I usually try to have some sort of story or witticism to open these posts. It's a rhetorical technique that carries over from my training as a public speaker. The more I tried to come up with one to open this post, the less and less appropriate it seemed. I promised you that this blog would be an inside look at the lived experience of grad school, and right now there is nothing witty about it, not even from my usual go of bleak, macabre, or self deprecating humor. Right now, we are in the middle of a pandemic, and any use of humor would just be me deflecting.
Life is strange for everyone right now. On the whole, I'm quite lucky. My university determined that everyone working at the level of graduate assistant or higher would continue to be paid. I'm financially stable, and able to pay my rent and other bills. For that I am inexpressibly grateful. Not everyone is so fortunate. I have friends at other universities who are struggling to find funding for this summer and beyond. But even those of us who are stable with respect to finances are struggling with this. Classes are switching over to online. But a lot of graduate classes are discussion based. Discussions and questions just don't flow as well online, even with video calls. It's harder to stop professor and ask a question, it's harder to give feedback on what you do and don't understand, so instructors just plow along with material, leaving confused students behind. But class really are the least of it.
For my cohort in particular, we are dealing with our qualifying exam. For those of you unfamiliar, the qualifying exam (or qual) is an exam every prospective PhD student, no matter the field of study, takes in one form or another, sometimes at the end of first year sometimes after the second or third. The exam covers any material in the courses the student has taken up to that point. Formats differ from school to school and program to program. In my program there is normally a written portion, which is take home, open note, open resource, and questions might take the form of a set of clinical symptoms and the we would be asked to guess what sort of injury or disorder might lead to these symptoms. For us, that means using the knowledge we've been taught and figuring out how a change in A leads to B and causes C. It's a very open ended, but it also allow time, time to think and search, and time to consider all the options. Then it is followed a few weeks later by an oral exam where a panel of professor ask you questions, starting with very basic ideas, and continuing until you reach the limit of your knowledge. It is one of the major landmarks of a PhD course of study. As big as the SAT and the GRE. We pass this exam, or we fail out of the program. We've spent all year preparing for the exam in this format. With social distancing requirements, this format, particularly the oral component, is impractical. So, with a scant 2 months until our exam date, the format has radically shifted. Suddenly, we are to write a grant, something most of us have very little experience with. That at least we have more time to work on, several weeks at least, and a few last minute classes on how to write a good grant that may of may not actually apply to the specifics of what we're being asked to do for the exam. The other portion is now a 4 hour closed note proctored exam. Certainly the same material will be covered, the format SHOULDN'T matter, but of course it does. The format changes how we study, how we prepare and what we prepare and this change makes much of the prep we have already done useless. It makes the advise and experience of older students who never experienced this format useless. More importantly, it changes how an instructor writes questions, and I don't trust most of my professors to truly account for what is an appropriate question for a closed note, time limited exam after years of writing questions for a take home, week long, open note exam. For me, for my classmates
On top of that, many of us are stuck in far from ideal studying and working conditions (as are most of you I imagine). I am currently at my family home helping take care of my grandparents. We have very unreliable internet, and I have no office space to work in. These are the same troubles a great many folks are facing, but they are worth mentioning because they compound everything else.
So, like most folks right now I imagine, I'm stressed, terrified, exhausted, and just doing my best to keep my head above water with no idea what the future really holds.
Stay strong, and stay safe
Faxe MacAran
Life is strange for everyone right now. On the whole, I'm quite lucky. My university determined that everyone working at the level of graduate assistant or higher would continue to be paid. I'm financially stable, and able to pay my rent and other bills. For that I am inexpressibly grateful. Not everyone is so fortunate. I have friends at other universities who are struggling to find funding for this summer and beyond. But even those of us who are stable with respect to finances are struggling with this. Classes are switching over to online. But a lot of graduate classes are discussion based. Discussions and questions just don't flow as well online, even with video calls. It's harder to stop professor and ask a question, it's harder to give feedback on what you do and don't understand, so instructors just plow along with material, leaving confused students behind. But class really are the least of it.
For my cohort in particular, we are dealing with our qualifying exam. For those of you unfamiliar, the qualifying exam (or qual) is an exam every prospective PhD student, no matter the field of study, takes in one form or another, sometimes at the end of first year sometimes after the second or third. The exam covers any material in the courses the student has taken up to that point. Formats differ from school to school and program to program. In my program there is normally a written portion, which is take home, open note, open resource, and questions might take the form of a set of clinical symptoms and the we would be asked to guess what sort of injury or disorder might lead to these symptoms. For us, that means using the knowledge we've been taught and figuring out how a change in A leads to B and causes C. It's a very open ended, but it also allow time, time to think and search, and time to consider all the options. Then it is followed a few weeks later by an oral exam where a panel of professor ask you questions, starting with very basic ideas, and continuing until you reach the limit of your knowledge. It is one of the major landmarks of a PhD course of study. As big as the SAT and the GRE. We pass this exam, or we fail out of the program. We've spent all year preparing for the exam in this format. With social distancing requirements, this format, particularly the oral component, is impractical. So, with a scant 2 months until our exam date, the format has radically shifted. Suddenly, we are to write a grant, something most of us have very little experience with. That at least we have more time to work on, several weeks at least, and a few last minute classes on how to write a good grant that may of may not actually apply to the specifics of what we're being asked to do for the exam. The other portion is now a 4 hour closed note proctored exam. Certainly the same material will be covered, the format SHOULDN'T matter, but of course it does. The format changes how we study, how we prepare and what we prepare and this change makes much of the prep we have already done useless. It makes the advise and experience of older students who never experienced this format useless. More importantly, it changes how an instructor writes questions, and I don't trust most of my professors to truly account for what is an appropriate question for a closed note, time limited exam after years of writing questions for a take home, week long, open note exam. For me, for my classmates
On top of that, many of us are stuck in far from ideal studying and working conditions (as are most of you I imagine). I am currently at my family home helping take care of my grandparents. We have very unreliable internet, and I have no office space to work in. These are the same troubles a great many folks are facing, but they are worth mentioning because they compound everything else.
So, like most folks right now I imagine, I'm stressed, terrified, exhausted, and just doing my best to keep my head above water with no idea what the future really holds.
Stay strong, and stay safe
Faxe MacAran
Twitter: @TheMacAran
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