The Dreaded Un-Funded MA

[pomoisdead]

I'm really curious--what on earth did you do that meant going $120,000 into debt? 

Long story short, young and dumb.

 

Family was in a very good financial standing when I was going into college, so I took a low-funded offer from a good school far from home rather than a fully funded offer close to home. Was told "it would all be taken care of". Economy collapsed with the family business. Rest is history.

[ProfLorax]

I did an unfunded MA as well. At the time, I didn't even know that funded MA's were a thing! I paid in-state tuition at a state school, so that helped keep the costs down. I know the experience I gained from my MA helped to make me successful this application period. Also, I just found out that I made it past the first round for a full-time, tenure-track teaching position at my community college and will soon be invited to interview. I decline the invite, but this has shown me that even if I didn't apply to PhD programs, I would have still had career options directly related to my MA degree.

 

However, I have some caveats. Like others have said, the worth of an MA degree is entirely based on how much effort a student puts into coursework, networking, and extracurriculars. I worked my ass off as an MA student, and then I worked my ass off as an adjunct instructor. I was always on a look out for ways to make myself stand out. 

 

If you do choose to pursue an unfunded MA, keep an eye out for other forms of funding. My university had a graduate equity fellowship that I didn't notice until the end of my first year; I applied and got it, which covered my tuition and fees for my second year. I heard later on that pretty much no one applies for that fellowship, so it was pretty much free money, just waiting for applicants! So, keep your eye out for random grants and fellowships that may be under the radar.

 

ETA: I guess this post is more of a general response to the question of unfunded MA's and not so relevant to the OP. This is what happens when I don't refresh a page for hours before posting! 

Edited March 8, 2013 by proflorax

[LeatherElbows]

There are a lot of factors to take into consideration, so it's hard to make blanket statements about unfunded MAs. Age, marital status, future goals, plans for a year spent reapplying, current debt, employment possibilities while in the MA, whether the MA leads into a PhD at the same school, quality of the program, and placement rate are all things I'd take into account.

 

The only thing I would say with certainty is if you accept an unfunded offer, have a firm plan on where the money will come from and what you plan to do after the MA is over. 

[thestage]

I really wouldn't agree with such an absolutist stance. As I've posted often, the Chicago MAPH was extremely crucial to any present success I've experienced, and I know there are many others who'd point to their MAPH year as a crucial factor toward their later success. MAPH is sometimes partially funded, but mostly unfunded. It's one of a few exceptional "unfunded" MAs that consistently produces excellent placement. 

 

I would, of course, say that unfunded graduate work is always a thorny issue, and must be handled with care--but I would suggest the individual concerned examine the situation carefully and make their best call.

and those "excellent placements" MAY produce jobs 7 years down the line. if you are lucky. jobs that will not pay very well. so how long do you plan on being saddled with Chicago's debt? the money that they directly took from you and gave to a PhD student?

[ComeBackZinc]

and those "excellent placements" MAY produce jobs 7 years down the line. if you are lucky. jobs that will not pay very well. so how long do you plan on being saddled with Chicago's debt? the money that they directly took from you and gave to a PhD student?

 

Brusque. But accurate, I'd say.

[JosephineB]

Don't do it - especially if you plan to go to UW. My best friend goes there (in a different humanities field) and though it is a good school, they are BROKE across the board. She is leaving to go to a different school because they have no support for grad students outside of TA-ships. As in they literally offer zero support at the dissertation phase. A select few grad students get adjunct jobs, but the rest either have to secure outside funding or pay out of pocket to write their dissertation. Unacceptable. 

[Swagato]

and those "excellent placements" MAY produce jobs 7 years down the line. if you are lucky. jobs that will not pay very well. so how long do you plan on being saddled with Chicago's debt? the money that they directly took from you and gave to a PhD student?

 

 

Brusque. But accurate, I'd say.

I didn't incur debt from Chicago.

[hidalgo]

I really wouldn't agree with such an absolutist stance. As I've posted often, the Chicago MAPH was extremely crucial to any present success I've experienced, and I know there are many others who'd point to their MAPH year as a crucial factor toward their later success. MAPH is sometimes partially funded, but mostly unfunded. It's one of a few exceptional "unfunded" MAs that consistently produces excellent placement. 

 

I would, of course, say that unfunded graduate work is always a thorny issue, and must be handled with care--but I would suggest the individual concerned examine the situation carefully and make their best call.

 

so what do people do? borrow 25k for tuition and another 20k? for living expenses???

[sebastiansteddy]

It really really depends on the circumstances. Some unfunded MA programs cost much more than others. Mine was fairly inexpensive, and I am not too worried about the debt I am in from it. I also had no debt from undergrad, and that factored quite a bit into my decision to take on an unfunded MA. 

 

TwoEspressos - what about Georgetown? Even if you are funded there, their website says the stipend is $5,000 a semester. $10,000 a year to live in DC can't be easy, where rents are often $1,000+ a month. Would you take out loans for living expenses?

[Two Espressos]

TwoEspressos - what about Georgetown? Even if you are funded there, their website says the stipend is $5,000 a semester. $10,000 a year to live in DC can't be easy, where rents are often $1,000+ a month. Would you take out loans for living expenses?

 

You underestimate my ability to live frugally.   I'm poor and likely will remain poor my entire life, so Georgetown's pittance, were I to receive it, wouldn't be so daunting.  I would do everything in my power not to take out loans for Georgetown.  And if I don't receive a funding package, I am certain I'll decline the offer.

[sebastiansteddy]

You underestimate my ability to live frugally.   I'm poor and likely will remain poor my entire life, so Georgetown's pittance, were I to receive it, wouldn't be so daunting.  I would do everything in my power not to take out loans for Georgetown.  And if I don't receive a funding package, I am certain I'll decline the offer.

 

I guess I am underestimating you! DC is one of my favorite US cities, but it is VERY expensive. Even if you can get a cheap place to live, say even $750 a month which is probably impossible in DC - that's $9,000 a year. With Georgetown's stipend, that'd give you $1,000 to live off of for the year...in DC... food, books, transportation, utilities...

 

You would certainly gain my admiration (more than you already have) if you manage that! 

 

I don't mean to be a jerk at all, just making a point that a loan-free MA can be difficult since funded MAs often (though certainly not always) provide a substantially lower stipend than PhD programs. I also do not mean at all to take away from your accomplishment of being accepted to Georgetown - I do really think it is a great program that tends to place very well into PhD programs.

Edited March 8, 2013 by sebastiansteddy

[Two Espressos]

I guess I am underestimating you! DC is one of my favorite US cities, but it is VERY expensive. Even if you can get a cheap place to live, say even $750 a month which is probably impossible in DC - that's $9,000 a year. With Georgetown's stipend, that'd give you $1,000 to live off of for the year...in DC... food, books, transportation, utilities...

 

You would certainly gain my admiration (more than you already have) if you manage that! 

 

I don't mean to be a jerk at all, just making a point that a loan-free MA can be difficult since funded MAs often (though certainly not always) provide a substantially lower stipend than PhD programs. I also do not mean at all to take away from your accomplishment of being accepted to Georgetown - I do really think it is a great program that tends to place very well into PhD programs.

 

I'm pretty sure living in D.C. proper would be impossible on the 10k stipend, which only a very small percentage of admitted students receive anyways.  I guess I'd have to live outside the city and commute.  So the biggest challenge, I suppose, would be to find an apartment near a metro line that isn't expensive (which, again, may be impossible: I'm not that familiar with the area.  I hope it's not impossible.  ).  I agree with you that living on Georgetown's stipend would be incredibly difficult, but I'm committed to making it work in the case that I do receive it.

Edited March 8, 2013 by Two Espressos

[sebastiansteddy]

I'm pretty sure living in D.C. proper would be impossible on the 10k stipend, which only a very small percentage of admitted students receive anyways.  I guess I'd have to live outside the city and commute.  So the biggest challenge, I suppose, would be to find an apartment near a metro line that isn't expensive.  I agree with you that living on Georgetown's stipend would be incredibly difficult, but I'm committed to making it work in the case that I do receive it.

 

Good luck, I really hope you are offered the funding there. Just as a point of comparison, GWU offers it's PhD students somewhere between $22-23k to live in DC.

[thatjewishgirl]

I know that Oklahoma is not anyone's idea of glamorous, but I want to throw this out there: Oklahoma State University is a wonderful school. University of Central Oklahoma does not have the ranking of OSU or OU, but I went there and made the most if it. They give you literally thousands of dollars per year for conferences and everyone gets a TAship with tuition paid. Same at Oklahoma State, minus paying for conferences. OSU's MA package (PhD package for that matter) is great and everywhere in Oklahoma is super affordable. While I certainly would not suggest OSU for PhD, I would for MA. Anyone who got shut out this year should think about applying - living in OK for two years would be absolutely bearable, and OSU is really strong in certain areas, film, MFA, Native Studies, Irish studies all spring to mind, and OSU has one of the top Milton scholars in the world and is the home of the Milton Quarterly. The guy whose assistantship involves editing the Quarterly has had it for forever, so surely he'll graduate eventually! AT UCO everyone teaches 2/2, and you can do that at OSU too, but they have more options for fulfilling the remainder of your assistantship.

 

And I would like to repeat that at both of these schools almost everyone is accepted and funded. So if you would rather not pursue an unfunded MA, apply to some Oklahoma schools for next year. OSU takes out of state and Okies alike, so I think chances are good for anyone on here.

Edited March 8, 2013 by thatjewishgirl

[pomoisdead]

so what do people do? borrow 25k for tuition and another 20k? for living expenses???

Work. Not hard to do when you're taking 1-3 classes.

[Gwendolyn]

I'm probably echoing others, but I've always been told to never go anywhere that wasn't going to fully fund. I think it's especially telling if other applicants to the program received funding, but you did not. Schools tend to fund those who they believe will be most successful.

[Swagato]

I do want to expand a little bit on what I said earlier. The choice to attend an unfunded MA (or partially funded, etc.) is, of course, dependent on individual circumstances. As far as Chicago's program is concerned, there is a sustained (and very successful) effort to place graduates both to academic and non-academic positions, the latter including so-called "alt-academic" and industrial positions. By no means am I saying that it is a guarantee that you will find yourself in any of those categories, but, well, a funded MA is no guarantee of that either. It basically comes down to cost/benefit, and how you define costs and benefits is wholly up to you. My own experiences, and what I've observed of others' though, have convinced me that it can be worth doing an unfunded MA, but that these tend to be the exceptions rather than the norm.

[Pranayama]

An additional question: does anyone know about the unfunded MA in rhetoric at Carnegie Mellon? I just got accepted. There is no way I will attend as I already have two other funded offers (one MA and one PhD), but they have some wonderful faculty at CMU that I would have loved to work with (namely Suguru Ishizaki and David Kaufer). Is it a money-making sort of program, similar to the MAPH at U of Chicago? I am not trying to offend students or former students at either program, I am just curious. 

[JosephineB]

Work. Not hard to do when you're taking 1-3 classes.

??

 

I invite you to try a quarter or two of grad school and then get back to us on this. 

[Datatape]

I invite you to try a quarter or two of grad school and then get back to us on this. 

 

It can be done.  I worked two jobs (one of which was full-time) while earning my M.A.  I finished on-time for my program and earned at 3.87 GPA.  Now, did I have even a remote inkling of a social life or free time while I was doing it?  No.  But it can be done.

[lcampb]

Don't do it - especially if you plan to go to UW. My best friend goes there (in a different humanities field) and though it is a good school, they are BROKE across the board. She is leaving to go to a different school because they have no support for grad students outside of TA-ships. As in they literally offer zero support at the dissertation phase. A select few grad students get adjunct jobs, but the rest either have to secure outside funding or pay out of pocket to write their dissertation. Unacceptable. 

I just wanted to respond to this because I'm a graduate student now at UW now in the English department. While this is true of a number of the humanities departments, the university has been allocating funds based on student enrollment in departmental classes and this means the English department is doing a little better than other departments because of composition enrollments. We're okay on funding - almost everyone is able to get 6th year funding and I don't know of anyone who hasn't gotten second year funding. That said, they're not great about first-year funding (only about 50% of the incoming class as others have mentioned). So I think your chances of being funded in your second year are very good. Also, I've seen people find a number of options, from TAing for the Comm department to enrolling for only one or two quarters the first year, to reduce first year expenses until second year funding arrived. So as others mentioned, be on the look-out for options and support. Regardless, wait until they've made funding decisions to start worrying too much.

[IneluctableModality]

Well, I was in something like your situation last year (shut out of a bunch of Ph.D. programs but offered an unfunded MA spot at a pretty amazing school) -- In the end, I took the advice of everyone on these boards and decided to not go into debt. Given my personal circumstances, I think that was probably the right thing to do, but, to make the facile point that so many others here have made, it really depends on the situation.

 

In your situation, I would lean towards waiting. I remember what it felt like to consider the prospect of waiting another year to reapply. It sucks. It feels like being sentenced to purgatory. But it's just so hard to predict what will happen over the course of a year. I got a great job in book publishing in New York, and now my work will actually pay for me to do an MA part-time (I'm hoping for NYU but we shall see...). Point is, I never in a million years could have seen this coming, and everything worked out great. I was so stuck last year in the mindset of must-start-grad-school-RIGHT-NOW that I almost decided to take on a ton of debt and move to a strange, unfamilar city with no financial support. So I guess my real point is that being super set on starting grad school right away can lead us to make not-great decisions sometimes.

 

That said, UW is a great school. I'm from Seattle and I love that place so much. I know several professors and a guy in the Ph.D. program -- he is one of the happiest grad students I know. Cost of living is pretty affordable (at least in the eyes of someone who now lives in New York), and although it's true that the place is pretty cash-strapped, I think the MA offer is worth some serious consideration.

[Troppman]

It can be done.  I worked two jobs (one of which was full-time) while earning my M.A.  I finished on-time for my program and earned at 3.87 GPA.  Now, did I have even a remote inkling of a social life or free time while I was doing it?  No.  But it can be done.

I just want to echo this point. 

[ComeBackZinc]

I just want to point out again: if the intention is to get into a PhD program and to eventually get a tenure track job, understand that a significant majority of the people who attempt that fail. The job market is that bad. Obviously, I'm taking this bet myself, and obviously, I could be one of the people who fails. But if you end up taking $50,000 in loans over two-three years in an MA, which is wholly possible, and you go out onto a job market that is as bad as the English job market is... you're taking a huge risk. 

 

I don't mean to dwell on this. But it's important to note: the bias here is always going to be towards encouragement and support. That's a good thing! But the message not to go into debt, because of the certainty that many people who post here will end up on the outside looking in, has to be voiced, strongly.

[kareneliz]

I agree with various things that have been said above, both in the "for" and "against" columns. In my own experience, my un-funded MA resulted in a fully-funded PhD at the same school. Those two years spent on my MA, though not cheap, showed me what graduate work should look like, taught me how to participate fully in my education and take advantage of university resources, allowed me to attend conferences, present research, network, etc. etc. -- all things that I have NO doubt drastically improved my chances when I applied this year to PhD programs. I, similar to the original poster, was rejected from PhD programs my first try, and ended up facing an unfunded MA or nothing. I took the MA, and this time around, am taking full funding at a school I love. As others have said, it's all in how you use it and make it work to your advantage!

 

And while I respect the pragmatism of some on this board regarding the future, debt, the job market, etc: We are all here on this site, submitting these applications, wishing, hoping and praying... because we so deeply want this next step of our journey to happen. Maybe a doctorate has been your goal your whole life. Maybe this process is your Moby Dick: it must be faced and attempted, so you can face yourself. I understand that feeling entirely! It's why I'm here. That being said, the risk can be worth it. And while I don't advocate being an idiot with your finances (as several folks have said, it's MORE than possible to work and go to school -- I worked three jobs all throughout my MA. No spare time, but my debt is smaller than most), I don't think an unfunded MA is a surefire way to RUIN YOUR WHOLE FINANCIAL LIFE. Mine, at an affordable school, was a $20,000 liferaft that brought me to where I am now. I certainly agree that spending the money without a committment or a plan is foolish... but if this is really your dream, your goal, and the thing that you want: I believe an MA program can help to better prepare you.

 

If you apply again next time around instead of accepting this time, I recommend taking a look at Binghamton University in NY. That's where I am, and where I'll be staying. In-state tuition is only $7,000 a year. And like I said, my affordable MA became my ticket to a PhD!

 

Good luck with whatever you decide! I'll be thinking of you.