SOP advice
I've been trying to write my SOP, but it's been very difficult for me to know what exactly I should include. I've looked at other samples posted here, as well as Duke's guide on their website, but I just don't seem to know what to put in, given my interest in indisciplinary studies and my educational and professional background
( Read more... )
Also, your recommendation letters can be a great way to get some of the personal stuff in there without you having to say it. Maybe a professor you know well can talk about how your work experience informed your approach to the course, etc.
As far as targeting professors, I did it and had success with it. Yes, there are interdepartmental politics in play, but looking at program websites--and asking around among your peers and professors--can give you a good feel for them. For instance, one program I looked at didn't have any information on interdisciplinarity on their website, so I avoided referring to it in my SOP (something that would be harder to do, granted, given your interests). In some cases, my targeting was right on, and the Directors of Grad Study at those programs mentioned the same people that I had pointed to as good matches; in other cases, my targeting was off, and that didn't seem to matter at all. Writing that fit paragraph, though, helped ME figure out whether schools were good matches--if the paragraph was hard to write, I knew that the school might not be a good place for me (and indeed, with only one exception, the programs I was admitted to were the ones that I had sized up as the best fits). My thought here is, what's to lose? A place that uses the names you mention in your SOP as a way to decide whether to admit you probably wouldn't offer a healthy environment anyway. And don't worry about contacting professors--I didn't contact anyone, and it didn't seem to matter. I think what the fit paragraph does is show that you're thinking about how to insert yourself into a scholarly conversation--that you're thinking about whose work you want to engage in, why, and what you'll derive from it in either content or methodology. You're not expected to have read every (or any) professor's work widely, but it helps, I think, to show that you're thinking about what directions your work will go in based on the resources available to you at a particular program.
As far as talking about why particular programs can be a good fit, I didn't do much of that and focused instead on professors. But you could certainly mention things like colloquia, structural elements of requirements, the program's approach to teaching, etc. as things that make you interested in a school. The key here is, I think, to avoid statements that are too general. Ask yourself, "Could I say this about any school?" If it's universally true, take it out; if it's what makes a particular program distinctive, and distinctively attractive, leave it in.
Is the University of Michigan on your list? It has the two-statement system, and if you're not limited geographically, you should consider it: highly interdisciplinary, and a good match for your interests.
That 2010 WGI lounge community will pick up soon, I bet--last year's didn't even really get going until December. But in the meantime, wgi_lounge_2009 is a fantastic resource--lots of us put a lot of our best advice in some of the later threads.
Reply
Leave a comment