Wanting only MA at Florida institution

[JerseySeashell]

I am new here, just started the process of jumping into the graduate school pool. I know I'm great with research, love history and have the chops to get the job done. I just don't care about teaching in a tenured position at a big school; I think I would be happier at a good small college or even private secondary, or in museum work.

I'm 41 and returned to finish my BA last year at University of St. Thomas, Houston. This is not my home, and my boyfriend and I want to return to Florida where he was living for 12 years and where we met 2 years ago. (Don't ask how we wound up in Houston; one word=family).

Please throw your two cents in re:

• Schools/Programs
• Concentrations/Disciplines of History
• Careers

On my short list are:

University of Florida

Florida State University

University of Miami

Florida International University

University of South Florida

On my safety list are:

University of West Florida

University of North Florida

University of Central Florida

I have a 3.24 gpa (3.89 in History) and I just won the department scholarship for achievement/essay. I've even considered staying in Houston to attend Rice, but I think my chances there are slim to none, especially as preference is given to Doctoral candidates and I'm just not ready to spend the next 6-7 years of my life in school. I love being in school, but barring a rich uncle dropping dead and leaving me a ton of cash, I want to get out there and start "doing" history.

Thanks!

[qbtacoma]

Hi there!

The advice you get here depends a lot upon the field you plan to go into, as the guidelines for being a good candidate vary widely. For example, historians of the Middle East or medieval Europe need to come fluent in several languages already, while this is less of a concern for Africanists or Americanists. Also the subfields are very important for assessing the quality of a program at the graduate level. UC Berkeley has an excellent reputation as a history program overall, for example, but you should not go there as a Latin Americanist because they do not have enough professors in that subfield to give you full exposure to the field.

One thing to keep in mind is that MA programs in the US are rarely fully funded, especially now that the recession has put so many public universities in a difficult position. It is not at all worth it to take out loans for a degree in history - period. If you can pay for it yourself, that is one thing, but loans for a humanities degree are never going to give you a good enough salary to pay back the debt.

As far as getting out there and doing history, there are some options: getting hired as a curator for a museum, as you mention, public history (especially in the National Park Service, but there are often fine local history societies who require historians), library work, etc. As you can see, these options are not "pure" history - really nothing is except for academia, and these alternatives usually require other kinds of training and are often as difficult to find work in as regular academia. Though you could always freelance your own documentaries and such. I'm just brainstorming here, so don't take my word as indicative of all the possibilities there are, but sadly our work in history is difficult to do outside of independent wealth and/or academia. And for academia, you need the PhD.

[StrangeLight]

yep, if your goal is to teach at a small liberal arts or community college, you'll need the PhD. those jobs are extremely competitive. you may know someone with only an MA teaching at a community college somewhere, but odds are they've either been there for a decade or more (before the job market got really ugly) or they're being paid by the course ($1500-3000 per course you teach). if it's the latter, it's not exactly an ideal long-term employment plan. even for the museum gig, you'll be competing with people who hold PhDs. while it may seem like an easy transition to either teach college or curate a museum, they both require rather specialized training. a museum won't care if you TA'd for 2 years. a college won't care if you did an unpaid internship at a museum. but getting a teaching job without TAing, or a museum job without some internship experience, is nearly impossible. to have a good chance of pursuing either of these options, you'll have to be sure to take advantage of opportunities pertaining to both careers.

and we need to know what kind of history you plan to do in order to be able to give you advice or recommendation on your school list. what do you want to study?

[TMP]

Ditto with Strangelight. You really have to decide what is it that you want to do with your history degree. It'll give you some kind of goal to work towards when you hit rough patches in your MA program. I've been in the museum world and you do need to have some kind of MA degree and several internships with excellent connections to even make it through the door (although volunteering for a while will certainly help!).

My suggestion is to get your state residency ASAP and just work until you can qualify for the low in-state tuition so you won't have to take out so many loans to finance your MA. That's how some people get their MAs cheaply enroute to the PhD.

[natsteel]

This is not wholly related to the OP, but I think there a fair amount of people who are under the misconception that there are still CC jobs out there for people with MAs. The reality is that the market is so saturated at this point that tons of PhDs are applying for those CC jobs.

I would second the advice not to take out loans for an MA in History. Perhaps one of the schools has a public history program, but I would also second the advice about establishing residency first before starting an MA to minimize tuition costs.

If I were you, I would apply to both PhD and MA programs because you could possibly end up getting an offer to do a PhD with funding. You say that you don't want to spend 6-7 more years in school because you want to get out there and begin "doing history." In a PhD program, only the first 2 years or so would be coursework. After you finish your exams and advance to candidacy around the 3rd year, your primary responsibility would be to research and write your dissertation, while TA'ing on the side. You'd be out of that daily school culture/routine and there's no experience more about "doing history" than writing a dissertation.

My fear about just doing an MA would be that if it were not in public history or in education, an MA in History will not increase your marketability very much at all when it comes time to hit the job market.

[simone von c]

UNF has an excellent, small MA program and an outstanding track record placing students in doctoral programs. They also have a competitive teaching assistantship which can help with tuition. I recommend it highly.

[JerseySeashell]

Thank you to everyone for your input; I am starting to focus more down to public history/museum studies. I found several schools in Florida that offer these programs as well as certifcates/specializations, and I'm going to focus on American History, possibly Southern U.S./Civil War. I know there's not a lot of money involved in these fields, but at 41, I have to do it now or do it never. I have learned to be content with less, and my boyfriend's steady income means we will get by no matter what. Thanks for the advice on taking residency first; the costs ARE hugely different, and maybe I could use the year to set up house, get a year in as a volunteer somewhere to see what I might like, and save money so I can go back full-time once I get accepted somewhere.

Thanks again!

[JerseySeashell]

One footnote; while many of you mentioned TA's (I assume these are the same as GA's?), I'm reading a book called "Getting What You Came For: The Smart Student's Guide to Earning an M.A. or a Ph.D.", and Robert Peters talks about getting stuck in school for additional years because schools are wasting students' time as cheap labor teaching classes at the expense of their education, and that by forgoing these "opportunities" a student is more likely to be able to devote more time to working on their thesis and graduate on time. Do you agree?

Also, regarding getting funding and getting into PhD vs MA programs, natsteel said, "I would apply to both PhD and MA programs because you could possibly end up getting an offer to do a PhD with funding." Do students ever apply to PhD programs with only the intention of getting their MA? For example, Rice University gives preferential admission to PhD's over MA's, and I'm wondering if students who apply there wanting an MA just outright lie and say, "Sure, I want my doctorate" with the intention of dropping out as soon as they reach MA status? What happens to funding you may have received as a PhD candidate if you don't finish your PhD - does it have to be paid back? Any comments?

[sankd]

One footnote; while many of you mentioned TA's (I assume these are the same as GA's?), I'm reading a book called "Getting What You Came For: The Smart Student's Guide to Earning an M.A. or a Ph.D.", and Robert Peters talks about getting stuck in school for additional years because schools are wasting students' time as cheap labor teaching classes at the expense of their education, and that by forgoing these "opportunities" a student is more likely to be able to devote more time to working on their thesis and graduate on time. Do you agree?

Also, regarding getting funding and getting into PhD vs MA programs, natsteel said, "I would apply to both PhD and MA programs because you could possibly end up getting an offer to do a PhD with funding." Do students ever apply to PhD programs with only the intention of getting their MA? For example, Rice University gives preferential admission to PhD's over MA's, and I'm wondering if students who apply there wanting an MA just outright lie and say, "Sure, I want my doctorate" with the intention of dropping out as soon as they reach MA status? What happens to funding you may have received as a PhD candidate if you don't finish your PhD - does it have to be paid back? Any comments?

Well, it's much less problematic if you are on an assistantship. You can always leave a PhD program with a MA. You can even leave at that juncture for another university - it's the only time you can do it without being completely stained with a scarlet letter. You and your program don't really have to worry about the funding you did have because you worked for it while you were there and your departure frees up a funding line for a new student.

For fellowship students, it is a little different but the general theme is the same. The department has a lot of students. They are concerned about their bottom line. You leaving with an MA after being accepted for 4-5 year funding is only going to impact your professional relationship with your advisor, if anything.

As for this supposed wasting time, I worked as a TA as a MA student and I finished all of my classes and my thesis in four semesters. I also did PhD applications this past cycle. While I was used for my labor, I was still able to make progress.

[pudewen]

On the question of TA-ing, I think there are two things worth considering. First, there's a relatively good chance it will be necessary if you want some sort of funding, which, unless you can afford to pay tuition for grad school (a bad financial bet in general), you'll want. You have to pay the bills somehow, and I think it's hard to argue that being a TA is a worse way to do it in terms of its effect on your learning than working a part-time job elsewhere.

The second thing is that, if you want to get a job that requires teaching (and it sounds like you in fact want a primarily teaching based job), having teaching experience on your cv is very important. If you're trying to get a community college type job with only an MA, I'd venture to say it's absolutely necessary. In fact, you should probably be seeking out opportunities to teach (especially if you can get to design and teach your own class, which some universities let grad students do). If you were looking for an MA to do something like museum work, then yeah, TA-ing wouldn't do you much good (and might be distracting) outside of the financial side. But since you're looking to teach, you'll need to TA.

Edited July 11, 2011 by pudewen

[Riotbeard]

I know people who got MA at FSU, FIU, and South Florida, and they all seemed to like their program. Ray Arsenault (the author of The Freedom Riders) is at South Florida, so if you are interested in doing 20th century stuff, he would be great to work with, and has a lot of connections especially amongst Southern and Civil Rights historians. Beyond that, he is very nice, and from what I hear a very good mentor. They also have (i am sure limited) options to get a funded MA in Florida Studies. FSU also offers funding for MAs, and I have heard good things about their faculty from people who have been there. I also got to meet a prof at UF recently who seemed really nice and interesting to take classes from. The person I know who went to FIU seemed to like it, but I don't know whether her MA was funded...

All of the people who got masters the programs are at funded PhD programs, so you can move to the next level from these schools. I don't know why I know so many people who got masters in the state of florida. Best of luck