Top Ten Survival Skills For Geography Majors

• 2.1 academic progress: In trying to satisfy both university and College requirements, as well as departmental requirements, there’s a lot of room for errors of commission, omission and communication. Thus it’s good to meet with advisers from time to time to make sure you are "on track," and that there are no glitches. The two requirements that cause the most problems are the language requirement and the 180- credit requirement. A word about each:

• 2.1.1 the foreign language requirement. Very difficult to get out of. Is satisfied by getting a grade of 2.0 or better in the third quarter of a language. Remember that if you took the same language in high school, the 5 units of the 101 version of it here will not count toward the 180 credits. Also, once you start your language don't interrupt your progress, since the knowledge is cumulative and also because it can be hard to get into the more popular courses, such as Spanish. many people take intensive courses in the summer to meet the requirement, combining all three quarters into one. This experience is not for everyone, however, since you are immersed in, say, Norwegian, to a degree that may affect your dreams and few remaining waking moments. Others take their foreign language courses at community colleges--which is OK, even in the senior year, keeping in mind that you can only transfer 90 community college credits to the UW, so if you already have an AA degree, you can’t take the language at a CC and have the credits transfer.
• 2.1.2 the 180 credit rule. This requirement is only waived posthumously, and having it waived after you’ve died probably won’t mean that much to you anyway. Be sure to track your credits quarterly so you don’t get a nasty 178 or 179 credit surprise at the end. Be sure that all courses you took at other institutions have been evaluated and assigned credits--especially those taken your last quarter or semester at your old school. And double-check to make sure that the same course doesn’t appear twice on your transcripts--advisers and transfer evaluators sometimes miss repeated courses, but the people in the graduation office NEVER miss them, and we’ve had a few students who couldn’t graduate on time because they didn’t realize they had repeated a course. Sometimes a course has the same title and number but has changed. In such a case, you’ll need to file a Graduation Petition to have the credits count twice. See Geography advisers.
• 2.1.3 petitioning for graduation. Sometimes there are discrepancies between the credits you thought a transfer course was worth and what it was actually assigned--or else it transfers in as 4 credits when you really need 5, or counts for social science (I & S) when you thought it counted for humanities (VLPA). In such cases, and when there are other extenuating circumstances affecting your ability to satisfy the general education requirements, you must petition the College through departmental advisers, asking for an exception, dispensation, etc. Geography advisers will furnish you with the form, and you then fill it out and return it to us. We either approve or disapprove and then forward it to the College. Depending on your timing, it can be several weeks before the College committee that decides on petitions meets, so you should take care of all discrepancies as soon as you can.

 
• 2.2 Career Planning. We stress course selection as part of a process of professional development and career planning, and will gladly sit down with you to help in this planning process. (See many of the tips and services listed below)

• 3.1 Take Geog 397 (Tutorial For Majors). The tutorial is designed to help orient you to the department, the discipline of Geography, and worlds beyond geography, including worlds of work, worlds of electronic reference and information, and other educational sources.

• 3.2 Faculty mentoring and other contact. The tutorial also requires that you meet with a faculty member to help you sharpen your focus and sense of educational purpose. Obtain a copy of the "Student-Faculty Mentoring Guide" from Geography Advising. Faculty also give papers during the Friday colloquium (2:30-3:30), and are often available afterward for informal conversation at a weekly reception. They also welcome you top drop into their offices for discussion, counseling, etc.

• 3.3 Getting to know TAs and other graduate students. Graduate students are obviously somewhere between the undergraduate experience and the faculty perspective, and, as such, often prove to be invaluable sources of information about courses, faculty teaching approaches, academic resources, and geography departments at other schools. Most importantly, they often are familiar and comfortable with recent and current approaches in geography and other disciplines, and a great source of intellectual stimulation. Talking to Teaching Assistants in courses closest to your interests is one way to get to know which graduate students you are likely to have the most in common with. Graduate students also present colloquia and lectures from time to time, and also are often found in Smith 401 (the Sherman Lab), 417, and 430. A particularly informal occasion for talking with them is after the Friday afternoon colloquium. The colloquium itself (see below), usually runs from 2:30-3:30, and a reception always follows it, in Smith 409. As is the case with faculty, graduate students enjoy, and are stimulated by, contact with undergraduates, so don’t be intimidated by them!

• 3.4. Develop communities with other undergraduates. Some years the Undergraduate Geography association (UGA) has been very active in organizing faculty talks (formal and informal), inviting guest speakers, planning career days and field trips, and sponsoring and organizing everything from volleyball games to the Commencement Party. In addition to the UGA, students also form study circles, reading groups of students with shared academic interests, and tutoring groups. Talk to geography advisers if you are interested.

 

• 6.1 The Center For Career Services, 301 Loew Hall, phone 543-0535, offers workshops on resume writing and interviewing, job search seminars, minority job placement programs, job vacancy listings, internship and summer job listings, on-campus interviews, and file service for applying for educational jobs and graduate school.

• 6.2 classified ads & the Geography Job Book. Each February, the department publishes an edition of "What You Can Do With a Degree in Geography," a 125-page compendium of the past year’s job announcements, job descriptions, job-hunting tips, sample resumes, lists of alumni employment, and complete internship information, including a list of recent internships Geography majors have. This guide may be purchased for around $8 at Professional Copy and Print, 4200 University Way (phone 634-2689). A copy is also available in Suzzallo Library. One of the main sources used for this book are the Sunday classified ads--especially check the following categories for jobs relevant to Geography majors: appraisal, community development, computers, environment, forestry, geographer, GIS, housing, import-export, marketing, planning, project coordinator, research, social services, surveyor technician, trade, and transportation.

• 6.3 join professional organizations: Professional Geographers of Puget Sound (PGOPS) is a loose network of working professionals and geography students who meet irregularly for brown-bag talks and field trips, and also publish an invaluable roster. Many members are alumni of this department and welcome your contacting them for job-hunting and career-planning tips. The Association of American Geographers (AAG) is the main national professional organization for geographers, and offers special interest group newsletters, professional journals, directories, job-hunting tips, and more. Student memberships in both these groups are inexpensive--see Geography advising for membership forms.

 

• 7.1 The Carlson Office (Room 9, Communications Bldg.) This is the UW’s main coordinating center for such programs as internships, service learning, tutoring and orientation. After a brief orientation, you may use their extensive internship listings.

• 7.2. Service Learning Options Service learning is an instructional method in which students learn through active participation in thoughtfully organized service that: a) is conducted in, and meets the needs of, a community; b) is coordinated with a school or community service program and with the community; c) is integrated into and enhances the academic curriculum; d) includes structured times for students to reflect on their service experience, and e) helps foster civic responsibility.


Geography offers approximately 5 courses that carry a Service Learning option. In most cases, it is one of several pathways through a course among which students can choose to accomplish course learning goals. Students who choose to do service learning select one of several possible community groups with which to volunteer. These groups are selected based on their thematic fit with the course's content and goals. Students can expect to work 25-30 hours over the course of the quarter (about 3 hours per week) at their site, and that the service learning option fosters learning of the course material by providing students opportunities to concretely experience/explore the manifestation and implications of concepts they are studying in the material world, and prepares students for thoughtful roles as active citizens. They substitute a writing assignment associated with their service learning experience for "regular" class assignments. There is special help available to coordinate and support SL activities.
 

• 7.3 Internships. An internship guide is available from Geography Advising, and is also included in our job book (see section 6.2, above). Internships are increasingly essential for a successful job hunt after you graduate. Ordinarily, you earn credit by signing up for Geog 494 after arranging a work-related project with a faculty member.

 

Graduate school admission is highly competitive--we only admit around 20 percent of applicants to our graduate program, for example. We have found that the most compelling reason to admit someone isn’t so much high GRE scores or grades (though those do of course get factored in), but, rather, a strong sense of intellectual engagement. The impression that you are enough of an "insider" in an on-going scholarly dialogue is crucial--you will have a competitive advantage if you seem to have a focus and direction and know the territory a bit. This doesn’t mean you have to know all the main articles in your field, or specify the chapter headings for your MA thesis. But it does suggest that you at least know the main topics of controversy, the mean areas of inquiry, the main schools of thought, in the academic arena you are hoping to enter a bit more deeply into. Merely saying you are interested in "GIS" or "land use" won’t get you very far, and is a wasted opportunity to impress your readers that you are a serious student of a particular topic, set of questions and concerns, etc. You’d be surprised at how many graduate program applicants write fuzzy, vague statements of purpose offering no specific clues to their intellectual trajectory.
 

• 10.1 study in a systematic way, at least 4 hours a day. Find a certain time and place to study every day, and stick to that schedule. This way you avoid last-minute cramming, which defeats the whole purpose of education: being able to reflect on the information you receive, process it, combine it with what you already know, and thus produce new knowledge. Treat this as seriously as you would a job.

• 10.2 reduce outside work: It’s better to work full-time for a quarter or two than to work 20 or more hours a week and expect to get the most out of your studies. Treat your undergraduate career as a job, as a career move, not as something you somehow have to do.

• 10.3 don't take too many time-demanding courses at once : take a maximum of two 400-level courses in your specialization at the same time, and try to strike a balance between highly methodological/systematic/theory-driven courses and survey or descriptive courses.

• 10.4 ask about prerequisites and respect them. All too often people take courses they aren’t ready for, either lacking the methodological sophistication, technical expertise or broad background to be able to do anything other than merely hang on in the class. This means you must be systematic in planning your schedule a year in advance. (See above)

• 10.5 ask questions. We’re all guilty of this one: sitting through a lecture we don’t understand, or one we have gotten "lost" in somewhere, somehow, yet not asking questions to get back on track. Rather than avoiding unclear or difficult material or staying "stuck," often just asking a question in class or of a TA before or after class can make the critical difference. Remember that if the question has occurred to you, or if you are not understanding part of a lecture or text, the chances are very high that many of your classmates are in the same predicament. So asking questions becomes a form of solidarity and community-building with your peers. It’s also been shown in study after study that critical thinking and problem-solving skills are developed only if you question the material, asking the "whys" and "hows" as well as learning the "whats". Call this developing a method of investigation and reflection--understanding how knowledge is constructed, what it is based on, and how the parts fit together, rather than treating each piece of information as separate, self-contained, and given.

• 10.6 take lots of "W" courses. Students often say "I hate to write--does this class have much writing?" This is definitely the wrong question if you want to develop your thinking and presentation skills because "W" (writing-intensive) courses offer you the rare opportunity to shape and present your knowledge, and produce documents that resemble the kind of reports that you are likely to be responsible for once you graduate. Consider writing as thinking, not as grammar, spelling, punctuation and other "picky" (yet vital) rules from grade school.