In my inbox today, I received a letter from CMU’s grad school.

The e-mail said, “Congratulations! Your project has been approved and your signature page has been forwarded to the Dean for her signature.”

Now, I just need to pick up a copy of my signature page, and the binding form, pay to have 2 copies bound, and return that form back to the grad school, and I am all set.

Excuse me while I go dance a jig.

My thesis has been approved by my committee AND the grad department. That means I’m all set to graduate. Woohoo! Life is grand.

Thanks for playing.

Or at least construction of a graduate department…

CMU’s grad school offices are under construction.

I just learned that the thesis-holding filing cabinet was pushed out of the way by construction people. It was pushed up against a wall, so the grad department cannot open it until next Friday, which I think means June 15.

I have already made tentative plans to meet with two of my professors this week to resign my newly formatted thesis signature page. I am hoping both of them will be available Friday (June 8). I also plan to submit my revised thesis (minus new signature page) to the grad department Friday (June since I will be in Mt. Pleasant.

That’s what prompted my call today to the grad school. I wanted to make sure I could submit the format revisions without submitting the newly formatted signature page too. Because I have to mail the signature page to one committee member, and I won’t be able to turn it in Friday. The good news is that is OK.

And because I called, I received several tips and updates including the construction news.

Overall, I am very pleased with how quick the grad department has responded. I mentioned that to the lady I talked to today, and she noted it is a lot easier to respond quickly this early in the semester. She said it was a different story when they have 60 of them pending later on in the semester.

Plus she shared information that will save me a possible heart attack later. She *technically* doesn’t work in the summer, so if I were to e-mail her, I would get an auto-responder that said she is off for the summer. This would have made me panic. But, she said she DOES check her e-mail, and she will follow through with my thesis so I can graduate in August. She doesn’t, however, check her voice mail. This is all very good information to know.

Plus, because of the construction, she suggested a few other changes when I show up on Friday. Nothing major, but it makes me feel better.

—

Today is the first day of the summer semester at Kirtland. So my summer break is “over.” I’m teaching online, so I am excited about all of the gas I’m saving. At almost $4 per gallon, it is nice to be working from home.

Thanks for playing.

Yesterday I received my envelope from the grad school noting the changes I have to make to my manuscript.

Overall, the corrections are minor. The biggest problem, however, is that I have to collect new signatures from my committee because the grad school determined my layout for my signature page isn’t correct. This is easier said than done. One of my members is currently in St. Louis Missouri.

You remember the 36-page document that gives you the guidelines for formatting your manuscript? I now have some suggestions on how they can edit that document so it makes it more likely to create a correct manuscript. (Wow, is that an ugly sentence or what?)

My biggest problem in my formatting is my bottom margin. I set my page margins just like the grad school told me too. And then I inserted my page numbers using (and this is where my mistake was) Word’s default placement, which put my page numbers about a half-inch above the bottom of the page. You would think it was the default placement for a reason, but the grad school doesn’t like it. So all of my page numbers need to be repositioned so there is an inch of nothing underneath them — including the signature page. And I can’t resubmit my manuscript to the grad school for final approval until I get the new signature page(s). Because I have to have at least two copies bound, and the signatures MUST be original. No copies.

There were other things that needed changed too. My chapter titles were formatted using Word’s “heading 1″ setting, which includes a 12 pt line spacing before the actual title, which made my titles below the one-inch margin demanded at the top of the page. So they began at 1.25 inches below the top of the page, which means the top margin was wrong.

Overall, the changes weren’t that hard. I’ve already completed them. Except, I need to have my signature page printed on the speciality paper by a laser printer (four times). And then I have to get it to my various committee members for their signature (black-ink only). And that’s not really that hard either. It’s just a hassle.

But, but, when I am done, I can resubmit it, and the grad department will be happy, and the dean will sign my signature page too, and I will be really really DONE. And that equals degree. So.

And there is good news too. According to the grad department’s guidelines, they aren’t even required to start looking at new thesis submissions for August graduation until June 1, and I received my changes in the mail June 1, so at least they didn’t make me wait. And when I submitted it, they said it would be about two weeks, but they had it in the mail to me May 30, and my defense date was May 25, so they were quick too.

I could grumble a bit, but I’m not going to (well, except for this blog post. But let’s look at this as educational. That’s it. Educational.). Yes, the changes are minor and pesky, and the guidelines (you remember the 36-page document) could be more specific, or at least offer the warning “do not rely on the default settings in Word,” but it’s all fixable and good. And really, the fix is pretty quick and painless.

The one correction I thought was very strange: the spacing in between my segments. My memoir is written in segmented essay format, which means I will have a section, a space, three shekels*, a space and then a new segment. This was done in double-space type. But the grad school wants the space between the sections and the shekel to be single spaced so that only two lines are between.

So I did do it like this

With the double space section.

(blank line)

shekel, shekel, shekel

(blank line)

New section starts here. But the grad school doesn’t want that. Because when you count it up, it actually ends up with three blank lines between the section and the shekels and the shekels and the section. And the grad school only wants two lines. This was probably the biggest “error” that I had to correct in my manuscript, and it accounted for most of the pages the grad school sent me.

The strangest thing:

On the title page, you have to type” Department of” and then enter the name of your department. I had typed, “Department of English.” They wanted me to add in “Language and Literature.” This confused me because there are three grad degrees in the English department and they are 1) Composition and Communication (which is the one I am receiving), 2) Creative Writing and 3) Language and Literature. So I thought they were getting my degree mixed up. But no, turns out the “official” name of the CMU English department is “Department of English Language and Literature.” Who knew? Not I.

*A shekel is an ancient symbol of weight that I selected to divide my segments because my thesis is primarily about weight issues (how cool is that?). I use a row of three to divide my segments. I’ve tried to copy and paste them here, but I have no guarantee you will see them correctly. But if you were to open up character map (start>programs> accessories> system tools> character map), in Times New Roman, a shekel is listed under U+20AA. Or you might be able to see it (I can) below, centered, three in a row:

₪₪₪

My defense was in a children’s library at CMU’s English department with my committee members. My friend Giggy was able to attend too. It went well. The questions were good. One of the questions almost stumped me. And now I don’t remember what the question was, I think I blocked it.

I was asked about my “evolution” as a writer during this process. There were lots of good things said. Let’s see, I was able to explain why I decided not to use quotation marks (a journalism thing). Because although I use dialog in this memoir, I don’t use any quotation marks because most of the dialog is reconstructed from my memory. And as a journalist, it felt wrong to place quotation marks around something I absolutely couldn’t prove was said exactly that way. I also talked about the ways I verified information in my memoir (interviewing siblings and other family members, using printed documents, old journals etc.)

We also talked about my biggest struggle — verb tenses. This was something I screwed up (in my rough drafts), as well as something I played with deliberately. I intentionally wrote some of the scenes as if they were happening right now. Some of the things I used in my memoir I had written a long time ago as part of writing prompts and/or journal entries. Some parts I wrote right after it happened and sometimes I wrote about things that had happened years ago.

I was asked which was my favorite sections, and which part I would most like to read aloud.

The feedback and comments I received were wonderful. All in all, a very good defense. My chair called it a “reflective celebration.”

They asked questions about my writing process, and when it was all over, signed off on my thesis. :0)

And then my committee chair took me out to Big Apple Bagel for a coffee and muffin, which is where he and I had been meeting all along to exchange stuff and discuss my thesis. So it was special.

After I left Big Apple Bagel, I headed over to Staples, made the last necessary changes (a few typos and I needed to write a brief introduction to my annotated bibliography), and when I was done, I had a copy of my thesis printed off at Staples. I. took that over to the grad department and turned in my thesis.

Now, the grad office has about two weeks to review my thesis to make sure it meets their requirements (the requirements for formatting, etc. are something like 36 pages long). I don’t anticipate any problems. When they OK it, the dean of the grad department signs off, and it is OK’d for binding. I have to have at least two copies bound (one copy goes in the college library).

So, barring any major issues with the grad department, I have successfully completed my degree!

I tell you it is anti-climatic. The actual degree won’t be issued until August because that’s the next cycle, and there is no graduation ceremony in August. If I want to participate in a graduation ceremony, I’d have to wait until December’s ceremony. I told my husband we aren’t waiting, we can have the graduation party in June.

And even though I’m “done,” I’m not done. I have to remind my professor to submit my grade for my thesis credit hours. He said he thinks I’ll have to come back down to Mt. Pleasant for that and meet with him and the department dean. He told me he thinks it is a credit/no credit grade.

I’ve applied for graduation. My chair received the results of my application Friday. So what I need to do now is the following:

• Have my thesis grade/credit submitted by my professor.
• Once the grad department approves my thesis, I need to have it bound.
• That’s it!

And now I get to enjoy my summer vacation.

Oh wait, I’m teaching this summer. The next semester starts June 6.

And now I get to enjoy my week off. Yes, I know there are technically 12 days between now and June 6, but I need to prepare my course materials so they are ready and waiting for my students.

Thanks for playing.