How my Graduate School Experience Prepared Me for a Career in Academia
In my last post, I described the five major reasons why I chose to pursue a career in academia. I knew that I wanted to pursue this career path when I entered graduate school, and fortunately, my graduate program was structured with the goal of producing well-rounded graduates who would be competitive in the academic job market. Graduate school was rigorous and challenging, and while it wasn't always pleasant, it has shaped me into the academic professional that I am today. Below, I describe six major ways that my graduate school experience gave me solid preparation for a career in academia. 1. Teaching experience Part of my graduate student stipend came from working as a TA, and all of us graduate students were required to accumulate a certain number of teaching experiences before we graduated. Since I realized early in my PhD experience that I wanted to pursue a career in academia where teaching was the primary focus, I strove to get as ...