I have decided that I am going to go to graduate school. Any advice?

[Nikia]

I graduated with my 4 year degree in Biology 11 years ago. Since then, I have worked in the food processing industry. I have been a tech until I got promoted a year ago to the head of the quality and research and development department. Unfortunately, I failed at that. I am still at the company with a new boss. I don't really want to be here anymore for a variety of reasons. I don't really want to do the type of work that I have been doing either. I want to be a real scientist.
There is a college within commuting distance with a MS in Microbiology that I am interested in. I know that I should take the GRE ASAP if I want a chance at getting admitted for next fall. At what point should I contact professors? I know that they usually want you to know what you want to do your thesis on before you are accepted. A few of the professors have research areas that interest me. I'd be open to working with any of them if that means that I can get into the program. I hope to get a an assistantship but am unsure of what I will do for financing if I don't. Do you think that companies give internships to first year grad students? Would that even be practical?
I am nervous about all this but I think that it is my only chance to get a job that I would enjoy and eventually earn a middle class income.

[struggle4progress]

1. Ideally you look up who the profs are, find out what their research is, look over a few papers,

and decide who you want to work with based on that

If you can't get copies of the papers easily, nobody's going to be upset if you email a few profs "i'm thinking of applying for grad school and wonder if you could send me one or two of your recent pubs. my backlground is <brief summary summary>"

[WinkyDink]

2. You lost me at "if you could send me...."

[Nikia]

6. Would it be better if I contact the professors in order of preference?

I don't have the papers but they have websites that describe their interests and current research. I wouldn't want to be eliminated from consideration from the program because my first choice professor was not able to be my thesis adviser when I would be happy to work with my second choice.

[struggle4progress]

13. The ideal prof won't be terribly thin-skinned about that, and most profs won't, but there are overly

sensitive ego-maniacs in academia, as elsewhere

You'll have to decide for yourself what you think about the small possibility of pissing-off somebody with a great research portfolio but ego-problems: you could say I don't want to lose the chance of working with that great researcher or If the person is a petty dickwad, I just prefer to stay away

You could always send all the emails on the same day: figure out the general structure of your emails, tailor each one individually, make clear you're intent exploratory, and see what you get back

[mysuzuki2]

3. See if you can get a good price on car lots of

ramen noodles.

[mysuzuki2]

4. See if you can get a good price on car lots of

ramen noodles.

[deucemagnet]

5. Here's my experience with grad school.

I went back to college on my GI bill at the age of 27 and started grad school at 31, so it sounds like you're in the same boat as I was age-wise. I was in a PhD program in microbiology at a large school so my experience may be a bit different than yours.

First of all, expect your first year of classes to be brutal. As a grad student, a B- is a failing grade, and you will be taking a lot of challenging courses. For example, as an undergrad, our two-semester biochemistry course covered everything up to pathways of amino acid synthesis. Our department had us take biochem along with the med students, and we were covering amino acid synthesis by the end of one semester. In my program, we had to take courses for the first two years, but I think the MS students were just in classes for one year. That will depend upon your particular school and program.

As far as contacting professors, if you have specific questions about the MS program, I'd email the department chair (or his/her office) and ask. The chair or the secretary/program director, or whomever will probably be happy to address your questions. As far as contacting professors about research, I'd wait until I was accepted into the program, and I'd only do it if somebody is doing something you really like. During your first year of grad school you're probably going to do lab rotations, meaning that you'll work for a few weeks in about 4 labs of your choosing in order to make the decision on which lab you'll join.

As far as assistantships, the only thing available to you will likely be a teaching assistantship. Depending on the school, most research assistantships go to PhD students in their 3rd year and above. I've never heard of anybody doing an internship while in grad school. You're going to be far too busy.

Given the current climate in the jobs market, it might be a good idea to hide in grad school for a while. I just finished a 2 yr postdoc, and as I write this I'm unemployed. I've been applying for teaching jobs at universities and government jobs, but like the rest of the job sector, there seem to be many more applicants than positions. My boss even noticed that there are fewer positions available. I think he's a bit worried about me, but there are actually quite a few jobs I'm interested in applying for, and I'm actually enjoying the time off.

This is just my experience, YMMV. Dedicate yourself and expect to put in a lot of hard work and it will be doable. Best of luck!

[Nikia]

7. Good luck with your job search

I hope that the job market is better by the time that I complete the program.
I guess that I figured that I will be pretty busy during graduate school which is why I need to figure out how we are going to pay for everything and live with the loss of my income. Still I think that this is the only way that I will eventually get a job that I feel is worthwhile and make money. At the point that I am now with my career, I would have rather majored in accounting and been an accountant (I find accounting very boring).

[deucemagnet]

11. Thanks!

There should be student loans available. I took out one in grad school, but I really didn't want to incur too much debt.

There's another option you might consider, which isn't entirely honest, but times are tough! If you could get into a PhD program, you'll be paid a modest yearly stipend. And I do mean modest. When I started grad school in 1996 my stipend was $13,500/yr, and that was on the high end of what grad students received at the time. You could always do the PhD program for 2 or 3 years, then make up an excuse for why you have to leave. Usually, if you've done something like present a poster at a conference, that, along with your coursework will fulfil the requirements for a masters, and most schools would like to see you leave with at least a masters. Again, it's not entirely honest, and it kind of screws the lab you're working for, but I've seen a few students get out of a PhD program with a MS.

I hope you eventually get the job you want, but I have to mention that working at the lab bench every day can probably get just as bad a accounting. There will be long stretches where nothing seems to work, and you'll spend a lot of time troubleshooting and still getting blank western blots, plates devoid of mutants or PCR reactions that just won't work. There were many times during the past two years when I wished I was back in front of a class, but then there were many times when I was in front of a class that I wished I was back in the lab. I guess it's kind of love/hate, with me at least. :)

[Lucian]

8. I'm a first year graduate student with a research assistantship.

The first year is going to be brutal. I've been going at this for about a month now and the workload is tremendous. It's hard to have a job when there's a lot of homework. I quit my retail job and rely on my assistantship as my primary means of income.

When I decided I wanted to go to grad school this past spring, I had to hurry and take the GRE. This was back in March and the School of Graduate Studies at the college I was going to (and still am going to now) needed me to apply by May 1 for the fall semester. I did okay on the GRE. Not the best. But the professors already knew me and knew what I was interested in, so I think that's what helped me get in. When I applied, I had to write a page on, among other things, what I wanted to do for research. Since I'm an archaeologist, and since I've worked with the archaeology professor before (the chair of the grad school program), I already knew what I wanted to do.

I didn't have to contact anyone beforehand to get in because I applied at the same school I attended for my BA. But, I'm sure if I went somewhere else, I would've contacted the department and asked questions. Also, do study for the GRE. I got lucky with my score. But if it's been awhile since you've attended school, you may need to brush up on your math and language skills. Don't waste your money by buying a book. They can be costly (around $200). Check out your local library for GRE test prep books. If you need financing for school, you can take out loans. You'll have to fill out some info for the government on how much you make, etc., and you'll get loans based on your income.

If you have any other questions, feel free to ask! :hi:

[Nikia]

9. How does financial aid work when you'll be leaving your job?

Even if I was Superwoman, I could not do my current job and go to graduate school at the same time. Regardless if I am able to fit some job into my schedule, I will experience a loss of income. Is there a way to convey that on financial aid forms?

[Lucian]

10. I have no idea.

All I remember is that they asked for all my tax income from the last time I filed my taxes.

I would contact the financial aid office directly once you get accepted into a program.

Sorry I couldn't be more help on this.

[pitohui]

16. i will make a suggestion here

i am not sure how she wrangled it but when my friend decided to go back to school she found a way to convince her employer (who was also a friend and the owner of the business) to put her down as laid-off

in that way she could be drawing unemployment for a period of time before she had to worry about chasing student loans

if you can get your boss to do that, it might save you a semester or two where you wouldn't have to borrow money

it's the loans that will screw you up if you're an older student, you have a smaller time horizon to earn out the investment of getting the degree and much less chance of getting hired for a high paying position when you graduate -- as i said in my other post, my friend ultimately got "all but dissertation" but the financial aid she took was a mistake, it has her in debt slavery as another poster put it and she is not a bit better off financially than before

actually she has LESS money, she gets about the same pay but it's several years later, and now she has the added student loan debt, however it's a wash because at least now she has health insurance, which she never had in her old job since it was for a small business

[dimbear]

12. For your encouragement, I immediately began to make

50% more once I got that MSEE. And it was for doing about the same level of work, but since I had no previous electronics degree I couldn't be classified as an engineer.

Now here's the clinker. You should preferably have saved up the money to just do it 'bam' in about 3 quarters/2 semesters for it to be practical. Otherwise you face possible debt slavery. Just sayin. Good luck.

[tammywammy]

14. I don't know about your field, but here's my advice as a fellow student

Check if your university prefers the GRE or GMAT. Also most school have info sessions, go to one and see if you even like the school.

I don't know about internships. Fill out your federal student aid form, you could qualify for loans or other aid. Do not take out more loans than necessary! Research what fields you'd like to go in and the minimum salary. Be conservative in your future income estimates, so you don't end up taking on more loans than you could ever pay back.

I'd also recommend picking up a study guide for whatever entrance exam you take, so you'll be familiar with the exam and how they word the questions.

Good luck! I graduate with my bachelor's in May and start a MBA next fall. :)

[pitohui]

15. i hate to ask how old are you but think about it

a friend returned to graduate school in her fifties and because of the low pay you get as a teaching assistants, she had to take out loans, she'll be in debt until the day she dies and student loans are the one kind of loan you can't cancel in bankruptcy when it turns out the new job pays no more than the old pre-grad school job did

which is what happened with her

i honestly do not know what to tell you but i have seen no evidence that a ms in microbiology will pay a living wage, at least it doesn't in my area -- to the best of my knowledge that is just a very low paid field and the master's degree doesn't mean a middle class income, which is why a lot of women are in the field, they are really living on hubbyfare (the husband's job, their money is just extra money)

if you really need the money, i dunno, i hope my information is old, i've lost contact w. most of those folks but i would look HARD at what people are really paid in that field because at last i heard, it wasn't worth it if you need to live on the income

[Nikia]

22. I'm 33

I do think I should do this soon before I get much older and become an "older worker". I have a couple of different ideas about what jobs I could do when I get done. I don't want to be a food tech for the rest of my life and being a quality manager in food doesn't seem to be my thing either. I don't think that I have the personality to have a successful career at it. I have seen a few quality manager jobs listing that as the preferred degree, however, if it came it came to that.

[JCMach1]

17. Do it for yourself primarily....

for employment purposes second...

There are no job guarantees any more.

[HopeHoops]

18. Start smoking pot again.

[Cant trust em]

19. You don't have to have a perfectly honed thesis or research question when you apply.

You should be able to discuss something with some reasonable clarity and passion in your essays, but you're not married to that idea. You just want to give them the idea that you really want to be there and why you want to go to school.

[RedCloud]

20. Eggsxactly! Make THEM think they taught your something before you got your Master's.

Personally I would love to see a paper proving that some microbes are actually alien space diseases sent to knock out populations.

[timtom]

21. Just don't go for an MBA!!!