Graduate School Experience
i. The first 2 years are taking required classes and writing your Master’s Thesis.
1. You’ll probably begin your thesis research end of your first year.
2. You’ll need a thesis committee to consult regarding your research.
a. Your Thesis Committee is usually made of at least 2 faculty members who will guide you in your
master’s thesis research.
b. Once you are done writing up your thesis, your thesis will be reviewed by at least 2 thesis readers. The
thesis readers will decide whether you pass or need to rework your thesis. They will send their
recommendation to the department larger thesis committee.
c. You and your thesis committee will have a chance to defend your work and respond back to the thesis
readers. Your thesis committee members should be there to help and defend your work. Note I said
“should” because they don’t always.
d. An agreement will be reached on whether you will make minor or major revisions to satisfy the thesis
readers. If there is disagreement, there would be an arbitration committee (3rd readers) to settle the
disagreement.
3. You need to have a pass on the thesis to move on to the next stage.
4. Occasionally, the department decides that you are “not Ph.D. material” and will urge you to discontinue the
program by giving you a terminal master’s degree.
ii. The 3rd and fourth year are more classes and preparing for your field or comprehensive exams. Some programs have
two; others have 4 to 6 exams.
1. Basically, you need to demonstrate mastery of the field. They usually give you a list of books to read and a list of
questions that could be asked on the exams. You prepare yourself and file when you’ll be taking the exam. The
test can involve a whole day, several days or a whole week of typing up your answer to the questions given on the
beginning day of the exam.
2. Sometimes, the department allows you to come up with your own questions for the exam. In this case, it is a selfdesign
exam. Often times, this self-designed exam is a literature review for your dissertation project.
3. Around this time, you should consider exploring other resources and meeting other faculty outside your
department. In your dissertation time, you will need an outside faculty for your dissertation committee.
4. After taking required courses, you’ll have time for elective courses. Make sure you take classes that will prepare
you for the dissertation, to help you narrow down your topic of interest.
a. Be careful not to get stuck with taking classes after classes without seeing an end in sight. You will
always find interesting classes to take within and outside your department.
b. There are too many information out there; you cannot know everything. The point is to be able to know
the overall picture and where your work is situated in the larger picture. It is impossible to know
everything.
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iii. Your fifth-year and on involves preparing your dissertation proposal or project.
1. You need to write up a dissertation proposal and have it approved by your dissertation committee before you can
carry out your dissertation project.
a. You need to set up a dissertation committee who will guide you in your research design, execution and
write-up.
b. Pick faculty who knows something or is expert in your area of research. If not, he/she should be open to
learn new things and is able to guide you in what they know. They should want to help you in your
endeavor and not give up on you just because they are not familiar with your topic.
c. The dissertation committee usually consists of 2-3 faculty members in the department and an outside
faculty member.
i. One person will be your dissertation committee chair or 2 can be your dissertation committee cochairs.
ii. The Chair or Co-Chairs are the ones working most closely with you. They are the ones to defend
and support you when other committee members disagree about the direction of your work.
d. Dissertation committee members should know your work better than any other faculty. They will also be
the ones you most likely to turn to when you need recommendation letters as you apply for jobs.
e. Try to pick members who can give different types of feedback to your work (methodological, theoretical,
substantive, moral support, etc.). As well, they should be people you respect and can work with; they
have your interests of finishing the program.
i. Some people may be reliving their dissertation stage and won’t pass you until you have a
“perfect” and flawless dissertation. This could drag you in the program for many more years than
necessary.
2. Once your dissertation project is approved, you need to carry out the research, collect the data, analyzed the data
and write up your findings.
3. For some dissertation advisors, they want full report every week or month. For others, they don’t see you until
you’re ready to defend your final dissertation. In any case, make sure to consult them when you are stuck, and
make sure that they also feel that it’s their job to advise you through while you’re working on the dissertation.
4. Often, you’ll need to meet up with your committee members again to defend your dissertation. Sometimes, they
just need to sign off the dissertation and do not require a formal dissertation defense meeting.
5. The final passing test of the dissertation process after the substantive test by your dissertation committee is the
librarian’s formatting test. This is just tedious work of making sure your filed dissertation meets the formatting
standards and requirements of the university’s library. It may take several days to make sure your formatting
(margins, fonts, type of paper, table and figures, page numbering, headings, etc.) is correct.
b. The informal process: Things to look out for.
i. Graduate school is often an alienating process where you feel infantilized again. Do not despair, remember your goal,
persevere and look ahead. It’s also good to look back to see how far you have gone.
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ii. If you have family or plan to have one, the graduate experience may interfere with this. Some people have to plan to have
kids at the same time that they are writing their dissertation. In any case, you need a supportive partner to go through this.
iii. Be aware of egomaniacal professors, who will use you as pawns for their ego-tripping game with other professors. Talk to
other graduate students to avoid them.
iv. Beware of professors who will use you to do their grunt work but you will not learn anything from them.
v. Avoid tenured professors who are not up to date in their research and are still teaching from their notes in grad school.
vi. Beware of new, untenured faculty who are insecure and trying to prove how rigorous they are to senior faculty. Your
interest is not their priority. They may side with other professors to put you down while talk to you nicely.
vii. Avoid unhealthy competition that many grad schools foster: put other people down so you can stand on top of them.
viii. Surround yourself with friends who are supportive. Have a different set of friends, who are not graduate students, to keep
you grounded (mental masturbation can be nauseating and impractical). However, you will also need your graduate
friends to validate what you’re doing. Your family may not understand what you’re doing and think you have all the free
time in the world. (Actually you do have more free time than when you become a professor!)
ix. Find a faculty mentor and a student mentor. People you respect can help you go through graduate school without losing
your integrity.
1. A good mentor will not only teach you about the research process, writing process, and publication process, but
will also be your moral support.
2. A good mentor will guide you and work with you step by step from co-writing an article with you to encouraging
you to publish your own.
3. He/she will prepare you for professional presentation and give you feedback on your strengths and weaknesses.
4. He/she will teach you about professional etiquettes and help you meet important people who can change your life.
x. The best lessons you’ll learn will be from other graduate students.
1. Study groups will bond you and your intellectual development will be through this group of colleagues.
xi. Go to talks outside your program/department. Meet other scholars outside your field.
1. You’ll need an outside person for your dissertation committee.
2. You want to know of other resources (libraries, scholarships, conferences, colloquia) that will facilitate your
training.
xii. Stay healthy physically (and mentally and spiritually)
1. Eat well
2. Exercise regularly to avoid carpal tunnel or tendonitis. Carpal tunnel and tendonitis are real and serious problems
that are lifelong debilitating injuries. As a scholar, you will need to type for the rest of your life and so your injury
will never completely heal.
3. Make sure your work station is ergonomically correct. Use voice-recognition program to ease your hands.
xiii. Know yourself, allow yourself to make mistakes and learn from them, give yourself downtime, listen to the inner child,
never give up on yourself, and remember the light is at the end of the tunnel.
