Anticipating a challenging fall

There remains a lot of uncertainty about the coming fall semester: the only certainty seems to be a consensus that it will be challenging. To get a sense of what fall might look like, I encourage you to read the communication(s) from MSU as well as to check out several Inside Higher Education articles that…

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Some helpful links for coping in this time

A recent article from Emerging Scholars Network had some helpful links for coping with disruption from Emerging Scholars network. I especially appreciated this article about how grad school had prepared the author for quarantine.

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Challenges of Graduate Students

This fall the Campus Edge board has been working to understand how we might better respond to the challenges that graduate and professional students experience. Campus Edge students identified the following as the most significant challenges: Stress and/or lack of time; Work/life balance (and “grad student guilt”); Lack of clarity with regard to expectations and…

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Loneliness, Meaning, and Hope

The Los Angeles times recently published an article by Varun Soni, who is dean of religious life at USC, highlights some of the changes that he’s seen among students during the eleven years he’s been in that role. In the beginning, the conversations he had with students centered on “quests for meaning and purpose. [Students]…

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Academia and your Identity

Kate Samardzic recently wrote a helpful article that illustrates what she wished her friends and family knew about her PhD experience. It captures the experience of many of the graduate students that I know, reading it can be a way to understand better what it’s like to be in graduate school. In the article, Samardzic…

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Mental Health and Graduate School

As we’ve noted before on this blog, “graduate students are at a greater risk for mental health issues than the general population.” A recent study by Harvard quoted in The Atlantic reiterates this, noting that “the study’s results, which also include survey responses from nearly 200 faculty members, indicate that many Ph.D. students’ mental-health troubles…

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Millennial Burnout

A recent article on millennial burnout points to the challenges that millennials face in growing up in a culture that has valued being busy over one’s well-being. The author, Anne Helen Petersen, notes the following: Why can’t I get this mundane stuff done? Because I’m burned out. Why am I burned out? Because I’ve internalized…

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Loving the grad student in your life

Christian Courier recently published an article by Meghan Kort on how to love the grad student in your life. She begins by explaining a bit about the mental health challenges of grad school and then provides wisdom about “how churches, families, and friends can show more love when we encounter stressed-out grad students in our lives.…

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Sometimes leaving is the better decision

As a pastor to graduate and professional students, I recognize that I have a vested interested in people staying graduate students. Yet, sometimes staying isn’t what’s best for someone, and I am thankful that I have been invited into conversations with students about that. To give you an idea of some of the challenges and…

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Mental Health + Graduate Students = Crisis

Colleen Flaherty from Inside Higher Education recently reported on several studies that “suggest that graduate students are at greater risk for mental health issues than those in the general population. This is largely due to social isolation, the often abstract nature of the work and feelings of inadequacy — not to mention the slim tenure-track job…

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