Saturday, August 25, 2007

Grad School...

So, I start grad school on Monday. Academically, I don’t expect it to be too big a jump, since I was taking mostly graduate level courses last year. But it still feels like a huge step to be taking, and the past few days haven’t been very reassuring.
I’m in an odd position, because I’m doing a program that almost nobody else has ever done. Both the Asian Studies program and the Journalism school promote their dual degree programs, but neither seems terribly prepared for students to actually enroll in them. Asian studies doesn’t quite know what to do with me, because I’m a journalism student. On top of that, I’m doubly isolated by being a Southeast Asianist in a program that’s dominated by Chinese and Japanese studies. On a more positive note, though, it’s a very small class [4 students this year, the other 3 studying Japan], so we do all have access to a lot of personal attention, and my advisor in the program seems very supportive.
The journalism school, on the other hand, appears to have written me off completely. I won’t start taking their sequence of intensive reporting classes until next year, so apparently, I do not exist to them. Which means, for example, that I was not invited to attend the orientation session and get to know the faculty and other students. I only found out about it because I happened to stop by the school looking for some information, and noticed signs pointing the way to “New student orientation.” Which, by then, was pretty much over. Fantastic. And then I was told that I’m “not really a journalism student yet.” Which was the first I’d heard of this, and a bit of a surprise, considering that one of the major selling points of the dual degree program is that students are supposed to have full access to both departments [which in the case of the J school includes career services, a lot of really nice equipment, and other perks I’ve been eagerly looking forward to] while studying here. So, once again, I find myself having to fight with the administration of the Journalism school before even getting started. A situation, eerily, and unfortunately, reminiscent of Madison. And a great way to get started.
Do other people have to do this? I feel like my entire academic career has been marked by epic battles between me and the administration.
I’m trying to stay positive, though, and look at the school’s disorganization about dual degree programs as an opportunity to design my own course of studies the way I want it.
Provided, of course, that I don’t mind butting heads with bureaucrats at every step of the way.

2 comments:

Mitch said...

Isabel, I think you've run into one of the contradictions currently facing those on the wrong end of the academic profession (i.e. graduate students). While academic departments (and professors to a degree) are now espousing inter-departmentality and transdisciplinarity (are these words?), they don't go out of their way to actually promote it and even do things to actively discourage it. This will change, I think, but for better or for worse, academic institutions are conservative in the way they behave, even if individual academics are creative, daring thinkers.

Isabel E said...

no, they're not words. what are you, a political scientist? but i know what you mean...