87: Culture Shock in Undergrad Versus Grad School

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Hi everyone. Today I have an episode on culture shock in undergrad versus grad school. I've been thinking a lot about students who are applying to grad school or getting ready to apply to grad school right now. I've been thinking about those that have been accepted and have started their graduate programs, or are about to start their graduate program. This is orientation week for those in the UC system, which means that your classes are starting soon. They either have just started or they're starting in the coming week.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

What comes up a lot when you're new, when you're transitioning into a new program, a new space, a new setting, a new institution, is you're having to learn to navigate the culture. What is it like here? What are the expectations? What do people do around here? What's the workload going to be like? What do they think of me? What do I think of them? And it reminds me of the culture shock that a lot of us who are first gen experience when we first go to college.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

For me, I'll tell you this. When I first went to college, I was privileged enough to attend a program called the freshman summer program at UCLA. It was a transitional program the summer before your freshman year, to help you learn the campus, navigate the space, and have access to resources and meet students like you, who were also first gen, students of color. I remember, I was roomed with someone. My roommate was of a different race and ethnicity as me, and she had parents who were- one was a doctor. another was a lawyer, if I remember correctly. Her family came to drop her off. Her older brother was there. He had gone to UCLA, and they were all helping her unpack and decorate her room. And I remember just what a difference it was- her situation versus mine.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Mine, my mom was really uncomfortable with driving me to the campus. So she asked my older brother to come with her. They came. They dropped me off at the front of the building. They put my stuff on a yellow cart, and said, bye mija. Mucha suerta. Good luck. She had to work. And I was on my own from there. I remember being so afraid- seventeen years old, completely on my own, first one to move out of the house among my family. I have five other siblings. It was a big deal. And having to unpack and decorate- all of that by myself.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Then they asked me- the parents and my roommate- so what do your parents do? I remember, I didn't really know how to respond. I was like, well, my dad died and my mom sells candles. She sells religious articles. And that was about it. That was all I could say. But I remember feeling different. To me, that was the first moment that I realized that I was first generation, without quite being able to articulate it at that moment. Then of course, I attended classes, met more people- professors, staff members, learned the term first generation, both in the US and in college. And realized, wow. That was the moment that it was stark, and very clear that I was like, oh, I'm different. I'm first generation. I'm different from other people here. That was my first kind of experience of culture shock in undergrad.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Culture shock for me was also the first time being around so many white people. I grew up in the Northeast San Fernando Valley. A community that has a predominant Mexican immigrant community. So I was around a lot of brown folks, but not a lot of white or Black folks, or even any other ethnicities outside of being Mexican, Central American. A couple of folks from South America, but really predominantly Mexican and some Central Americans. That was what I was exposed to in my childhood. So being around folks of different races was a big deal for me.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Being around middle class and wealthy folks was also a big deal. I don't think I realized just how poor we were until I got to campus and realized, wow. People actually take vacations. People can afford new laptops. People don't have to have part time jobs. People have parents who pay their rent for them. All of that was news to me. It was also my first time being in a city outside of my own. So that was another culture shock of the difference between my smaller city and the big city of Los Angeles.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Also, the big, big culture shock, too, was the culture shock in not knowing the hidden curriculum. So not knowing all the acronyms, all of the jargon, all of the expectations, the decorum. Like what are you supposed to do when you go to class? Not knowing what office hours were. Everything was new, and I was so shy- and to be frank, embarrassed to ask questions. I thought that people were gonna think that I was not smart, and that I didn't belong, that I should have never been admitted, and that I should quit. To me, that was the ultimate failure, so I avoided that. I avoided asking questions, and I learned things the hard way.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

That to me, was culture shock in undergrad- navigating all of those differences. I didn't quite expect to have to go through such a major culture shock in graduate school, because, I mean, I was one of the privileged ones. I was in a two year research and grad school preparation program, very similar to McNairl called the Mellon Mays undergraduate research fellowship. Through the two years I was with that program, I was getting groomed to go to graduate school. I was being taught what to expect in graduate school, being taught how to conduct research. And yet, there were still things that came as a surprise to me- that may come as a surprise to you if you're new to grad school too, or if you're just getting started with applying.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

I want to mention some of those things, what they were for me, because they might come up for you as well. The one thing that I noticed right away in my graduate program was that there were fewer first generation students. What did that mean? That meant, regardless of whether someone was white, or a person of color, it was hard for me to find folks who were first gen like me. A lot of folks had parents who had advanced degrees or who had PhDs. And that was different.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Also, even fewer folks who were working class. Again, a lot of folks came from generational wealth, didn't have to worry about their tuition and their funding and their fees. That was very different for me. I was not accustomed to being around, especially wealthy people. Noticing that people in my program- I remember someone going and spending their spring break. They're like, oh, I think I'm gonna give myself, reward myself with a trip to Tahiti. At that point, I don't think I had ever even been outside of the continent. I think I had only gone to places in the US and Mexico. That was it. So to me, oh my goodness, you can just treat yourself to a trip abroad was such a luxury, and was very different from my own experience. So being around wealthy people, seeing where they lived. When they invited us to study groups, I'm' like, on my goodness. You live in what- back in the day- was like double or triple what I was paying for rent. That is very different.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

The other thing that was different, that reminded me of undergrad, is again, not knowing the jargon. But in undergrad, it wasn't just- it was kind of like, not knowing the jargon of being on a campus. But this time, it was not knowing the jargon, the vocabulary of the department and discipline itself. Perhaps it was harder for me because I did switch fields. I went from literature to performance, so there was probably a lot that I missed in that transition. But nonetheless, I've heard from several friends, colleagues, students, that no matter what, no matter how much they learned in undergrad, they feel like they have only touched the surface with what they're learning in undergrad. Then they get to graduate school and realize, oh my goodness.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Everybody else, it seems as if they know all the prominent scholars. They know all of the studies. They know all of the big terms in the field, the hot scholars, etc. They are familiar and they know what they're talking about. That's not always necessarily true. Or maybe those folks have had more time in graduate school to get accustomed to, again, the culture and the language that's used. You shouldn't feel bad if you need to take notes, and do a little bit of extra research to catch up. So the jargon, especially if the jargon- not knowing the jargon in my department was a big deal. I know I butchered many, many scholar names in trying to say them out loud. Sometimes people corrected me, sometimes they didn't. And yes, it was embarrassing. And oh, well. You live and you learn.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

The other thing that I think is a type of culture shock that was different for me in graduate school than an undergrad is that when I got to graduate school, I noticed that I was around a lot of people who were all convinced that they were going to become academics. I think I've always had in the back of my head, this feeling that, oh, I don't know if I want to do this for the rest of my life. I was always a very good student. I couldn't think of anything else to do with my interest in literature and performance that could pay the bills, so it made sense to go to graduate school and possibly become a professor. But again, in the back of my head, there was always that thought of like, I don't know if this is it for me. Maybe I want to do something different. And I was not presented with options.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

If I have any kind of critique that I want to make to my undergraduate research program- and perhaps something that I would want to implement in programs, if I were still involved in them- it's to teach students about other options outside of the academic tenure track path. Because why? There are just not enough jobs out there. To be frank, there are not enough stable, tenure track jobs for everybody that's getting a PhD. So to me, whenever I had and expressed my considerations or my desire to possibly not go the tenure track route, to possibly work in higher ed but in a different capacity. Even less, if I had even thought about leaving academia altogether like I'm doing now, people looked at me like something was wrong. Like, why would you want to not- you have to become a professor.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

That was a big shock, being around people who could not see outside of life in academia, and being around people who had made academia their entire identity. That was hard, because I've always had multiple identities outside of my academic identity, whether it's being a daughter of immigrants, having certain responsibilities, whether it's having a chronic illness, eventually becoming a mom. I have always had other things, and I have never been able to 100% devote myself to my job or to my research. And that's frowned upon, or at least that was frowned upon in my program. That was a big, big shock to me.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

The other thing I noticed in graduate school that was different from undergrad - again, another shock- is that in undergrad, I did feel like if I searched for it enough, I could find support. I could find programs. I could get help. Whereas in grad school, a lot of times it felt like we were just fending for ourselves. There were fewer student orgs, for instance. There were fewer scholarships. There were fewer kind of programs that were catered to helping- again, helping grad students. Everything felt like the focus was on undergrads, and not so much on the grad students.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

And that made it hard, because that only increased the sense of isolation, and the sense of struggle when you don't have the kind of built in support within the institution. So for me, I constantly felt in graduate school that I had to create that support, that I had to build that community. Because if it wasn't there, then I needed to build it and create it to sustain myself. That's one of the ways that I was able to finish and graduate. But you may notice that you may feel like oh, there's less support. There's fewer programs. Where are the student orgs for grad students?

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Another thing that comes up a lot has to do with the way that you're treated in undergrad versus in grad school. In undergrad, you are seen as a student and as someone who's learning. As such, you'll get a lot of support. Especially, you know, some professors are different than than others. But generally speaking, there's more hand holding. Even in the syllabus, there are more firm deadlines. There is support. You can get support on your writing, support on a project. Whereas in grad school, a lot of times, you have soft deadlines. What does that mean? That means, okay, your advisor might want you to finish something by a certain date. But if not, it's not the end of the world. You can kind of just stay in graduate school another year and keep working on your dissertation.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Because there are soft deadlines, because you're expected to be more independent, time management can be really hard. All of a sudden, you have a lot of time on your hands- especially when you're done with your courses, when you're done with your exams, and you're just working on your dissertation. Keyword just, because just makes it seem like it's an easy thing to do. But it's actually incredibly hard to have this open schedule, and yet have so much to do. Because it takes a lot to work on a dissertation project. You're not just writing. You're creating knowledge. You're gathering data. You are revising. You are polishing it. So you are sending it to multiple committee members. You are getting all of their input and addressing it. It takes quite a bit of time and effort. And when you have soft deadlines, when people aren't checking up on you, when no one is holding your hand, that makes it harder. That can be a bit of a shock, especially for folks who aren't as comfortable with their time management. So that's another big one.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Another thing I want to mention has to do with - it really depends on your discipline, because some disciplines have more people of color in them. Some disciplines have more folks who come from working class backgrounds. But in my experience, like I mentioned earlier, I found it hard to find first gen folks. And even among people of color, I found it hard to relate to a lot of them because of our class difference or because of cultural differences. They may have been Latinx, but maybe they weren't Latinx with Mexican heritage. Or maybe they were Latinx and I don't know, they weren't aware. I know there's this saying that some people say is like skin folk are not always kinfolk. There are some folks who were POC, but I just didn't feel comfortable. I didn't feel safe around them. Just to say bluntly, I didn't feel safe around them. I didn't feel like I could confide in them, and share, and be completely honest and upfront. A lot of things felt like surface level, like I could only do small talk with them. And I don't like small talk. I am not a fan of it. I like to be real open, honest, upfront. transparent, even in some cases, blunt with people. So that was hard, to be around other POC and not fully relate to them.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Another thing I want to mention- and I'm guilty of this too, in terms of my own kind of like skin color- is that there's a lot of colorism in graduate school. I want to put it out there. As you advance, that's the thing. You'll notice, from undergrad to graduate school, from graduate school to becoming junior faculty, the number of POC folks diminishes. It keeps diminishing. That's why, when you notice in your classes, there aren't a lot of Black and brown professors. And that's unfortunate. But also a lot of people are pushed out. People like me. People like my colleagues, my friends. They get pushed out. They decide to leave for better, more sustainable, more healthy environments.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Going back to the colorism, even among folks who are Latinx, even among folks who are Black, there's not a lot of dark skinned folks in grad school. And I think that has to do with colorism in academia. We have heard of cases of folks who have actually been imposters, actually pretended to be Black or brown, and they've gotten away with it. Or they've said that they are indigenous, and they're not- they're Native American, and they're not. That is a big problem. That's why I want to remind you that even if someone is a person of color, even if they're BIPOC, that doesn't always necessarily mean that they're a safe person for you, or that they're someone that you want to build community with. I think to me, that was a big shock. And I think that's why it helped me to kind of lean on my own community, and not always have to rely on folks in my department, for instance, to build that community.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Another thing I want to mention is - what do you do when you're initially navigating this culture shock? Because it's really hard that first semester, that first quarter, that first year. Sometimes even the second year, it can be really hard. It's normal to be made to feel like you don't belong. It's normal to keep experiencing microaggressions. You might think it's imposter syndrome. But actually, it's white supremacy. You know what I mean? What do you do then?

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

Well, make sure to ask questions. Ask questions, especially when you're able to identify safe people, people that you know are cool, are not going to put your business out there, are going to advocate for you. Make sure you try to build community. Also, remind yourself that you're not meant to fit in. This space wasn't made for people like you. And it's even more of a reason for you to keep going, especially if you have a strong reason for pursuing this degree. If you know exactly why you're doing it, you know what you're going to get out of it, and you remain committed to finishing. Keep reminding yourself that, so that the times that you feel like oof. I'm so different. I don't belong. I'm struggling. You can kind of let that be that inspiration to keep you going, to keep you kind of building that momentum to finish, and then pursue the next thing. The next thing might be staying in academia, or the next thing might be considering options outside of it.

Dra. Yvette Martinez-Vu

I think that's all I want to say about culture shock. I hope that you found this helpful. I really want you to think about all the different things that you're navigating- or that you may be navigating soon- and to remind yourself that it's okay. It's okay if you don't 100% fit in. It's okay if you're struggling. Always ask questions, ask for help, build community. And you will get through it. Thank you so much and I'll talk to you all next time.