Tom Petty was right: the waiting is the hardest part. Once all of my doctoral stuff was submitted (approximately January 1, 2009), I got a pretty severe case of the “itching to find out what happens next.” Here are some “do’s” and “don’ts” based on my experience managing the purgatory that was January, February, and March of my doctoral admissions process.
Stepping Out Onto the Tightrope (or Part One of "How I Found Myself to be a Doctoral Student")
During the fall of 2008, while I was finishing my masters degree in Higher Education at Penn State, I decided that rather than taking a break from school I would try to move directly into a doctoral program.