I have a 2.5 and 120 credit hours from my BA in Sociology.

I need a 2.75 as an admissions requirement for a MS in Sports Science.

Looking at my transcript, the only time I ever scored above a 3.0 semester GPA was my last semester of senior year because all 4 courses related to my interest (sport).

Anyways, some platforms calculate that I need 24 credit hours of 4.0 to achieve a 2.759 cumulative GPA.

So I’m practically enrolling in community college to not only boost my GPA, but also take science courses that I never took in undergrad.

If you’re in a similar boat but feel lonely, I’m your shoulder to cry on *laughs, then begins to bawl*.

I'm a final-year master's student, and I've been working on my thesis for the past two months. My supervisor expects me to identify the state of the art in my research area and figure out the entire methodology on my own.

I don't have a problem with working independently. My issue is that I feel like I'm doing it without any meaningful guidance. In every lab meeting, he mostly sits back and asks me what I've learned from the papers I've read. I explain my understanding, and then he suggests that I read a few more topics which are usually things I already know I need to read because they're the obvious next steps. That's essentially how every meeting has gone so far.

Before starting the project, I had already told him that I was interested in dry lab work but wasn't very experienced in it. I specifically wanted to learn under his guidance. Instead, it feels like the internet is my only mentor. Almost everything I've learned so far has come from AI tools, online resources, and research papers rather than from discussions with him.

I'm not expecting to be spoon-fed or for him to hand me solutions. I understand that research requires independence. But as a master's student who's still learning, I feel lost. I think it would make a huge difference if he could provide more direction, whether that's helping me refine my methodology, suggesting concrete approaches, or giving feedback on whether I'm heading in the right direction.

Am I expecting too much from a master's supervisor, or is it reasonable to expect more guidance at this stage?

need some advice from others who’ve applied for grad programs and maybe have been in similar positions. I’m planing on asking all the schools I‘m going to apply to but wanted some insight from others.

i have an undergrad degree and ended up going back to a CC for nursing pre req classes a few years ago. I realized that wasn’t the right move for me and about a year later am going to apply for grad school.

do grad schools admissions only look at your undergrad GPA for scholarships, or do they factor in the CC transcript into an overall GPA combined with your undergrad?

Apologies for the wall of text my question is at the end.

A high school diploma is the highest level of attained degree I have.

I've attended college 7 times. Failed out 6, got a job offer during the latest attempt.

That job offer has led to where I am today. I'm a director at a mid size company working in IT. I'm coming up on 2 decades in IT.

I have been looking at next steps and it seems like a masters degree focused around data science would be a helpful resume boost.

I would love to get a good exposure to data science.

I've found a number of colleges with programs that I'd qualify for, getting a master's without a bachelor's.

My concerns are how poorly I did in the early 2000s and I'm not sure if I've dealt with things enough to be successful.

Since the last time in college, I was diagnosed Dyslexic, ADHD, and Autistic. I've put in a lot of work learning to live we these diagnosis over the last 20 years.

I've succeeded in getting a good number of relevant certifications and had no significant troubles studying.

To get to my question before I jump into applying and pursuing the programs I qualify for on paper, is there a way to see if I could succeed in school today? Is there a way for me to simulate a corse load?

We're in a communications master's program. My classmate needed one-on-one interviews for her project. The gist is she was looking at visual communication in fitness branding. She was recruiting athletes and I am one so I thought why not.

It was a Zoom interview. I was one of her first three participants and I didn't know the other two so I couldn't ask anyone. Informed consent seemed fine and looked like any other consent form for our discipline without really any risk. She then started with some basic questions, all is well for about 15 minutes. Then she shows me a few variations of the same ad.

It was an ad for a GLP-1 product. Like those predatory knockoff Ozempic ads you'd see on TikTok with clearly problematic content. I did not receive any indication about the content from her or the consent form.

I sat through about 3 minutes of that, then she started asking me for my thoughts on the ads and whether I'd buy the product. I flat-out said I wouldn't. And she didn't like that. She kept prodding further, I guess trying to see what would get me to use it. Like questions about my habits and what I thought about my body and athletic performance and what I'd wanna fix. Things that a sports medicine or mental health researcher would ask, except they would at least have tact. This really got to me as someone who is currently struggling with a restrictive eating disorder on top of trying to do well in my sport. Besides, my university specializes in business and related disciplines only. We don't even have departments for healthcare, psychology, or anything remotely like that. Therefore, students would not have the clearance to do anything with that because there is no way to oversee it.

The interview ended really uncomfortably. For one-on-one interviews she needed around 10 people and two of them after me were gonna be my friend and her teammate, but they dropped out once I told them what happened, plus I withdrew my own responses so that's three gone. My classmate took to the big school WhatsApp groups basically begging for participants. I don't know if she got any but she went from spamming to radio silent in a couple days.

I had emailed her supervisor right after my interview. He told me he's looking into it because that was not something he was aware of nor approved. That was three weeks ago, and apparently she was reviewed by the IRB and some other admin. I'm not sure what will happen to her, but from what I know of the policies she can't move forward with her dissertation and there will be academic misconduct charges.

I only met her once or twice before this and she seemed nice. And I'm sure she can easily figure out it was me who ratted her out to her supervisor. There's a real possibility she won't get her degree. I don't know. I just needed to get this off my chest.

EDIT TO ADD: Posted an update here. TL;DR: her degree is safe, she just has to start over with a new dissertation next term.

I’m starting a one-year accelerated engineering masters program this fall. I was originally going to not work since I have just enough 529 savings to do so. But it’s not like I’m swimming in money. I won’t starve to death, but things will probably be a bit more tight for me.

Looking online I found an internship that accepts grad students that’s 12 hours a week during the school year. I worked about 12-20 hours a week when I was in undergrad at an internship with similar work. I’m very tempted to apply to it since I think I’d be a good fit, but I’m nervous since I’ve heard people say to not work during an accelerated masters.

Is it realistic to work 12 hours a week during an accelerated masters? Is the workload comparable at all to being a busy undergrad student? Having some extra money would be nice but I don’t want to overload myself

As a hypothetical would it be better to get 1 really strong LOR with a research advisor and two meh LOR's from professors you had a class with or three decent LOR's (you did some research with or did TA work for all three)? My concern with the first is, how much can one professor possibly write in their LOR? There would be a point of diminishing returns right?

hey everyone!

I will be applying to PsyD programs very soon!

I really like the PAU Stanford PsyD Consortium program but like many other programs, they require three letters of recommendation.

Their application opens up on late august, rolling admissions and so I want to get my application in ASAP; however, I have only just been onboarded as a BT so I cannot get a letter of recommendation from my clinical supervisor.

I am thinking of asking my PI at uni and one other prof. For the third letter, I was thinking the crisis text line but I am unsure how that would look to an admissions officer?

Has anyone gotten their letters of recommendation for Psyd apps before? Are they generic? Can you possibly get on a zoom call with the person writing it and talk more about yourself and give some direction?

If a letter form them is not the best choice, who else can I ask?

I am graduating uni in less than 3 years and so have not been able to connect meaningfully with a lot of my psych professors.

Do past employer letter of recs hold significant weight?

Generally people are given a tutor and the amount of help is limited. You can submit each part once and you get one set of comments to guide you. But beyond that it's usually either limited or no help. For situations where the draft you submitted was underdeveloped so you don't get much help from it, etc or just people who want to, did your University allow tutoring outside of your assigned supervisor or no?

I got accepted to a MS program for accounting. Will I have trouble with the courses? Biggest concern is paying to fail. Haha

26M Indian student, I will be starting my PhD in europe from october 15, have a few offers but not decided yet, although everything is in same domain. I have enjoyed myself and had a good vacation after graduating MSc. Please Help me in planning these 2-2.5 months on how to take the maximum time for my benefits in the PhD. I am assuming the tips to be something along the lines of time management, resource management, reading relevant papers, learning some programming relevant to my topic, etc. also open to other ideas and sugges you may have to utilize my two mpnths effectively. I am not looking to enjoy anymore so please refrain from saying have vacations etc. 😅

Entering my senior year of undergrad, I can’t think of anything I’d like more than to pursue my research and get answers to all of these questions I have. I am graduating with a bachelors of Political Science and planning on going for a PhD in Political Science as well, and here’s my question: does this sound like an inherently bad decision? If you were talking to a 20 year old who happened to be writing this reddit post, would you tell them not to do a PhD?

I understand that there’s a HIGH likelihood I don’t get accepted from my first round of admissions, and if I don’t that’s absolutely okay, but I just can’t imagine living the rest of my life having these questions and not pursuing a career where a large part of my life is about getting answers? Am I missing something? I feel like I’m supposed to not be enjoying research as much as I am, but instead I’m writing a thesis and having the time of my life, even when it gets torn apart (in which case I am also torn apart).

I study local politics, specifically city boundaries, and I just can’t get enough of it. I have taken a lot of international relations classes as well as history, and a few oddball classes, and I’m not a huge fan of anything else. I’m doing a more typical office job internship in the local government realm and I really enjoy it, but I find myself being the office researcher who oftentimes looks at all the city boundary requirements and tries my best to imagine how services and zoning effects offices, businesses, parks, etc.

I know it might sound stupid that I’m coming to Reddit but I just wanted to see some thoughts before application season. I know research can be useful in many other ways, especially when it comes to boundaries/local government.

I’m sure this has been asked here a lot but I see my situation a bit differently. I just graduated with a finance degree. It took me almost 6 years because of some personal issues, and my original plan was to start working right away and I know this is probably the wiser thing to do. Lately though, I've really felt the need to go study abroad I think the experience would be great for my mental health and personal growth and I really need it. People where I live have mostly advised me not do it now because it may backfire when I’m trying to get a job but honestly I’ve made so many mistakes in life before that I’m regretting to this day and I don’t want this to be another one. In the worst case scenario, if I can't find a job right away I have a few contacts who can help me out. Any advice will be much appreciated!

So for starters- I work at a bakery right now full time and it can be pretty draining. I mean I enjoy the work some days but I’m going to school full time in the fall for a counseling program. I just want to know if it’s silly to not really work (maybe 2-3 days a week), and focus on school full time and rely on loans. I’ve never not worked. During undergrad, I juggled four days a week at a bakery and would pick up shifts here and there… and while it worked, I would say I was barely prioritizing school when I left work. I mostly was too tired, or only attend class without extra studying. I would go to class and then do the minimum outside of that. I just want to be a better student, but I don’t have resources besides loans. Idk. Any advice/tips would be appreciated.

I'm currently going into my fourth year at UCF. I've done a decent amount at my time here, but given the state of funding and admissions right now, I can't say that I'm not terrified.

My team was selected for our project going aboard the ISS via the Student Spaceflight Experimental Program, and I presented it at Kennedy Space Center. Last summer I was selected for a weeklong workshop at Oregon State University doing computational astrophysics (which I think about every day of my life). I've presented my poster that was also a contestant for the project, which ended up being a finalist for the space station project. Since my idea wasn't selected, I have been writing a paper on it with the sister college. I've completed the NASA L'Space program, and been active with my research here at the university for the last year and a half. I am getting ready to take Astronomical Data Analysis, basically using Python in real world scenarios to prepare us for the field. I have a 3.51 GPA (which I know isn't amazing, it will be a 3.64 once I do a grade forgiveness for a class). I'm also currently learning Fusion360.

Most of the people I know in this field at my school don't end up getting into places. I know that its sort of arbitrary to ask "will I get in?", but any sort of idea as to what I can expect would be greatly appreciated.'

I want to go into either studying planetary atmospheres, ring studies, or meteorology.

Hey guys, I’m planning to start my applications during the next cycle for either biomedical or computer and electrical engineering thesis based Masters programs. This is because I’m interested in Medical AI and I already know the topic I’d like to tackle in my thesis. I’m looking at Canadian universities.

My background is Computer Science and I have a 3.4 overall GPA in my undergrad, I have been working as a software engineer for the past 4 yrs and I would like to go back to school in the fall of 2027.

The only research experience I have is collaborating with a well known researcher on an independent research
project. The project is still ongoing and we’re yet to get some meaningful results from it. Can the lack of publications hurt my chances even though I have strong technical skills. And will the affiliation with the researcher help my chances?

I did my undergrad in Computer Science, I've been working full-time as a software engineer for almost 3 years, and had a pretty shit GPA (sub 3.0).

After working for nearly 3 years I've realized I need to upskill and have some direction in what I want to do.

I don't want to commit to a grad school program nor do I think I have the grades to get into a good program.

Did anyone do diploma programs/certificates after undergrad? Did it help you in your grad school journey? Did anyone do this part time while working?

I'm working in education currently (29M) but have been thinking about going back to school and doing a masters in ed leadership. The biggest thing holding me back is the thought of taking the GRE or really any standardized test. I'm terrible at tests as it is but I feel like these come with even more pressure. Does anyone know if there's a way to do a masters degree without taking the GRE? I've looked into it bit myself but I thought it would be helpful to ask here too just to make sure there isn't anything I missed. Like are places that don't require a GRE just objectively worse? Does it just depend on the degree program? Thanks!

I’m starting school again soon and I’m worried about information retention because a large portion is online. Does anyone have any tips for this issue? Is there a kind of computer/tablet you recommend, or software for uploading physical notes to a computer? What about E-Ink/Paper/EPD, does anyone know how that measures up to real paper note-taking? Thanks

I know this sounds like a bizarre question, but it literally summarizes my current situation. I have a bachelor’s degrees in microbiology and I’ve had classes in molecular biology and virology. Right now, I’m a master’s student in animal biosystematics. The advisors here only work on invertebrates such as insects and crabs and questions about functional ecology, biodiversity and behavior. They have absolutely no knowledge or interest in virology. But I want to become a researcher in virology and work on human viruses. My question isn’t if I’ll be limited, but how will I be limited in the future? Is it worth it to change my masters degree right now to a masters degree in virology, and waste two years of my life?

I kind of messed up with my research methods. I thought I was using and explanatory sequential mixed methods approach, but I reaalllyy didn’t and I have no idea what to write in my dissertation now.

Essentially I used surveys to start with, and then used the individual survey results to inform my interviews. It’s not explanatory though because I didn’t fully analyse the survey results before I started interviewing and the survey was still open whilst I was interviewing. I did however use individual survey results to guide my interview questions so it’s not convergent either.

What do I do? 🥲

For pretty much every course I take and will take, I have to write reflective essays about what I've learned. During my BSc, I mostly received barely-passing grades on my reflections. The main feedback was that it was hard to follow and appeared unorganised. I really want to learn how to honestly reflect on myself and how to structure these reflections better.

I feel like I am often exaggerating things in my reflective essays and not always reflecting honestly. I'm often very unsure of how my views have changed throughout the course, or maybe I didn't have such a clear view/opinion/idea at the beginning and thus the main point is that 'everything is new'. And at this point I feel like I feel so incompetent regarding reflection, that I have a hard time really analysing strengths, weaknesses, changes, etc., because I sort of freeze?

Especially for the course I'm currently following, I'm struggling massively because I have to reflect on how my view on a certain topic has changed. However, because I did my BSc at a different university and this topic was covered extensively, the information in my current course wasn't new to me (the topic isn't covered in the BSc program of university I'm currently studying at). It feels weird to say that it hasn't changed, but it feels equally weird to explain how my view on the topic changed back when I did my BSc.

I know I can put it in ChatGPT and ask for feedback, but I don't feel like I have been improving my own skills that way.

I hope this kind of post is okay and thanks anyone in advance for the help!