Why do you even want to go to grad school anyway?

[qed67]

To break to trend of the acceptance/rejection topics in here, how about some soul searching while waiting it out?

 

I posed think question to myself and I thought it would be good for anyone to seriously think about it: Why? Why put yourself through writing all these essays, taking GREs, spending hundreds of dollars, stalking grad-cafe, go on tough interviews, etc... All to spend 5-6 years of your life to putting even more pressure on yourself until you finally get through it? Most people do fine without a PhD... why do you need to do it?

 

Don't answer like you're telling me, or like you're writing a SOP... what's the reason you used to convince yourself that this is right? Imagine you're trying to convince yourself from 9th grade that this is what you need to do. Have you ever put these feelings/ambitions into words? Think about it even if you're a lurker, or you don't want to share for everyone to see. You might learn something about yourself. 

 

I'll tell you why I'm doing it. Because statistically, I can't do it. Statistically, I'm supposed to want to grow up to play in the NBA and sell 1M records as a rapper, not to win a Nobel Prize in physics. I should just settle for working at Walmart and have a few kids I won't take care of, and probably end up in jail before I turn 25, not rock the boat and dare to dream different. I only know of one person from my HS actually got to the NFL, and all he does is sit on the bench, the rest... some are doing okay, but 90% completely lack ambition; they're so complacent with... "mediocracy" for lack of a better word. I'm not trying to say I'm better than them for going to grad school, but I'm disappointed that all these people that are still young are wasting their potential. You can't become the next Einstein unless you try to become Einstein. I'm doing it to prove I can do it. Why live your whole life and not aim high? You only get one chance... Even if your first path was misconstrued, you ain't dead yet.

 

That's something to consider even if you don't get into the grad school you like or even any at all... you ain't dead yet, so don't act like you can't get higher.

[Sorawit]

For me it's just an inevitable choice (at least in my head.) I've been wanting to do something in policy field for a long time. But my background is environmental science and I have very little knowledge in important subject like economics to get a job.

I didn't get accepted at all last year. But i know that I'd regret not going through application process hell again. This year, it finally paid off.

One more thing, it would've been much easier if I could get a scholarship from Thai government. But it doesn't offer any for environmental policy program and it's the reason i had to work so hard to get a spot at grad school in America (no, this program is not available in Thailand)

At this point i don't even care about funding, I'll take a loan if i have to. I just know that it's what i want to do. Sometime i wish I could just walk away from politics and become a chef (i love cooking!), but again, i just know there'll be times, in the future, that i complain about illogical policies. I just can't face my future self for not try my hardest when i can.

I'll just cook for fun

[queenleblanc]

The only way to work as a speech language pathologist is to get a clinical masters degree, so that is the big reason for my pursuit to get into grad school. Perhaps more pertinent to my situation is a career change from music education to SLP. I also plan to eventually pursue a PhD to research and teach at the collegiate level.

[tiarabun]

I came from a family of nothing. My parents don't even speak a word of English. I was supposed to be a mediocre person until I met the professors in college who believed in me and made me realize I could be so much more. Having worked in several industries after graduation in which 3 years were spentl teaching highschool kids, i realized education is my calling. I missed teaching and inspiring younger generations when i was doing a corporate job.

I want to follow my professors' footsteps, and the only way to become a professor is to have a PhD.

[Regenerative Christine]

Between my sister and I, she was always the one who commanded that attention among the two of us as being 'the smart one.' Though she did a lot of soul searching throughout her years of schooling, she was always able to excel academically and stay well focused. I was and will continue to be insanely proud of her-I see how people react when I tell them about her..and so it made me think to myself i need to start looking at myself the way I look at my sister. 

 

I was not well focused throughout my years as an undergrad (8 years). I had little direction and dealt with bouts of depression and social anxiety. Both of my parents did not have a college education and were pretty taboo in talking about mental health, so there were countless semesters where I was in and out of school.

 

My sis recently got her PsyD and I see how empowering that has been for her; not only as a Filipina-American woman but as the first on both sides of the family to earn a Doctorate. Applying to grad school at this point means the world to me-i feel like it would be this sort of redeeming experience to compensate for my lack of focus during undergrad. 

[acoustic_alchemy]

I've been pretty good at science (especially chemistry) by the time I was a freshman at college, but it was volunteering as an undergraduate research assistant and presenting my work that made me think, I want to do this for the rest of my life. I loved the process, from finding an interesting problem, to mapping out and performing experiments, to collecting data, and going in surprising directions. Frankly, the lab is where I felt most at home through all of college.

 

I don't really have teaching experience other than short presentations with elementary schoolchildren, but it's rewarding to see that "click" within people as they realize that this science stuff matters to everyday life, and it's so freaking cool! This kind of realization is to me especially important at the collegiate level because the curriculum is most suited for teaching how to use the scientific method and critical thinking in the context of chemistry. Even if none of my students become scientists in the "pure" sense, a deep understanding of how to interrogate the world and communicate to other people about those findings is important to future doctors, nurses, politicians, teachers...heck, everybody, in my view. /soapbox

 

I'm gunning for the PhD partly because it's the most direct path toward becoming an independent researcher in my field, partly because I might as well dream big or  go home

Edited March 5, 2013 by acoustic_alchemy

[RandiZ]

I'm the geeky kid who read encyclopedias and almanacs for fun. I love research, not just surfing on the internet, but the real finding the right keywords to illicit ERIC to bring up the right journal articles. I love to think about, talk about what I've learned and synthesize it into something new and different. I like studying big systems, figuring out how they work and telling other people about it in uncomplicated language. For personal satisfaction, I need the work to have real world applications that can impact people's lives in a positive way. I'm very successful at putting together interdisciplinary teams and creating something that none of us could have done or even thought up individually. I enjoy time with my family and have a few hobbies. But essentially, I'm always reading and writing about my areas of interest. Earning a PhD just seems like a way to get paid for doing what I already love to do.

[dunkeaters]

Honestly, I just really love debating. I love challenging ideas, having to analyze them, and trying to come up with my own rebuttals to them. It's like a great game I play, and it's such a rewarding feeling coming to understand the "why" question behind so many different topics. Basically, I decided I'd rather be poor and do philosophy than rich doing anything else. 

[raneck]

In my junior/senior year of undergrad, I thought a lot about just getting a job vs. grad school, but eventually I came to the conclusion that I could be successful in grad school, so why not?  At the time, I certainly had more experience with the academic world, so going to grad school definitely felt more comfortable. I am not the kind of person to be "passionate" about anything. I'm a good engineer, I do good work.  There are certainly some projects on my plate that are less interesting and more tedious, but who cares.  I just like doing cool stuff.

[Linelei]

Because I believe in my soul it's what I'm meant to do. I want to research issues that I find really important, both personally and universally. I love working in the lab, I love the teaching experiences I've had, and I love the process of discovering new and relevant things. I've been inspired by mentors and look forward to someday mentoring my own students. I have a clear idea (open to life's changes, of course) of what I want to study over my career and what I would like my research to accomplish. When I think about grad school it feels right, like I am on my path.

 

Maybe that's all cheesy hippy stuff, but you asked for what I tell myself, and this is it: I just know.

[ZacharyObama]

I'm tired of being poor and underemployed.

[zabius]

For me, this is the culmination of a very long love affair with insects and their kin. :-)

 

But before that, I was all about dinosaurs (honestly, what little boy isn't?). When I was in kindergarten, the teacher organized a career day, in which we all sat in a circle and discussed what we wanted to be when we grew up. The night before, I made sure that I could pronounce "paleontologist" correctly (yes, I practiced for this), and when it was my turn to share, I proudly proclaimed that that was what I wanted to be. My teacher, however, called me out right in front of everyone else and said, "That's not a real job. You can't get paid to do that." Then she tried to encourage me to be a police officer or doctor or construction worker like everyone else in the class. I was totally crushed... she quite literally snuffed out my dream because I was impressionable enough to believe her. I actually got a little depressed over this... I packed up the dinosaur books that I was learning how to read from, stopped playing with my dinosaur toys, and asked my parents to buy me new non-dinosaur bedsheets. I honestly thought that I'd have to be a cop or fireman even though I didn't like those professions at all. My heart was with the dinosaurs, but I let my teacher convince me that dinosaurs were "just for the movies." 

 

Next year, my quirky first grade teacher decided that hamsters and turtles were boring and went for spiders as her class pets. She collected a few from around her house, put them in cages, and did a little spider biology unit to teach us about them. Most students thought it was icky, but I loved it! I relished my week as spider monitor, during which I had to observe the spiders every afternoon and record their behaviors in the class spider journal. After the school year ended, the teacher even let me keep the surviving spiders for the summer! It was great... in the years to come, I read more and more about spiders and other arthropods, and became more and more hooked. I eventually decided that I wanted to be an entomologist when I grew up so that I could learn more about these animals forever.

 

And that's what I've been working towards ever since! I joined a spider biology lab during my second semester of undergrad, churned out a few interesting projects there, and then proceeded to a master's program where I investigated a different type of web-building insect. Now I'm applying to PhD programs so that I can continue the dream! The end goal is a job in academia, with an equal mix of research (because it's interesting) and teaching (so that I can inspire people in the way that my first grade teacher did).

 

Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if my first grade teacher didn't step in and encourage me to be passionate about something again. Maybe I would have really tried to be a cop or construction worker? Sometimes I also wonder what life would be like if I had decided to get back into dinosaurs. In any case, I'm doing this PhD because I like bugs. But I'd also like to think that I'm getting revenge on that terrible teacher who crushed my childhood dream way back in the early 90s by working hard to follow this second dream. I recently got my dinosaur toys out of the closet too... just because. :-)

 

[bTW, the kindergarten teacher was eventually fired after numerous complaints from parents about her teaching style. She deserved it!]

Edited March 6, 2013 by zabius

[charlesjeon]

You get paid to learn. Why not do it?

[echlori]

A somewhat related quora thread: http://www.quora.com/Graduate-School/Should-you-get-a-PhD-only-if-youre-very-passionate-about-your-field-of-study

 

Personally, for my field, it seems that there's an increasing demand for phd level statisticians. 

Edited March 6, 2013 by echlori

[khart16]

For me, I've always seen myself in school. I never really knew "what I wanted to be when I grew up" but I realized as I was going through school and then college that my passion is learning. I love to learn and expand my knowledge and challenge myself. I am one of those people that is good at almost everything- you know, can pull out the A's and an occasional B in math but hate those classes with a fiery passion. I love languages and thought that I would be doing something in that field but I eventually changed my major to history because I love understanding why people do and see the things the way they do. With grad school, I can use my language skills with the primary sources and study something that I really love and continue to study it for the rest of my life through research and teaching classes to young adults.

 

Of course there are other benefits, such as basically getting paid to go to school or "avoiding the job market". But in all honestly, I would love grad school despite its difficulties. I'm more than capable to go all the way with it and it's not just something I need to get out of the way for a certain job I want, I'm actually looking forward to it (but am still waiting on admissions decisions). My area of specialization gets a bad reputation for being dull and stagnant and I think it's important for those who want to be professors to show passion for their subject so the students can get excited about it as well.

[ak48]

Don't know what I want to do in life, still kinda don't. Figure specializing in a "always in demand" profession is the way to go. Plus I figure it will open opportunities for me.

 

i'm not nearly as "omg I want to do research and I'm sure of it" as I figure i should be. Maybe it'll bite me in the ass later.

[Grace187]

For me, this is the culmination of a very long love affair with insects and their kin. :-)

 

But before that, I was all about dinosaurs (honestly, what little boy isn't?). When I was in kindergarten, the teacher organized a career day, in which we all sat in a circle and discussed what we wanted to be when we grew up. The night before, I made sure that I could pronounce "paleontologist" correctly (yes, I practiced for this), and when it was my turn to share, I proudly proclaimed that that was what I wanted to be. My teacher, however, called me out right in front of everyone else and said, "That's not a real job. You can't get paid to do that." Then she tried to encourage me to be a police officer or doctor or construction worker like everyone else in the class. I was totally crushed... she quite literally snuffed out my dream because I was impressionable enough to believe her. I actually got a little depressed over this... I packed up the dinosaur books that I was learning how to read from, stopped playing with my dinosaur toys, and asked my parents to buy me new non-dinosaur bedsheets. I honestly thought that I'd have to be a cop or fireman even though I didn't like those professions at all. My heart was with the dinosaurs, but I let my teacher convince me that dinosaurs were "just for the movies." 

 

Next year, my quirky first grade teacher decided that hamsters and turtles were boring and went for spiders as her class pets. She collected a few from around her house, put them in cages, and did a little spider biology unit to teach us about them. Most students thought it was icky, but I loved it! I relished my week as spider monitor, during which I had to observe the spiders every afternoon and record their behaviors in the class spider journal. After the school year ended, the teacher even let me keep the surviving spiders for the summer! It was great... in the years to come, I read more and more about spiders and other arthropods, and became more and more hooked. I eventually decided that I wanted to be an entomologist when I grew up so that I could learn more about these animals forever.

 

And that's what I've been working towards ever since! I joined a spider biology lab during my second semester of undergrad, churned out a few interesting projects there, and then proceeded to a master's program where I investigated a different type of web-building insect. Now I'm applying to PhD programs so that I can continue the dream! The end goal is a job in academia, with an equal mix of research (because it's interesting) and teaching (so that I can inspire people in the way that my first grade teacher did).

 

Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if my first grade teacher didn't step in and encourage me to be passionate about something again. Maybe I would have really tried to be a cop or construction worker? Sometimes I also wonder what life would be like if I had decided to get back into dinosaurs. In any case, I'm doing this PhD because I like bugs. But I'd also like to think that I'm getting revenge on that terrible teacher who crushed my childhood dream way back in the early 90s by working hard to follow this second dream. I recently got my dinosaur toys out of the closet too... just because. :-)

 

[bTW, the kindergarten teacher was eventually fired after numerous complaints from parents about her teaching style. She deserved it!]

 

I love this!! Except for your kindergarten teacher crushing your dreams, that's rotten. When I was in kindergarten we had to write down what we wanted to be when we grew up. I raised my hand and asked my teacher how to spell "entomologist." She looked at me blankly and said, "How do you think you spell entomologist?" She was very encouraging, though. I eventually moved on to other things (including a brief span of digging holes in the yard when I wanted to be a paleontologist), but I wanted to study insects for years and years. I'm in medical geography now, but I've carried this into an interest in vector-borne disease. And I still have the pinned bug collections my dad and I made in Elementary school, hanging in my home office.

[zabius]

I love this!! Except for your kindergarten teacher crushing your dreams, that's rotten. When I was in kindergarten we had to write down what we wanted to be when we grew up. I raised my hand and asked my teacher how to spell "entomologist." She looked at me blankly and said, "How do you think you spell entomologist?" She was very encouraging, though. I eventually moved on to other things (including a brief span of digging holes in the yard when I wanted to be a paleontologist), but I wanted to study insects for years and years. I'm in medical geography now, but I've carried this into an interest in vector-borne disease. And I still have the pinned bug collections my dad and I made in Elementary school, hanging in my home office.

 

That's awesome! Especially that you still have your old insect collection. In my experience (from talking to other entomophiles), it seems like entomology is something that gets into people at a very young age (kind of like a larval parasite). Some stick with it, others pursue different careers... but for most of these people, the underlying "bug love" never really goes away.

 

I also think that it's cool how you've been able to incorporate your love of insects into your medical geography work. It's hard for me to combine insects and dinosaurs, but palaeoentomology is a close compromise. Unfortunately, it's exceptionally hard to find a job (or even a PhD program) in that, as there's very little money in the study of extinct insects. But it's kind of a side hobby for me now; I love reading about new fossils when they're discovered. 

Edited March 8, 2013 by zabius

[1FJG]

Because I can handle the truth and I'm consistently looking for answers to my questions, through experimental research. Yep, I find amusement from being a lab slave.

[Lulubelle]

I already have a career, but I've been bored to death in it every since I graduated. I've gotten a chance to do some things in it related to my new path, though, and those were definitely much more rewarding and enjoyable. I have no real desire to move forward in my current career. I know that some people are OK with having an unfulfilling job, but it's important for me to do something that I believe in and that lets me use a lot of different skills that I enjoy. 

 

Pretty much all of my prospective career changes required me to go back to school in some form, but this was most related to experiences I'd previously had and made more sense for my life. I know some people get into higher ed with a bachelor's, but I'd rather get the master's out of the way now while I don't have a lot of obligations in life.

[Seeking]

Because I can be nowhere but in the academia - this the career I love despite all its insecurities and not-so-hidden inequalities and injustices that plague the academic world.

 

I come from a family of high-achiever professionals who make a lot of money, but none of them is an academic. As a person involved in the academia, I don't earn like them, but I am the most highly educated person in my family and they are proud of it, though I feel I have a lifetime to learn.

 

Perhaps I won't be an Einstein, but let's see - after I die, I may be remembered by my books by the next few generations of students.

Edited March 9, 2013 by Seeking

[Queen of Kale]

I want to squish rocks and shoot lasers and play with all the fancy toys no one let me play with before I went back to school.  And I want to do it forever.  Getting paid is just a plus, IMO.

[TeaGirl]

I feel intellectually ambitious. I need to keep challenging myself to be happy and I don't want to settle.

 

That's the main reason. It also happens that I love my field, living in different places, learning new things that interest me, and getting a PhD will let me do all of the above plus open up a career path that I really want.

[midnight]

First and foremost, it's the only route to the profession I want (SLP).

 

Also, I love learning, challenging my mind, and acquiring new skills while honing my old ones.

[slpf13]

I can't work as a Speech Language Pathologist without a Master's degree. And similarly, I can't get a PhD (if i wanted to) down the road with a Master's degree. So, basically my whole career path relies on a Master's degree. And I LOVE being in school!