Grad Life
Maximizing Feedback About Research During Conference Sessions
By James Steur, Ph.D. Candidate, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign The 80th MPSA Conference is just around the corner, and if you’re like me I’m excited to explore new restaurants in downtown Chicago, present my research, and blog about exciting panels. Over the years, I’ve written blog…
Practical Tips for Online Student Engagement
By James Steur, Ph.D. Candidate, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Since the spread of COVID-19, many universities recognize that online teaching is here to stay. However, the online teaching environment poses its own set of unique challenges around the instructor’s teaching presence and…
Define Your Success: A Roundtable on Surviving Graduate School
By James Steur, Ph.D. Candidate, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Graduate school is an exciting time for students to explore their research interests and develop as a scholar. However, the experience also poses its own set of challenges: an intense workload, understanding statistical…
Conference Smarter Not Harder: An Interview with Dr. Gustavo Diaz
By James Steur, Ph.D. Candidate, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign In this blog post, I’m interviewing Gustavo Diaz (pictured at left): a recent PhD graduate and Postdoctoral Fellow at the Center for Inter-American Policy and Research at Tulane University. Gustavo has attended MPSA six…
Coping with COVID-19: A Graduate Student’s Reflections
By James Steur, a Ph.D. student in political science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign About one month ago, I wrote a blog post about strategies for networking at the 2020 MPSA Conference. To be frank, given the last few weeks, my post about networking and my own research seem…
MPSA Member Profile: Ajenai Clemmons
Ajenai Clemmons is a Ph.D. Candidate in public policy with a concentration in political science at Duke University. Her academic research focuses on the most important factors that help and harm the police-community relationship, focusing especially on African Americans and European Muslims.…
Show Me the Money: Securing Research Funding
By Charmaine N. Willis of University of Albany One of the most important parts of conducting any research project, regardless of its methodology, is securing research funding. The recent MPSA conference offered several roundtables dedicated to research funding; in this blog, I cover the roundtable…
How to Thrive in Graduate School (Whatever That Means)
By Colleen Wood of Columbia University In addition to thematic panels, the 77th Annual MPSA Conference offered a wide range of roundtables on professional development including practical discussion of fieldwork and research tools and bigger debates on pedagogical practices and public engagement.…
MPSA’s Standing ePanels: A Supportive Space for Feedback and Skill-Building
By Colleen Wood of Columbia University In the exhibition hall at MPSA, it is easy enough to get stuck in the book displays or free coffee stands. But for those who push past the publishing stands, an ecosystem of poster presentations awaits. This year, MPSA experimented with a new presentation…
Organization, Flexibility, and Thoughtfulness (#MPSA19 Prep)
By Danielle King of University of Missouri in St. Louis The responsibilities of a graduate student feel daunting under the most benign of circumstances. This semester, I have added in the extra burden of attending a few conferences, and this March, I find myself excited but a little tense. The…