Now what do I do?

[photosinensis]

I've got to cough up three letters of recommendation and a statement of purpose in order to apply for grad school. While I've got ideas for two of the letters of recommendation, and have even asked one of the people involved, I've got no clue what to do with the statement of purpose.

I'd like to have statement of purpose done by the end of the week, sooner if possible. Since some of y'all have actually gotten into grad school, what should I be doing? What do I need to include? What should my CV look like, and what should I emphasize there? I know I'm going to have to fork my CV from the current version, which is more geared towards work experience and not academia.

Help me, Obi Wan Kenobi. You're my only hope.

Comments

[flourish]

On your CV, you should emphasize academics (obviously) and also any teaching or research experience or anything that could be possibly twisted to appear to have to do with research or teaching experience. Library work is good too.

Make sure that you list all the presentations you've done at conferences. I'd list it even if you did some for work, depending on what kind of grad program it is. For mine I included Harry Potter cons (!) and that was fine.