Linguistics Graduate Student Niamh Kelly
Being an IE Program mentor provided me with the opportunity to reflect on the factors that motivated me to attend grad school in the first place. It reminded me of my passion for linguistics and on the life experiences that brought me here. It also allowed me to share with Vanessa the reality of grad school - from the excitement of doing what I love to the stress of grad school responsibilities. I would have loved to have had some real insight into the life of a graduate student and I appreciated being able to do that for someone else.
Through this program Vanessa became more familiar with the subfields of linguistics and I think this helped her to make an informed decision about her future. I found it refreshing to consider graduate school life from the outside and to re-think my own career plans while guiding Vanessa through some of those difficult decisions.
I plan on being a professor some day and this experience allowed me to improve those skills and to see things from the perspective of an undergraduate student - something that is too quickly forgotten!