How To Keep Track at Grad School

June 27 2011, 10:06am

Today’s guest post is from Ashley Spade. Ashley is a law student at Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago. When she isn’t at the library, she enjoys blogging, running, and spending time with her furry sidekick, Sir Winston Pugsalot. Follow their adventures on Twitter: @ashspade or check out her contributions at The Professional Intern for more tips on surviving school! In my experience, college was similar to high school. You go to class, do your homework, take your tests, get your grades and participate in a few extracurricular activities. Sure, you have to be pretty disciplined, since you won’t have teachers and parents keeping you on task all day. But the expectations of college are still very clear, if you just have the discipline to move through the process. However, in graduate school, what you are supposed to do is much more nebulous. For example, housing and funding are both up in the air, and your research is completely self-directed. Then if you continue far enough in your work you begin to reach a point where you are an expert in your field and there’s no longer anyone more knowledgeable to defer to. It can be pretty daunting. You need to be prepared for an experience completely unlike your undergraduate one and you need to come in with a game plan to succeed. I’m going into my 3rd year of law school here at Northwestern, and my advisor tells me I’ll probably be here for a total of four years. If I had planned things better I might have been able to finish in three. I have friends and family in other universities that have had the same problems, and their lack of focus or direction has made their graduate school experience bleed into additional years of study. Here are some tips to keeping yourself on track at grad school: Funding and Advising Try to get an assistantship for 3 years. Find a person that you really want to work with and be upfront with them. Initially, I know the urge is just to get your foot in the door, but in graduate school it is extremely important that you find an advisor that is the right match for you and that can afford you.

Where to Live Along the lines of number one, make sure you move somewhere you can afford. Nothing distracts you and wastes your energy more than being broke and having to move. Consider splitting rent with a colleague or moving into a studio apartment, and don’t push for something more expensive than you absolutely need. If you are moving across several states, you also may consider looking at moving companies with pick-up and drop-off sites all across the country.

Prioritizing If you are like me, you will tend to spend a lot of time and energy getting your homework done, and your research might suffer as a result. You need to figure out early on how many hours per week you are going to spend on each class and on each of your other projects, and stick to those numbers. Sometimes you won’t get to read as carefully as you would like or write in as much detail as you want to, but it is crucial that you stick to your schedule and don’t fall behind.

Social Life To be honest, you will have none. Don’t get me wrong, you should try to make friends, and those friends might be a very valuable resource/safety net for you, but you won’t have time to hang out with them every day like you might have in your undergrad. Trust me when I say this, you will be too busy to spend any more than the occasional hour together. Grad school may seem overwhelming at first, but have no fear! While you will be kept busy with classes, research, and possibly even an internship, you will have a gratifying experience that will not only prepare you for an enjoyable future career but also help you grow as a person.