The Ad(PhD)venture Begins…

The fall semester starts tomorrow and my “Ad(PhD)venture” officially begins. It took years of second (and third) guessing myself before signing onto the ultimate academic safari, and of course, the wisdom of that decision remains to be seen. Along the way, however, I collected a wide range of advice about starting a PhD program. It generally distilled down to:

A) Don’t do it

B) Your advisor will make or break your experience

C) Be prepared to spend the next few years weeping

D) Write, write, write

At this point, some of these nuggets are more helpful than others: I obviously ignored “A,” I’m ignorance-is-blissfully dubious of “C,” but the other two are at the forefront of my mind as I sharpen my pencils (no, really, I’m actually bringing pencils – who knows what to expect at this point?).

Any and all other advice is welcome!

And with that, as the ever-wise Billy Madison once said, “Back to school…”

~C.B.