To take a year off, or not?

DespSeekPhd
Fri, 17 Oct 2008 15:02:36 +0000

For God’s sake. Go travel for a year. Have fun. Meet lots of people totally unlike you. Eat food you’ve never heard of. Take the wrong train because you translated wrong. (Just don’t lose your passport!)

If you have plenty of research under your belt as an undergrad, grad schools will not care if you took a year off to travel. They will see it as time well-spent gaining different experiences, and more importantly, they’ll see it as time that will mature and focus you. Grad schools are well aware that lots of students come in and burn out quickly, and they’ll certainly get that you wanted a different experience for a bit. Plenty of other people apply and are admitted to pursue second careers, and this is similar.

If you live your entire life around the minuscule effects it may or may not have on your academic future, you’ll miss out on a lot. I love my research, and I love my field, but there are other things outside the ivory tower.