Graduate School, Day 1

Monday was a nice day today in Kaohsiung. I took the photo above while strolling downtown at lunch. Blue skies, palm trees, aaahhhhhh. Soak it in!

It was also the first day of school. I wish I had a lot to talk about with regard to school, but my first class isn't until tomorrow, so I will have to wait to weigh in at any length. I can mention a few things that I have noticed thus far, though.

-Even though classes started today for the fall semester, I am still not registered for classes. This is not congruent with what I am used to - I would have had classes selected and locked in ages ago at an American school, not to mention tuition paid, etc. Nope, none of that has been done here, although I was able to finally pin down exactly when I will be able to register: next week, Monday through Wednesday. This week I can go to whatever classes I want, see if I like them, then register next week for the ones I want to take. Sounds pretty nice, huh? Don't like a class? Don't take it! Unfortunately, it isn't quite that nice or easy for 1st semester graduate students. My classes this semester are pretty much proscribed to meet certain requirements forthe program. Here are the classes I plan to take:

-Philosophy of Social Science (required)

-Taiwan Government and Politics (required)*

-Research Methods of Political Science (required)

-International Relations

* Taught in English

All are three credit classes, meaning I will have 12 credit hours, which is quite a bit for graduate school. Not to mention that three of four classes will be taught in Chinese! You probably noticed that the first three classes are required. The final one, international relations, is my chosen major, so I think even though I believe it is not technically required, I do have to take 4 international relations-related courses for my major. So in other words, it would be a good idea for me to take it. Plus it will probably be the most interesting of my classes this semester (although I bet the Taiwan government class will be pretty interesting, too). The other two? (research methods and philosophy of social science) I predict these will likely be a pair of "snorers." Required snorers, though, so they shall be taken.

Tentatively, I will only have classes on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday this semester, making every weekend a 4-day weekend (nice!). My first required class is international relations, which will be tomorrow (Tuesday) afternoon. Then on Wednesday I will have Taiwan government and politics and the research methods of political science course. Thursday's class will be the philosophy of social science class.

In addition to these, I think I am going to "audit" (this week only, during the course "shopping" period) two or three other classes that look interesting that I may take at a later time. These are U.S. Foreign Policy in the 20th Century, U.S., P.R.C., Taiwan and Taiwan Strait Security, and National Security and Crisis Management.

I need 39 credits and to write a thesis to get my master's degree here. Today is the first step of many more to come.

-Books. I stopped by the university bookstore last week to see what books they had for the classes I figured I was going to need to take. There were pretty much no books fitting the description of the ones listed for my classes, so it should be interesting to see what is said about the required books when I go to the classes this week. I expect to hear, "You're on your own to get the books." I wonder if I can get some of them on Kindle? That would make my life easier!

GJS