ER's End of Year Wrap Up

As the final semester of my first year in the HEA grad program comes to an exhaustive close -- I can’t help but take a breather to reflect on what’s happened during the past year.

Overall, I feel this has been one of the most personally satisfying educational experiences I’ve ever had. I’ve learned a lot since August of 2007 and look forward to continuing the program and future learning opportunities. Graduate school is nothing like the undergraduate experience -- on numerous levels. It's much harder than I expected, takes more out of me and I find myself caring very deeply about my program, my peers andthe future -- a lot more than when I started. The diversity and depth and scope of my peers is outstanding. I don’t think I could’ve found a better representation of “real life” -- kinds of diversity: racial, sexual, gender, socioeconomic -- at any other private university than at

Suffolk

. The academics are challenging, the instructors are great and things get especially interesting when professors give students lead or freedom to really dig into and study subject matter, theory or contemporary issue of importance. And I’ve had a lot of fun getting to know everyone and, thankfully, there’s been more laughs than tears – and that’s always a good thing. Howver, it’s school and it’s an educational thang so here’s ER’s Things I Learned at

Suffolk

:

Lessons Learned

(an amalgamation of my own personal lessons and from others):

Thou shalt not be overtly-criticizing of peers in a public forum.

During panels or other outside guest speaker engagements – formulate good questions, if possible get a business card and don’t be afraid to keep in touch.

Thou shalt not swear during an oral presentation.

If thou are starting a 25 page research paper less than a week before it’s due – thou are screwed.

Never tell your instructor that you consider their comments to your paper picayune.

Thou shalt not swear during an oral presentation.

As tempting as it sounds when classmates encourage writing a paper while intoxicated – don’t.

One cannot perform complex scholarly reading while watching American Idol. (Michael Johns was robbed…)

When the same teacher every week says “we might be getting out early this week” don’t believe it.

Thou shalt remain composed during a presentation, even though you only have 13 minutes and everyone else got 20-25 minutes. Losing your @#*& in abundance is never helpful.

Begin looking for your post-graduate job now.

Working 35 hours per week, plus commuting 15 hours, and performing unpaid 10-15 hours of weekly Internship -- makest thou very, very, cranky to the husband. 

Working hard all year means one thing – Summer is all that much sweeter!

Take care to all who read this Blog. I’ve really had a great time doing it and I hope I’ve generated some entertaining and informative reads, opinions and comments. Happy Summer 2008!

Comments

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