170: Top Ten Episodes of the Grad School Femtoring Podcast in 2022

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Welcome back to another episode of the Grad School Femtoring Podcast. This is your host, Dra. Yvette. Today I have a short and sweet episode for you sharing my top ten episodes from 2022. It's the end of the year. How are you all doing? Some of you might be on winter break. Some of you might be spending time with loved ones, with bio fam, with chosen fam, with friends, with your community. I'm continuing on this bandwagon of reflecting and assessing and thinking about my 2022 highlights.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

For the podcast, I thought I'd share what the most played episodes are. These are not my top ten podcasts per se. I didn't choose these. Actually, I just went in, checked my data of the most played episodes, and then put them in order from most played to least played. I thought I would share that information with you because it does shed light on what topics you all are interested in, what guests you've enjoyed having on the podcasts. And I'll make sure to link these episodes in the show notes, so that if you didn't get to listen to these episodes earlier in the year, you can do so, play some catch up over your break while you have some spare time.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

We'll get started with the most played podcasts of 2022. These are not the most played podcasts overall. That's a separate list of the most streamed, most played episodes. Those happen to be my early episodes. They have a lot of streams, a lot of listens. But I'm focusing just on the ones that I released this calendar year in 2022.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

The first one that's the most played in 2022 is episode 115. It's titled Gap Years, Rejection and Reapplying to Grad Programs with Adriana Jaramillo. Adriana, I don't know if you realized this, that you would be my most played guest for my podcast this year. But yes. I guess a lot of people want to hear more about experiencing application rejection and how to manage that, and then what the reallocation process looks like. I'm happy to say that Adriana is now in a graduate program, and appears to be doing very well. Correct me if I'm wrong, Adriana.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

But that's really insightful just to know that you want to hear more about gap years. You want to hear more about navigating rejection, which is a very uncomfortable feeling. I know that's a big fear for a lot of folks applying to anything- whether you're applying to grad school, whether you're applying to fellowships., to jobs. There's always that fear that you're just got to put so much time and energy into it and not get anything. And then what? Adriana has done a really good job of articulating that experience, and then actually successfully getting into graduate school after taking that time off.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

The next most playing episode is episode 114 on Financial Literacy for First-Gen College Students with Ana and Jeremy of Brewing Dinero. If you don't follow them, Ana and Jeremy have a platform. I have them on Instagram, and they might be on other social platforms. But their platform is intended to spread financial literacy information to first gen folks, undocumented folks and the wider Latinx community or Latine community. They shared what they wish they knew about financial literacy in that episode. It's a lot of gems about budgeting, about learning about how to invest, about how to navigate college debt or even avoid getting into student debt altogether. So if you want to learn a little bit more, and you want to hear more on the topic of financial literacy, check out episode 114.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

The next most popular episode this year is episode 112. You'll notice a lot of these are the earlier episodes from the year, because those tend to get the most listens over time since they've been out longer. So the next one is 112. This one is on why and how to invest in yourself. This was a solo episode I recorded. And in that episode I talked about different ways that you can invest in yourself, whether that's a financial investment in your future, through coaching, through hiring other folks to help you and support you, or other types of non monetary forms of investment- investing time in gaining knowledge from reading books, listening to audiobooks, checking out books at the library, and a number of other resources and strategies for you to prioritize yourself and invest in yourself.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Because if you are like me, if you're a first gen professional, from an immigrant background, it can be very hard to focus on yourself, prioritize yourself, when you come from collectivistic cultures, when you come from a very kind of family oriented and helping type of expectations from your family. Keep that in mind. If you really want to make sure that 2023 is the year for you to focus on yourself, invest in yourself, invest time, energy, money on you and your personal development, professional development, listen to Episode 112.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

The next most played episode is episode 119. This one is titled Doctorahood and All of Its Brown Mujer Magia With Dra. Lorena Marquez. Dra. Lorena has a platform called Doctorahood. She actually sells mugs and tshirts called doctora and future doctora. She is the founder of the Dinner with Doctoras, and she's also a director of a cross cultural center I believe in Cal State LA. And I'm speaking off the cuff here. Idon't have notes. So this is what I know about Dra. Lorena just from kind of following and supporting her work.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

She's an incredible human being. I love everything that she has to say about brown mujer magia and about how her work is informed by Black feminist and Chicana feminist epistemologies. I'm very much aligned with what she does, and I'm really glad that y'all enjoyed her episode too. If you want to learn more about Doctorahood and her platform- and how to build a similar platform, if you want to do that- listen to that episode, which is 119.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

The next most played episode is episode 116. This one is all about Housing and Funding in Master’s Programs with Christina Rodriguez, who is the founder of the Latinas with Masters platform. Christina is an incredible edupreneur, mama scholar, doctoral student- probably candidate at this point, soon to be doctora, I should say. Christina is- she's built this really big, inspiring platform, Latinas with Master's. And she is the go to person to learn more about navigating housing, whether it's in graduate school or even outside of graduate school.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

She knows a lot about the housing market and community and all that kind of stuff in I believe in the Northern California area. But she knows a lot. She knows a lot about housing. She knows a lot about funding. She knows a lot about navigating master's programs. If you want to follow her and her platform if you haven't already, check her out. I know I have her on LinkedIn and on Instagram, but she's probably on all the other socials as well. If you want to hear more from her, definitely listen to episode 116.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

The next episode- I'm going in order by most played. And these are all the most played, so even the last one I share is still one of the top played episodes this year. The next one is episode 118. This one is called organizational systems and standard operating procedures. This is a solo episode, and this is my jam. This is my stuff. This is what I love to do. I love organizational tips. I love sustainable productivity tips. I love personal development, professional development type of stuff. I love sharing any tools that I can offer that will simplify your life, that will help you be more efficient with your time, that will help you get more done in less time so you can have more time to just enjoy your life.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

In that episode, what I talk about is how to develop your own organist organizational system, how to create your own standard operating procedures. That way, you can work smarter and not harder. That way, you can have go to instructions on how to do things. That way, you can create your own templates for doing things. So that whenever you're doing something that's repetitive, you will have a go to resource to minimize your decision fatigue and to help you just make things a little easier, a little faster, a little better. If you are into that kind of stuff, if you want to get a little bit more organized, listen to episode 118.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

And in general, listen to this podcast and follow me on all the socials. Because I love that stuff, and I'm going to be sharing more of that kind of stuff on this podcast, on my email newsletter- sign up if you haven't already- on my blog, and on the content that I share on social media. If you like that stuff, then you're at the right place. If you don't, then maybe you're not at the right place. But that's okay too, because I'm sure you'll find something from my other episodes that you enjoy as well.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Next most played episode is episode 113 on personal brand design and the business of personal development with one of my femtors, Dra. Lauren Mason Carris. Lauren is the VP of Penny AI. I met her when I was an undergrad and applying to the McNair Scholars Program. And she was in a doctoral program. I think she was in linguistics? Oh my gosh, I'm sorry, Lauren, if I can't remember what doctoral program you were in. But she was a graduate mentor of mine, and femtor of mine. She's doing really incredible work in the field of the transition from academia to industry.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

She shared a lot of really great insights on how to develop your own personal brand. If you haven't heard of the topic, personal branding, it is a really great career development thing to do for yourself to really set yourself apart from other candidates when you're applying to jobs, both inside and outside of academia. Personal branding, I think everybody should learn a little bit about that. And personal development is also really important, because otherwise it's really hard to live a fulfilling life if you haven't truly kind of figured out who you are, what you want to do, what your values are. What's your mission, your calling? What are the things that kind of bring you joy, and energize you and nourish you? So personal brand design, personal development are very, very important topics. I'm also very much a fan of them too. Check out episode 113 with Dr. Lauren Mason Carris. You will not regret it.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Next episode is episode 125. This one is titled Navigating an Ed.D. and a Higher Education Career as a First-Gen Latina with Jacqueline Banegas-Abreu. Our guest Jackie, soon to be the Dra. Abreu, Banegas- Abreu. She talked about her experience navigating her higher ed career, working for student support programs, and the reasons behind why she decided to pursue an EdD and then that whole application process. How that went for her and what it's been like, this journey of navigating that EdD program, what it's been like for her. I loved the conversation that I had with Jackie, because I just recall cracking up so much. It just really felt like chatting it up with a comadre. I love how she just kept it real. If you need a little bit of motivation, if you're interested in pursuing an EdD, definitely episode 125 is an episode that you should listen to.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Next up on top episodes is episode 139. That is on Imposter Syndrome as a High Achieving First-Gen Grad Student with Samantha Gonzalez. Samantha's episode is- I feel like it's one that a lot of us first gen, students of color, professionals of color will likely relate to, because a lot of us experience what some people call impostor syndrome. Or as Dr. Lisette Sanchez taught us in a former episode, it's also known as an imposter phenomenon. Because it is not a syndrome, per se, in that we are made to feel like imposters. It is the environment that is not nurturing us, that is not making us feel valued and seen and heard.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

I love all of the insights that that Samantha shares about her experience navigating imposter syndrome, her experience navigating being a high achieving student- the struggles and also what she's learned from that. If you yourself, find yourself maybe struggling with being a high achieving student, with feeling like you're not enough in the spaces that you're in, check out Episode 139. Samantha has a lot of wisdom to share about it. I know that I learned a thing or two about how imposter syndrome or phenomenon, how it gets played out how it gets developed and what we can do to combat it too.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Next up- this is the last one. There are ten Top 10 episode. The last one that is a top episode for this year is episode 129, on How to Advocate for Yourself in Grad School with Amanda Peña. Oh, Amanda. I feel like when I think about Amanda, she is just so fierce, and really knows what she wants to get out of her experiences. Amanda has a background I believe in marketing, and I believe in helping people with their branding. Correct me if I'm wrong, because I've had a lot of guests and they've covered a lot of topics. But Amanda decided to pursue a master's program at USC in the Iovine Program. And as she was very deliberate about advocating for herself, about making sure to ask the tough questions, about asking about funding, about asking about faculty diversity, about asking for opportunities, about meeting with professors.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

I love that about her. She went in- I think it helps that she had this experience, this job experience outside of academia that helped to inform the reasons why she realized- okay, I have all this experience and people are not taking me seriously. So what's gonna help? What's gonna help me to have others take me seriously? And it's getting this advanced degree. That's why she went on to pursue her graduate program. But then also having that job experience and knowing her worth made her realize that she's not just gonna go to any program. She's gonna be very specific about the kind of needs, resources and access to opportunities that she wanted. And she was going to go out and ask for it. If you don't ask for things, you're not going to get them. That's episode 129, all about learning how to advocate for yourself. That's a really, really great episode. Check it out if you want to learn some strategies for how to advocate for yourself too.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Then I'm going to do just a little bonus. I know it's supposed to be the top 10 episodes. But I found this super interesting. This is actually number 11 from this year. The number 11 Top played episode this year happened to be a replay. It's the replay of writing the statement of purpose. That episode- writing the statement of purpose. It was episode 134 as a replay. But I think it's one of the first five episodes that I ever released when I started the podcast. So it's not the most polished episode, because it's one of my earliest, one of my first episode. But I find it so fascinating that it continues to be a top episode. I believe that's the single most played episode out of all of my podcast episodes.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

I thought I would share that because a lot of y'all still want insights on grad school, on applying to grad school, on writing. That means I need to keep providing more content on that. What I've learned from this year is that y'all want to learn about grad school admissions. Y'all want to learn about financial literacy. Y'all want to learn about personal development. Y'all want to learn about productivity strategies. Y'all want to learn about first gen BIPOC experiences, especially experiences of women of color. And yall want to learn about how to navigate being us and in spaces that maybe don't always value our experiences.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

So that's it. Those are the top 10- plus one, I guess top 11 episodes. But let's call it the top 10 episodes of 2022. They're going to be linked in the show notes. Go ahead and take a listen if you haven't, if you missed any of those episodes. And don't hesitate to reach out if you have any other suggestions for topics that I can cover in 2023. I hope you all have a lovely, lovely New Year holiday, and I will talk to you all in the new year.