What should I do, if anything, about old, unflattering transcripts?

Anonymous — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 11:15:54 -0800

I am planning to apply for one of the Fulbright teaching assistantships for the year after I finish my Master's degree. I am unsure of what to do, if anything, about my academic history. Is it worth it to try and bury old, unflattering transcripts? I went away to college when I graduated high school and suffered through a very severe depression, lasting for a couple years. As my depression and anxiety went untreated, I have a mountain of failures on my transcript from that school. I was dismissed from that school in 2000 for low GPA. Now, almost ten years later, I'm in graduate school, enrolled in a well-regarded program. I went back to school a few years after leaving the first time, gradually working my way back up from community college onward. I was awarded my bachelor's degree and graduated summa cum laude (3.92 GPA), receiving both departmental and university honors. My graduate department awarded me a first-term fellowship when I entered based on what they saw as my promise as a student. Since then my grades have remained very high, my teaching evaluations have been excellent (important because I'm going for the teaching assistantship and plan to ask my supervisors to be references), and I have several years of experience under my belt showing that I can be and am an excellent student.

However, I'm concerned about the effect of the earlier transcript, because things like the Fulbright mandate that you send all transcripts from all institutions attended, no matter how old. Every time I see that requirement for anything I'm filled with dread, because it forces me to remember a really dark time in my life, and to feel like I'll forever be judged for it. I really want this experience: I am a language teacher who has never actually been abroad; I've learned languages out of context, like systems to be mastered, and while that approach has taken me to a high level of proficiency I find that I am really missing the cultural experiences many of my colleagues have had, and I feel like it would be really important and beneficial to me as a teacher and as an individual to have this experience. As such, I'm trying to maximize my chances of getting it. I would think that my more recent accomplishments matter more than failures from ten years ago, but I'm still worried about them knocking me out of the running.

So, I've been wondering if I should write the registrar of my first university to see if I can get those records sealed or otherwise enact some sort of retroactive withdrawal. There's a part of me that thinks just letting it all out in the air and showing the whole story of my failure and recovery is better than just burying the old transcript, but the attitude I've seen displayed here in the past in response to academic questions like this one is that even one failure on a transcript is a horrible black mark, let alone a whole host of them. I realize that no one here can tell me anything for certain about the effects that my full undergraduate history would have on application reviewers, but I'm looking for experiences with this sort of thing. Is the "redemptive narrative" potent enough to just let things lie, or in the interest of maximizing my chances should I try and get rid of the black marks? I transferred some courses from this school to later institutions, too, so wiping out this particular transcript (if they even allowed me to do so) would not eliminate all references to it in later transcripts, and might raise questions. I'm trying to make this decision soon, because if I initiate this process it'll probably take a while (again, if it's even possible) and my campus's due date for the Fulbright application is 9/18, a month before the national one. There is not a lot of room to address my academic history in my personal statements for the grant, because they're limited to one page each and I've already strained to keep them within that limit just answering the questions that Fulbright suggests you answer, so the only place I would even have to address this would be in my campus committee interview, if I get to address it at all. I feel like the honest thing to do would be to just have my record speak for itself, but I don't know if that's the wise thing to do, because if this is gaming the system it's something people do all the time, as it's not at all uncommon at my current school for students to have retroactive withdrawals approved for courses they failed, even if they're made to jump through hoops to do it, raising the question of what that "honesty" is even worth in the first place, especially since it's uncertain as to whether I'll have the opportunity to contextualize it, and without that context, they're just letters on a page.

Thanks in advance for your input. I've been a member of this community for a long time, albeit mostly as a lurker, but I felt like this was the place to go for it. Asked anonymously because I don't know that anyone I know reads AskMe but in the case that they do I would prefer to keep my memory of this episode in my life private.

Interesting Non-Academic Fellowships

divabat — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 03:27:38 -0800

What are some interesting non-academic fellowships out there? Some examples of what I mean:

Sauve Scholars
Pop!Tech Social Innovation Fellows
Ashoka
Echoing Green
TED Conference Fellows
YouthActionNet Global Fellowship
YSEI Fellows

So essentially they give you money and support for your projects, or for attending an event of theirs, but the focus isn't on academia and is generally open to a wider selection of people (compared to traditional fellowships that are geared towards academics). What other terms do they use to describe themselves?

(the examples I used up there are largely youth-oriented, but other focus areas are more than welcome.)

Starving Artist seeks funding

whimsicalnymph — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 13:40:06 -0800

How do I pay for grad school? So, I just got accepted to Columbia University for an MFA in fiction. Which is awesome. But I don't have a lot of money. Which is, well, just the way it is.

Do you know any resources for outside fellowships/scholarships that I could apply for?

Ways to get private and government loans?

I already filled out my Fafsa. That is the first step, correct? What next?

job in the Netherlands?

cog_nate — Mon, 15 May 2006 13:25:29 -0800

One-year position in the Netherlands: Should I take it and how do I prep for it? I've been offered a one-year archival position in the Netherlands (Nijmegen). I'm in the US. It pays less than what I get now and even less than a job I was just offered today. However, it's doing something that is directly in line with my schooling/training. Plus, it's perhaps the only chance for my wife and I to cut away for a year abroad. From my perspective, the only major negative is that it would require my wife to give up her job, which she enjoys. Those of you who have done one- or two-year foreign fellowships, etc., how did you think/work through these issues? How did you prepare to be gone for only one year? What special considerations did you take into account for your spouse/partner? Also, how did you transition back after the fellowship? Finally, anyone with experience getting a place in Nijmegen -- what are the going rates, and could two fairly frugal individuals live comfortably on 1.575 EUR/mo? (General encouragement is also welcome.)

Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with fellowships

What should I do, if anything, about old, unflattering transcripts?

Interesting Non-Academic Fellowships

Starving Artist seeks funding

job in the Netherlands?