GoCorral

I ended up getting rejected from the other program I applied to so I accepted Sac State’s offer of admission last week.

Sac State has a typical biology Master’s program. I’m reading up more on the specifics lately.

One of the things I found is pictured above, a writing test.

Sac State wants to know that its Master’s students can write competently.

A competent writer reflects well on the college and honestly, they wouldn’t be doing their job if they didn’t make sure their graduates were good writers.

I like to think of myself as a good writer. I do this blog after all don’t I?

I’m published in a magazine too. I’m a successful amateur for sure!

But they have higher qualifications for themselves.

So I can resign myself to taking a class on writing at Sac State (not so bad actually) or I can try and waive myself out of it.

First way to get out, already have a Master’s or PhD. NOPE!

Second way, publish an article in a peer-reviewed journal. Nope.

Third way, have an undergraduate GPA of 3.7. I’ve got a 3.55. Not quite there.

Fourth way, get a 4.5 on the writing section of the GRE. I got a 4.0. I could retake it though!

Fifth way, teach a writing class at a college. No again.

The second way was the most intriguing to me. I’m already working on a paper for a peer-reviewed journal.

I mentioned in a post on Alexander the Great a while back that I’m writing a paper on him.

The paper is basically finished at this point. I’ve gone through a lot of edits over the past two years with a lot of advice from very helpful friends, family, and friends of family.

I actually already submitted the paper for publication once in the Journal of Popular Culture. It was turned down.

This is pretty typical scholarly journals. The paper is never quite what they’re looking for.

So I was turned down, but with a list of revisions I could make to resubmit.

I finally sat down finished the revisions given by them and a few other helpers that read the paper since my first submission.

Now my most persistent helper is my favorite Classics professor when I was taking Classics as an undergrad. He gave me a more difficult edit, to try restructuring the conclusion section.

Right now the conclusion section is separated into paragraphs based on which source on Alexander I’m talking about.

The professor wants to see how it looks when the conclusion is split based on which topic I’m talking about.

I’m doubtful that it’ll be better. The conclusion already looks so good! I’ll give it a try though.

So tonight I’m going to stay up later and rewrite two pages on Alexander the Great’s modern image. Hopefully this version will get published and then Sac State will have proof that I’m a good writer. Wish me luck!

-Mister Ed