Category Archives: GSCS life

This is a reminder that the UBC TA Union, CUPE 2278, is holding a strike vote on Thursday March 22. We strongly encourage you to make your voice heard and vote at this meeting.

The vote will be held in the foyer of the Graduate Student Centre (6371 Crescent Rd, UBC) between 8 am and 8 pm on Thursday March 22.

There will be an information meeting held by CUPE 2278 on Wednesday, March 21, at 5pm in Woodward Building (room 2). You can contact Heather, our new Union Rep, if you want to walk over to Woodward together. Thursday from 8 am – 8 pm (location TBA) and this meeting will be a great opportunity to get informed.

For more information, you can visit the CUPE 2278 website.

Our conference is just a couple of weeks away, and the full program is now available on this website! Check out our conference page.

You can also download our conference poster in PDF format. Keep an eye out for these around the department.

Happy New Year!

This January, the GSCS is pleased to bring you a seminar about the issue weighing on every graduate student’s mind: Publication. We are excited to have professors Richard Carpiano and Neil Gross as our speakers for this event. The seminar will address a variety of questions about the publishing process, including:

– How does the publication process work?
– What kind of papers do academic journals look for?
– What are the standards of quality necessary for getting your paper accepted?
– What to do next when your paper is rejected/accepted/accepted with revisions
– Other questions you might have

UBC Professor Neil Gross, the editor of Sociological Theory, will be addressing these questions as well as many others. Professor Richard Carpiano, who has published extensively in the fields of sociology, public and population health, will tell you more about what it’s like to be a reviewer, how to respond to reviews, and how to write a good review for others.

This event will take place on
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
11:30AM – 1:00PM
in ANSO 2107.

We are extremely thankful for Profs. Carpiano and Gross for sharing their invaluable knowledge with us, and we hope to see strong attendance for this event. Please feel free to invite friends and colleagues from the undergraduate program or other departments as well.

We look forward to seeing you there!

The last GSCS meeting of 2011 will be held December 14, 2011 in Room 24 at 11:30 am. The following items will be discussed:

1. Graduate Conference Update
2. Faculty Meeting Update
3. Headship
4. Department Review Letter
5. Office Key Deposit and Lock Box Code
6. Office Decor

—

As most of you are aware, the GSCS now has an office (Room 24)! Up until now, the door was unlocked at all times, making it potentially difficult for people to leave their belongings in the room. To change that, I have installed a lock box for a door key. The code to the lock box is available for any Sociology grad student who wishes to use the room. You simply have to request the code from Heather (see bottom of this post).

However, the deposit for a key is $50. The GSCS executive has decided that it would be best to collect a few dollars from whoever is willing to volunteer a day or two of coffee money to support the establishment of graduate student space in the department. Please let me know if you are willing to kick in a few twoonies and we can determine how to make the exchange (we will also be collecting donations at the meeting, so bring some cash!).

We are also looking to decorate the office, so if you have any posters from previous conferences or any items of decor you would like to donate please feel free to put them in the room.

We will be deciding on a code for the lock box at the meeting – if you plan on using the office, please email our VP Admin, Heather (hholroyd@gmail.com), after December 14 to receive the code.

As you know, our department will be hiring a new department Head before the end of the year. There are many opportunities for graduate students to be involved in this process and I think it is crucial that we make our voices heard – department Heads have a strong influence on the direction of the department and what is (or isn’t) considered a priority, which can have a direct and important impact on our experience as graduate students.

I (Hélène) will be acting as graduate student representative on the Search Committee, and as such, I want to gather feedback from as many graduate students as possible to be able to best represent our interests on this committee. It doesn’t matter if you’ve only been in the department for a few months, or are just a few months away from graduating – your opinion is extremely valuable to me, and I think everyone has something to contribute to the process. The more of us actively participate in this process, the more the voice of graduate students is likely to be taken seriously, and to be taken into account.

So please go and fill out this survey on the criteria that you think should be used, and what leadership qualities that you want to see in our next Head of Sociology. Survey answers will obviously remain anonymous.

It is likely that the GSCS will put together a statement regarding this matter as well as regarding the departmental review; if you want to be involved, I encourage you to attend our next meeting. Once the Search Committee puts together a short list of candidates, they will most likely be asked to do a job talk for the whole department, and I will try and secure some time for the candidate(s) to speak specifically to graduate students.

If you have any questions or comments about this process, you can email me at helenefd [at] gmail.com. I always welcome feedback! :)

The GSCS will be hosting our next student led seminar on Wednesday November 9th, 10-12, in room 2107 (right before our monthly GSCS meeting).

The focus of the seminar will be “Applying to Graduate School“.  This seminar is to support Masters students and fourth year undergrads who are applying to graduate programs this year.

This will be a relaxed opportunity to get advice and support from your fellow graduate students.  Bring along copies of your application materials if you would like to get feedback on your work.

Hope to see you there!

September is behind us, funding applications are (mostly) all done with, it’s time to… work some more! Oh, the glamour of the grad student life. In the midst of everything, next week is a busy one for the GSCS! There are two events coming up:

• Thanksgiving Networking Lunch: The Department is organizing its first annual Thanksgiving Networking Lunch! Take a break from your academics and introduce yourself to colleagues around you, and enjoy some turkey and non-turkey sandwiches, cookies and drinks.  Tuesday Oct 11^th, 12:30-2:00 in the Lino Lounge (that’s the faculty/grad lounge near the photocopy room). The expectation is that everyone should attend, so this will be a great opportunity for grad students to introduce themselves to faculty and other students – something that doesn’t happen too often, what with our busy lives!
• GSCS meeting: We will be having our monthly-ish admin meeting on Wednesday, October 12th in room 2107. The meeting is open to anyone, so if you want to know what’s happening with your student council, give us some feedback, or make suggestions  for future events, you are more than welcome to attend! Among other things, we will be hearing updates from our reps at faculty meetings and the GSS and discussing a recent meeting with Dr. Guppy.

Here is the list of resources mentioned in today’s Scholarship Workshop. Feel free to add links to any sites or resources that you’ve found helpful:

That’s it, the new school year is really here! Two events to celebrate (?):

• Back-to-school drinks at Mahoney’s & Sons
  On Tuesday, September 13 at 4:30pm, we will gather at Mahoney’s & Sons on campus. This will be a great opportunity for current students who have been traveling all over during the summer to catch up, for new students to have more of a chance to get to know everyone a little better, and for everyone to chat and have a good time. We scheduled this event so that students who are taking SOCI-500 with Dr. Neil Gross can head over to Mahoney’s after class – a good way to relax!-
• GSCS elections
  Like every year, the Grad Student Council is holding elections to choose a new executive. We will meet on September 14, at 10am (location TBA) for this occasion. (This is just before the TA workshop, for those concerned.) If you are interested in joining the GSCS executive or helping out in some way, you can check out the list of positions. Feel free to join us even if you don’t think you can take on any specific positions, as there are lots of ways that you can get involved in smaller ways.