Self-assessment, part 1: Grad School?

[This will be a three-part series of posts.]

Apologies for the freeze in blog entries. I'll need to figure out how to squeeze in time during school to do this because I really like writing entries. For now, I'll take advantage of my winter break to get back up to speed.

I've been home for three days, and while I ensure myself much relaxation, I guess you can say I find a lot of "fun" in researching options for my future. I don't find this as a duty or an assignment; it naturally comes out of my nature of being incredibly risk-averse and loving research.

I've firmly established that I will not go to an advanced-degree school right after college. After much online research and discussions with alums and professors, I know that real-world work experience will help me. I can save up more money, build my resume with experience, network, and think more seriously about whether I want to go back to school, what kind of school I want to go to, when, and why.

This is especially good advice for humanities and social sciences (from here on out, HUMN/SOSC) students. For engineering and natural sciences students, grad school is still a wonderful thing to pursue: while no grad school decision guarantees a person a higher-paid and more prestigious job that one will enjoy, it seems that the majority of these folks seem to be in good standing. They also have more funding given to them as they are still in grad school. Debating between a master's and a Ph.D. may be worth reconsidering for even this cohort (see Infographic on the Costs of Going to Grad School). Again, this cohort would do well to also explore the rest of my post since NIH/NSF grants are starting to dwindle.

For people like me, however, grad school is especially becoming more and more of a really stupid decision. Just take a look at these links:

"Adulthood waits."

100 Reasons NOT to Go to Grad School: it's only up to the 70s at this point, but it's quite a vast and eye-opening blog. It also has links to other sites of similar flavor.

The disposable academic: Why doing a PhD is often a waste of time: from one of my favorite sources, the Economist.

Articles from The Chronicle of Higher Education:

So You Want to Go to Grad School?: by Thomas H. Benton. It's a pretty good summary of the demerits of grad school for HUMN/SOSC. Keep in mind that this man recognizes he is one of the "lucky few" English Ph.D.'s in a tenure-track position, but he writes these articles to warn people before investing in grad school to make informed decisions.

Is Graduate School a Cult?: also by Thomas H. Benton. My religion pundit self will refrain from commenting on the sad use of the word "cult" here, but nonetheless, it's an interesting read.

So You Want to Get a Ph.D. in the Humanities: alright, I gotta admit... The girl sounds scarily like me, like the mentality I have had for a long time about why I would want to go to grad school. The feeling echoes a comment in the next link (and here, I agree that it's NOT funny because it's so true).

"So You Want to Get a Ph.D. in the Humanities: 9 Years Later": also by Thomas H. Benton. Read the comments too. One of them says something like, "It's too true to even be funny." Fortunately, it's funny for me since I haven't leapt into a Ph.D. program (yet?).

The Big Lie of the "Life of the Mind": " She was the best student her adviser had ever seen (or so he said); it seemed like a dream when she was admitted to a distinguished doctoral program; she worked so hard for so long; she won almost every prize; she published several essays; she became fully identified with the academic life; even distancing herself from her less educated family. For all of those reasons, she continues as an adjunct who qualifies for food stamps, increasingly isolating herself to avoid feelings of being judged. Her students have no idea that she is a prisoner of the graduate-school poverty trap. The consolations of teaching are fewer than she ever imagined. " This article speaks to me the most.

A Letter From a Graduate Student in the Humanities: this is written by an English Ph.D. candidate who responds to Thomas H. Benton and other doomsday writers of grad school with pleas for solutions for grad students and Ph.D.'s who are struggling with finding a job inside and outside academe.  

You can also do a quick Google search with keywords such as, "grad school, should I go to, costs of..."

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But first there is the question: why graduate school? Let's be honest, Jasna. Well, shamelessly put...

• I love school and learning. For much of my life I have been in this environment and could not have imagined myself anywhere else. I love intellectual challenges; I want that "life of the mind."
• I want prestige. Because I have a very high GPA, great relationships with my professors, and go to a reputable university, I feel entitled to get an advanced degree such as a Ph.D. as a tangible measurement of my self-worth. I am egotistic. Furthermore, these credentials mold me as an exemplary applicant for graduate school.
• I love researching and coming up with new ideas.
• I want to surround myself with other intellectuals. I love stimulating discussions and people who have high intellectual capacities like me.
• I love teaching and counseling. 
• All of the above said, I would incredibly love the idea of being a tenure-track professor. In the ideal situation, I will be my own boss, get to research and write about what I love, inspire young minds, counsel these young minds, have great benefits for both myself and my kids (free education!), and be called "Professor [Marie]" or "Dr. [Marie]." Wouldn't that be fancy? Plus, many of my favorite people are professors, and it is natural for me to want to be like them.
• I am graduating with a humanities degree. There is no other direct path for me to take with a religion and East Asian studies degree, other than to teach at the grade school level or go to a seminary. And hell no, I'm not going to any seminary (though I would like to teach grade school for some time).
• I am pressured by my family and friends to get an advanced degree. This is similar to the prestige bullet point. Because I have been known as an intelligent and continuously successful student, my loved ones expect me to get a prestigious, elite job that requires great intellect and all that crap. And if you know me well, I hate ruining people's expectations; I love going beyond people's expectations. 
• This pressure is further hindered by the fact that I am a first-generation immigrant. I have had this drilled into my head that my parents went through shit tons of difficulty and brought my brother and me to America for all the opportunities it has, for us to have a better life. Underlying all this sincerity is the expectation of doing "better" than my parents because of my greater opportunities here than in our home country. My brother is finishing med school to become a doctor; it's only expected that I get a Ph.D. or J.D. Otherwise, I feel that I am wasting the gift my parents gave me in being able to live here. I feel inadequate compared to my brother and am letting my parents down.

I don't mean to brag. I just mean to be frank of my elitism and subsequent insecurity. And the truth is, I know that graduate students and freshly minted Ph.D.'s think just like me in these regards.

But the other truth is, graduate school is a long, brutal, and expensive ordeal that in many situations does not involve much fruitful, intellectually curious discussion. It's cut-throat competitive during and after for those rare tenure-track jobs and insecure, slave-labor-like adjunct positions. And if you find yourself not getting either of those things (or you're dissatisfied with wandering the country as an adjunct), you'll in many ways be seen as overqualified or just plain inexperienced for jobs outside of academe.  

[See Occupy Wall Street for even more people who feel entitled. Some of them even "only" have bachelor's, though others also have Ph.D's.]

So, here are the majority of my concerns with grad school. I have one other major concern, but I'll leave that with the rest of my concluding thoughts to the third and final part of this Self-Assessment series.