Graduate School or Teach. What to do first?

3/14/2012

The issue of graduate school versus teaching first is a question that will generate a great deal of debate amongst those of us in the teaching field who have chosen one particular path over the other. Through the voices in this blog, you will hear different perspectives on how some of us have come to make this decision, and through your own critical examination of our voices, you may find something that will inform your own decision

4 Comments

David Hawthorne

3/14/2012 08:24:09 am

For myself, the decision was quite simple. Getting a job was important to me financially. I figured graduate school could wait. Luckily I interviewed and was placed in my first and only job one week before the start of school. During the next year my wife and I chose to get married and then had our first daughter. That certainly set our timeline of what was coming first. We both got jobs and worked graduate school into our lives. Wasn't easy getting married, buying a house, having a baby and going to school. All worked out in the end.

I think with the current state of the state it just might force people to go into graduate school first. Not a band thing. Things all tend to work out in the end. What ever decision you choose it will fine.

Jennifer Greene link

3/16/2012 11:51:52 am

I entered James Madison University eager to begin my career path, and to further my knowledge of music. I found myself floundering a bit at first, as many freshmen do, having been a big fish and now finding I was more like a feeder fish! After finding my footing (and the practice rooms) I felt I was on my way to my goal. Then I took my first music education class and I found myself at odds again. The image I had in my head of what a music teacher should be did not match up with the image that was being presented to me. As I struggled to reconcile myself with the concepts of teaching music, I was thrown into the world of educational theory. I felt completely overwhelmed, without any means to connect Dewey, Vygotsky, Maslow, or any of those people to being a band director. Consequently, I dismissed most of it as irrelevant, and only did what I needed to do to pass the class. Gradually, I became disillusioned with the idea of teaching in the first place, and felt the lure of performing. As a music student, living the life of a musician was exciting. I was surrounded by others who were committed to excellence, and my competitive nature propelled me to practice and perform at the highest level. Although I did not officially change my major, I applied for a full senior recital and entered any and all performance competitions that I could. Then came student teaching, and my inner struggle began again. Although my cooperating teacher was not overly helpful or encouraging to me, he did one thing right- he let me teach freely. From day one I was actively involved in each band class. I had the freedom to develop and implement lessons of any content or level of creativity, and I loved it! Not only did I savor the opportunity to exert my teacher instincts, but I also reveled in the opportunity to develop relationships with “my” students. The teacher bug had bitten me again, and I remembered why I wanted to do it in the first place.

However, I felt that I was not really ready to teach. I felt that there must be more to learn about being a music teacher- pedagogy, learning theory, educational philosophy- that I had missed in my undergraduate program (mostly my own fault). So I decided to continue on to graduate school without teaching in between. My focus was on teaching and pedagogy, and I chose my courses accordingly. I did not perform in a major ensemble so I would have time to focus on my class work, and so I could spend my time in the library instead of the practice room. I was in classes with those who had taught, and those, like me, who hadn’t. While I did envy the experience that some brought with them, I personally felt that many of them were “stuck in their ways” and not open to the new ideas and pedagogies that were presented. Once I graduated and began teaching in the field, I felt sure I had made the right decision. While many of my colleagues were struggling to take classes at night, or give up their summers to get their degrees, I was able to focus my energies on forming my identity as a teacher. And let me tell you, the first few years of teaching are HARD. I can’t imagine adding anything on top of that.

I will say that now that I have a few years of experience, and I have returned to school to pursue my doctorate, I have a new perspective on educational theory and research. Being in the field has shed new light on the philosophies that I understood in a different way prior to teaching. So I do understand the argument that it may be better to teach before grad school, but I personally would not consider it unless I could take the time off to be a full-time student. Otherwise, I think it would be more like going through the motions just to get it finished, and it can be so much more than that.

And that is my very long story.
Jennifer Greene

Terry Caviness

3/16/2012 11:59:43 am

Terry Caviness – Graduate school vs teaching first

Personally I went directly on to graduate school. For me this was an easy choice. I knew I wanted to try to perform with an orchestra, or at least explore the performance opportunities in music. Believe it or not, you will never have more time to practice than you have right now in college. I know you’re thinking no way , but really when you get a job much of your schedule is dictated for you, during and after school hours, especially if you are at the secondary level. I suppose if you go home right after school, do the bear minimum at your job and are single, you can practice a lot, but then do we really want you teaching if that is what you are going to do???? So for me, it was a no brainer to go to grad school. I went to Fredonia for undergraduate school and if I wanted any opportunities to audition for orchestras, I was advised that I needed a performance school on my resume like Eastman, Northwestern, New England, Julliard etc to even get orchestral audition opportunities, so that is what I did.

I did end up performing and teaching so it worked out for me. I got the high level performance experience out of grad school and used it. NOTHING replaces playing in groups of that high a caliber, nothing at Fredonia ever reached the level we achieved routinely at Northwestern, and nothing at Northwestern achieved the type of performance routinely achieved when you play in the Syracuse Symphony or many other orchestras of that caliber. Many of my friends went on to teach before grad school. Most of them ended up piecing together their grad school experience over summers or during night classes. This gets the requirement done, but the quality of experience and added stress to your daily life does increase tremendously. Plus you are really not members of the academic community, just a visitor getting the job done. Not that this is a bad thing, because you now know what you need to get out of these classes and if performance isn’t on your mind and your life has started, this maybe exactly what you need, and a great way to pick and choose the kind of courses you know will strengthen you as a teacher. No matter what you learn in college undergrad, you will learn two to three times that amount in your first year of teaching. No classroom experience really prepares you fully for the practical application of teaching, you just have to learn a lot those first couple of years, which makes taking those classes both important and difficult dually.

Very few of my friends went back after a year or two, mostly because once you’ve had money it is hard to go back to Ramen noodles. Realistically, when you get a job you start life, meaning you get a car payment and other bills, maybe even a house. This makes it increasingly difficult to give up life for two years and go back to academia for that full grad school experience. If you do, I think you are much more ready as a student to learn and understand what you need to know to be a better teacher, and understand what you want to get out of your grad school experience. It is a crazy schedule for 4 or 5 years to complete the coursework like this, with a full time job and taking night or summer classes, especially if you are involved with marching band, or a musical!!!! This makes for some very long and tired nights and weeks!!!

Another variable is if you get scholarship or Teaching assistant positions to pay for grad school or another opportunity arises, this often weighs into the plans and pushes you one way or another, like the opportunity you guys at SU have to go on and do the year of grad school and be completely done with your requirements, a great idea and opportunity if you know you are going to definitely be a teacher. If you are unsure at all that teaching maybe your calling for life this may not be the best tact to take.

I don’t know that I am supposed to draw conclusions for you guys here but there are some of my thoughts on the different grad school scenarios. What I do know is it is a personal decision, no one way is right, you have to weigh your financial situation and how you want to live your life, and who you are as a person.

Ruth Samuels

3/18/2012 06:28:00 pm

I received many opinions during my senior year as I chose whether to apply for jobs or complete my grad school first. Each viewpoint is valid, but as the others on here have said, it's really a personal choice; what you can afford, where you are in your education, and what your goals are.

I am so happy that I did my graduate work full time right after undergrad. Luckily, I got a graduate assistant position in the music ed dept., so that helped financially. I went from a state school (Potsdam) to a private school (SU), so I got the benefit of having both experiences. I used graduate school to fill in gaps that I was missing, classes that I felt filled out my background and made me more marketable as a teacher, such as behavioral techniques and world music. I also wanted marching band experience, something that I did not get in high school or at Potsdam, but was able to get at Syracuse.

For me, that was definitely the way to go. I can't imagine going to school now at nights or summers in addition to working, but I have a great amount of respect for those who do. Had I taught first, I would have brought experience and a different viewpoint to the course work, but since I was there full time, I was able to immerse myself in my studies. I feel that I got a great deal out of my time at grad school as a result. Good luck with your decision!

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Graduate School or Teach. What to do first?

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