Do you have a Plan B?

[qbtacoma]

I've seen this topic discussed indirectly on a lot of threads, particularly for the folks with job offers outside of academia, but I'm curious if others are taking the same approach I am. Given the very difficult job market, especially in the humanities, are you going into the application process (or did you go into it) with a Plan B?

For me, having several back up plans is essential to why I'm choosing to apply now. Originally I thought I was going to do a program in Library and Information Science rather than history, with a plan of working a few years and then going back to get a Ph.D in LIS so I could be a professor. I really liked certain aspects of LIS that are, let's face it, more hands on and less Ivory Tower than history, and I struggled with reconciling my social justice interests with my love of academia. After a few conversations with professors, I decided that I should go all the way and really do what I love - research, reading, having challenging discussions - for my career. I can always do LIS later (though that job market is also pretty bad right now). I would also be interested in the foreign service should all that not work out, and to qualify to serve in it I would have to pass the exams, which I feel I could do fairly easily (if I can do grad school, I can surely do that). Heck, working at a food bank could be a dream job for me. There's a lot I'm passionate about.

Here's the thing, though - part of the reason I'm so optimistic as to apply to grad school at all is because I'm pretty much assuming that the bad job market won't apply to me. I will almost certainly get a TT offer, possibly even in a decent location! Yes, I know this is arrogant and naive and probably wrong, but if I didn't believe it then I wouldn't be applying to grad school at all. Wishful thinking is a powerful motivator...but I'm also glad that I could be very happy doing many different things.

Are other folks thinking these things? Do you see your Plan B (if you have one) as a vague possibility or as an almost certain next step when you don't get a TT position?

[waddle]

Yes. It's called med school.

[eklavya]

oh.. so you are talking about the plan B AFTER grad school? isn't that still too far to worry about?

i don't have a backup plan at all. being an international student, i will most probably go home (after few years of fooling around in industrial research after phd), and be a bigshot scientist/researcher there! hehe

though, this is what i have in mind right now... who knows what turn the life will take next

[qbtacoma]

oh.. so you are talking about the plan B AFTER grad school? isn't that still too far to worry about?

Yep. Grad school is the first step to be a history professor at a sweet college somewhere nice. Goodness, if my only option turns out to be working at a for-profit college or struggling as a community college adjunct for the rest of my life, my Plan Bs are going to kick in hard. But no! I have decided it won't happen to me! I am worthy! Lalalalala!

[Sparky]

One of the main reasons I'm studying history, instead of religion or literature (what I do incorporates all three) is that it is the only subject I would be--really--happy and satisfied teaching in high school. In fact, there are days when that is Plan A.

Plan C, of course, is to marry rich.

[waddle]

One of the main reasons I'm studying history, instead of religion or literature (what I do incorporates all three) is that it is the only subject I would be--really--happy and satisfied teaching in high school. In fact, there are days when that is Plan A.

Plan C, of course, is to marry rich.

I feel the same way about teaching (albeit chemistry, not history) in secondary schools. What's Plan D, win the lottery?

[drumms9980]

I graduated a couple years ago and am doing research for big pharma. If I don't get in anywhere I'll just keep working and maybe reapply next year.

[Pleiades]

Yes, my Plan B will be finished before Plan A (grad school+TT teaching job) since I have an education minor and am getting certified to teach high school history by the time I graduate next May. As Sparky has also said, I would be happy teaching the subject in a high school...but I hope that I can follow my dreams and do research, write, and teach at a university one day! I also don't mind the idea of being an adjunct at a community college even if it'll be for many years. I attended one for some basic classes because it made financial sense at the time, and I had some amazing professors there.

[Ludwig von Dracula]

I already have a teaching degree and experience, so if the job market really sucks, or if I don't even get into Ph.D. programs, I'll be able to go back to teaching high school. Not sure how many school divisions will want to hire a teacher with a graduate degree (automatic pay raise) who has only two years of job experience, though...plus I don't really relish the idea of teaching teenagers again.

[Tufnel]

Honestly, my "plan B" is full-time music. It's completely ridiculous that the only two careers I find palatable are incredibly competitive. However, that could very well be part of the appeal.

Truth be told, I'm concerned about finding time for music during grad school. It doesn't need to be front and center but without the occasional gig, I'll probably lose my mind.

[MoJingly]

Honestly, my "plan B" is full-time music. It's completely ridiculous that the only two careers I find palatable are incredibly competitive. However, that could very well be part of the appeal.

Truth be told, I'm concerned about finding time for music during grad school. It doesn't need to be front and center but without the occasional gig, I'll probably lose my mind.

I understand this. I did my undergrad in music but am now applying to science PhD programs. I've pretty much decided that music never leaves you and, if needed, you will always find time to make it a part of your life.

[EricaMarie]

Right this second, I refuse to have a Plan B. For me, having a Plan B means I'm planning to fail at Plan A, and if I'm already thinking I'm going to fail, why would I bother trying?

That view may change in the next span of time, but as it stands now, its Plan A or bust.

[TheDude]

On the music note: I majored in performance for a while in my undergrad. Once I left studying it formally I found that every time that I picked up my instrument felt better. I was more clear headed and focused in the shorter practice time I had. To be totally honest I think I have lost some chops that I had when I could practice nothing but music for 8 hours a day, but as a musician I feel like my ears, and my feel for both my instrument and music overall, is much improved.

I also have access to record with a few buddies who are supremely talented. When we want to make tunes, or an album as we are currently doing, we record ideas when we have time and use the net to send media files back and forth to see what happens. It works. Additionally, I'm just as content making solo arrangements of famous jazz standards on my guitar or music that no one will ever hear but me. All of this requires little interaction, musically speaking, with anything but my own thoughts and private moments. So, to bring it a bit full circle I have had to modify my perceptions of what a happy and successful musician was. I plan to keep on working at this when I am in grad school.

However, as someone who currently makes my entire salary with music related endeavors I will say it is pretty rough out there. Unless you are doing some amalgamation of teaching privately, doing corporate or wedding gigs, doing studio work, and then recording/performing your own stuff pro bono, it is pretty hard to make a go of it. Musicians as a whole have a very poor sense of business, and this just creates a dog eat dog world of total buffoons out there. Gigs don't pay what they used to. People don't care about live music like they used to.

My plan B: I don't really know. I guess a Master's, but I don't know what purpose that would serve. Most programs that offer this are only a year. Will I really get to know my research advisor that well from the time I start in September to when I'd need a letter in November? It seems like a useless waste of time and money.

[NadaJ]

My Plan B is to apply again next year.

[BlueRose]

I've thought about doing test prep (GRE, MCAT, etc). The going rate for private MCAT tutoring around here is $65/hr - you could make a decent living on that. It's part-time work, but you could spend the rest of the time doing whatever you please. You could do whatever research you wanted, especially if it's theoretical work (cheap!). No faculty meetings, no grants to write...sigh. There are moments when this is my Plan A. But I'm afraid that if I don't have to care what the scientific community thinks of my work, I'll turn into a crank pretty quickly.

...and I'd have to hang around with premeds all day. This will also make me cranky.

Realistically, my Plan B involves getting a job as a data-wrangler / grunt programmer, ideally in bioinformatics. There's plenty of work there; not thrilling work, but respectable and important work, better than a large swath of white-collar geek jobs out there. That's one reason I've gone more towards the computational side. I like my Plan B options there better than the perma-postdoc / lab grunt positions for experimentalists who don't make the cut.

If I'm right about where my weird interdisciplinary field is headed, I'll be perfectly positioned to transition back in a decade or so, and I'll look darn smart doing it. If not, I'll get a middle-class job pushing electrons in the bowels of some vast research conglomerate. There are worse outcomes in life, to be sure.

[Bukharan]

My plan B is to go to Amsterdam and become a street dancer. I will be living in one of those shaky boats on the water as I won't be able to afford much else.

Seriously, no plan B. It is only Plan A!

[juilletmercredi]

I'm already in graduate school (in my third year) but my plan B and is really my plan A. When I came to graduate school I wasn't planning on going into academia; I was planning to take my PhD into government or military research or into the private sector. I have come full circle - through a vested interest in becoming a professor and back again to realizing that it's really not what I want at all. Since then I've been exploring a variety of careers that aren't academic at all and I plan to get some internships over the next two summers that expose me to industry jobs. Honestly, I'd rather be a management consultant than be a professor at this point. Academia just isn't that appealing to me, and I TA'ed last semester and I was not fond of it.

But it's because I'm being realistic with myself - even though the job market in psychology isn't horrible, my degree is an interdisciplinary one and might incur some doubts, and even if I was able to find a tenure-track job it likely wouldn't be in a desirable location. I've been checking out the CHE job listings and they mostly seem to be in places I don't want to live (and I am willing to live in a LOT of places - I love new opportunities and new people).

[lab ratta-tat-tat]

Financially- my backup plan is much more lucrative than my plan a.) getting into graduate school. Perhaps my backup plan as Senior research assistant at University XYZ-awesome-ness should be my first plan.... and graduate school should be a back up plan hmmm....... not a bad idea.

[newms]

I'm on my plan B. I currently have no plan C but I will definitely still want to go to grad school if I don't get in again this year.

[tls]

Right this second, I refuse to have a Plan B. For me, having a Plan B means I'm planning to fail at Plan A, and if I'm already thinking I'm going to fail, why would I bother trying?

That view may change in the next span of time, but as it stands now, its Plan A or bust.

i like this attitude. i start to cringe when i flesh out the details of a plan b. i'll know in 2 to 3 short months if my plan a, getting into a phd program, doesn't pan out. i'll just stay positive and focus on getting in until i have no choice but to detail my plan b.

[qbtacoma]

i like this attitude. i start to cringe when i flesh out the details of a plan b. i'll know in 2 to 3 short months if my plan a, getting into a phd program, doesn't pan out. i'll just stay positive and focus on getting in until i have no choice but to detail my plan b.

But doesn't the great expense, certain stress and heartache of grad school make you nervous? What if it's all for nothing? Not thinking about it at all seems like a dangerous plan to me.

[tls]

But doesn't the great expense, certain stress and heartache of grad school make you nervous? What if it's all for nothing? Not thinking about it at all seems like a dangerous plan to me.

it does make me nervous. but i've applied to phd programs before with no success, so my perspective on the application process has changed. i was absolutely devastated when i didn't get in. i figured that i would never apply again. i didn't have a "plan b" then, but i found a great job which gave me lots of opportunities and helped me formulate my research interests. looking back i realized that i had made the first application process an "all-or-nothing" endeavor and i thought that a phd was the only thing i was meant to do at that time. of course, i was wrong.

this time around, i put more effort into my applications and i know that i have a good shot at getting into the schools i've selected. AND i know that if i don't get in i will figure out a next step which is meaningful and relevant to my career and education. i am a scholar and not getting into a phd program will not take that away from me. i still feel nervous at times, but I am confident that everything will work out in the end.

[qbtacoma]

it does make me nervous. but i've applied to phd programs before with no success, so my perspective on the application process has changed. i was absolutely devastated when i didn't get in. i figured that i would never apply again. i didn't have a "plan b" then, but i found a great job which gave me lots of opportunities and helped me formulate my research interests. looking back i realized that i had made the first application process an "all-or-nothing" endeavor and i thought that a phd was the only thing i was meant to do at that time. of course, i was wrong.

this time around, i put more effort into my applications and i know that i have a good shot at getting into the schools i've selected. AND i know that if i don't get in i will figure out a next step which is meaningful and relevant to my career and education. i am a scholar and not getting into a phd program will not take that away from me. i still feel nervous at times, but I am confident that everything will work out in the end.

That makes a lot of sense. In a way you're already living a Plan B so it's not such a big deal to delay thinking about it.

[rsldonk]

Plan B is to become a crack whore. Plan C is robbing banks. Plan D is law school, but I think I'd prefer suicide.

[natsteel]

I don't have an actual Plan B... but if, for some reason, it doesn't work out, I'd probably take a year off and apply to law school next year. If that didn't work either, I'd probably just go back to music supplemented by clerical work.