margarets

I wrote this in my post from yesterday. It matters because it's definitely holding me back in terms of getting my work taken seriously, getting to work on projects where I can develop my skills, and so on, and all of *that* inhibits my career progress. In the workplace, it absolutely does matter what people think of you. Look at all the studies that show that various physical characteristics influence how people are perceived in the workplace and how it directly affects their income. It's no different for other characteristics, especially anything subjective like "competence" or "interpersonal skills". I don't care about it in the core of my being, it's not the basis of my self-esteem. It's more of a tactical thing. Um, OK, then why are we all here, stressing & freaking out over every little word in our SoPs and sinking into depression with every rejection? Why care so much about this or that school's ranking or prestige, if it's "nothing special"? Why bother going at all? And I never disputed that there are other ways of being smart. My issue how to change perceptions.

Wow! I had no idea this thread had developed like this! Anyway, here's some more context. This is my current workplace where, for reasons I have never been able to figure out, I seem to be perceived as not too bright, with not too many skills and little capability to learn new things. I'm basing this on accumulated comments and the like over the years, rather than just one incident. It's as if my prior education and experience count for literally nothing. I did not have this problem in previous jobs, and if anything I'm more professional and present myself better than I did when I was younger, so it's really odd that I have this problem in this job. It matters because it's definitely holding me back in terms of getting my work taken seriously, getting to work on projects where I can develop my skills, and so on, and all of *that* inhibits my career progress. I've been stagnating and nothing I've tried seems to work. Trust me, it's not like the people I work with are all geniuses and I simply can't keep up. These are people who struggle on a daily basis with the routine tasks of their very average jobs. (I'm not being snarky, that's actually true!) The update is that the time has come to tell people in the office that I'm doing a graduate degree part-time. (It requires an adjustment to my work schedule, which is the only reason why I bring it up at all.) My boss's reaction was as flat as possible: "that's fine". It's occurred to me that since most of these people did not go to university, they might honestly have no idea what graduate study involves or that, in general, people who do it can at the very least learn new things, and aren't usually stupid. I think they might see it as more like a hobby, but irrelevant to my capabilities as a worker. (Because, you know, doing grad school part-time while working full-time is like SO EASY.) Now I'm looking at the situation as a tiny sociological study. What does it take for a smart person to get a group of people who think she's dumb to change their minds, even a little bit?

Hmmm... I'm thinking that if I should simply not-care that they are reverse-snobbing me then it should be OK for me to regular-snob them. And if they don't like it, they can just ignore it! If they can dish it out, they can take it!

I can relate. I'm the first person in my family to get a degree of any kind. Most of them really have no idea what is involved in getting a bachelor's, let alone a master's. They think it's nice that I got in, but don't really see it as an achievement.

Maybe writing them off as idiots IS the solution! I used the word "cowl" yesterday with someone who didn't know what it meant, so I've probably alienated her now.

I didn't say people with less education are stupid. "Bothering" is too strong of a word. It's more like "I'm in a situation where this is an issue, it interferes with getting certain things done, and I'm looking for solutions". I figured that others with advanced degrees might have encountered this as well, and might have good suggestions.

"I don't bring up being a Ph.D. student with people outside of my department unless they ask me about it first, e.g., "what do you do for a living?" and then I tell them; the idea being that if you're modist about it and realize that it's just a job like any other, then there's no implication of "I'm better than you because I'm more educated." That's exactly what I mean by downplaying it. Add in a person thinking they are better than you because they are less educated, i.e. too smart to fall for all that degree malarkey. To give you a fuller picture, these are people who think I'm "weird" because I read books, by choice.

I'm not sure if this is the right forum for this question, but here goes: For those of you who have run into this, how do you deal with reverse academic snobbery? I mean a scenario where someone with less formal education than you being dismissive of your education. I've known people who apparently think nothing of any value is taught at universities, except for STEM stuff, and that pursuing study in anything other than a STEM field is a sign of a frivolous nature and stupidity. There is an element of having to hide/downplay your achievements/smarts/knowledge in order to get along/fit in, but of course that gets old after a while. I'm in such a situation right now and I won't be able to just get out of it in the foreseeable future. I will eventually, but in the meantime.... what to do?

It is ridiculous. Your thing sounds way better. I hope you get to do it.

This is pretty much the environment I am in, and I very specifically chose not to do a master's in public policy or admin. The stuff I see every day... no way they are teaching that in grad school, which means they really aren't preparing people for what lies ahead. Better to read Shakespeare, Machiavelli, Dilbert, and watch Yes Minister, and anything else along those lines.

Did you, in some form? Though I rather like the way you've written it here.

I have other reasons, but the final push to get serious about applying was a comment a co-worker made about my "learning curve" re: a certain task she assumed I couldn't do. Bear in mind that this task is something taught in community college to people who just got out of high school (and isn't difficult anyway). With two degrees under my belt, I think I have demonstrated my ability to freaking LEARN. But I work in the bizarro workplace.

I work in an environment where, because I don't do the same thing they do, and because they don't actually know anything about me, a lot of my co-workers have assumed I'm a moron. For extra irony (or whatever it is) these same people have community college diplomas, and sometimes not even that. They screw up all the time, I pretty much never do (or if I do no one has told me about it), but in their eyes I'm the dumb one. So I want to go to grad school so I can rub it in their stupid faces. The hitch is that most of them probably barely even know what grad school is or that it is generally a smart-people thing. So they will probably still think I'm dumb!

I approached professors for recommendations 14 YEARS after graduation - and that's not even the record for that program, some grads have asked for LoRs more than 20 years later. So just go for it. Comments I heard from program secretaries made it clear that profs get these requests all the time, it's no biggie. When they get your request, the secretary will pull your file for the prof to review. Have your CV up to date because your recommenders will want to see it. If you were a reasonably good student, your request will be totally appropriate.

My wait is over! I've been accepted! And it was fast. I only got the "we have all your documents now, stay tuned" email in the last week of March, and the acceptance letter was dated April 10! I was actually on vacation and had no idea - I figured it would take longer, especially since last year the program didn't even close applications until late May. I guess this means my SoP was OK. Whew! Also, YAY!!!!!!