Fall 2017 applicants

[dr. t]

50 minutes ago, DCguy said:

So if someone has to take 4 years at a less prestigious place (like I did) - go for it. Otherwise you'll end up being an assistant manager at that grocery store that both of them worked at.

Or you could, I don't know, do something with your BA? 

4 hours ago, DCguy said:

I also will catch some flak for saying this but: you will get a job even if you don't go to an ivy. You might have to wait and definitely will have to go wherever the hell it is, if we love teaching and researching that's the path to take. 

Of course you'll get a job. 4-5 jobs at different universities, even, which will net you a whopping $25k a year (if you're lucky). But jobs! Hooray! No health insurance or sick leave, though, so don't get the flu!

For the reasons listed above, plus the fact that elitism is a factor with which you have to contend on the job market, landing a TT position with a PHD from a non-elite university is very, very unlikely.

50 minutes ago, DCguy said:

 Based on the negative advice and outlook that a lot of people on this forum have, why are you even bothering?

Because breathless hyperbole isn't a particularly insightful way to understand a more complex argument? I never said don't go to grad school. I said don't go to graduate schools that manipulate your love of your subject to the benefit of their bottom line. I said only go to a school that will set you up for success. I am absolutely shocked that this is at all controversial. 

Edited March 14, 2017 by telkanuru

[dr. t]

47 minutes ago, DCguy said:

 I expect someday that most of us here will end up with tenure at Western State U because we're dedicated enough (we came to the grad cafe after all) to keep searching until we find it. 

Statistically speaking, this is just plain incorrect. And optimism in defiance of all reality is very easily confused with stupidity.  

[TMP]

35 minutes ago, telkanuru said:

Statistically speaking, this is just plain incorrect. And optimism in defiance of all reality is very easily confused with stupidity.  

Again, back to my earlier post about jobs.  "Most" is incorrect.  "Some" is a better word choice.

Same goes with "little debt."  That's relative as @Sigaba pointed out.  Some of us are horrified by the thought of having more debt that we can handle while doing PhD.  Some of us say "meh, it's $3K."  Others say, "I just need $30K to complete my research abroad and then I'll come back to teach to make ends meet while writing."  I'm in the first category.  You might be in the second or third.  But your life, your choice.  Just make sure your 50 year old self won't regret this when you realize then what you would have done with $50K that you spent to pay off your loans when you could have used that towards something you'd like to do then.  Like... retirement savings.

[Calgacus]

1 hour ago, DCguy said:

Yes a "little debt" means different things: the price of a car or house maybe - it's all a little debt though, isn't it? I should've been clearer I guess. Not everyone is going to get a tenure track. I expect someday that most of us here will end up with tenure at Western State U because we're dedicated enough (we came to the grad cafe after all) to keep searching until we find it. Circumstances will dictate how many of us are stuck as adjuncts forever, of course. I'm more optimistic and my challenge to anyone who doesn't like my optimism: why are you doing it if you are so sure that you won't get a tenure track job? Based on the negative advice and outlook that a lot of people on this forum have, why are you even bothering?

There is a difference between being optimistic and being realistic. It seems ridiculous to me to try to convince yourself that the job market is not what it is. Telling people to close their eyes and just believe is misleading and unfair to them. More constructive advice would involve facing the reality of the job market head-on and suggesting ways they can maximize their chances at some sort of full-time employment, whether TT or alt-ac or whatever. Decisions about funding packages, which is I think what began this sidebar, is absolutely one of the factors that goes into what those chances look like 5-7 years down the road. Pretending otherwise doesn't change anything but your preparedness.

[zeev]

 

 

12 hours ago, DCguy said:

So, if you the choices are to go into a little debt and put off starting a family until you are in your early thirties before getting an academic job or start a family in your mid twenties and work the noon to close shift as a manager at the local grocery store five nights a week, I'll go with the path that gets me a job that doesn't make me hate life.

I am planning to start my PhD in the fall. This deeply depressing (mis)ordering of priorities, which seems to be all-to-common amongst grad students, is what makes me the most worried about doing a PhD. What you are suggesting is that we sacrifice (or, at best, delay) the most fundamental and intimate aspects of our lives - financial security and having a family - for our work.  If you went to a job interview, and the interviewer offered you the job, a job which you would no doubt enjoy, but told you that the pay was so terrible that you would go into debt if you took it, and you would be unable to have a family for many years, would you take that job? No, you would laugh yourself right out of the door. Why is graduate school any different? The second sentence in this quote offers a clue. You imply that the only alternative to grad school is to work as a "manager at the local grocery store five nights a week". As @telkanuru wrote:

8 hours ago, telkanuru said:

Or you could, I don't know, do something with your BA? 

@DCguy, I think you already know this. I'm pretty sure you know that grad school and working at a grocery store are not the only two options in life, especially for someone who is smart enough to get into grad school. Instead, what you are implying is that grad school is the only worthwhile path in life. And that is why you are suggesting that we sacrifice, again, the most fundamental aspects of our personal happiness and wellbeing in order to do it.

So, why am I worried if I don't share your opinion, or your priorities? I am worried because grad school is a process of socialization. I am worried because if the rest of my cohort shares your priorities, I will be constantly looked down upon for going home to spend time with my wife and family, instead of burning the candle at both ends during another late night at the library. Perhaps that isn't you. Or perhaps you weren't planning to have a family that soon anyway, so delaying it is fine. But mostly, I am worried that you are contributing to this socializing process right here on gradcafe, before us new students even get to our programs, and reinforcing this toxic culture of sacrifice for the next generation.

8 hours ago, telkanuru said:

I never said don't go to grad school. I said don't go to graduate schools that manipulate your love of your subject to the benefit of their bottom line. I said only go to a school that will set you up for success. I am absolutely shocked that this is at all controversial. 

Every aspiring and current grad student should print out this quote and stick it on the wall above his or her desk. I too am absolutely shocked that such a statement is at all controversial. Thank you to @telkanuru, @Sigaba, @Calgacus and @TMP, who show us that there is a better way. 

 

[AP]

13 hours ago, DCguy said:

I also will catch some flak for saying this but: you will get a job even if you don't go to an ivy. You might have to wait and definitely will have to go wherever the hell it is, if we love teaching and researching that's the path to take. 

The fact that we want something to be true doesn't mean it is. 

[TMP]

2 hours ago, zeev said:

 

 

I am planning to start my PhD in the fall. This deeply depressing (mis)ordering of priorities, which seems to be all-to-common amongst grad students, is what makes me the most worried about doing a PhD. What you are suggesting is that we sacrifice (or, at best, delay) the most fundamental and intimate aspects of our lives - financial security and having a family - for our work.  If you went to a job interview, and the interviewer offered you the job, a job which you would no doubt enjoy, but told you that the pay was so terrible that you would go into debt if you took it, and you would be unable to have a family for many years, would you take that job? No, you would laugh yourself right out of the door. Why is graduate school any different? The second sentence in this quote offers a clue. You imply that the only alternative to grad school is to work as a "manager at the local grocery store five nights a week".

Grad school is what you make of it.  Graduate students are your peers, first and foremost.  You do have the option of joining the grad culture within your department and/or the university.  If your family is more important, then that's okay.  You will see your grad peers around the department and an occasional organized meet-up at a bar.  You choose how personal you want to get with them.  If anyone gives you a hard time about wanting to be your wife, ignore them.  Seriously.  You'll be taking grad school seriously as it is.

[Sigaba]

17 hours ago, DCguy said:

n regard to this argument they are having, I'm on reaglejuice's side.

@DCguy your defense of @Reaglejuice89 and his controversial position in this sidebar isn't just about shared perspectives on happiness and the future. (You know that I know exactly what I'm saying.) If your decision not to disclose relevant information reflects a wider pattern of behavior, you may find yourself in avoidable situations down the line.

Edited March 14, 2017 by Sigaba
Italics everywhere.

[psstein]

11 hours ago, Calgacus said:

There is a difference between being optimistic and being realistic. It seems ridiculous to me to try to convince yourself that the job market is not what it is. Telling people to close their eyes and just believe is misleading and unfair to them. More constructive advice would involve facing the reality of the job market head-on and suggesting ways they can maximize their chances at some sort of full-time employment, whether TT or alt-ac or whatever. Decisions about funding packages, which is I think what began this sidebar, is absolutely one of the factors that goes into what those chances look like 5-7 years down the road. Pretending otherwise doesn't change anything but your preparedness.

I agree with you. A certain, highly prestigious program in my field told me that they focus almost entirely on preparing their students to be academics. I asked about alt-ac resources, and the answer was effectively that they're few and far between. Unfortunately for that program's graduate students, their placement reflects the lack of interest in alt-ac.

[OHSP]

5 hours ago, psstein said:

I agree with you. A certain, highly prestigious program in my field told me that they focus almost entirely on preparing their students to be academics. I asked about alt-ac resources, and the answer was effectively that they're few and far between. Unfortunately for that program's graduate students, their placement reflects the lack of interest in alt-ac.

I am pretty certain I'll be turning down a top 8 school because of how they view alt-ac paths. For my particular research interests (and for the career I've been building), it's just not going to work to be at a place where TT is viewed as the only valuable end goal. [It's not like my alternate options are significantly worse than top 8, though, and if the top 8 school were my only fully-funded option, it'd be much harder to turn it down. And also I have to say that, aside from this particular school, everyone else has been very like "yeah duh of course non-TT paths are valid and valuable"].
**using "top 8" because of that depressing Slate article.  

Edited March 14, 2017 by OHSP

[psstein]

16 hours ago, OHSP said:

I am pretty certain I'll be turning down a top 8 school because of how they view alt-ac paths. For my particular research interests (and for the career I've been building), it's just not going to work to be at a place where TT is viewed as the only valuable end goal. [It's not like my alternate options are significantly worse than top 8, though, and if the top 8 school were my only fully-funded option, it'd be much harder to turn it down. And also I have to say that, aside from this particular school, everyone else has been very like "yeah duh of course non-TT paths are valid and valuable"].
**using "top 8" because of that depressing Slate article.  

I read that Slate article; I suppose my program is in the "Top 8" as well, though if you read the journal article it makes reference to, it doesn't make mention any of them.

Reality is that program reputation matters. You're going to have a lot easier time getting hired out of somewhere like Harvard (although their HoS is terrible in my area) than you would somewhere like Florida State (despite their excellent American history program).

[RageoftheMonkey]

8 minutes ago, psstein said:

I read that Slate article; I suppose my program is in the "Top 8" as well, though if you read the journal article it makes reference to, it doesn't make mention any of them.

Reality is that program reputation matters. You're going to have a lot easier time getting hired out of somewhere like Harvard (although their HoS is terrible in my area) than you would somewhere like Florida State (despite their excellent American history program).

If you open the "supplementary materials" pdf from the study it actually gives the school rankings. Weird that it's buried in supplementary materials instead of being part of the study and the article about it!

[psstein]

5 hours ago, RageoftheMonkey said:

If you open the "supplementary materials" pdf from the study it actually gives the school rankings. Weird that it's buried in supplementary materials instead of being part of the study and the article about it!

Thanks. After looking at it, I'm a little less impressed with the results of the study. I think the general message holds true (e.g. people from programs outside the top 10 are less likely to get hired), but the details of the article and the study seem to be questionable. For whatever reason, it cherry picked Brandeis' American History program to rank it, rather than the history program more generally.

The study may have been slanted towards American history, I can't tell you one way or the other. For HoS, the prestige rankings would probably look a bit different.

[RageoftheMonkey]

21 minutes ago, psstein said:

Thanks. After looking at it, I'm a little less impressed with the results of the study. I think the general message holds true (e.g. people from programs outside the top 10 are less likely to get hired), but the details of the article and the study seem to be questionable. For whatever reason, it cherry picked Brandeis' American History program to rank it, rather than the history program more generally.

The study may have been slanted towards American history, I can't tell you one way or the other. For HoS, the prestige rankings would probably look a bit different.

Interesting, yeah I was wondering why Brandeis was so high.

I also wonder how much the results hold across disciplines. For me, I'm deciding between American Studies at Yale and History at Cornell. Yale is #2 in History and Cornell is #15 -- so that's a pretty significant difference -- but I don't know how to work American Studies into that. Of course, I know that it's harder to get a job with an interdisciplinary degree, but it's hard to get a sense for how to compare American Studies at Yale vs History at Cornell. I would be very curious to hear anyone's thoughts!

[nhhistorynut]

This might seem a bit off topic after...whatever the hell has been going on over here debate wise the past couple weeks lol...

BUT, I was looking in my school's blackboard and came across this:

 

 

Note how it says "to The End of Time."

Made me laugh...

[OHSP]

7 hours ago, psstein said:

Reality is that program reputation matters. You're going to have a lot easier time getting hired out of somewhere like Harvard (although their HoS is terrible in my area) than you would somewhere like Florida State (despite their excellent American history program).

Yeah, definitely. I guess for me, my "less prestigious" option is still "prestigious". 

[psstein]

3 hours ago, RageoftheMonkey said:

Interesting, yeah I was wondering why Brandeis was so high.

I also wonder how much the results hold across disciplines. For me, I'm deciding between American Studies at Yale and History at Cornell. Yale is #2 in History and Cornell is #15 -- so that's a pretty significant difference -- but I don't know how to work American Studies into that. Of course, I know that it's harder to get a job with an interdisciplinary degree, but it's hard to get a sense for how to compare American Studies at Yale vs History at Cornell. I would be very curious to hear anyone's thoughts!

It depends on the funding offered/fit/what have you... but just on a strict, gut level, go to Yale.

I was on an interview committee for a new 19th century Americanist at my university (still in undergrad). One candidate went to Yale, another went to... somewhere else (Iowa, maybe?). You better believe that my report included a remark about her Yale PhD.

[RageoftheMonkey]

6 minutes ago, psstein said:

It depends on the funding offered/fit/what have you... but just on a strict, gut level, go to Yale.

I was on an interview committee for a new 19th century Americanist at my university (still in undergrad). One candidate went to Yale, another went to... somewhere else (Iowa, maybe?). You better believe that my report included a remark about her Yale PhD.

Both have excellent funding and academic fit. I'm really lucky to be able to choose between the two. Yale has six guaranteed years of funding but you're cut off after that, whereas Cornell only guarantees five years of funding but says that they usually find money to get everyone teaching jobs past year five, and external fellowships add years to your funding (whereas they don't add to your time at Yale). It would certainly be hard to turn down Yale, but I could see myself falling in love with Cornell when I visit. They both have visiting days in the next couple weeks, so hopefully I will realize that one is clearly the better fit and the decision will be easy!

[nevermind]

2 hours ago, psstein said:

You better believe that my report included a remark about her Yale PhD.

1

Honestly, I've seen candidates at "top tier" programs fail miserably in their job talks, especially from interdisciplinary programs where they lack methodological grounding in a particular discipline (sociology, history, etc.). Just because someone has a "shiny" Ph.D. doesn't (necessarily) make them more equipped for the market than others. There are more things to be aware of when a candidate comes to campus than where they received their Ph.D. from (though certainly, it helps get you in the door), but maybe that's just my non-Ivy Ph.D. status showing. 

[minion.banana]

Finally rejected from NYU, so formally accepted a spot at the University of Michigan. Wahoo.

As for the conversation that's been going on, I've been told by numerous mentors who are on admissions in different programs (History and Islamic/Religious Studies, mainly) that even if it shouldn't be the case, the ranking of your school does matter when getting a job. Same for what you write your dissertation on... For example, if I was to do an Islamic studies degree, I'd been told that to be taken seriously when looking for jobs to write about something medieval because committees believe that means you know your shit as opposed to someone who wrote about modern stuff- told this by the now-director of Islamic studies at Duke. Not sure how the dissertation thing would apply to history, though.

[russianblue]

6 hours ago, minion.banana said:

Finally rejected from NYU, so formally accepted a spot at the University of Michigan. Wahoo.

If you don't mind me asking, how did you receive notification?

-

Also, thanks @Gotya64 and @luz.colorada for the positive vibes. I'm not feeling very optimistic, but discussing everything with my cohort as just shown me that this whole application process is full of surprises!

[gnossienne n.3]

5 hours ago, minion.banana said:

For example, if I was to do an Islamic studies degree, I'd been told that to be taken seriously when looking for jobs to write about something medieval because committees believe that means you know your shit as opposed to someone who wrote about modern stuff- told this by the now-director of Islamic studies at Duke. Not sure how the dissertation thing would apply to history, though.

As a medievalist, I find this advice somewhat hilarious. I see the reasoning in that particular line of logic, and of course I'm not going to argue that knowing about the early origins of Islam is going to be disposable knowledge if you're a modernist, because that simply isn't true. I just can't imagine writing a dissertation on a period other than the one I'm invested in over the long-term in order to impress hiring committees. Dissertation topics do matter in history, but mainly because they're meant to be demonstrative--or at least indicative--of a sustained area of expertise and research interest. If medieval Islam isn't your thing, and you don't plan on pursuing it after the dissertation becomes a monograph, I can't see why you'd do your dissertation on it. Especially since there's quite a bit of specialized training that you'd need to acquire simply in order to deal with your medieval sources (though this will vary depending on your languages/paleography/codicology skills). Then again--and I'm sure this is what your people were getting at--there are prejudices held by hiring committees just as by laypeople that perhaps have to be considered. It's just rare that those prejudices favor the medieval!

[Sigaba]

8 hours ago, minion.banana said:

For example, if I was to do an Islamic studies degree, I'd been told that to be taken seriously when looking for jobs to write about something medieval because committees believe that means you know your shit as opposed to someone who wrote about modern stuff- told this by the now-director of Islamic studies at Duke. Not sure how the dissertation thing would apply to history, though.

 

2 hours ago, LadyPole said:

 I find this advice somewhat hilarious. 

You're blowing off guidance from Omid Safi for an entirely different field (a point made clear in mb's post, twice) after you've done how much coursework as a graduate student in any field?

[gnossienne n.3]

21 minutes ago, Sigaba said:

 

You're blowing off guidance from Omid Safi for an entirely different field (a point made clear in mb's post, twice) after you've done how much coursework as a graduate student in any field?

I'm not blowing it off, which I hope was evident from the rest of my comment. I found it amusing, not bad advice. It's unusual to hear advice from other fields that recommends looking to the medieval period when that is not the main period of interest. I'm far more accustomed to hearing medievalists dismissed, even by other historians. That's all I meant. I am very clearly writing as someone from a different field (you'll note I started that sentence with "As a medievalist") and I offered my perspective with all the caveats you pointed out. No need to attack my credentials.

Edited March 16, 2017 by LadyPole

[nevermind]

1 hour ago, Sigaba said:

 

You're blowing off guidance from Omid Safi for an entirely different field (a point made clear in mb's post, twice) after you've done how much coursework as a graduate student in any field?

1

Let's step back from the appeal to authority via Omid Safi. The advice above may have been directed to a particular individual's background/educational experience (minion banana) and thereby it might not be suitable to apply it broadly to all history graduate students or it could have been taken out of context/misunderstood altogether.

What is important is: to ASK YOUR OWN ADVISOR about career goals or other people in your department/university who know you, who know the market and CONSIDER THEIR ADVICE more seriously than strangers on the internet (me included). My two cents is (1) you need to choose your dissertation topic wisely, to be marketable and of interests to people with different backgrounds ("why does this topic matter to people who AREN"T interested in my niche specialty"?) AND (2) You'll (most likely) get burnt out on what you write about, so don't think that it will necessarily be "easier" if you're in love with the project (it might be, but it might be a short-lived romance as well). I work on modern stuff, but that doesn't mean that I ONLY learn about modern stuff...you should be cognizant and conversant of other topics (and perhaps even the historiography!) of other fields. Whether or not that's useful for your dissertation is up for you and your advisor to decide. You don't want to lose out on a job because you were too myopic or too general in your preparation--the difficulty (like all things in grad school) is finding the balance.