For Organizations. Shape Created with Sketch. Select listing type. When preparing to enroll, be sure to do the following: Check items off your to-do list before school begins. If you have any big extracurricular projects or plans that are still in progress, do your best to finish them before school starts. Create a workable schedule for ongoing tasks. Even after clearing your plate, you may still have plenty of responsibilities to juggle.
Make a list of all of your recurring commitments and put together a timetable that works for you and that allows for plenty of study time!
Ask friends, family, and co-workers for support. Reach out to people you trust early, and see how they may be able to help you balance the demands of graduate education with your other commitments. Tell them what you hope to achieve, what your schedule is going to look like, and how your goals relate to your position at the organization. Budget more time for yourself than you think you need.
So if doctoral students are underpaid and overworked, why do over , students —more than the number for dentistry, medical and law schools combined—complete these programs every year? There are many answers to this question, and they vary from department to department, individual to individual. For some, graduate school is a convenient next step, a way to inch towards adulthood while keeping your career options open and remaining in a familiar university environment.
For others, graduate school offers something they simply cannot get elsewhere. These students enter graduate school because they are extremely passionate about their field—passionate enough that they are willing to dedicate over six years to studying off-the-wall research ideas in excruciating detail. Universities, with a commitment to intellectual freedom, are one of the few environments capable of providing the funding and resources necessary for this type of work.
So, we put up with the hours, put up with the pay, and put up with the dwindling career prospects in the hope that we can pursue research we are passionate about—and then we cross our fingers and hope the rest will work out. Unfortunately, as the study pointed out, it often does not work out. Still several years away from graduating, they have to deliberate between grinding through the remainder of their program or exiting early and entering the job market in an awkward position: underqualified compared to other doctoral graduates and inexperienced compared to others who joined the workforce directly after college.
Even those who are interested in their work have to grapple with seemingly infinitely postponed graduation dates. No matter how hard you may work, no results will likely mean no degree.
Is it four first-author research articles? What about one review paper and a few conference presentations? At best, this creates a confusing system where students perform substantially different amounts of work for the same degree. At worst, it fosters a perverse power dynamic where students feel powerless to speak out against professors who create toxic working conditions, even resulting in cases of sexual exploitation. Yes, research has historically produced innovations that have revolutionized society.
But for every breakthrough there are many other results without any clear social application , and given the slow, painstaking process of research, you may not be able to tell which is which for decades. Clearly, if nearly 10 percent of the graduate population is experiencing suicidal thoughts, something is not working right in the system. But prioritizing writing articles, op-eds and reviews that relate to my field seems like an objectively wiser investment of my time.
I could have spent 16 hours perfecting an essay on The Jungle. Instead I leeched eight of those hours to write this article. Nearly everyone is brilliant. Once a big fish in a small pond, the pond has expanded exponentially, and I have become a shrimp. My cohort of five, brilliant. My professors, brilliant. Most everyone here is brilliant. Depression is prevalent. This comes as no surprise. Graduate students are overworked, isolated and poor. In my field of history, we also tend to read an absurd amount about destruction, death and disaster.
My program has an incredibly supportive graduate community -- the people are a large reason why I came here -- yet depression among grad students is still rampant. Our heads are savagely hit with the fact that our aspirations to become professors are increasingly ludicrous in the face of a dismal job market. And yet we push on. While depression is prevalent, so too is resilience. Flexibility is vital. I had read Gay New York cover to cover.
I had a concrete list of questions, and, by God, I had no intention of diverting from that list. Class discussions need frameworks; they need signposts. I had to learn to be flexible and adaptable. In our profession, Ph. We are often perceived as being on the lowest rung of the totem pole, constantly scrounging for publications and relentlessly networking.
Again, I hope these lessons prove helpful to others in a position similar to mine. With the first semester of my Ph. Tim Seiter is a Ph. He is writing a history of the Karankawa Peoples of Texas. Expand comments Hide comments. View the discussion thread. We have retired comments and introduced Letters to the Editor. Share your thoughts ».
About Contact Subscribe. Career Advice. Tim Seiter shares insights after his first semester. By Tim Seiter. January 29, Bio Tim Seiter is a Ph. Read more by Tim Seiter. Inside Higher Ed Careers Hiring? Post A Job Today! Most Shared Stories Ex-dean at Southern California indicted for bribery Inside Higher Ed Suit claims department chair shielded serial sexual predator Satiric look at this year's implicit bias module season opinion Inside Higher Ed Faculty call for reinstatement of acquitted professor Higher education should prepare for five new realities opinion Inside Higher Ed.
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