Surviving Grad School

Prioritizing vs Procrastinating

Published: 15 June 2011
Written by PhdStudent
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Categories: Strategies for Grad School, Surviving Grad School
Tags: graduate school organization, how to prioritize

Graduate school organization is a key to graduate school success! Most of your time spent as a graduate student will be a delicate act of balancing and doing multiple things at the same time, but sometimes, some tasks will require more attention and focus than will others. Consequently, you must learn how to prioritize and to plan tasks to be successful as a graduate student, especially because you probably have…

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Helpful Tips for First-Time Graduate Teaching Assistants

Published: 15 June 2011
Written by PhdStudent
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Categories: Surviving Grad School, Teaching in Grad School
Tags: graduate teaching assistant, lectures

You got your bachelor’s degree. You got into graduate school. Now, you find yourself with your first teaching assignment. For some grad students, this is an exciting moment for which they have been waiting a long time. For others, however, being assigned to teach is terrible news, and dread the idea of having to give a lecture. Some graduate students chose to go to grad school to further their educations…

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Reading for Detail

Published: 15 June 2011
Written by PhdStudent
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Categories: Strategies for Grad School, Surviving Grad School
Tags: read in detail, reading for detail

Reading for detail can be a daunting and challenging task but proves important in graduate school. Time is valuable, so reading things repeatedly is impractical. Here are a few tips and tricks to understand what you are reading the first time. Staying engaged in what you are reading is vital to reading for detail. How can you stay engaged in the reading? Annotating the writing as you read forces…

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Maintaining Large Classes

Published: 15 June 2011
Written by PhdStudent
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Categories: Surviving Grad School, Teaching in Grad School
Tags: classroom management

Think back on your undergraduate career, do you think your professor or GTA had good classroom management skills? Do you remember sitting in the back of a large lecture hall talking with your friends, texting, and taking notes that consisted of nothing more than doodles? If this was you, you were probably thinking that no one even noticed you—you were just one person in a room of 300. The beautiful…

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Loans for Graduate Students

Published: 15 June 2011
Written by PhdStudent
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Categories: Paying for Graduate School, Surviving Grad School
Tags: loans for graduate students

Higher education can be funded through a variety of resources, including loans for graduate students. For students who exhibit financial need, Perkins Loans are a viable option. Though debt from Perkins Loans can be excused under some specific situations, this debt must be paid back like most other student loans. The policies of student loans for graduate students are constantly being amended. Types of repayment and consolidation and interest…

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Teaching in the Virtual Classroom

Published: 15 June 2011
Written by PhdStudent
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Categories: Surviving Grad School, Teaching in Grad School
Tags: teaching an online course

How is teaching an online course different than teaching a regular course? Education is changing in many schools and programs worldwide. In recent years, the number of courses and entire programs–both undergraduate and graduate–that are being offered online has dramatically increased. As a graduate student, you will likely be either assisting or teaching an online course at some point in your graduate career. There are some important differences between teaching…

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Relaxation Techniques

Published: 15 June 2011
Written by PhdStudent
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Categories: Managing Time and Stress, Surviving Grad School
Tags: life as a graduate student

During graduate school you could be demanded to write a term paper, finish your research assignments, and plan a birthday party for your best friend all in the same day. Because you are so busy, you probably find yourself overly stressed from time to time. Although having a little stress in your life as a graduate student is a good thing and results in high productivity, too much constant stress…

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The Grad School Dash: Tips on How to Graduate from Graduate School

Published: 15 June 2011
Written by PhdStudent
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Categories: Adjusting to Graduate Study
Tags: graduate from graduate school

If you have ever seen the 400-meter hurdle dash on the Olympics, then you already have a pretty good sense of what it will take to graduate from graduate school. You will start out going as fast as you can, and every so often you will jump, sometimes praying that you will make it over your next obstacle and not eventually drop out of graduate school. The good news…

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Time Management 101: Learning to Say No

Published: 15 June 2011
Written by PhdStudent
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Categories: Managing Time and Stress, Surviving Grad School
Tags: graduate student organization, Time management

Saying no is not always easy, although it is vital to time management. Telling your major professor that you do not have time to write a literature review for his or her upcoming manuscript because you have to study for your comprehensive exams will be really difficult. It might even be harder to tell your best friend that you cannot make it to his or her birthday because you have…

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Student Debt Assessment

Published: 15 June 2011
Written by PhdStudent
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Categories: Paying for Graduate School, Surviving Grad School
Tags: relief from student loan debt, student debt

As the price of higher education has been rapidly increasing, so has the national amount of student debt. Funding student loans has been a recent priority of the government and banks. A law passed in 2007 discouraged private lenders from consolidating student loans, which caused problems for students with debt. Lenders do not want to consolidate debt, but students need to save on interest and to have lower monthly…

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