Advice for Choosing Programs/ The "fit" issue

[soc_gradGuy]

I found this forum because I've recently had several students ask me if I would write them a letter of rec. for grad programs that they want to apply to in the Fall. When I got into conversations with these students about the application process, a few them mentioned that they've been reading gradcafe for advice/ideas which is great. Wish I knew about it/it existed when I was applying

I'm actually a fifth year grad student and last year I started teaching my own class--I think because of my slightly relaxed demeanor and younger age students felt comfortable approaching me during office hours and now I have the perhaps problem of too many letters to write. Incidentally, I told all of the students that I would be their back-up letter if they couldn't get 3 faculty members to write for them (just because my letter may not carry all of the esteem of a tenured faculty since I'm still just a doctoral candidate). Nonetheless, I'm not sure how much this may really matter for some types of programs.

But, the point of this post, is that I just wanted to give my 2 cents about this whole "fit" issue. This is what I told my students, and perhaps it may be helpful for others.

Now there are sorts of reasons to apply to highly-esteemed programs given the name branding of certain schools (look mom, I have a PhD from Wisconsin/Harvard) but talking to a couple of students they seemed somewhat confused about this whole "fit" issue when it comes to choosing a school. Some things to consider, from my point of view:

1.) When you're applying to a PhD program, you're applying less to study sociology or even study a particular issue, but rather to learn and do RESEARCH

2.) Given that, what kind of RESEARCH broadly do you think you might be interested in doing yourself--and devoting big chunks of your life doing (what kind of research activities do you see yourself enjoying)

3.) What are the empirical projects and questions do you see yourself interrogating

4.) How will the faculty in said department help you in becoming this supposed future researcher that you envision for yourself

This is naturally difficult I think for students mainly because many undergrad programs give them very little experience in the way of reading and doing research (like actually going through soc journals or talking about the leading areas of research). At least in our school, undergrads may have a methods course or an honor thesis seminar but most have little experience going through journals and thinking about current studies. The problem is worse in sociology because we write in a very dry and off-putting language in our top journals, I feel. Graduate school is almost about learning the language and style that goes into reading/submitting something to a specific journal. Sociologists also define their interest areas with some rather broad strokes. "I'm interested in stratification" the life course, marriage, Gender and so forth. Consequently searching for your niche program can be a little alienating because it's hard to get a sense of faculty interests/expertise.

My advice:

1.) I bet most programs know this, and don't expect applicants to know their exact dissertation interests--so don't beat yourself up if you feel you don't have an area/topic of research that you have feel 100% about

2.) However, most programs will gauge your research abilities for being able to identify the DEPARTMENT'S RESEARCH areas (can they go to our webpage and figure out our key areas)

3.) Consequently you will need to frame what you think may be your research interests in terms of these key strengths of the department (specify your interests a little bit more forceful, though)

4.) And lastly...

If you have time on hand (maybe you have a year or a couple of months before applying) skimming current journals may be a good way to go to get a feel of the land, but more importantly get a sense of what you may like doing. But like I said, sociologists write in these journals in a very dry style. So I've been also recommending my students to check out magazine like Contexts or Psychology Today as well as blogs/podcasts/forums that report on recent research in an accesiable way. Contexts has this research discovery section for instance that is very good and they post some of these online http://contexts.org/discoveries/ (search the tags for topics you like).

Another good place to check out is http://thesocietypages.org/ (the blogs are decent, and check out their podcasts--good especially for long runs)

Social Psych. Quarterly, if you have access, also has articles in condensed format that is pretty nice,

The ASA site itself has good stuff to check out. Do people know of others?

My point here is just to get yourself a bit more familiar with the world of "Current Research" before applying to programs. That way you're search for a niche will feel a little bit more genuine. Alright back to grading

[centurysun]

I found this forum because I've recently had several students ask me if I would write them a letter of rec. for grad programs that they want to apply to in the Fall. When I got into conversations with these students about the application process, a few them mentioned that they've been reading gradcafe for advice/ideas which is great. Wish I knew about it/it existed when I was applying

I'm actually a fifth year grad student and last year I started teaching my own class--I think because of my slightly relaxed demeanor and younger age students felt comfortable approaching me during office hours and now I have the perhaps problem of too many letters to write. Incidentally, I told all of the students that I would be their back-up letter if they couldn't get 3 faculty members to write for them (just because my letter may not carry all of the esteem of a tenured faculty since I'm still just a doctoral candidate). Nonetheless, I'm not sure how much this may really matter for some types of programs.

But, the point of this post, is that I just wanted to give my 2 cents about this whole "fit" issue. This is what I told my students, and perhaps it may be helpful for others.

Now there are sorts of reasons to apply to highly-esteemed programs given the name branding of certain schools (look mom, I have a PhD from Wisconsin/Harvard) but talking to a couple of students they seemed somewhat confused about this whole "fit" issue when it comes to choosing a school. Some things to consider, from my point of view:

1.) When you're applying to a PhD program, you're applying less to study sociology or even study a particular issue, but rather to learn and do RESEARCH

2.) Given that, what kind of RESEARCH broadly do you think you might be interested in doing yourself--and devoting big chunks of your life doing (what kind of research activities do you see yourself enjoying)

3.) What are the empirical projects and questions do you see yourself interrogating

4.) How will the faculty in said department help you in becoming this supposed future researcher that you envision for yourself

This is naturally difficult I think for students mainly because many undergrad programs give them very little experience in the way of reading and doing research (like actually going through soc journals or talking about the leading areas of research). At least in our school, undergrads may have a methods course or an honor thesis seminar but most have little experience going through journals and thinking about current studies. The problem is worse in sociology because we write in a very dry and off-putting language in our top journals, I feel. Graduate school is almost about learning the language and style that goes into reading/submitting something to a specific journal. Sociologists also define their interest areas with some rather broad strokes. "I'm interested in stratification" the life course, marriage, Gender and so forth. Consequently searching for your niche program can be a little alienating because it's hard to get a sense of faculty interests/expertise.

My advice:

1.) I bet most programs know this, and don't expect applicants to know their exact dissertation interests--so don't beat yourself up if you feel you don't have an area/topic of research that you have feel 100% about

2.) However, most programs will gauge your research abilities for being able to identify the DEPARTMENT'S RESEARCH areas (can they go to our webpage and figure out our key areas)

3.) Consequently you will need to frame what you think may be your research interests in terms of these key strengths of the department (specify your interests a little bit more forceful, though)

4.) And lastly...

If you have time on hand (maybe you have a year or a couple of months before applying) skimming current journals may be a good way to go to get a feel of the land, but more importantly get a sense of what you may like doing. But like I said, sociologists write in these journals in a very dry style. So I've been also recommending my students to check out magazine like Contexts or Psychology Today as well as blogs/podcasts/forums that report on recent research in an accesiable way. Contexts has this research discovery section for instance that is very good and they post some of these online http://contexts.org/discoveries/ (search the tags for topics you like).

Another good place to check out is http://thesocietypages.org/ (the blogs are decent, and check out their podcasts--good especially for long runs)

Social Psych. Quarterly, if you have access, also has articles in condensed format that is pretty nice,

The ASA site itself has good stuff to check out. Do people know of others?

My point here is just to get yourself a bit more familiar with the world of "Current Research" before applying to programs. That way you're search for a niche will feel a little bit more genuine. Alright back to grading

Your post is really helpful, although i do not learn sociology.

I am an international student, learning medicine now and hoping to further my education in America. As an international student, I know less about how the addmission commitee and professors of certain programs think or how they will evalutate my personal statement and CV.

[Satori]

Good stuff... thanks for the post... As entering students, there's an awful lot we can learn from those who are further along. Thanks for taking the time to write this up...