fashion but I wouldn't tell them just to give them a "warning". I'm not too sure how I will be handling it with graduate school but for now, I'm just going to attempt to do what I can to control it so that I don't have to tell anyone about it.

Goodness, the first email offer I got, I was almost certain was a mistake, it was my first choice with funding! Then I got a second offer with more money from the same university but a different program, then I got my third and fourth from other schools. I couldn't refuse any of them because I couldn't be certain that the one I picked was the real one. What made it worse, is that I went to visit two of the campuses and at one of the universities, where I got admitted into two programs (my first choice); I was speaking to a prof, I had told him that I received admissions to both programs and he looked at me funny and just said, "well you must have had a very special application profile because both those programs are extremely competitive." It also doesn't help when I almost certain that I would get rejected everywhere, glad to see I'm not the only one.

I am not sure I would be able to answer that question, but I think it depends what direction you are going into. I'm extremely interested in Political philosophy including a lot of the things you mentioned, critical theory, postructrualism, lots of Foucault, Arendt in Derrida. However, I only plan to learn and study these issue so that I can include them into my study of international relations. Therefore I don't plan to study in depth these issues, but they are sort of a means to an end if that makes sense? Anyhow, one thing you could consider is neither philosophy nor polisci, one of the programs I was thinking about for graduate studies was a graduate program in social and political thought. The program has a good reputation, and I know people who graduated from it have gone either in philosophy, sociology or political science. Programs like that help keep an open route in case you change your mind or just don't want to decide so it something to think about and look into. There's a limited number of universities that offer this of course so that may be a problem.

Hmm that does seem unfair from your prof, specially due to the fact that you did well in his classes. I didn't have a great cumulative GPA either, my profs writing the LORs were also shocked by it, but they used it and turned it around saying that earlier grades didn't demonstrate my potential, as they clearly thought I showed potential in their classes. Just out of curiosity, where is your institution? I'm in Canada, I'm guessing you're somewhere in Europe?

Depending on your field of study, specifically for the humanities and social sciences; it's always a good idea to go elsewhere for your degrees because it broadens you're scope of knowledge, you're exposed to different methodologies and approaches that you may have never discovered at your own institution. It also helps in building networks at different institutions if you plan on continuing into academia. I have build a network at my undergrad institution where I've build good relationships with a lot of profs, I'm hoping to do that in graduate school in a different department -- it enlarges the resource network in your field.

My institution uses a 10 scale as well, a 7.0 actually converts into a 3.3 since it's a B+ which qualifies for a cum laude ;-)

It depends if your initial offer was conditional. Different schools have different standards, one my offers was conditional on the basis that I just graduate. However, the school I decided to attend made me an offer on the condition that I maintain a 3.4GPA in the last year of undergraduate study. All of this should be detailed in your official offer.

I've decided to write a paper and try to get it published next year since I most probably won't have time to write anything like this during gradschool or maybe I'll use it as a conference paper. I also managed to get a small RA position with a prof doing research on the same subject. That shouldn't keep me too busy, i'll spend the rest of my time sipping tea, reading novels and enjoy long walks in the park.

Natofone, you are right on the usage of statistical research, but I think using it and only stats for understanding the world composed of people with different histories and cultures can lead to a dangerous path. Even with stats, you can count people and state behaviors in the U.S Canada or wherever and do the same for people in states in Asia or the Middle East. By that, we act as though people are all the same and will all act certain ways depending on certain variables and I think that is dangerous. We're obviously just drawing back to a positivist/post-positivist debate. Nothing new here, I don't know why certain people are surprised that we or I don't think IR scholars should be solely relying on stats or some want to just get rid of stats completely. Feminist, postcolonial, postructuralist IR scholars have all challenged the claims of positivism. I did my undergrad in a department where math was unheard of, why in the world would you need it if you're studying polisci? Then somewhere along the road, I discovered I was just studying at a critical department and that there is something called quantitative IR where people actually took calculus and algebra class, I think that's a bit much.