As I mentioned before in previous posts, I did get accepted into a couple of grad schools, and I made my choice. It wasn’t as easy of a choice as some might think. In the end, I chose to accept the offer from Stony Brook University for a number of reasons (some of which I’ve listed below).
Before I talk about why I chose Stony Brook, I want to thank the people who made it happen for me: the writers of my letters of recommendation. My gratitude to, and appreciation for, Prof. Dray (OSU), Prof. Cristofaro-Gardiner (UC-Santa Cruz/IAS..and soon UMaryland I believe?), and Prof. Pomerleano (UMass-Boston) knows absolutely knows no bounds.
Prof. Dray had the benefit of teaching me in two classes and knowing my work (both in its competency and its limitations). Prof’s Cristofaro -Gardiner and Pomerleano both took a chance on me based on a few conversations via Zoom and via emails. That’s….a lot.
All said and done, I was extremely lucky to run across three people willing to give a guy in his 40’s with a spotty transcript a chance. More than giving me an opportunity to even be able to hand in a grad school application (almost all programmes require 3 letters for an application to even be considered), the fact they took a chance on me just kind of gave me a feeling that…I don’t know.. there are actually people in this world who will help you if they see your potential, desire, and drive. Their willingness to take a chance on me…it was something I needed just on a basic, human level. Even if I didn’t get accepted into a single programme, my feelings of gratitude and appreciation for the efforts of Prof’s Dray, Cristofaro-Gardiner, and Pomerleano would be no less profound. If for no other reason than to justify/ reward their faith in me and willingness to take a chance on me, I’m going to throw everything I have into this opportunity and make the most of it.
So, I was accepted into 4 different Masters programmes: Portland State University, CalState-Long Beach, Howard University, and Stony Brook University. While I was humbled to receive any offers at all, I ended up choosing Stony Brook for quite a few reasons. Amongst them:
- My interests are in Geometry & Topology (and specifically the Symplectic and Contact Geometry/Topology). Stony Brook is a fantastic school for those subjects. While the majority of the classes will be Core Grad Courses (Geometry Topology, Algebra, Analysis), the selection of electives was (and is) amazing. My one big disappointment is that I can only take a couple of the electives (I'd take them ALL if I had the time & money!).
- I have some established acquaintances in the programme via the various Symplectic and Symplectic-adjacent conferences/colloquia/seminars/etc. that I’ve attended online over the last year+. It’s nice to at least know a few people when going to a new place, and everyone I’ve talked to at SBU has been really nice and helpful. (This is not to imply that other programmes weren’t helpful. The other schools did a great job of answering my questions and were otherwise helpful).
- Even though it’s Long Island, it’s still close to NYC. One of the things I considered when choosing a school was comfort, which includes a little familiarity. Quite frankly, I wasn’t sure if I was ready to jump back into actually living in a big city. Stony Brook is a pretty good compromise: it’s not a big city (at all), but NYC is still super-accessible via the LIRR. And I’m most familiar with NYC. I lived in Jersey City and Brooklyn for years. I went out there almost yearly growing up. It’s familiar enough, and I’ll admit that I’ve definitely missed the City. It can be insane (and it can smell really, really bad), but it’s always interesting and you can always find something fun to do.
There are more reasons than just those. My “Decision Rubric” was pretty intense. It really came down to Howard and SBU. The idea of attending an HBCU was, admittedly, extremely tempting. HU’s math department also has one professor (Prof. Einstein-Matthews) who has worked in Symplectic Geometry, so I would have had a good thesis advisor (assuming he would have wanted to be my advisor…nothing is guaranteed in life, after all).
I want to thank all of the programmes that went through my applications and accepted me. (I also appreciate any programme that actually read my application at all and didn't just immediately toss it in the "better luck next time" bin, to be honest).
I want to also give a special thanks to Prof. Guo (OSU). Not only did I take more classes with him than any other prof, he took a chance on me and gave me the opportunity to do a term-long independent research project. He also wrote a letter of recommendation for me for funding to a conference in Geometry and Topology at L’institut ’Henri-Poincare that was aimed at undergrads/early grads (I didn’t get accepted for funding, but it still meant a lot to me that he did that for me).
I also want to thank Prof. Das (UWisc-LaCrosse, last I saw). Prof Das was the one who suggested I switch my major to math when I took Vector Calc I (MTH 254 at OSU) with him when he was a Post-Doc at OSU.
There have been tons of other profs, both at OSU and other schools who’ve helped me along the way to mathematical maturity, if only by entertaining my questions and/or giving me honest, fair feedback. My thanks to them as well.
Anyway, I’m really excited to begin this next chapter at a great programme. It really hit home for me today (17 August, 2021) that this is actually happening when I went to the Grad Student orientation, and then when I got my SBU ID. Getting my SBU Mathematics Dept. coffee mug with my name on it made me smile, too. It was nice to chit chat with my fellow grad students. It was a very welcoming experience.
Even on the (looooong) solo drive out here, which was literally 50 miles short of being a true coast-to-coast trip, I don’t think the fact that I was going to grad school at SBU fully sunk in. My trip took about 6 days. I left Philomath on the 7th of August and arrived in Manhattan on the 13th. I actually took a weekend to enjoy the City. I went and did a bunch of things I missed from when I lived in Jersey City and Brooklyn. Mostly it was food related stuff: getting some 3 Guys From Italy pizza in Journal Square (Jersey City) which is THE best slice of pizza pie in the world, going to Flatbush and walking around and soaking in the Caribbean and African culture and getting a cone with a scoop of Irish Moss ice cream and a scoop of Guinness ice cream at Taste the Tropics (on the corner of Nostrand and Ave D), walking the 100 blocks up to Harlem to soak in some more culture and show respect to the Allah School in Mecca. I got a haircut and beard trim in Central Park. I got some halal African food from B&B on 26th St. I walked around Downtown Manhattan a lot and people watched. And I absolutely HAD to check out the new Little Island park on the Hudson off the piers. The first night I got out there, I only checked it out from the shore at night. I guess you need reservations to go in after 12pm. So the next day I went in at 11am and walked around the park itself. It’s definitely a neat little park to walk around, but to be perfectly honest…I thought it was more impressive to look at from the shore, especially at night. It’s a pretty cool piece of aesthetically pleasing Civil Engineering (if you like very modern things), and looking at it with the lights of the Jersey City/Hoboken skyline as a back drop…it’s an impressive sight. To celebrate graduating, I even splurged on $200/night hotel room in the Fashion District just so I could get a good NYC skyline view. I was on the 20th floor, and my view was North facing, so I had a really nice view. There’s a lot of variety in the architecture and heights of the buildings, and a lot of the buildings still have the old wooden water towers on their roofs. All in all, it was worth it, even if it was probably a better idea to save some of the money I spent. It was a nice way to celebrate a pretty big accomplishment (graduating with a Mathematics degree from a good university with over a 3.0 GPA). Honestly, I didn’t really talk to a lot of people while I was out there. I just wanted to hear the City, and I wanted to reflect on how much had changed for me in the 15 (!!!) years since I had last lived out here. On the 16th, I finally got out to Stony Brook and went and visited the campus really quick. It’s a nice campus, and I like the contrast of the angular, brick Math Tower and the smooth, glass Simons Centre.
Anyway, I’m excited to do a lot of hard work and learn a lot of really interesting material. I’m excited to be here.
(Fun bit of trivia: I actually submitted my Stony Brook application on Christmas Day. I guess you could say getting into the programme was the best Christmas gift I ever got in my life. Stony Brook, UCLA, and Uof Southern Cal were my three "dream school" applications, and I actually got into one of them! I do have other dream schools, but I allowed myself 10 applications to submit. Grad school apps are NOT cheap....I spent a little over $1000 on the 10 applications I submiitted)
(Fun bit of trivia #2: I actually drove the entire 3500+ mile road trip with my check engine light on. The drive itself was...a journey. I actually took a very round-about way to get to NYC/LI just to stay as far away as possible from the Michigan border. Plus the shorter I-84/80 was rife with construction, which kind of negated any time-saving of th shorter distance.)
(Fun bit of trivia #3: Apparently other SBU students think I moved here and am paying tuition to be their fucking weed dealer instead of a math student. The number of people who've asked me if I'm selling weed is greater than the number of days I've been in Stony Brook. Nothing like feeling completely fucking insulted by the student body of one of your dream schools after driving across the whole fucking country to spend a bunch of money you don't have..)