Sorry if this kind of post shouldn't go here-- I don't post often and I'm not sure of etiquette.
Are there any facepunchers who happen to either have been through grad school, are in grad school, or are in the process of applying for it? Even if not, any insight or help with this situation would be appreciated.
I should start off by saying that this is for my older brother, which indicates the issue here to begin with. I currently go to the same college as him, and while I'm a 2nd year, he's already a senior, and hasn't done [i]jack shit[/i] in looking at his future. He's a lazy, procrastinating little bitch, and hasn't done anything in researching or applying for grad school, which in all likeliness looks like the path he'll take. Even with all of our pushes to try to get him to do something about it, he keeps putting it off every time and at this point hasn't done anything. As tempting as it is to let him suffer the consequences of his own inaction, this has become a major issue of contention within my family, and [i]somebody[/i] needs to do something, and if it happens to fall to me, then so be it. In the end, he's still my brother, and I still care about his future.
As I said before, he hasn't done anything to prepare for applying, and doesn't even know when deadlines are or what he needs to do. After looking some of it up myself, I've found that the deadline's on Jan. 15th and requires a whole lot of shit (GREs, rec letters, essays, etc.). Quite frankly, at this point, it doesn't look possible to even get the bare minimum of an application in, never mind a strong one. Although I've been painting a pretty bad image of him, it's not like he's wasted his entire time at college. He's a chemical engineering major, is currently working under a professor in a lab, and has been pretty successful grade-wise, but he may end up squandering all that. What would be the best course of action here? Is it even worth trying to get an application in for the coming year, or would it be more reasonable to just take a gap year with an internship or something and focus on the year after that?
Thanks in advance for any advice.
Depending on which school and program you're looking to get into, a decent Grad school typically requires very high GPA in your third and forth year, which can be quite difficult to attain in certain programs. This is something you really have to consider first.
At this point, I'd cut losses and take a gap year, do some work and attend some examinations, and basically just build up a stronger case to make sure that he has at least a fighting chance of getting into a decent college course. His primary mistake was not finding out enough about what he needed to do in the first place, but that's easily laid on the shoulders of his laziness. He's in a decent position at present but it really won't be enough as you've mentioned.
Anything at this stage will need him to take a huge effort. If at any point he falls back into laziness during this time, that's going to be that and it'll be another year wasted at least. Not to mention that competition becomes more and more stiff for the few seats in colleges available because newer batches of students will swell the numbers of potential applicants, many of whom might be able to put up a superior application for grad schools.
[QUOTE=corkscrew_1;46130024]Sorry if this kind of post shouldn't go here-- I don't post often and I'm not sure of etiquette.
Are there any facepunchers who happen to either have been through grad school, are in grad school, or are in the process of applying for it? Even if not, any insight or help with this situation would be appreciated.
I should start off by saying that this is for my older brother, which indicates the issue here to begin with. I currently go to the same college as him, and while I'm a 2nd year, he's already a senior, and hasn't done [i]jack shit[/i] in looking at his future. He's a lazy, procrastinating little bitch, and hasn't done anything in researching or applying for grad school, which in all likeliness looks like the path he'll take. Even with all of our pushes to try to get him to do something about it, he keeps putting it off every time and at this point hasn't done anything. As tempting as it is to let him suffer the consequences of his own inaction, this has become a major issue of contention within my family, and [i]somebody[/i] needs to do something, and if it happens to fall to me, then so be it. In the end, he's still my brother, and I still care about his future.
As I said before, he hasn't done anything to prepare for applying, and doesn't even know when deadlines are or what he needs to do. After looking some of it up myself, I've found that the deadline's on Jan. 15th and requires a whole lot of shit (GREs, rec letters, essays, etc.). Quite frankly, at this point, it doesn't look possible to even get the bare minimum of an application in, never mind a strong one. Although I've been painting a pretty bad image of him, it's not like he's wasted his entire time at college. He's a chemical engineering major, is currently working under a professor in a lab, and has been pretty successful grade-wise, but he may end up squandering all that. What would be the best course of action here? Is it even worth trying to get an application in for the coming year, or would it be more reasonable to just take a gap year with an internship or something and focus on the year after that?
Thanks in advance for any advice.[/QUOTE]
Does he have any letters of rec lined up? Because if he tries to do that last minute, his professors are gonna go, "Lol no, should have contacted me 2 months ago."
[editline]2nd October 2014[/editline]
Do the programs he'd apply for likely require the chemistry subject GRE? Has he taken it? If not, he's fucked for this year. There are no more subject GREs until April.
i don't see the big deal, why doesn't he get out there and get some real world experience and then revaluate whether he should go back to grad school or not
unless he's pursuing academia/research i don't see the need to head straight back to school
[QUOTE=lum1naire;46137680]i don't see the big deal, why doesn't he get out there and get some real world experience and then revaluate whether he should go back to grad school or not
unless he's pursuing academia/research i don't see the need to head straight back to school[/QUOTE]
Even if he's pursing academia, one year off is not going to hurt your chances of getting back into grad school considerably. Or likely at all.
I don't think he's going to need the subject GREs at least, but he doesn't have any letters of rec right now, so I guess that's going to be a major issue. So it seems like just taking a gap year for the time being would be the best option?
Thanks for the help, guys.
I'm in my second year now. How do you even get letters of recommendation? Do you just do well in a class and ask a professor at the end of the semester?
I guess I should start thinking about that kind of thing. So far all the networking shit that college was supposed to be for has been a bust. I've got 17 credit hours this semester, I don't have time to network [I]shit.[/I]
[QUOTE=Used Car Salesman;46153675]I'm in my second year now. How do you even get letters of recommendation? Do you just do well in a class and ask a professor at the end of the semester?
I guess I should start thinking about that kind of thing. So far all the networking shit that college was supposed to be for has been a bust. I've got 17 credit hours this semester, I don't have time to network [I]shit.[/I][/QUOTE]
Go to professors office hours and just talk about the class or their research once every other week. I was pretty close to one professor and she managed to get me 4 letters from professors I didn't even know (including the head of department). Some professors will go to great lengths to help you.
If you haven't talked to them before and just ask for a letter they might find it offensive.
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