The "Education" Thread

I got a second confirmation from my (new/old) manager that the department would be willing to pay for me to take actuarial exams once the budget is renewed for 2016. Excite!

Still considering a full-on career change to something not insurance though. I have time to make that decision though.
 
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I took the GRE today, scored 159 on the verbal and 165 on the quantitative. Both are out of 170. I only spent one day studying for it so not bad. I skipped two questions on the quant section like a dumbass, I clicked continue when it asked if I wanted to review my answers with 6 minutes left. So it could potentially be 167 out of 170. Oh well. They say 162 or above is highly competitive anyway.
 
I got a second confirmation from my (new/old) manager that the department would be willing to pay for me to take actuarial exams once the budget is renewed for 2016. Excite!

Still considering a full-on career change to something not insurance though. I have time to make that decision though.
Damn nice, those are even more expensive than the GRE. What was your major, accounting or something? I wish someone would pay for mine. I teach stats every semester so I'd probably own the shit out of the first two or so.
 
Damn nice, those are even more expensive than the GRE. What was your major, accounting or something? I wish someone would pay for mine. I teach stats every semester so I'd probably own the shit out of the first two or so.

Finance. 225 for the exams and study materials can be at least that much money.
 
Thank god this semester is over. This was an absolutely brutal stretch of grading. Don't give your students big assignments the week before finals!

That said, it was worth it. Only two kids failed my English class and all the students passed my philosophy class. This last set of philosophy essays were dope. We read Descartes's meditations; then, for a number of key arguments (cogito, proof of god, and mind-body dualism) we read a critique. On the final the students had to pick one of the debates, explain both sides and take a position within the debate. I got some really strong arguments this time and this was an in class essay (as a opposed to a take home). Granted, Descartes is way easier than Aristotle, but nonetheless, these kids are getting it.
 
Dropping in with some good news. Over a month ago I had laid down my moderator privileges and have been on hiatus from frequenting this forum indefinitely, but I'll make an exception for this.

An article I had submitted to the Journal of Late Antiquity has been accepted for publication, pending substantial revisions. If I get the revisions done by the end of March then my article will appear in the Spring issue of JLA in 2017.

This is a significant step forward in my professional career, and I could not have gotten to this stage had I not stopped drinking this summer. This is one of the best forms of encouragement.

Cheers!

P.S. damn, things look different here!
 
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Update on publication prospects.

I a got another acceptance, this one from the Canadian journal Phoenix.

The best part is that they are ready to accept it as is without revision. However, the reviewers did provide some criticism and recommendations for minor revisions, which I'll consider. Once I've made those changes I'll send it back out and hopefully see it in print next year!
 
Just sent off the last of my graduate applications. It's strange how stressful clicking boxes can be. I sent off my last one a month after sending off the bulk of the bunch and regret my original SOP. The substance didn't change with revisions, just simple grammatical stuff. There were no glaring grammatical errors, just simple things like moving words and commas around. I'm still paranoid that a glaring error found its way on one of the applications. Whatever.

The semester is going well. I tested out of that joke 100 level computer course (the "test" had questions on floppy discs and dial-up on it). I'm enjoying my courses, but have had trouble thus far with finishing my readings for my senior thesis. I'm not concerned about having enough time to write it, but the clock ticking is distressing. It's going to be on how WWI resulted in a permeation of the ridiculous into perceptions of day-to-day existence in the writings of intellectual in German speaking countries in during the decade following the war. That will be the thesis at least. I'm going to analyze philosophy, literature, music, and politics (and maybe film), and try to tie them together amongst themselves and with war memoirs.
 
Nice dude, i'm done this semester too. Don't think i'm doing grad school though.

The sentence where you explain your thesis is confusing as hell haha. One chick I knew last semester wrote her thesis on the use of nazi propaganda via fairy tales, sounded tough as hell to write a paper on it though.
 
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Nice dude, i'm done this semester too. Don't think i'm doing grad school though.

The sentence where you explain your thesis is confusing as hell haha. One chick I knew last semester wrote her thesis on the use of nazi propaganda via fairy tales, sounded tough as hell to write a paper on it though.

Are you trying to get into the Foreign Service? I got the impression of that from a post you made recently. If so, good call. I've considered taking that path myself. If my current plans don't work out, I plan to pursue it.

:lol: Philosophical histories are difficult to write.The subject matter is so up in the air that it's difficult to write a genuine history ( especially in a 25-50 page paper). My main goal is to not write one of those joke cultural history papers that conflate the particular with the general, as Foucaultians do so often, much as I'm sure Foucault himself is rolling in his grave over. I hope that by restricting myself to the DWEM that I can do this ( I prefer DWEM anyhow *TRIGGER*). Regardless, I'll write an A paper, but I want for it to be one that I'm truly proud of.

I've been trying to formulate a thesis for the last two years. It started as a general aspiration to write an intellectual history paper and was distilled to what I have now. Essentially it will cover the disillusioned atmosphere found in intellectual dialogues and monographs the within German speaking intelligentsia during the period following the first world war, and will focus specifically on implications concerning day-to-day existence. Think of it as something that concerns the precursors of the notion of absurdity that followed WWII and is found most easily in the writings of Camus.
 
Yeah, testing the waters. Got 3-4 weeks to hear if I pass the test, then I send some personnel resume thing and wait until month and then if I 'pass' that, I go to some oral exam in D.C. and that's it. We'll see how it goes. Traveling is something I miss and I don't think I can hack it as a civilian :D

Sounds like you have to read a shitload of primary sources, that I imagine aren't translated haha. Good luck!
 
Good luck! A Foreign Service career is a great one to go after. If you're in DC and my schedule isn't too crazy, a beer or ten together is a must. If you're down on capital, my couch is free to you.

Fortunately, for the purposes I have now, translations aren't an issue. An MA thesis and PhD on the other hand... let's just say fingers are crossed for the Fulbright.
 
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Holy shit. Dude that's huge!

It is. I received emails from a couple of professors and a student asking if I had any questions and I'm too dumbfounded to think of anything. I gave a polite reply and told them I will have questions for them within the next few days (i.e. after I collect myself). This is not just exciting but also a huge relief--I've been questioning my path for the last few years, thinking up countless back-up plans if I couldn't get funding somewhere. My big question is whether if I win the Fulbright, can I defer the package they offered my until the next year. I would be surprised if they said no because, of course, anyone with any sense would go for the Fulbright instead because with that on their transcript they could get funding elsewhere the next year.

They probably think you're black

:lol: My professor from CC joked about this. University of Rochester didn't accept me, so they must have looked at my answers regarding demographic questions :p
 
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Wow, a lot of people here work in education.

Me too. I've got an MA in English Literature, a BA (Hons) in English/History/Philosophy and a Graduate Diploma in Education in English and History - and I sure as hell won't be going back to study any time soon!

In Australia we can defer payment of our degrees and then pay it back to the government as soon as we earn over a certain threshold. So I'm clear there as I originally graduated in 2002. Luckily I did my Masters by research, meaning I only had to write a thesis and not attend classes, at a time when the government was providing full scholarships for research students. So I didn't pay a cent and ultimately saved about $10,000. I finished in 2010. So I've been pretty lucky. But yeah, that's it for me and study. Being free of that pressure is great.
 
3 undergraduate degrees? Jesus Christ man, professional student!?

The MA and Grad Dip Ed were post-grad.

I remember people I went to University with who were taking 7, 8 years to do a Bachelor degree... just incredible. I'd call them professional students if they weren't such amateurs at it hahaha.
 
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