Mason Grad Insider

  • March 31, 2017

    One of the more tedious tasks to studying or reading for your graduate course work is taking good notes on what you are reading. While this may or may not come easy to you as a student, it is an imperative skill to master as soon as possible. Below, I’ve summarized how to use the Cornell method on note-taking that you can apply to almost any graduate course you take.

  • January 27, 2017

    How many of us set goals for the academic semester or year? Goals are important to getting things done and moving forward to advance both our professional and personal lives. They serve as a motivational tool to keep us on track and focused on the many smaller tasks that lead up to achieving our desired outcomes.

  • January 29, 2020

    Interpersonal skills can be described as those that allow you to successfully interact with and convey information to other people. Regardless of our program or degree level, all graduate students can benefit from improving these skills, especially those of us preparing to enter the career world soon.

  • October 21, 2020

    Networking — the dreaded topic Career Services loves to tout as uber–important – cannot possibly continue in these socially distanced times, can it?  Yes.  Networking is alive and well.  And, similar to social events, K-12 education, and even political debates, to be safe and effective, a bit of change is required.

  • September 16, 2020

    One of the keys to remaining resilient is knowing when to ask for help and when to take time to – as one of my colleagues reminds me – “Take care of you.” You might be thinking this is a somewhat selfish approach, but in the end, if you cannot take care of yourself, you are less likely to be at your best to attend to your studies and take care of others.

  • March 10, 2017

    If you are in graduate school — whether part-time or full-time — chances are you are inundated with multiple reading assignments. From reading dissertations to textbooks, these assignments can be time-wasted without a having a strategic approach to pull something useful out of it. Below are outlined some helpful tips for you to consider with respect to your graduate-level reading assignments.

  • February 4, 2021

    For some, virtual job interviews feel even more complicated or overwhelming compared to in-person interviews. Adding the layer of technology can create additional unease for candidates who are new to job searching, as well as those with more than 30 years of work experience. I hope to assure you that virtual job interviews are really just the same old thing. When preparing for virtual interviews, the basics of job interview preparation will see you through, whether you have to drive to your interview or just turn on your computer.

  • October 6, 2021

    You are in fact here to start a business - that business is your own research portfolio and your areas of expertise. You may not be selling any goods or materials, but you’re selling your ideas and your research.

  • May 5, 2021

    There are plenty of great reasons you should get a plant, which I’m going to outline here. Some of these are my own personal reasons, but I also drew a lot of these reasons from the amazing horticulture class...

  • September 22, 2015

    By Kelly Pedersen
    It’s time to fire off a quick email to your professor - but wait! First make sure that you understand the rules of email etiquette.