what do you do in the summer? (too early??)

[blasian]

hi everyone,

 

i'm a first year phd student and i was wondering what folks do in the summer? i won't have funding and if it's anything like when i was an MA student, jobs are so competitive in the summer (hence the post now, in december!!). when i was an MA student, my summer jobs (camp instructor) had applications due in february!! 

[socialequity]

@blasian I am wondering this myself!! Good question....

[PsychGirl1]

This is a foreign concept to me! In the summer, we take classes, do research, and do practicums :-).

 

Maybe try getting a job as a tutor? Either independently (aka post on CL, etc.) or with a company- tutoring companies tend to be very flexible, so you could even make an arrangement to work there every summer. Since you also already have your master's, you could see if you could teach a class at a local community college over the summer, which would also look great on your CV.

[lewin]

Yes, bizarre! I research human participants so summer is the time to analyze and write up the data I collected during the school year, and plan research for September. My program funds students year-round though.

Edited December 16, 2013 by lewin

[TakeruK]

My program funds students year-round too so this is also strange. But during my application year, I got some offers that were 9-month only with a note that students can obtain summer funding if they find a prof willing to pay them an RA. When I talked to the department further about this (e.g. to ask how competitive these slots are), they said that basically every PhD student will be able to find one if they really want, but some students choose to take the first summer off to study for quals (also in your first year it might be harder to compete for RA slots) and in later years, your thesis advisor will generally hire you as an RA in the summer. This is a physical science program though, where the majority of our funding comes from RAships!

 

At another program, we're paid for a set number of RA hours per year. I think it might work out to be like 30-40 hours per week of RAships, which is basically not possible to keep up during the normal school year due to taking classes and TAing, so students are expected to work less RA hours during the school year and then work as full time RAs in the summer. However, we don't really log our hours (because ultimately, to do a good thesis, we normally would have to work well beyond the RA hours assigned) and we're paid the same amount every month whether or not it's the summer or regular school year, which helps with budgeting etc.

 

So, to me, summer means freedom to just do research and basically keep more regular working hours. It means less interruptions due to classes or TAing. It also means more time to enjoy the non-work aspects of my life as well as time to travel for academic conferences too!

Edited December 16, 2013 by TakeruK

[Andean Pat]

Like the OP I am not funded in the summer so I understand your concern. By no means is this too early to ask. Actually, I am applying for funding to do field research and the deadlines are between January and April. So, yeah, I basically have a plan of what to do, I am only missing the money!

[fuzzylogician]

This is a good time to start asking around your department about summer funding and make it known that you are interested in getting some, if there is any to be had. Talk to different professors about what you might do. Getting funding might be difficult and depends on factors in your program that we can't know about. For sure applying for university-internal funds will take time, if possible. For external grants people might have it's easier - they just need to want to take you on as a research assistant for the summer. Note that even if you don't get funding, there might be a (perhaps unofficial) expectation that you still be at your department at least some of the time, which is something more advanced students can tell you about. They might also know about funding opportunities and how you go about obtaining them, so I recommend talking to them about that too.

 

In my program everyone gets one month of summer funding and I've been able to get one additional month every year I've been there, and with travel home it ends up covering all the time I am around. I basically work on the same things as during the year, only it's better because there are no classes to take or teach so there is more time for actual work. I think I do most of my writing during these uninterrupted periods of time. On the other hand, some professors are gone over the summer and since students are gone it's harder to recruit subjects for experiments, so that's something to plan for. I try to have my experiments done before finals, otherwise it suddenly gets much slower.

[i.am.me]

My advisor just wrote up in my paper - did you read this book? did you read that book? That person has a book too...

 

So, reading is what I will be doing for the next couple of holiday breaks. 

[Authorization]

There are a few potential answers to this:

 

* A summer internship with an employer of interest relevant to one's field of study

* Your full-time job if you have one

* Summer classes

* Your full-time job + summer classes

 

Or the less productive option, take a semester off to visit family. 

[juilletmercredi]

I had summer funding so I did research over the summer  I do have some friends who didn't have summer funding; they usually got internships or summer jobs both at and outside of the university.  Most of the time they were research jobs (as a RA or something) or internships related to our field.  One summer I chose to do a non-academic market research internship that I really enjoyed, and two summers I taught in an honors summer program for undergraduates.

[Pol]

RA 35 hours a week for 12 weeks, iirc the salary is around 20$ and hour. Other than that, I'll be spending 4 weeks at the ICPSR.

Edited December 18, 2013 by Pol

[blasian]

this is hella helpful. thanks for the responses! i'm not sure about opportunities for research over the summer at my school but an internship sounds cool. guess i gotta start looking and inquiring!!

 

thanks!