Kent State University pros and cons

Once I received my grad school acceptance letters, I had to seriously think about each offer. There were many differences between each school and offer, but several factors were the same for the three schools I applied to.

I received a graduate assistantship with stipend at all three schools, and I would be required to work about 20 hours a week at each one. I also received free tuition from all three schools.

 I considered all of the pros and cons of each school in order to make my decision. Here is a look at my pros and cons for the master’s of communication program at Kent State University.



Kent State was one of my top choices for graduate school.



Kent State University Pros:

1.  I really like the communication studies program. It is broad, so I would be able to study a variety of topics within communication. I would be able to focus my degree into one or two areas consisting of: health communication, interpersonal communication and mediated/mass communication.
2. One of the required courses for the program is titled Teaching of College Communication. This class sounds perfect for what I want to do with my degree, which is teaching communication at the college level.
3. Kent is close to home; it is only about an hour away. Distance is important to me because I love having the option to go home if I need to. Mercyhurst is only about one hour and 15 minutes away, which I think has been a good distance because I have always been able to go home when I wanted to.   

Kent State University Cons:    

1.  Kent’s stipend was the lowest amount I was offered. It was a little more than half of what Ohio State offered. In fact, the stipend was the same amount as when one of my professors received her master’s degree from there in 1998.
2. I would only receive tuition remission for nine credits each semester. If I took more than nine credits, I would have to pay for each additional credit.
3. The offer letter I received from Kent did not explain what my job requirements would entail. I was not told whether I would be a teaching assistant, research assistant or graduate assistant. I emailed a communication professor at Kent and asked questions, but she only alluded to the fact that I might be required to teach. I was never told exactly what I would be required to do.

My grad school offers

After searching for schools, taking the GRE, sending in applications and waiting about a month, I heard back from the three schools I applied to.

I applied to The Ohio State University Master’s of Arts Communication program, Kent State University Master’s of Arts Communication program and The Ohio University Master’s of Science Journalism program. I was accepted to all three schools and received a graduate assistantship with stipend at all the schools as well.  

Ohio State offered me free tuition and a stipend for working 20 hours a week as a grad assistant. My duties would involve either assisting with research or teaching. 



I was so excited when I received my acceptance letter
from The Ohio State University.

 Kent State offered me free tuition for up to nine credits a semester and a stipend for working 15-20 hours a week as a teaching assistant. The fact that I was not offered free tuition in full made me nervous. However, when I asked a professor from the communication program, she told me I would typically only take nine credits a semester. My Kent State stipend amounted to about half of what Ohio State offered.

Ohio University offered me free tuition and a stipend to be a grad assistant, but they never gave me an actual amount for my stipend. I was told the normal stipend is about $9000, but I was never given an exact amount. The details of my assistantship and what I would be doing were never explained either, but this was my third choice for a school, so I didn’t ask a lot of questions or try to find out all the details.

All of my offers covered the nine months of the school year when I would be working. I would get breaks between semesters and my summers off as well.

My plan was to only go to graduate school if it would be free and if I would get paid for it. If I was going to have to pay to get a master’s degree, I would apply to jobs instead. Because of this plan, I only applied to schools where I knew funding was available. I was lucky enough to have all the schools I applied to offer the funding I was looking for.

The Chronicle of Higher Education allows you to search for schools and look at the stipends they offered graduate assistants during 2008-09. Although these numbers may be out of date, it is helpful to know how much money students made three years ago. The website also explains if the school offers health benefits to its students, how many grad students were enrolled in specific programs and the amount of hours grad assistants were required to work.

Of course, if you have specific questions about a program, the school itself is always the best place to go for an accurate answer.