puddle
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Posts posted by puddle
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In response to:
How to create forms of good governance in Africa that can lead to sustained economic development?
Why does Africa remain poor and underdeveloped?
How can Africa grow economically and reach its full potential?
What advisors come to mind in connection with the above?
My first suggestion would be to narrow down these interests a bit... you could spend your life chewing on one piece of any of these puzzles. Just a thought.
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Oh, heads up! Word on the street (i.e. from idle chatter between expats at a hotel in Lilongwe last summer) is that Michael Bratton is considering leaving Michigan State. I spoke for some time with a woman whose husband was being supervised by Bratton and the gist of the conversation was that he was not very happy there... worth keeping in mind. Also, this may or may not be idle gossip. Take anything and everything you read on these forums with a grain of salt. Anything I write, doubly so.
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PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad Institution: USA-'top' ranked public
Major(s)/Minor(s): Political Science
Undergrad GPA: PBK, Magna Cum Laude
Type of Grad: Political Science MA, reputable Canadian University
Grad GPA: 4.0
GRE: 710V 790Q 5.0AW
Any Special Courses: MA focus in methods and comparative
Letters of Recommendation: MA supervisor, quant specialist from MA, UG mentor and PI on some of my research projects
Research Experience: 2 summers in Africa, 5 paid RAships, 1 unpaid RAship, MA thesis
Teaching Experience: 4 semesters TAing at MA university (2 semesters Quant Methods), 2 years tutor for official UG Tutoring Dept (department supervisor in senior year)
Subfield/Research Interests: comparative, developmental political economy, experimental and quantitative methods
RESULTS:
Acceptances($$ or no $$): Yale, UBC, Texas A&M (all $$)
Waitlists: nyet
Rejections: Stanford, Harvard, NYU, WUSTL, Columbia, Northwestern, Chicago... need I go on
Pending: Toronto
Going to: ... still waiting on some official documents, a scholarship, and some visits
My advice: Contrary to popular belief, rejection from one top ranked university does not mean rejection from ALL top ranked universities. A month ago, I was awash in rejections. They rained down like manna from heaven. It sucked. I am a second time applicant and was seriously considering changing fields (I purchased an LSAT book, browsed med school entrance requirements, submitted a CV to some NGOs etc). Through all of this, I acknowledged that leaving academia would mean giving up on my two greatest passions: teaching and research (at least, giving up on having it all). Today... I have no regrets.
One other thing: fit isn't everything (at least in the sense that fit with a university does not guarantee you a spot at said university). Consider that while you are looking for fit (professors who you want to work with) so is the university admissions committee. You just have to hope that your Venn-diagrams overlap!
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Just to add my two cents... you might want to be concerned with not how the department fits you (i.e. the professors you would like to work with) but also with how you fit the department (i.e. the professors who have openings for PhD students in your area in the coming year). It is sad to say but my impression is that PhD applicants interested in studying Africa have taken a bit of a beat-down in this and past years because many of the Africanists in top departments are already supervising a fair number of top students. If this is the case, there may be 1-3 spots open in your (and my) area and you have to ask yourself 1) if you are competitive for these spots and 2) if the cost of applying to a bunch of programmes is worth the benefit of being accepted.
Just to expand on this thought: if the number of spots is so small, you will probably want to apply to at least 6 universities in the top 15 and maybe a few more second tier schools in order to "secure" (obviously, we are all pretty in-secure) a spot. This process could cost you upwards of a thousand dollars (and really, the time and energy it takes to assemble applications should not be underestimated). At the end of the day, you have to ask yourself if a PhD is really what you need/want to succeed in the field. I know people in the field of African development who completed an MA in Economics or PEG and are now well placed in research positions with major international institutions and NGOs. For example, I have a friend with a great World Bank contract (note: let's not turn this into a WB beat-down) who is making good money, has spent the last 5 years globe-trotting, and who has just recently finished work on a major research project in Malawi... all with an MA.
On the note of pursuing just an MA: if you enter a 2 year funded program, you will receive two years of the same intensive training (same classes, same professors, same work load) as you would as a PhD student. After those two years, you will be able to leave the program and apply for jobs. Alternatively, if you decide at that time that you have a research question that MUST be answered in the form of a dissertation, you can apply for PhD programmes (or streamline into the PhD at your current university) and continue along the academic track.
One final point, you mention that you are interested in economic development/growth/governance/democratization. I think all of us (and your future PhD programme) would need to know more about your specific interests before we could point you towards a potential advisor. Some of my fellow grad-cafe-ers have mentioned Chris Blattman is going to Columbia (sad times for us future Yale-ies) but you mentioned that you are "not particularly keen on the conflict/civil war aspect of political economy of African development." Here are the titles of 3 of Blattman's most recent papers: Civil War, Gender and Reintegration in northern Uganda (2011), The Consequences of Child Soldiering (2010), Civil War (2010). So while Blattman is an amazing scholar, it seems like your research interests are taking you in another direction. My suggestion is that you look first at substantive areas of inquiry (i.e. "I want to study public goods provision in ethnically heterogeneous communities" or "I want to study gender-inclusive democratic interventions" or "I want to understand the effect of endowments on 21st century development initiatives") and then look for scholars who could support you in answering those questions. You may find 1 or 2 professors at any given university who study these types of questions in the African context (after all, what would be the point if everyone was doing it?) but you will probably find a few more who do your "type" of work or use methods that are interesting to you. Then you just have to cross your fingers and hope (as I did) that you are competitive (grades, GPA, research experience, letters, writing style, SOP etc.) and that one of the professors you are interested in working with has a spot open for you.
Best of luck!
- meep
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Hey all. It's been a tough couple of months. A few grad cafe-ers were posting today about receiving 5 rejections today. That blows. For my part, I am really happy with the places that I have been accepted to but the grand majority of emails have started with the words "I regret to inform you...".
My response to all this negativity: silliness. I suggest that everyone who feels beat-down, down-and-out, out of their mind... etc. should take this opportunity to chose something in their life (really, it can be anything) and formally reject it. Try not to reject anything that will make other people feel worse (i.e. I am not going to "reject" any of the schools that have rejected me... this would be redundant... also, I am pretty excited for or jealous of the people who did not get rejected). Here is my example... feel free to chip in with your own rejection.
I reject wet socks.
Dear wet socks,
I regret to inform you that you will not be offered a place in my wardrobe this coming year. You lack the warmth and comfort that I associate with your peers (dry socks) and you make me miserable/uncomfortable. Yesterday I was forced to use the word "moist" to describe you. Please do not trouble me by applying again next year. I wish you no luck at infiltrating wardrobes in the future.
Regards,
meep
- Megan, contretemps, Bookbag and 4 others
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Awesome - thank you both. I am from out of town and will not have a car during the visit, so the train sounds like a great option. I appreciate the tip!
UCLA does not really have a great shuttle option from the Amtrak station (downtown) into Westwood. You pretty much go Amtrak --> metro (yes, there is a metro) --> bus down Wilshire and then walk from Wilshire up through Westwood (suggestion: pack light... this can be a hot walk with a heavy bag). This is much less complicated than it sounds. Good luck!
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This is a sticky issue. Obviously nobody should feel pressured to give up options until they're ready. On the other end, the OP is correct insofar as we shouldn't hold onto schools just because we can.
I use a method that I call the jellybean test: You have 10 jellybeans to distribute amongst your offers, where more beans == higher preference. If a program doesn't get any jellybeans in the test, cut them loose. They're not in contention for your services. I've declined two offers this week, and will likely decline two more next week. I won't make a final decision about where to go until after visiting, but I know that I'm not (for example) going to Maryland under any circumstance, so I can (should?) decline that offer.
In the strictly normative sense, we've earned the acceptances we've gotten, and have the right to hold onto those offers until April 15. But if you find yourself holding onto an offer because it's fun being wooed, because it makes you feel special or just because you can, then I would argue it's time to decline an offer or two and (potentially) let others in.
I would get confused half way through and eat 6 of the jellybeans (especially the fruity ones... I love those). Fact: I would only have 4 jellybeans left (See! Bean counting isn't just for Economists!)
On a moderately more serious note - I would not have applied to a school if I was not seriously considering attending. It would be foolish to make decisions without weighing your options (and impossible to weigh your options without all information).
I have used a lot of brackets in this post (probably because my thoughts run in wild tangents). In other news, we should all be a bit more understanding of goodluck here. At one time or another this process has driven us all to do crazy, uncharacteristic things. I plan to ignore her plea but I certainly understand where it comes from.
- kaykaykay, jbriar and CooCooCachoo
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(3) Ask if you can sit in a class or two. If you do, don't be a jerk in class. You're there to observe, not to interrupt. If the professor asks you a question or something, go ahead and participate, but don't be a jerk about it.
An example on (3). Last year, we had a guy sit in our (highly technical) dynamic modeling class. He happened to sit in the dryest, hardest lecture of the year. So the professor proves a theorem on the board that has us all panting and trembling, and he writes out "for all" on the board in doing so. During break, the prospective student rocks up to the professor and is alike "Hey, why did you write out 'for all' instead of using the upside-down A? That would have been more rigorous.'" Don't be like that. That's jerky.
That was me! No, I kid. I didn't get into that university last year... I was the woman sobbing mournfully outside your classroom window.
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You should arrange for a phone call from the Director of Grad services, it really helps! Some DGS are so on the ball they even have skype. A nice little face to face really went a long way to a) taking away some concerns I might have had about uprooting and moving. b ) Makes it feel really REAL. Like picturing myself there in the near future.
stupid emoticons... I just want to say b ) but it turns it into a
I hate that emoticon too...
I will be speaking with the prof. who contacted me (a POI ... if that stands for POtential advIsor...) later this week when she returns from an exotic foreign land. Until then I will just stew in my anxiety and luxuriate in a general feeling of benevolence and love for everyone and everything (even if it does not feel real, it feels pretty damn good!).
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A UCLA grad once told me that the department tends to dump everyone in the deep end and see who fights their way to the top. This means that there is a lot of competition for funding, office space, grants, etc. Knowing this, they probably accept people without funding in the hopes that those people will accept and help offset the cost of the funded students. It seems savage but UCLA has become pretty "every woman for herself" since the California budget cuts. On the other hand... amazing department, amazing campus, amazing weather.
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SCENARIO: I received an informal admissions email from a POI and have been driven mad by its informality. I read the email about 4 times a day to confirm that it is real (and addressed to me) and I check my mailbox roughly 3 times a day (yes... this is illogical as mail is only delivered once a day) to see if the official offer has arrived by horse and buggy (snail mail is too kind a description of Canada Post).
THOUGHT: This school could save me a lot of gut-clenching anxiety if they spent some of my application fee (or the fees of the 600-odd other people who applied) to fedex this darn letter to my house.
CONCLUSION: I will not believe that this is real (and not some anxiety-hallucination) until a shiny letter appears in my mailbox.... maybe I should go check for one now...
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2 years out from my UG and I now have an MA, a few years reserch experience, a handful of TAships, some research trips abroad, conference presentations, working towards some publications. When all is said and done, the accomplishment has been working out what I want to study (something I did not know for sure in my undergraduate because the time I might have spent deciding what field really interested ME [rather than my favourite professors] was devoted to athletics). I am happy with where I am now but I might have been equally happy going straight into a PhD (gotta love the counterfactual).
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I'd look into some Canadian programs if you want strong programs that won't bankrupt you. The connections you get probably aren't as strong as, say, Chicago's CIR program (which from what I know is a great program that places people really well), but I'd say they're more academically-oriented than most US programs. If you're planning on applying now though, I think only a few programs will still be accepting applications (including Columbia, I think).
Yes! Canada! Depending on your interests, take a look at:
UBC
U of T
McGill
McMaster
etc...
These schools have low tuition, great funding packages, and offer experiences you might not get in a US program (i.e. TAships, RAships, etc.). No reason to bankrupt yourself on the way to a PhD eh?
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There is something wrong with me. Everytime someone mentions a troll, I think of a little naked pink a-sexual dude(tte) with orange hair. This makes me giggle. The admissions process is taking its troll.
- puddle and Overtherainbow
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Both parents have PhDs... brother finishing his PhD and then going to med school... dad is at the top of his field. All in sciences. I guess you could call me the black sheep for going into social sciences. Baahhhhhh
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PSU - Feb 24-27
UT - March 1-2
CU-Boulder - March 1-3
Northwestern - March 1-3
UC Irvine - March 1-3
USC-POIR March 4-6
UC Davis - March 7-9
UChicago - March 8-9
UWashington March 8-9
UCLA - March 8-10
Cornell - March 12-13
MIT March 13-14
UNC - March 15-17
Michigan - March 15-17
UVA - March 16-17
UC Berkeley - March 18-19
Duke - March 18-20
Wisconsin - March 22-24
NYU - March 23
UPenn - March 23
WUSTL - March 23-24
Rochester - March 25-27
Minnesota -March 26
Columbia - March 27-29
OSU - March 29-31
FSU - March 29th-31st
Yale - April 1-3.
Stanford - April 9-10 -
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"I feel like I read this application 2 years ago. Wait a seccond......."
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I will sleep. For a week. Without checking my email address. That is all.
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Wuerzburg! One of my favourite German cities. Those are some fine wine cellars you guys hide in the basement of the palace.
Political Economy of African Development
in Political Science Forum
Posted
This is very good advice.