jeffster

I think it comes down to what you want to get out of it. It sounds like you're already established in your field, to some degree, and may just be looking for resume padding. If that's the case, it seems like the first school with the better name recognition and less-helpful staff would be a good choice. On the other hand, if you actually are looking to grow your skills and build on what this degree will give you, I would pick the one with the more engaging faculty every time. Good luck.

I'm not in this field at all, but it seems to me that it's a perfectly valid scholarly topic, but I can also see how you would find it tricky to address in an application. Maybe try couching it in heavy academic language, and avoiding anything that smacks of slang, like the word "porn". Honestly, if you explain it to the adcom the way you just explained it to us in this thread, I can't imagine you'll have an issue.

Honestly, I know a number of people in relationships where the woman is older, though maybe it's less common than the reverse. The older you get the less age matters anyway, and once you're both in your 30s, I wouldn't even spare it a second thought. You probably have more in common with a 3-year (or even 10-year) younger fellow grad student than you do with someone the same age who has no college education and four kids.

It seems like you should address the physical issues, but you want to address it briefly and in a way that gives some closure. If your medical issues are still ongoing, then really it is a liability if the school were to compare you dispassionately to a similar applicant. Obviously you shouldn't lie, but the best possibility seems like a mention of some medical problems that required surgeries, which caused you some struggles followed by eventual perseverance (and apparently keeping up some great performance too!). I wouldn't disclose a mental health issue, especially not if you're doing fine now. However, you should ask yourself honestly if this is the right thing for you - if you struggled with some things in undergrad due to mental health issues, how will you hold up under the strain of Phd work? I think if you've confronted yourself honestly over this, and maybe spoke with your therapist about it if you have one, and the answer is "I can handle it" then don't even mention it to the university.

Really now, this thread is amazing to me. Of all the stupid shit celebrities do, you're mad at James Franco for going to school? Seriously? He certainly has no obligation to prove his qualifications to the public. The public doesn't vote on who gets to go to Yale! (but seriously, vote for me please) The only legitimate line of questioning here at all is whether or not you liked his published work. Perfectly valid if not. You could even then draw a valid conclusion that it reflects poorly on the school when an alumnus of theirs does bad work. But other than that, all these rumors do a disservice to academia, and make everyone look extremely catty. Really now, you read a post on the interwebs from a guy who knows a guy who had a class with him who said he skips class a lot and hits on girls? Astonishing.

This is broadly-speaking, but if you want prestige in an econ PhD program, you're really looking at the US (mainly) and the UK. There are a few other exceptions scattered around, but the huge majority of internationally-prestigious econ programs are in those two countries. If you wanted to actually work in mainland Europe, I think the impact of that would be greatly diminished. Frequently regional schools perform very well within their region, where other schools and employers are familiar with their work. But since your goal is to specifically head to the US afterword... I don't know, maybe a degree from Zurich would make you stand out as something different from the people you'll be competing with? I've never heard anyone suggest that, in fact usually the opposite (people look for programs they're familiar with, not exotic ones), but it could be. Mind once again though, I'm speaking broadly here. Behavioral econ isn't my area at all, and maybe Zurich is prestigious enough in this area that the name would be recognized in the US.

I did one, it was fine. I wasn't sure if the interviewer would want to use video or not, so I initially started it without, and as soon as I saw her video appear I turned mine on. Wasn't awkward at all.

I would have to echo what a few others have said: it seems like a very bad idea right now, unless the reason is extreme. After all, your MS isn't the end of your career; it's the very beginning. You're potentially starting off on the wrong foot with another top school this way. Plus as others have pointed out, you generally don't move from a PhD to an MS... So, if it's just a case of cold feet, stick with Berkeley. If there's actually a serious reason behind this, then maybe that's something else.

I would think they would cut you a break for medical reasons - there's been a lot of talk of such things around the forums, and that seems to be the general consensus. One concern though might be that if this medical issue reoccurs every two years or so, will you experience the same interruption in your grad work? Also, I would be cautious about "taking it slow" while you get back into school. Grad school will be far more intense than undergrad, so if you're taking it slow already, they might be concerned about your ability to handle grad work. You might also try talking to an adviser and seeing if there's any help to be had from your undergrad institution, as far as the academic transcript goes.

I've been working in business for a while now, so maybe it's different from academia, but I actually find it immensely helpful when people at least list their job title in their email signature. "Who the hell is this person that just emailed me? Oh, there in their email signature it says Vice President of Cookie Baking. Okay, I didn't know that was a position, but I better be nice to them." You know, that sort of thing. I would think even in academia, however, it would be frequently very beneficial to at least list phone, office location and title for your official school email. One thing I can't stand though is the use of jpegs in an email signature. Oh, and I should add that you definitely want to avoid parroting a mini version of your CV in your email signature. Just keep it functional.

My goodness, the pictures from Dal PhDer and bluetubeodyssey just make me want to scratch those bellies. The bunnies are cute, but I wouldn't trust my dog around them! She's grown up with cats, but she loves to chase critters she sees outside. Also, since everyone liked her, here's another shot of Misty in the car on the way up north a few years ago. She's a goofy puppy in an adult dog's body.

I love it, perusing this thread quickly exhausted my daily supply of up votes. Here's my little dober-girl, Misty. She's been with my parents for the last year and a half while I live over seas, but once I take stock of how grad school goes I'll look at moving her in. Although now she's so used to having my parents two dogs around, and their big yard, I might feel terrible trying to move her to a small apartment in the city!

I really have a hard time understanding getting a Mac. I got my Windows 7-based laptop, an Acer, well over two years ago. It cost $650 on Newegg, brand new (17" screen, 4 gigs of ram). I've never had a single problem with it, and Windows 7 usage is easy as cake. I have friends with Macs that are less powerful than my laptop and have smaller screens, which they paid around $2000 for. Even if you were to accept that Macs don't break as often as PCs, I could replace my laptop with a brand new one three times over. And I still would have paid less than they did for their Mac. If you're really a non-technical person, or maybe fall easily for phishing scams and such, then a Mac could be better than a PC. Most people use PCs, thus most malicious software is written to exploit PCs. Also, Mac makes great looking products, so I guess there's that. And the magnetic power cable is pretty cool. And you might save one pound in weight. But is that worth over $1000 extra? As far as I'm concerned, not even close.

Most faculties list the average GRE scores of previous years admitted classes on their websites, but they also tend to say that there isn't an exact GRE score they're looking for. It's just one more element they can use to differentiate applicants. I've also heard repeatedly that some programs use it as a cutoff - above a certain point and they consider you for admittance based on your other factors, below it and they don't. So, check those schools websites and they should be able to tell you.

Again, it depends on what you want to do. If you're going to work in your field, where everyone is likely to know that Trinity College is good at something, great. But if you might end up in the private sector, that wont carry as much weight. Here's an example. I went to Michigan State University for my undergraduate. It's ranked #1 in the world for nuclear physics, just ahead of MIT (Or was last time I heard anyone talk about it; maybe it's changed now... doesn't matter for the example though!). People in nuclear physics itself probably know this, and could weigh a degree from MSU appropriately. Almost everyone else, however, will have the instant name recognition of MIT and will never even compare it to MSU. There's no hard and fast way to analyze this. Just consider where you want to work geographically and whether you want to be in academia or in the private sector. If your goal is to work in Europe, and you don't get into a prestigious US university, then generally speaking you would probably be better off in a mid-range school in Europe than in the US. But despite how much you and I are talking about it, there are going to be far more important factors than this to weigh I imagine.

Well, the US schools would still be fine if you can get into a higher-profile one. Although sometimes even that can be an issue, I have a friend in Europe who has an undergrad degree from Brown. Everyone there knows Yale or Harvard, but no one has heard of Brown at all. So not even all Ivy League schools will make the name-recognition cut!

You would probably be best off meeting with a financial aid adviser at your school. This is the sort of thing they're paid to help with! In addition to advice, they might be able to help you find other sources of funding besides loans, or additional loans if the federal ones aren't enough.

I think it depends on your goals. If you are interested in working anywhere in the world that you find opportunities, then a European institution will be great (particularly in Europe). Unfortunately it's been shown repeatedly that name recognition matters for a university, both in academia and (particularly) in the business world, so if your goal is to work in the US at all then you will be better off at a US institution, or a well-known international one. For example, many in the US are likely to know LSE or Oxford or the Sorbonne. But something like Central European University in Budapest, or Charles University in Prague? They're fine schools that carry a lot of weight in their regions, but will be almost meaningless to many people in the US. It's not impossible to take a degree from a place like that and work in the US, but it's definitely going to be a bit of an obstacle. Of course the same is true to a lesser extent with small schools in the US also. A lot of schools are known as fine institutions in their region, but unknown if you cross to the other coast, or sometimes even to the next state. Anyway, just something to keep in mind about where you apply to school versus where you actually want to work. I wouldn't call it enough to be a deal-breaker either way.

I did a few years at community college too, and it's a great way to get pre-reqs out of the way easily and cheaply. Here's my pointers, some of which have been touched on already. This is all going on the assumption that your long-term goal is to get the associates done, transfer to a 4-year institution and finish the BA/BS, then go onto grad school: Take as few of the classes in your major field at CC as possible. You need to develop relationships with professors in your field at your 4-year institution. It's literally crucial that you get to know 2-3 professors in your area or a related area, who will write letters of rec for you to grad school. This is most easily done if you take more than 1 class with that professor, though it's certainly possible after 1 class if you stand out. Take at least 4 courses a semester, 5 if you can. CC classes tend to be easier, and you'll need to show any potential grad school that you can handle a heavy workload. If you part-time your way through undergrad, it wont reflect as well as if you loaded up on classes. Of course that comes with the caveat that you still have to actually do well in those classes, so make sure you're accurately assessing your own ability to get by with a heavy workload. Take as few online courses as possible. Grad school isn't done online, and the point is to show the grad committee that you can handle it and they should invest time and money in you. Also, you really need to develop those relationships with professors, and you wont do that online. Definitely do not take anything in your major field online. Personally, I took just one course online, and it was a summer class taught by a grad student anyway. Community college is a fantastic way to do your early university education for far less money. I also found at my community college that it was even better than the state university I went to for the more "practical" oriented courses. For example, I took a biology course on natural resources there (my major has nothing to do with biology), and the teacher instead of being a professor was a long-time inspector for the department of natural resources, who took us all over the city to actual relevant sites. And I had an international law course taught by someone who actually practices as an immigration lawyer, who brought in several immigrants she had helped to talk about things. These were far better experiences than I would have gotten at a university with an academic teaching them, I think. On the flip side, however, I found the theory-heavy courses (economics, sociology, poli sci, etc) tended to be much better at my state university. Also, meet with a CC adviser early and plot out a course to your transfer - CC advisers should be well used to students whose goal is to get to a 4-year institution, and will have good advice for you. Take that list of courses you put together with professors you want to take to a meeting with them. Good luck

I'm not in law school, but check out this commencement address. I read about it in The Atlantic recently, and it might address some of your concerns about law school. http://lessig.tumblr.com/post/24065401182/commencement-address-to-atlantas-john-marshall-law

I've always had a hard time finding shirts that fit me. They're either too baggy around the body with sleeves that are right, or the sleeves are too short and the body fits right. That all changed when I moved to Europe though. There aren't very many of them in the States I don't think, but over here the store Zara has button-up shirts that fit like they were made just for me. Great for the tall skinny types, and not overly expensive either. Anyway, I think the OP is on the right track! Don't underestimate dressing decently. Unless you talk on the phone a lot, the way you look is the first real impression you make on nearly everyone you meet. Some people will weigh it more than others, of course, but the way you've dressed will also affect the way you carry and present yourself unconsciously. If you roll out of bed without a shower, throw on shorts and a Justin Bieber t-shirt and head out, that will change your bearing for the worse the whole day. Make your minimum attire jeans without holes and something other than a t-shirt, and you've already started off on the right foot. And it doesn't have to be expensive, or all done in one grand shopping spree! if you're like me you hate shopping - you just want nice things in your closet ready to go. So just gradually improve your wardrobe over time, discarding the worst of it and adding new pieces. Unlike women, we don't really need pre-planned "outfits." Find one nice shirt, next month get a nice pair of jeans, the next a pair of shoes that aren't sneakers, etc. Much easier on the budget and on your shopping-nerves that way. Oh, and get one black belt and one brown belt, then one pair of black leather shoes and another of brown. If you have matching black and brown leathers, you can basically wear damn near any combo of other things and it works, from suits to jeans.

That's a shame your school wouldn't work with you on this, especially as you've explained the issue to us. Maybe it's worth trying with them again? Anyway, assuming you've exhausted all opportunities in that area, the main thing now is going to be explaining it in your statement. I imagine you can mention your illness and how it came during the semester at school, and how you dealt with it and what good came from it (i.e. it made you tougher, it refocused you, etc etc). Schools generally seem to be receptive to such things. Hope everything is alright now!

It's hard for us to pick when you don't know yourself! Maybe we can help with questions. Why do you want to go to grad school as opposed to entering the work force? What didn't you like about sociology? Why masters or jdr instead of PhD? Do you have some career goals? How strong do you feel about not living in a college town again? With a few of these answers we might be able to come up with some relevant advice.

The weight given to the GRE seems to vary by area of study, specific school, or even by individual members of committees. I have a family friend who is a top professor in entomology, and he says when he sits on grad committees he puts virtually no weight on the GRE because he doesn't believe it's a good indicator of anything. On the other hand, to get into a top econ program you pretty much need to have a 790 or 800 on the quant section. So in short, the GRE isn't necessarily the most important thing. Try checking with the departments you're interested in and asking how much they weigh it, and assuming English isn't your first language, whether they make some allowance for that in the verbal section. The information might be on their websites already.

Whatever program you were to choose, the main thing you'll need to figure out how to address is if you made it four years into one PhD program and then quit, how do they know you aren't going to do that in their program too? Why would they invest effort and money into you, when they could accept other students without this? That seems like a huge obstacle to me, I would be curious if anyone else has been successful doing such a thing. Seems like you would need to put serious thought into your statement of purpose, and how you can frame this. Also, those are some really, really broad areas you mentioned there. How do you know you would be interested enough in one of those to make it all the way through?