Biznono wrote:If you like what you're doing, and if you're not paying for it (and you shouldn't be in the arts and sciences since your salary will be too meager to pay off debts), you should ignore the bullshit and the nightmare scenarios, write a dissertation, and see what happens.

Biz, do tell how one wrangles a department to cover at least your cost of tuition, if not all of one's living! Specifically in a department that amounts to the academic equivalent of the margins of nowhere. Certainly there is graduate funding, but that's not guaranteed and usually difficult to obtain. And even if you get it, it doesn't cover all of live's expenses even at a very affordable state school.

Most PhD programs in history at major research universities will cover tuition and expenses if you are in for the PhD and not for a terminal Master's. It is rare for terminal MA degrees to be covered by aid from the school. It is true that there can be competition for different fellowships, and I don't mean to present too rosy a picture. But if you figure out how things work early on -- how to write grant proposals and to give the graduate school the impression your work will amount to something -- you should not have to take out loans or, if this is an option, reach into savings to pay for the degree, at least no more than a small percentage of it. This is one of the things that sets a PhD in history apart from a law degree. I should also say that the kind of money you get while in school isn't enough to support a family, but it's enough to support a single person who can find ways to live frugally.

I'd say a PhD in the arts and humanities should be done for love, but a PhD in the sciences can be plausibly done for the money.

But then what do I know. I have an MFA...the most suspect of all terminal degrees! I did a 2 year program in 3 years...while also working full time. It was hard never sleeping, but it was one of the best decisions I've ever made. I wish it could have lasted longer. (But not, perhaps, too much longer. I graduated at the age of 47! I also met my wife there.)

I just completed my MLIS (Master of Library and Information Science) in May . In my field of librarianship, it's generally a requirement that professional librarians have an ALA (American Library Association) approved MLIS degree. Hence, I had to get the degree if I wanted to make the career switch.

Without hesitation I will say that going back to school was the best the decision I ever made for myself. A week after completing my degree, I was offered a full-time job. I don't think this is typical of most fields, however. I wouldn't even say it's typical of the library field but rather I had all my ducks in a row upon graduation and an opportunity came my way at just the right time. So, all of this factors into my feelings that a higher degree is a favorable thing to do, but the best thing about getting my degree is that I no longer have to work horrible corporate jobs that I despise and everyday I am rewarded by the work I do. For those reasons alone, I would do it all over again in a heartbeat.

I'd have to agree that it's pretty much retarded to pay for a political science postgraduate degree. There's nowhere near enough money to be made to justify loans or other forms of indebtedness. I applied to about a dozen places and only one failed to offer a tuition waiver and at least some tiny pittance of funds for living expenses, ranging from $8000 (thanks, Stanford!) to $19,000 (U of Illinois).

ginandtacos.com wrote:I'd have to agree that it's pretty much retarded to pay for a political science postgraduate degree. There's nowhere near enough money to be made to justify loans or other forms of indebtedness. I applied to about a dozen places and only one failed to offer a tuition waiver and at least some tiny pittance of funds for living expenses, ranging from $8000 (thanks, Stanford!) to $19,000 (U of Illinois).

I'll be finishing my MA in a Pol. Sci Dept. and have just made the leap over to a PhD program in philosophy. Things are bleak monetary-wise. This thread is less than encouraging.

I have a good friend with a PhD in rhetoric and feminism.

same wrote:I have a good friend with a PhD in rhetoric and feminism.

I.e. a PhD in English?

Andrew L. wrote:

same wrote:I have a good friend with a PhD in rhetoric and feminism.

I.e. a PhD in English?

Not necessarily, I mean I'm sure it takes a strong grasp of the English language to enter a degree program called Rhetoric and Technical Communication, but her research was more based in Sociology if anything I'd say.

same wrote:

Andrew L. wrote:

same wrote:I have a good friend with a PhD in rhetoric and feminism.

I.e. a PhD in English?

Not necessarily, I mean I'm sure it takes a strong grasp of the English language to enter a degree program called Rhetoric and Technical Communication, but her research was more based in Sociology if anything I'd say.

Oh hey, it's a bona fide interdisciplinary program. English departments are notorious for breeding Marxist-Feminists, etc, so that was a geeky joke on my part. It's possible and even likely that someone will walk away from an English degree having read more Foucault or Judith Butler than Shakespeare (who was totally a proto-Freudian deconstructionist* anyway).

*joke