Grad School Thread

[dfagdfsh]

Originally Posted by Joenobody0

Operations Management. It's basically applied Microeconomics and Industrial Engineering. Far different than History or English!

yea, I was gonna say. that much funding is basically unheard of in the humanities.

 

[Joenobody0]

Originally Posted by Teger

yea, I was gonna say. that much funding is basically unheard of in the humanities.

It's at the absolute upper end of my field too.

 

[dfagdfsh]

Originally Posted by Joenobody0

It's at the absolute upper end of my field too.

to give you an idea: the top phd programs I looked at were offering something like $15k a year.

 

[Joenobody0]

Originally Posted by Teger

to give you an idea: the top phd programs I looked at were offering something like $15k a year.

The first time I went into a PhD program the regular stipend was 17.5K a year in Berkeley Ca. That's like abject poverty! Luckily I was given a 2 year fellowship. After the fellowship ended I left for industry with my masters degree.

 

[dfagdfsh]

im currently apartment shopping. will end up paying like ~450-500 a month in rent this time around.

 

[dfagdfsh]

also, not to toot my own horn too hard, but it's amazing to me how difficult it is to get funding anywhere right now. i work in my school's english department (the place I just got in), so I'm familiar with the budgets, and they offer 2 people a year funding, and 20 people a year just pay to go. nuts. i don't know what anyone without supercompetitive grades/scores does...

 

[Joenobody0]

I agree with you regarding the competitiveness of admissions and funding. My program has something like a 2% acceptance rate.

 

[dfagdfsh]

i have friends that ask me about applying, and i tell them if they have less than a 3.9 not to bother

 

[HomerJ]

Originally Posted by Teger

to give you an idea: the top phd programs I looked at were offering something like $15k a year.

Sheesh. To rub some salt in that, I had an undergraduate stipend of $6000 + housing + conference travel for a 10 week summer research program. Rather lavish considering my GRADUATE stipend the next YEAR was around $19k.

 

[dfagdfsh]

Originally Posted by HomerJ

Sheesh. To rub some salt in that, I had an undergraduate stipend of $6000 + housing + conference travel for a 10 week summer research program. Rather lavish considering my GRADUATE stipend the next YEAR was around $19k.

i take some solace in the fact that all humanities students are equally underfunded. the thing is, if you think about it, it's an amazing deal for universities. if im teaching 2 classes a semester, they'd normally have to pay someone $6k a class to teach that.. they pay me almost nothing.

 

[fftfft]

Often there are good fellowships and string-free funding for the first year or two in a lot of programs. I've seen stipends as high as 30k/9 months. Some defense fellowships (with awful summer/post-graduation employment requirements and clawbacks if you don't graduate) offer over 40k. For regular TA/GSR funding, I've never seen it break 20k. This is in computer science.

 

[dfagdfsh]

Originally Posted by fftfft

Often there are good fellowships and string-free funding for the first year or two in a lot of programs. I've seen stipends as high as 30k/9 months. Some defense fellowships (with awful summer/post-graduation employment requirements and clawbacks if you don't graduate) offer over 40k. For regular TA/GSR funding, I've never seen it break 20k. This is in computer science.
well there are assistanceships and fellowships. you can get both, neither, or one or the other. assitanceships always involve some sort of work, while fellowships are 'no strings attached.' of course there's the lack of teaching experience downside to a fellowship. but yea, after my first year im gonna try to grab onto some of the additional funding out there.

 

[Joenobody0]

Originally Posted by fftfft

Often there are good fellowships and string-free funding for the first year or two in a lot of programs. I've seen stipends as high as 30k/9 months. Some defense fellowships (with awful summer/post-graduation employment requirements and clawbacks if you don't graduate) offer over 40k. For regular TA/GSR funding, I've never seen it break 20k. This is in computer science.

There's always the NSF fellowship.

 

[Gibonius]

Originally Posted by Teger

i take some solace in the fact that all humanities students are equally underfunded. the thing is, if you think about it, it's an amazing deal for universities. if im teaching 2 classes a semester, they'd normally have to pay someone $6k a class to teach that.. they pay me almost nothing.

That's exactly the reason they take in as many students as they do, despite there not really being any market for them after graduation. It's cheap labor. Not restricted to the humanities either, abuses are just as bad in the sciences although with a different focus.

 

[dfagdfsh]

Originally Posted by Gibonius

That's exactly the reason they take in as many students as they do, despite there not really being any market for them after graduation. It's cheap labor. Not restricted to the humanities either, abuses are just as bad in the sciences although with a different focus.

Of course. Although a lot of programs have been cutting back, just because the market is so bad. Even though graduate programs are without a doubt evil exploitative scams, they seem to have some conscience.

Ironically this comes during a time when applications are up 50% everywhere..