budding scholar

Enlightening is a strong word, but is what it feels like when the pieces begin coming together in graduate school, however early in the stage. This is what I had been missing, what I had so strongly in my master’s, but hadn’t yet felt in the Ph.D. There is some necessary self-absorption, inward focus on one’s own process, in graduate school. This is part of the growth. And to some degree (mostly because of working too much, and perhaps the choice of classes), last year I hadn’t gone deeply into what I care about, why I am doing this, and how the ideas I’m learning about are meaningful for me.

Perhaps the most important thing she said was that the next stage of my draft Fulbright proposal that I sent her needs to be connecting some theory, research questions, and data collection methods (i.e., research design). This involves reading a lot, vetting theories, talking with people doing work in the areas, and writing down the ideas. The reading a lot is the first piece I’m going to focus on.

The other thing she said is that if I want to do the comparative, international piece, I need to think long and hard about what that level of analysis lets me look at. What kinds of questions can be answered at the cross-country level around immigration and teaching? Why is the study meaningful at this level? Perhaps the instruction and immigration policy issues are better looked at at the local or country level. And if this is the case, why Spain?

Speaking of the Fulbright, I decided not to apply this year (following what I believe to be the sound advice of my adviser). I will be better prepared to apply next year. But the process of thinking about it and writing down a proposal for my ideas was very generative, and is, I think, helping to get this semester off to a good start.

I got one of the sociology classes I was interested in, on race and ethnic relations, so now my schedule for the semester is settled. It’s an extremely heavy reading class, but I expect to enjoy the material and learn a lot about history and current theories of race and ethnicity.

I introduced myself at the beginning of class, and for the first time ever, someone asked me whether I was a student of my advisor, and I felt what it’s like to begin to take on and be associated with someone’s research and way of thinking about education questions. I also felt, as I described what I’m interested in first in the measurement class, and then in the sociology class, how rusty I am at ruminating on and describing my own interests. Yet this is what it’s all about, what I need to focus on this year: how do my interests coalesce into 3 areas of specialization and one basic question?

I am thinking about applying for a Fulbright to go to Spain next year and do research on education policy responses to immigration.

Today we had a student panel come to our first year Ph.D. seminar to answer our questions about going through the program, meeting milestones, keeping life lively, and generally managing grad school. They had some very helpful points for working through the first years and moving to areas of specialization and dissertations, including:

• Think about what you really want to know, what you care about. What are your questions? What will you need to know to move towards a dissertation in your area?
• The areas of specialization should grow naturally out of what you’re interested in, but remember that they don’t have to be reflective of everything you’re interested–they’re just a way to move you forward to prepare for orals and the dissertation.
• Stay connected with your cohort beyond the first year; graduate school can be isolating in the later years when you’re focusing on your own work. Staying connected with colleagues in the program helps keep the momentum going from milestone to milestone.
• The dissertation might be 3 papers of publishable quality, rather than one enormous paper. This can be a more manageable alternative, and a really good choice for people who want to go into academia or another job where journal publications matter.
• In defining interests and research focus, you vote by what you feel passionate enough about to write a paper on. Think of class papers: which would you write again? For me, this would be the immigration papers I’m writing this semester, and the language papers I wrote last semester.
• As a way of learning about conferences, look at people who you’re interested in, check out their CVs, and see where they’ve presented their work.
• It will always be the case that there are more useful or interesting opportunities than you can take on.

It was striking to me both how far I have to go, and how well my current job and Master’s have prepared me to get there. Given that this program is so research focused, it really helps to have had several years of research experience. Yet there is so far to go, and the only way to learn it is to keep taking on each bit on a daily basis and trying to learn what I can to move forward. With many things, I’m aiming for some level of mastery, which raises the bar…especially with statistics and other methods and analysis topics!