A Late Summer Farewell

The end is near, dear friends... 

Summer is drawing to a close and my time writing for the Grad Life blog is also coming to an end. 

Between my graduate study abroad experience in London, to my work writing for all of you, I have had a great summer. I hope you, too, had a fantastic summer whether you were studying for Comps, researching your dissertation, preparing to begin your first year at Fordham, or just hanging out before another school year begins. 

Someone else will be taking over the Grad Life blog soon, and I'm sure they'll do a great job, keeping up the legacy Alex Loizzo started and that I tried to uphold. 

I introduced myself back in June and shared insights about my own life as a grad student, as well as ideas about larger issues of grad life. 

I shared the benefits of studying abroad as a grad student and experiencing new ways of living, as well as the fantastic/terrible truth that as a grad student, you are always working and learning and there is no such thing as summer break. I shared the highlights from my first year at Fordham, from my work on the Turning Tides Symposium on Diasporic Literature, and my realization that grad school is hard and doing exactly what you hope to do is often more challenging than do anything else.

There were a few posts about navigating the common logistics of grad life from hunting for an apartment at the start of a new school year to figuring out study habits that combat the loneliness of grad school (in two parts!). 

I hope that you were encouraged to dig deep and think about the relevance of pop culture phenomena like Harry Potter to our work as aspiring academics, as well as the way Twitter may (or may not) change the face of academia.

And beyond all these ideas about grad life, I hope the enduring conversations you will have with yourself and others after this summer on the Grad Life blog, will be about how to learn about teaching while we are grad students so that we can be sure to pass along all that we learn effectively, and also how to honor the ties between your personal life and your professional scholarship.

Keep reading what's been written and be sure to pass it along!

May your journey to grad school take you great places!