English
Answer:

Ask for help from your peers ,

Open up about feeling like an outsider ,

Open up about any lessons you find hard

3. Ask for help from your professors

In undergrad, my classes often had 300+ students per professor, so it was intimidating to ask for help.

In my Master's program, classes had 20 students per professor, and I realized that professors care because they'd:

  • Emphasize that it's okay to pause school.

  • Give detailed feedback on major assignments.

  • Adjust due dates whenever asked.

Robin Williams as a professor saying to his students, "Carpe diem. Seize the day. Make your lives extraordinary."

I feared I'd look dumb if I asked for help, but in seeing their care, I took a risk, reached out, and got advice that positively shaped the rest of my program, and I believe every student can benefit from professors' advice.

Quiz

You find yourself overwhelmed with balancing problems in your personal life and school, and you're falling behind on your assignments. What should you do?

Answer:

Talk to professors about your struggle

Take Action

Starting a Master's program can feel nerve-wracking, but with good time management and connecting to your peers and professors, it can feel much less stressful.

A woman smiling and nodding while saying, "I can do this. I can do this!" Have an idea on what school/program you're interested in?

License:

About to start a Master's program?

While some people feel excited about going back to school for their Master's degree, for others, it is terrifying.

A woman looking frustrated while saying, "Here we go again."

Graduate programs are no joke, with one study finding that nearly 35% of graduate students dealt with anxiety!

As someone who's about to start the last semester of his Master's program, I've felt a LOT of anxiety. Thankfully, there were some things I learned during my program that made things much easier.

To anyone about to start their program, here are 3 things I wish I knew about taking a Master's degree program.

1. Start assignments early!

Many of us got away in undergrad with procrastinating on tasks.

As Master's students, we often balance work & school, so procrastination can make life stressful.

To avoid that, I used Google Tasks to get started early.

A screenshot taken from my personal "Google Tasks" page. It contains three lists of upcoming tasks and due dates.

Here was my process:

  • Once I got a syllabus, I'd put all tasks into Google Tasks with a due date 3 days earlier than the actual date.

  • I'd set up alerts to tell me when I had a week left before my early due date.

  • I'd start working on each task 30-45 minutes a day.

This helped me finish my tasksearly, which gave me time to rest and greatly reduced my stress in my program.

Did you know?

One reason that people procrastinate is because they feel overwhelmed by a task.

By breaking an assignment into these daily 30-minute work periods, tasks can feel much more manageable.

2. Open up to your peers!

Nearly every graduate student will, at some point, feel like they don't belong.

A woman looking sad while saying, "Maybe this is just the wrong place for me."

I felt like an outsider because I felt alone in struggling, so I avoided my peers.

It wasn't until my third semester that, during a team project, one peer shared how they felt lost.

Their honesty led my peers to share their struggles, and it led to me asking peers for help, talking in my cohort's group chat, and finally feeling like I belonged.

It takes just 1 act to break the ice.

Quiz

You've just started your Master's program and you're struggling with feeling like you belong. Which of these actions could help you feel less like an outsider in your program? Select all that apply:

3. Ask for help from your professors

In undergrad, my classes often had 300+ students per professor, so it was intimidating to ask for help.

In my Master's program, classes had 20 students per professor, and I realized that professors care because they'd:

  • Emphasize that it's okay to pause school.

  • Give detailed feedback on major assignments.

  • Adjust due dates whenever asked.

Robin Williams as a professor saying to his students, "Carpe diem. Seize the day. Make your lives extraordinary."

I feared I'd look dumb if I asked for help, but in seeing their care, I took a risk, reached out, and got advice that positively shaped the rest of my program, and I believe every student can benefit from professors' advice.

Quiz

You find yourself overwhelmed with balancing problems in your personal life and school, and you're falling behind on your assignments. What should you do?

Subscribe for more quick bites of learning delivered to your inbox.

Unsubscribe anytime. No spam. 🙂

Take Action

Starting a Master's program can feel nerve-wracking, but with good time management and connecting to your peers and professors, it can feel much less stressful.

A woman smiling and nodding while saying, "I can do this. I can do this!" Have an idea on what school/program you're interested in?

License:

Your feedback matters to us.

This Byte helped me better understand the topic.

New Bytes

We publish fresh Bytes daily, we can send you a notification when that happens.

3. Ask for help from your professors

In undergrad, my classes often had 300+ students per professor, so it was intimidating to ask for help.

In my Master's program, classes had 20 students per professor, and I realized that professors care because they'd:

  • Emphasize that it's okay to pause school.

  • Give detailed feedback on major assignments.

  • Adjust due dates whenever asked.

Robin Williams as a professor saying to his students, "Carpe diem. Seize the day. Make your lives extraordinary."

I feared I'd look dumb if I asked for help, but in seeing their care, I took a risk, reached out, and got advice that positively shaped the rest of my program, and I believe every student can benefit from professors' advice.

Quiz

You find yourself overwhelmed with balancing problems in your personal life and school, and you're falling behind on your assignments. What should you do?

Answer:

Talk to professors about your struggle

Take Action

Starting a Master's program can feel nerve-wracking, but with good time management and connecting to your peers and professors, it can feel much less stressful.

A woman smiling and nodding while saying, "I can do this. I can do this!" Have an idea on what school/program you're interested in?

Rumie logo

This logo isn't an ad or affiliate link. It's an organization that shares in our mission, and empowered the authors to share their insights in Byte form.
Rumie vets Bytes for compliance with our
Standards. The organization is responsible for the completeness and reliability of the content.
Learn more about how Rumie works with partners.

License:

Recommended Bytes