Graduate School
Graduate School
Graduate school is the division of a university offering advanced programs beyond the bachelor's degree.
I started graduate school last week.And now that I think about it, I've been a student for 18 of my 26 years of existence. And I've willingly decided to add two more years to that. What was I thinking?!
I can't say that I have expectations of graduate school. I don't expect the experience to mirror that of undergrad. In fact, I HOPE it doesn't mirror that in any way. Not that undergrad was treacherous or anything, but been there done that.
Wait, I lied. I did have some expectations. A little background, I am pursuing my Master's in Applied Mathematics at an HBCU. So I had expectations of being one of many Black people in my courses. I expected to not be the only Black woman in my classes. So far I can say that is true for at least one of the three courses I'm taking this semester. I did expect it to be difficult and invigorating. It is definitely hard, but nothing I can't handle. And I am excited about learning and enjoying the material that I've been exposed to thus far, despite the confusion.
What I didn't expect is for one of my professors to say attendance isn't required, you only need to be present for the exams, and that he wishes this class was online. I also didn't expect him to leave an hour into this hour and 50 minute class. But he did. Oh, I also didn't expect this same professor to look at me and say that his past students have told him that he's biased towards students who have their hair dyed. My hair is purple *insert eye roll*. I also didn't expect there to be only 3 of us in my cohort and for me to be the only woman. But here we are. I was surprised to have undergrad students in one of my classes. Lastly, I wasn't really prepared for my classmates to be so standoffish. I know we all have to do the work and get the degree, but if we work together, we can all be successful. Anyways, I've made one friend that I have all my classes with. He's the only person who seems to be willing to collaborate and up for the task of depending on one another throughout this journey.
Despite some unexpected twists during the first week, I am still excited about the journey. I've discovered that it's going to be a challenging one, but worthwhile. Hopefully I find more of "my people" here soon.
Here's some wins from the last week:
Graduate school is the division of a university offering advanced programs beyond the bachelor's degree.
I started graduate school last week.And now that I think about it, I've been a student for 18 of my 26 years of existence. And I've willingly decided to add two more years to that. What was I thinking?!
I can't say that I have expectations of graduate school. I don't expect the experience to mirror that of undergrad. In fact, I HOPE it doesn't mirror that in any way. Not that undergrad was treacherous or anything, but been there done that.
Wait, I lied. I did have some expectations. A little background, I am pursuing my Master's in Applied Mathematics at an HBCU. So I had expectations of being one of many Black people in my courses. I expected to not be the only Black woman in my classes. So far I can say that is true for at least one of the three courses I'm taking this semester. I did expect it to be difficult and invigorating. It is definitely hard, but nothing I can't handle. And I am excited about learning and enjoying the material that I've been exposed to thus far, despite the confusion.
What I didn't expect is for one of my professors to say attendance isn't required, you only need to be present for the exams, and that he wishes this class was online. I also didn't expect him to leave an hour into this hour and 50 minute class. But he did. Oh, I also didn't expect this same professor to look at me and say that his past students have told him that he's biased towards students who have their hair dyed. My hair is purple *insert eye roll*. I also didn't expect there to be only 3 of us in my cohort and for me to be the only woman. But here we are. I was surprised to have undergrad students in one of my classes. Lastly, I wasn't really prepared for my classmates to be so standoffish. I know we all have to do the work and get the degree, but if we work together, we can all be successful. Anyways, I've made one friend that I have all my classes with. He's the only person who seems to be willing to collaborate and up for the task of depending on one another throughout this journey.
Despite some unexpected twists during the first week, I am still excited about the journey. I've discovered that it's going to be a challenging one, but worthwhile. Hopefully I find more of "my people" here soon.
Here's some wins from the last week:
- Finding street parking and not having to purchase a parking pass
- Making a new friend in class
- Getting those loans from undergrad DEFERRED
- Buying a new laptop
- Completing and submitting my graduate assistant paperwork (ca-ching!)
- Finding the PDF versions of all my required textbooks for FREE
- A friend found physical copies of my textbooks for FREE and sent them to me to use for the semester (shout out to Drea!)
- I had an AHA! moment in one of my classes this week
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