10 Things You Don’t Know You Don’t Know (about Grad School)

In graduate school, there are two syllabi: one public, one unspoken. The public one tells you all about required coursework and milestones. The unspoken one is full of insider information and a map to the minefield. To mark SU’s celebration of First-Generation Day, Stanford professor Tom Mullaney reveals the “secret syllabus” of grad school, offering concrete, practical advice drawn from his own experience, as well as the countless colleagues and students he’s worked with at Stanford and Columbia over the past 25 years. Remarks will be directed toward current first-gen grad students and first-gen undergrads considering grad school, but all are welcome. While supplies last, main campus graduate student attendees will receive a free copy of SU grad alum Alecea Standlee’s edited volume, On the Borders of the Academy: Challenges and Strategies for First-Generation Graduate Students and Faculty (The Graduate School Press, 2018). This event is supported with funding from the GSO.

 

Tom Mullaney is Professor of History at Stanford University. He maintains the First-Gen Prof website and the How Academia Works YouTube channel.