Legit work

Orientations were had all around this week: Jerry in Geography, I in Sociology and Micah an ice cream social for Kindergarten (aside - we are pleased with the teacher he will have this year. She seems spunky despite nearly 20 years in the Minneapolis Public Schools...). I can't say that I learned much new in my own orientation, given that I've already been a PhD student for three years and have been around the department for two of them. But I did appreciate a reframing of grad student life as presented by two faculty. That is, that grad school is in fact work, although it is not the (insert air quotes) working world per se. Rather than being a hiatus from work, or something that you do because you'd rather not have a (air quotes) real job, grad school is the early stage of your career - more like an entry level position in academic terms, I guess. Grad school is a funky place to be, maybe especially because I'm not a twenty-something fresh out of undergrad. I've had seven years experience working since then, am married, and have two children. I feel better thinking of it as an integral part of my career rather than a diversion from something else that's more (air quotes) legit. Phew.

Starting up

Tomorrow I officially start my life as a full time graduate student. It's been a long time getting here--more than two years since Sarah first suggested we do grad school at the same time. It sounded crazy then, but here we are. I'm mostly excited--no more grading 65 first drafts for awhile (my previous position as a composition instructor) and a chance to pursue my own interests. I feel good about the fit with my program and have several ideas to pursue research wise. To me, the problem is usually narrowing down and giving up on ideas rather than creating them.

There's concerns--balancing parenthood and life as an established homeowner with a grad student lifestyle that feels a better fit for 23 year old unattached folks. Will I have the discipline to find and develop a research focus for a dissertation? How much debt will we accrue? But at this point those feel like welcome challenges to engage and solve. I'm optimistic. Sarah and I have a plan in place with no paid childcare (yay!!) and we've cleared space on our bookshelves for textbooks. We're as prepared as we can be, I think. Bring it on!

Gender and life chances a la Tim Allen

Jerry came across this quote yesterday and I couldn't resist posting it in light of my research interests:

Women now have choices. They can be married, not married, have a job, not have a job, be married with children, unmarried with children. Men have the same choice we've always had: work, or prison.

Tim Allen: comedian or sociologist? Both?

Are you smarter than your spouse?

I love how you can turn on the Olympics at any moment and witness a world record of something being broken. All this competition has me thinking, how do academic couples handle the inevitable competitiveness that comes with being high achievers?

This question became personal in a conversation this afternoon. With chest properly puffed, I told Jerry that a research project I've been working on might get some attention from a prestigious newspaper. Before the words even left my lips I realized that Jerry has already been quoted in said prestigious newspaper. Not fair! I quickly restored my dented ego with the fact that I have two published articles in scholarly journals to his one. Bah!

It's not that this is new territory or anything. We took several classes together as undergrads and matched each other, A for A. He did crush me with his GRE scores, but we all know that standardized tests are overrated as a means of assessing intelligence and/or academic potential. Or, at least that's what I tell myself...

Hopefully the Social Science Building will be big enough for both of us this year. At least we're not in the same discipline!

Burning the unity candle at both ends

I finished up my teaching last week and now am finally, officially finished with a job that's lasted me almost a decade. And so a few days ago, Sarah and I sat down to figure out our game plan for the fall. Micah, our oldest, is in kindergarten this fall, and baby Luke will be with us or Sarah's mom most of the time.

Looking at our schedule together was both exciting and daunting. I'm on fellowship for three years, and so have no TA/RA duties to worry about. But logistics don't work themselves out easily--there's one day where we might be making three different trips to campus. In the end, though, it's exciting to start getting into details. This is really happening!

We share a bed, a house, two young boys, a cat.....

and now a blog!

In mere weeks from now, both of us will be grad students - Jerry in Geography and Sarah in Sociology. Could be interesting! So, we thought we'd blog about it together. The parameters here will be pretty loose, but in general we might post about what it's like to be married-with-children in grad school, as well as our individual scholarly pursuits.

Let us know what you think!