Worth it to apply to one program (MA MCC) this cycle?

[greybox]

As the title states, I'm looking for opinions on whether to throw in an application this cycle for NYU's MCC MA program? It would be the only program I apply to this year. Apologies for the long read, and thank you in advance for the help!

 

Background:

• I graduated in 2011 from a top-20 private research university with my BA in Economics (and minors in American Culture Studies and Public Health).

• I was a terrible student! Cumulative GPA was 2.77 and scattered throughout my transcript are 6 W's and 3 F's in a variety of subjects. My fall semesters are all above 3.0 and my spring semesters are all below. In what was supposed to be my last semester (Spr2011), I basically took the semester off since I took 3 W's and 2 F's that semester. I probably should have taken an extra year to repair my transcript and finish on a high note, but I ended up finishing in the summer mainly because my parents were funding college, and they insisted I finish ASAP.

• I don't have an excuse for the poor performance in undergrad (no sob story during my studies although ironically a couple of mental health issues eventually stemmed from the dismal performance but I will not be mentioning that in any of my apps); I think I was just academically burnt out from high school and lacking any sort of direction or motivation. I went from a Bio/History major to Economics, but I hated Econ as well and never had any professional aspirations with the major; it just seemed like a practical decision at the time.

• I took a couple of television courses with the only professor at my university involved in that field, and I loved them and loved the professor. Despite the interest, I stopped doing work in one of those courses and ended with an F although I continued going to class and doing the readings because I was genuinely interested in the subject matter. There was just some mental block that prevented me from getting the work done (all my F's basically followed this formula); to this day, I can't explain it. So basically, I ended up burning all bridges for possible LORs.

TL;DR: Low GPA from good university with no sob story. Don't think I can get any LORs from undergrad professors. Interested in grad school in a field I did not major in but have always been interested in.

 

Post-Undergrad:

• Remained burnt out from the undergrad experience for a while, and floundered in the job hunt while trying to explore other interests (non-profit work, education field, start-ups).

• Ended up working for a temp agency for 6 months (mainly taking non-profit gigs) and then taking a sort of full-time job at a college prep company as a glorified receptionist (while also formatting and editing SAT curriculum towards the end of my tenure there). Also started working part-time for an early stage start-up in customer service, social media, and ops about a year ago.

• Have traveled a lot during these last 2 years as well, since my work's always been flexible and not really a career.

• As cliche as it sounds, 2013 became a year of soul-searching and working through some issues. After an extended trip to Asia and some insightful conversations with fans at Comic-Con, it dawned on me that I could and should turn my "hobby" into a career. I proceeded to quit my awful college prep job over the Summer, self-finance and enroll in 2 upper div undergraduate Sociology classes at Berkeley for the Fall, and even buy the domain name that I wanted to use for any future personal website. I am still working part-time with the startup though.

• Doing pretty well in both classes, but because they're big classes, there's little opportunity to forge a close relationship with the professors. I've chatted with one prof about my goals, but for the other class, the GSI basically has all the office hours and does all the grading; I wrote my final paper about shipping practices within television fandoms, so the GSI knows my interests. Also started helping a sociology grad student with a research project, but it's not related to my field and basically just consists of reading articles and coding them.

TL;DR: Traveled and worked crappy jobs unrelated to media/comm but had an epiphany about 6 months ago and am now refocused on a PhD as the ultimate goal. Quit main job, taking classes, doing free labor for a grad student, still semi-employed for pay.

 

I had set a timeline that basically had me applying for MA programs next Fall, so I'd have time to take the GRE and build relationships for my LOR's, but after talking to a friend who's currently enrolled in the MA MCC program at NYU, I'm tempted to try applying to the program this cycle. I have not done all that much research into masters programs, but this one appeals to me because the program is theory-based and because the program is in New York City. If I'm paying a lot of money for school, I want to be in a city that I actually want to live in.

 

I know that I'll probably need to do an unfunded masters to get into a doctoral program, and the PhD at a reputable university is the ultimate goal. I personally have no money and would need to take out loans, but if I did not get any aid, it might be possible for me to ask my parents for a loan. Since a lot of MA programs seem to just fund PhD programs, would I have a better shot of getting in if I did not apply for financial aid and submit a FAFSA? 

 

If I apply, I could cram the GRE into early January and work on my SOP over the winter break. I'm still not sure exactly what I'd do about recs.

 

FWIW, my interests are in fan practices and fandoms (tv fandom in particular), online communities, participatory media culture, audience reception, etc. Basically, I've always loved television but fell in love with it as a potential academic field after reading Textual Poachers by Henry Jenkins. I also find Mike Wesch's work as a digital ethnographer quite fascinating.

 

Any thoughts?

 

[Duna]

Hmm. Brutal honesty: Sounds to me like an ad-hoc decision. If high school burnt you out and college seemed tough because you procrastinated, I do not really see why you would ever want to go to grad school.

 

To me, this sounds a bit like: Wow, hiking up that hill was damn exhausting and I felt like I couldn't get to the top. So now I will go and climb K2. 

 

But hey, I don't know you and I don't know your situation, so if this is what you want to do: go for it! But be sure to not have any illusions. It will be way more readings, way more working, way more constant pressure than anything you could have experienced in college. 

[NOWAYNOHOW]

I am finishing up my MA at MCC.  My impression since beginning there is that MCC is as much work as you want it to be. On one hand, I know people in my cohort who do the bare minimum, have a good GPA and don't want to advance to the PhD.  On the other hand, I work 3 jobs (research, editorial and TA) and finished most of my credits in the first year to focus on working, applications and the thesis in my second.  If a well-ranked PhD program is your goal, you can do it at MCC, but it takes a lot of ambition, determination and discipline to distinguish yourself from a very large MA cohort and to build a profile that will prove to adcomms that you are a good candidate.  I would say that it seems like a group of 15-20 students apply to PhD programs each year overall, and not all of those are serious.  Most serious applicants do get in to great programs - USC, UPenn, NYU, etc. etc...

 

I haven't finished applying yet, so I can't tell you how things are going to turn out, but if you have specific questions feel free to DM me.

[greybox]

Hmm. Brutal honesty: Sounds to me like an ad-hoc decision. If high school burnt you out and college seemed tough because you procrastinated, I do not really see why you would ever want to go to grad school.

 

To me, this sounds a bit like: Wow, hiking up that hill was damn exhausting and I felt like I couldn't get to the top. So now I will go and climb K2. 

 

But hey, I don't know you and I don't know your situation, so if this is what you want to do: go for it! But be sure to not have any illusions. It will be way more readings, way more working, way more constant pressure than anything you could have experienced in college. 

 

You make a valid point, and it's something that's always on the back of my mind. Self-doubt's always there, and since failure's been an actual part of my life, I think it'll always be there.

 

I think my academic decisions in high school and college were largely dictated by familial expectations, and my majors were never subjects I was interested in or even good at (for example, it's quite clear to me now that although I may be above average compared to the general public in math, I am certainly not good enough at it to be an econ major at a good university). I don't regret going to an academically challenging university (and honestly the environment and people there were awesome!), but I do regret the academic decisions I made during my 4 years there. The procrastination was certainly there, but I felt like a lot of it was a direct result of just "sucking" at my major and struggling to make passing grades in those classes. In one of my non-major classes, I was told by the professor that I was the only student he'd ever had who continued to show up to class and participate yet failed to turn in half the papers for the class..."You'll get an "F" but clearly you're still interested in the material."

 

To me, this decision feels like something that's always been there but something that I never allowed myself to fully embrace and pursue.  I don't doubt that I have the intelligence to succeed in this field, and given the opportunity to focus on it 100%, I'd like to think that I'd take it seriously. I suppose this decision seems like an epiphany because Comm grad school never crossed my mind (my undergrad didn't have it as a major nor Sociology, which I'd consider next closest to my interests). Now I just hope a school will give me the opportunity to pursue something that I've been passionate about for over a decade: 1000's of hours of television viewing, countless private journals on it (and the occasional public forum post or school paper written about it), a decade plus of both observing some fan communities and participating in others, years of reading academics like Jenkins and Jason Mittell for fun...

 

Guess now the first hurdle is selling myself to the MA adcomms...

[trizzleYO]

Man, I would seriously reconsider applying for any MA graduate work that is not funded.  Your point about New York is funny.  While true, you should get something out of it if you're paying for it, that's not exactly a fiscally wise mindset (why go 10k in debt - WHEN I CAN GO 50k?!).  I think research into funded MA programs would be a good idea, as would trying to forge some academic LoR relationships.