Graduate School

[Vince S.]

For those of you who have your masters or doctoral degrees, what are your thoughts about grad school?

I'm a junior in undergrad right now, and I'm seriously considering applying to graduate programs in English (my current major) or sociology. My goal is to attain the PhD so I can teach at the university level, but since some doctoral programs require an MA/MS to get in, I may have to make that "pit stop" first.

How heavy or intense is the coursework? This is assuming that I go to school part-time. I do wish to attain my Paramedic license first (which takes two years to complete) and work as a medic while going to grad school, so I'd be in my mid-twenties when I apply. My other plan is to put off or even axe being a Paramedic and just jump straight into grad school after undergrad. If I went this route, I'd be in school full-time.

Any insight would be appreciated!

[Anthbass]

Graduate school can be very rewarding and incredibly frustrating. The primary difference between it and the undergrad experience is that you are essentially floating your own boat. Your supervisor may or may not pressure you to be productive and the onus is on you to have done the readings, written the papers, and attend your classes. The workload is proportionately higher and you are expected to operate intellectually at a proportionately higher level, longer, than you would have as an undergraduate.
As far as I am aware, university profs are considered for promotion or tenure (and, I suppose, expulsion) over three areas: scholarship, service, and research. I am not sure if exhaustive research is critical to your dream of becoming an English lecturer, but I wonder if you might be able to pursue it more fully teaching at a college? It has been my experience that those who attain a Ph.D and look for a position at a University have a healthy interest in academic research or scholarship. If teaching is your primary goal, it seems like a college might be a better fit. It sounds as though you have a few years to think about it, so think hard. It is nothing to enter into half-assed or semi-committed. Good luck.

[fdeck]

I have a PhD in physics. The program that I went through (as is typical in the sciences) did not require getting a Masters along the way. The first two years were full time coursework, followed by time spent preparing for the candidacy examinations which included presenting a thesis research proposal. Then I did my thesis research, wrote it up, defended it, and got my degree. Bing, bang, boom.

That's the simplified version. The detailed version includes three years working on a thesis project that was an utter failure before switching to a new project. I succeeded in the new project in the way recommended by Karl Von Klausewitz for the conduct of warfare: "Maximum possible use of force." I completely overwhelmed a fundamentally unstable experimental system with electronics and computer controls -- things that I had to teach myself. All of my data were collected in roughly 1-hour intervals in between catastrophic breakdowns of the equipment. What a blast, like playing an unrehearsed gig with a killer band.

I don't mean to discourage you, but I think that today's grad student needs to know what to expect in order to plan their careers. Universities graduate far more PhD's than can all hope to become professors, and the percentage of college teachers in part-time and adjunct positions is constantly growing.

In the sciences, it is possible to get a full ride through grad school by winning an assistantship or fellowship. That's how I financed my degree, and as a result, I was debt-free when I graduated. Those gigs are more widely available in the sciences due to the ability to attract research funding, but they also exist in the humanities. In an assistantship, you work part time in teaching or research while studying for your degree. It's not a bad deal if you can live frugally.

A PhD, especially in the humanities, is not all that different from a music degree, in terms of how you may end up earning a living after you graduate. For this reason, I think you should only pursue it if you are so in love with the subject matter that you can't live without it. Like becoming a professional musician.

Every field is different, so I can only recount my own experiences here. In physics, a PhD is not enough to compete for a tenure-track position. It also requires a strong track record of published research after grad school, glowing letters of recommendation from well known scientists, and a proposal for independent research that can attract funding.

As I was getting close to finishing my degree, I realized that my career trajectory would not intersect with a professorship, meaning that I had no further business in academia. So I wrote an applications-oriented thesis and went into industry. That was not such a terrible concession for me, as I enjoy working on practical problems, and I have had a rewarding career.

[Atoz]

+1 to everything fdeck said... especially this:

Originally Posted by fdeck

All of my data were collected in roughly 1-hour intervals in between catastrophic breakdowns of the equipment.

[animal52]

I'm in my last year of doctoral studies as an organic chemist. I won't say much about my own experience of grad school because it has little do with a graduate program in English.

What I will say is this... to be a successful graduate student, you have to enjoy the subject immensely, as it will consume a large percentage of your life, and to that extent you will not have time for other things that you enjoy such as bass, a social life, the opposite sex, etc...

If you're ok with that, then go for it.

[von buck]

Originally Posted by Anthbass

Graduate school can be very rewarding and incredibly frustrating.

+1

As far as I am aware, university profs are considered for promotion or tenure (and, I suppose, expulsion) over three areas: scholarship, service, and research. I am not sure if exhaustive research is critical to your dream of becoming an English lecturer, Good luck.

Well you will more than likely need to be published in a peer reviewed journal on the way to that goal.

I just got my Master's in Library Science and it was a lot of work, but i really enjoyed it. Right now I'm a reference librarian at a small Ct. community college. A good portion of my duties includes helping students research their papers. At school doing research was about all I did, so it helped prepare me for helping these students. especialy for someone who hasn't need to write a paper in thirty years.

Andy

[Armueller2001]

I'm getting my M.S. and it's easy as hell

[Brad Barker]

hehe, no thesis defense for berkeley physics.

[MAJOR METAL]

Howdy Vince

I am currently in Graduate School and from what I can gather it seems that not all graduate programs are created equal. I happen to be in a very intense Graduate Program. The Director of the program says that our work load is atleast 3 times the amount of Undergraduate Seniors. Grad School is hard to get into and you go where you get in at the best cost. There are a only a handfull of graduate programs in this country in my field so I had to pretty much go in at the first acceptance.

[Atoz]

Originally Posted by Brad Barker

hehe, no thesis defense for berkeley physics.

Wow... it that's true, then it's a shame. My thesis defense was one of the most awesome experiences I've had. Made me feel like I really earned the Ph.D. in a kind of a cool, abstract way.

[Ericman197]

Graduate school isn't that hard. It's harder than undergrad., but undergrad is easy in the scheme of things. I never finished my masters in public health so I don't really know what it's like at the high end, let alone a PhD. Though in my experience medical school is much harder, and I know many people in the MD/PhD program who would agree with me. However that is a different case because the combined program is not the same thing as a straight PhD, and this is in a specific discipline (biomedical science).

I have a lot of respect for you dudes who can do a physics/math PhD. Calc II blew my mind, and even though I ended up with an A, it was the hardest class I ever took in college.

And yeah, listen to those guys telling you that you might not have a job when you graduate. My independent study professor (forest ecology) told me all about that in college. Not only is there a glut of PhD students, but you also have reduced government funding. Some areas are affected more than others. Public colleges in many states (especially New Jersey) have had their budgets slashed. Medical research budgets have also been tightening so it is very hard to get grants to pass. After all, Joe Schmoe doesn't care about your novel way to treat duchenne's muscular dystrophy by inducing DNA transcription misreading if he can't afford his car payments.

You can apply the same analogy to all aspects of education. The academic elite (perhaps you one day) might want to have certain things: a nice job where you can write, teach, whatever. But the public is only willing to support a certain amount of that. Even if you teach at a private institution, the tuition can only be raised so much, and can only support so many professors. You're competing for a job that is not easy to get, and hard to hold (unless you're lucky enough to get tenure).

If it's what you absolutely want to do, and you are truly good at it - then go for it. But if it's just something you kinda think you might like, and you're doing pretty well in your classes... think about it.

One of the things I've realized is that you have to do what you want to do in life, but that doesn't mean to take the job that is the most enjoyable. For example, what's the point in doing a job you like if you end up working 80 hours a week and living in borderline poverty? (This would be more along the lines of the worst case scenario for an English PhD, you could in fact do quite well). Compare that to doing a job that you don't enjoy, but don't hate - that pays you well, gives you nice benefits, maybe you work 30 or 40 hours a week, etc. Try to take everything into account. Too many college kids our age wind up in some very impractical fields because it's what they enjoy, even though it may not fit the lifestyle they want. There's a sort of disconnect between doing what they like, and living how they want to live. You can't always have both.

[Alfie]

Doing a PhD (we call it a DPhil at Oxford for some reason) has made me become a better bassist... but a worse archaeologist.

[Pilgrim]

I have a PhD in a combination of Adult Ed & Educational Technology. I went through a master's in Adult Ed as part of the path. The master's got me a university job, and the PhD was the tool I needed for mobility to another university and to get me to the pay grade I wanted. Whether you need to do a master's depends on the program design for the degree you want to end up with.

I didn't find graduate level coursework to be any harder than undergrad courses, but you're asked to apply what you learn in a different way. As you move up the degree ranks, you are asked to do more than recite and apply facts and information - you are asked to find relationships in disparate information and show understanding of how things relate, and finally to generate new knowledge.

There's a lot of variation in the experience based on the discipline. My experience in Education would be quite different from someone's experience in Physics, Enginering, History or other fields. Some faculty treat their assistants like slaves; others are really good to work with, even if they impose a heavy workload. It doesn't hurt to do homework on the faculty member before committing to an assistantship.

And of course, there's the issue of whether you even want to get a grad assistantship (teaching or research) to help pay the bills - but it will also add to your work load, although hopefully it will help you build your network at the same time. In today's world you can easily earn a Master's via distance ed while working full time. It does load your boat, but it pays the bills for school. It's tougher to earn a PhD via distance ed, and the number of programs at that level are very limited.

Regardless of what the institution says, university faculty are generally rewarded for research, grants & publication, and down the priority list, teaching. Public research universities (my experience base) are all caught in a situation where most faculty MUST generate grant funds because states don't pay the bills for the institution. Priorities do differ, but generally speaking you wont' get tenure if you don't do research, get grants and publish in peer-reviewed journals. Good teaching isn't enough to keep your job unless you're on a 100% teaching appointment, which is rare. An increasing number of faculty appointments are 9-month rather than 12-month, so your summers might be free unless you generate research funding for the summer.

I like the university atmosphere, and I'm content with having selected this setting for my career. Like any other workplace, there are plenty of internal politics, likes and dislikes, and you have to learn the ropes. I work in Continuing Education as an administrator, although I also teach online for another institution than my primary employer.

My personal opinion is that English is only going to benefit you if you target a teaching position in English - and there are a LOT of people with that credential. If you really want to teach English, then a Master's may get you into a good 2-year school, but for a 4-year school, it's going to take a PhD.