A most unusual case...

[changeisgood]

Well, maybe not, but I am an oddball.  I have a Poli Sci B.A., got my J.D. in 1991 and have been practicing law ever since.  But I'm now having a mid-life crisis and have decided (with my wife's wonderful support, as she is a PhD in Math) to switch careers and go into academia.  I'm enrolled in the University of Oklahoma M.A. program starting this Fall (2015), and the eventual goal is a PhD and a TT job somewhere.

 

Sooooo...any advice would be helpful.  My undergrad GPA is not helpful at all, but it *was* completed 27 years ago and I've changed a lot since then.   I did manage a 3.2 in my Poli Sci classes, tho.  The bad grades are due to 2 major changes and a lot of partying.  Once I figured out what I wanted to do with my life, things smoothed out.

 

My GRE is currently 165/150/4.5 but that was only with a 4-week prep on math I haven't looked at in 20 years.  I'll take it again next Summer and improve it.  I have no idea why the writing was so low but I'm confident I can get that above 5.  OU let me in as an M.A. student after rejecting me as a PhD student, primarily because of my unusual situation and I think the professors see me as a project.  The idea is to kick ass for 2 years and then see where I'm at for PhD purposes.  Research interests are AP with media/public opinion/voting behavior emphasis.  If any of you could give me some guidance I would appreciate it.  For instance:

 

I'm 48 years old, but with a lot of life experience.  Will that help/hurt/be of no consequence?

So far all my degrees are from the same university.  I've noticed that's rare with TT professors.  Do I need to really make sure I go somewhere else for a PhD, or does it matter on the job market?

Any suggestions on programs which will take me or that would be a good fit?  I can list out the top tier schools same as anyone, and if I have a 4.0 Masters GPA and get my GRE above 330 I will hopefully have options.  But I would appreciate any specific ideas anyone may have.  Thanks and I will be hanging around here during my Masters program.  Good to know this forum is here.

[rising_star]

If you want to be competitive for a TT position, you need to go the top ranked program that you can get admitted to. As far as I know, OU is not a top 10, top 20, or even top 30 political science doctoral program. American politics is an especially competitive area so you'll need to be in a top program. Even then, your age is likely to prove an obstacle on the job market, as there seems to be age discrimination (there have been multiple lawsuits filed against institutions in the last few years alleging this). 

 

While you're in your master's program, beef up your research experience and quantitative skills. Be a research assistant if possible so you can be a co-author on publications and conference presentations.

 

Good luck!

[cooperstreet]

Here's a question: since you are later in life and are getting a master's at the same place you got your undergrad, presumabely you have roots in your area. Are you willing to move to bumblefuck, nowhere that is located a thousand miles from where you are now?

 

Also, have done extensive coding and quantitative work in your previous career?

[TakeruK]

The main idea behind academics encouraging each other to attend different schools for different graduate programs is to broaden one's horizons and gain more diversity of experience.

 

But in recent years (in some fields more than others), it's been a lot easier to gain diverse experiences even staying at the same school. Communication with and travel to other scholars is much easier now with modern technology, so the "stigma" of staying in one place is lessened. But hiring committees still contain people from the decades where the stigma was still there, so this preference may still be reflected in hiring decisions.

 

In addition, with your life/work experience, I think you would be less of a concern than someone who finished high school, then did an undergrad, Masters, and PhD all at the same place. As I said above, the goal of going to different places is to gain diversity of experience, but you would have that already (albeit not in your field of study, but still).

 

---

 

For this next part, I apologize if you already know what you're doing and this part is just patronizing. I am writing it though because you asked for guidance. You mention a TT position as your career goal. You might have read a lot already about how academia is a very tough job market and that only a small fraction of graduates end up on the TT. It is my opinion that any incoming graduate student with a TT position as a career goal should treat it as a "shoot for the stars" goal and also have different career goals and motivations for entering a graduate program. 

 

Also, I notice that many students considering graduate school say they want a TT job but this is mostly due to a mistaken belief that the only possible job with a PhD is a TT position (in reality, at least in my field, the TT position is the exception rather than the norm). Your wife has a PhD in math and it sounds like she works in academia as well, so maybe you already know this (if so, sorry!). 

 

The point of this part is to ask what specifically do you want to do in academia? Is it TT job or bust? Or are you open to a lot of other things as well? I think knowing exactly what you want to be doing will shape the plan you take during graduate school, which then shapes the guidance others can provide. Again, I don't mean this as an attack/interrogation! You don't even have to answer here since it might be information you rather keep private. But I just wanted to guide your thoughts to setting a more immediate goal than TT job and then using those goals to determine how to best take advantage of your resources in your Masters and PhD programs.

[changeisgood]

Yes, I'm willing to move if need be.  The wife and I have already discussed it and we'll do what's going to give me the best chance to get into the best program.  Even if that means going off myself for a few years.  My kid's getting ready to start high school and he'll be a junior by the time this is an issue.  And there is always Skype.  However, we are fairly mobile as my wife is a non-TT lecturer at OU and never has been interested in research, she just likes to teach.  But, her field is modeling, so she's been talking about getting onto *my* papers and coat-tailing the publishing.   Seriously though, she'll be a great tutor for quant analysis.  I have virtually no prior knowledge in that area, but have been studying it for the past several months in preparation.  Downloaded R Studio and got myself some texts, borrowed my wife's Linear Algebra and stats books, and diving into it.  It's really a lot more fun than I thought it would be!

[changeisgood]

Appreciate the thoughts on staying in one place vs. diversity.  I do have a lot of experience in the field, as most of my law career was in government.  I've been involved in political campaigns, PACs, and worked for several agencies as well as our state's Attorney General's office.  I have a Con Law/Civil Rights background.  I got the chance to GTA this summer for a prof. in my dept. who was running a freshman AmGov course "against his will".   Heck, I could have lectured most of the course off the cuff without notes, just from my own personal experience.  It might have been a bit cynical though.

 

As far as goals, I would not say it's "TT or bust" but I do want to teach, research, and write.  TT will definitely be what I will shoot for but if it doesn't happen, there are enough smaller liberal arts colleges around that I'm sure I can find something.  It means a whole lot more teaching and much less time for research, but them's the breaks I suppose.  Moral of the story is figure out what makes you happy in life as early as possible!  I don't really have any desire to go back into the business world, or to be a political operative.  I might entertain some kind of think-tank position, but I really do want to teach.

[rising_star]

As far as goals, I would not say it's "TT or bust" but I do want to teach, research, and write.  TT will definitely be what I will shoot for but if it doesn't happen, there are enough smaller liberal arts colleges around that I'm sure I can find something.  It means a whole lot more teaching and much less time for research, but them's the breaks I suppose.  

 

Just so you know, even the jobs at the "smaller liberal arts colleges" are quite competitive. You'll still be competing against literally hundreds of other applicants for such positions. These positions are more competitive than people often realize, especially since for many they aren't the fallback plan but the desired result. If you want to be competitive for a job at a LAC, you'll need solid teaching experience while in graduate school, in addition to publications and ideally a demonstrated ability to supervise undergraduate student research. If you really want to do a lot of research, you'll be unhappy at a LAC where many times you're teaching a 3/3 or 4/4 teaching load.

[changeisgood]

If it were easy, everyone would be doing it, right?  My advisor knows what I'm aiming at and I've asked him to help me aim my research in a direction that's likely to draw the right kind of publishing attention.  We will see where it goes from there.

[law2phd]

I think that your professional experience may make you a somewhat more desirable candidate, at least for teaching undergraduate con law and introduction to U.S. government-type courses, than the typical student with your academic background (although I don't have sufficient experience to be confident in that judgment).  With that said, you still need to shoot for as elite a program as you can possibly get into for your PhD.

 

In regard to your advisor, I would imagine that there are a lot of faculty at OU who frankly have no idea how to place students in TT jobs at either research universities or LACs, given the department's ranking (this isn't a slight on the professors; I just can't imagine that they have experience with regularly placing people given the ranking).  You may want to independently do anything that you can to assess what your department's successful candidates had to do to land at a good place, in addition to learning everything you can from your advisor.

Edited June 30, 2015 by law2phd

[cooperstreet]

The bottom line is, if this is what you want to do, you need to go to a top program for your PhD. OU is not one of them.

[changeisgood]

Alright, I'm sure I'll be asking for advice on where to apply as I go through this year and get ready to tackle the selection process next Summer/Fall.

[grantman]

Good Day Trossier,

I would say given your background I doubt your undergraduate g.p.a. would be much of an issue. I would try to ensure that you get as high as graduate gpa as possible as well as cultivating a relationship with the professors whose research goals most align with your own, these people will be the ones who will write your letters when it comes time to apply for PhD programs.

Your legal experience I think will help you stand out given the fact you have been a practitioner of the law. Continue to work on your GRE's and what you are doing now I think is the best way , I wish I knew someone with a PhD in math because it has been a long time for me as well.

An option to consider is given your legal background maybe to try to get a adjunct position at a school that houses a great doctoral program and gain entry that way. While it is a ninja move if you prove to the school housing the doctoral program you wish to gain entry by taking some classes on the side.

If my response is a little chaotic I am currently at a baseball game with kids screaming right behind me.

[saudiwin]

If you do good work at OU, you should consider transferring to a different school. But if you can't hack it for life reasons, no worries. You can still get a TT job out of OKU, you just have to make the opportunities work for you and plan on being at a smaller college somewhere local. 

 

The great thing about having some life experience before grad school is that you know that there isn't a one-size solution and so much of your career are the choices you make. Same thing with grad students. If you work your butt off and become the best grad student you can be, doors will open.