EPISODE 1, in which uncertainty reduction is considered

here are no classic grad school movies. Sure, the standard college movie formula includes a guy in his late 20's whose been around campus forever but he's always an undergrad who just gave up at some point. When film does approach the grad experience, it's almost always from the perspective of medical students, with the occasional upstart-law-student-becomes-a-decent-human-being story thrown in for good measure. Unfortunately, I have neither the funds nor the facilities to produce a classic grad school movie. I do have webspace, however, and a desire for something to drive my writing. So, for the next couple years or so, ostensibly, I'll be writing weekly updates on just what one has to do to get that piece of paper declaring one a Master of something.

The story starts last Sunday night at the Muckrakers' Back-to-School Bash. See, the Journalism school grad community refers to itself as Muckrakers because of, you know, muckraking, and a bunch of J-school people live in a house that is now, that's right, the Muckrakers' House. Food was free, beer was cheap and I got to meet the bulk of the MA and Ph.D. students, plus a couple of profs. There wasn't a lot of shop talk -- I'd kind of feared that every conversation would be media effects this and surveying methods that -- but there was a lot of repeating my "Where are you from?" spiel. By 1 AM I found myself debating the relative merits of Rage Against the Machine being sponsored by Sony with a rabid Jets to Brazil fan and decided to call it a night.

Tuesday was the first day of classes; my first of the day (and of the week, in fact) is J970, a seminar called Mass Communication and Societal Institutions. The prof is clearly a veteran. He's well beyond the overassigning of literature that young hotshots apparently fall prey to. Not only is he circumventing the university book store system to make sure we don't get screwed on book prices, he's decidedly slack about doing the actual reading. If we don't get everything read, he says, don't worry about it, just bring up what you don't understand in class. He tried to scare a few people into dropping the course -- it's supposed to be 8-10 students, not the 15 that we've got -- but I don't think it took.

The other Tuesday class, really the major class of the semester, is J658, Communication Research Methods. The class is such a big deal here that "658" is apparently industry shorthand when describing your educational background. We're going to learn about surveys and content analysis and the like and then put together some big on-line research project. The good news is that the two guys teaching the class are the cool guys among the faculty. I'm told that one, my temporary advisor, likes to move his doctoral classes to his backyard so they can cook out and have some drinks while learning.

I went to Poli Sci 821, Mass Political Behavior, on Thursday afternoon and was promptly talked out of it by one of those hotshot young profs. He told me after the class ended that he had discouraged his first year doctoral students from taking it; I wasn't sure if he was on the level or if he was trying to be some Paper Chase hardass but the fact that I'd've had to spend about $300 on books clinched it. He did offer some suggestions on what I might take in the spring and said he'd also be open to working with me on an independent study project, which might be good given my lack of previous political schooling. I also may end up doing some IT work on his ongoing projects, which would probably be a good foot-in-door maneuver.

Friday at noon, J901 meets. 901 is a colloqium series, open to the public but available for one credit if you're willing to sign in every week. Basically, somebody from the faculty comes in and talks in general about a particular mass communication topic and about their work in that regard. Then the whole department goes over to the Union to drink beer and shoot the shit. It's kind of like the HU433 section I was in at Tech, except not at all.

I went to campus Saturday evening expecting to go watch "Lord of the Rings" for free on the Kohl Center lawn. I haven't seen it and don't really have much interest in seeing it but it was free and free is cheaper than renting. I got sidetracked, though, when I happened to see an event calendar listing that said the Reputation was playing on the Union Terrace. The Reputation is the new band from Elizabeth Elmore, formerly of Sarge and the Northwestern University Law school. Their debut record, out earlier this year, was pretty good so I decided to go check that out. The show was just as free as "Lord of the Rings" but I wound up buying a split 7" -- Elmore and Robert Nanna -- and a CD from the opening act, the Beatings. It's kind of gratifying that in a week and a half I've met a Pulitzer Prize winner and one of my indie rock heroes.

Next week the work of it begins and I become a Padawan again.

---

Aaron Veenstra is the managing editor of Etc. House Productions and a Master's student in Journalism at the University of Wisconsin.
Matriculation Reloaded appears weekly.