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Searching for a Graduate School: Using the Internet

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Gathering Information From Usenet Newsgroups

Usenet Newsgroups can be another good source of information. In two particular groups, soc.college.grad, and soc.college.gradinfo, prospective and current students (and some faculty and staff) exchange information on all aspects of graduate life. Naturally, admissions is a frequent topic. The traffic level in these groups has dropped off a great deal in the past few years, but I find that if someone asks a question, there are usually at least a few persons who will answer.

Usenet is constantly expanding, so there are groups beyond these two, particularly in the alt.* hierarchy. I just don't have time to read them all.

Subscribers to the groups can post inquiries: "I am looking for programs in field X," or, "I am looking for programs in field X in the Midwest." Once you have narrowed your search, you can ask things like "I am considering studying field W at Universities X, Y, and Z. What are the programs like there? What are the campuses like? What is the weather like?" Once you have some basic goals set up for the kind of schools you want, you can make good use of the Internet and other sources.

There are also newsgroups that are discipline-specific in which you might post queries about graduate study. As always, be polite: if you aren't sure from reading the group regularly that graduate study is a frequent topic of discussion, you might preface your posting with "I'm not sure whether this is an appropriate place for this question, but..." Better still would be to read the group's charter or FAQ or just browse the group itself for a few days to determine whether graduate study is a frequent topic.

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last revised: 09012000