The Future

Many of you that we have talked to in person already know this, but we finally have definite plans for what Jeran will do after he receives his PhD this summer.

Jeran's PhD defense is set for July 3 and we are VERY ready for it to come. Or at least I am very ready and Jeran is very stressed and busy getting ready for it to come. He has to submit his dissertation a few weeks in advance and also prepare a presentation. He also needs to submit a paper for publishing by then, but luckily that is part of the dissertation, not a completely separate thing.

So after the defense, he will have a week or two to finish making any adjustments and finalize things (I'm not really clear on what this entails, thus the vagueness, but he said he would need this time to finish work), and then several weeks off before he starts a Masters in Biostatistics at UNC-Chapel Hill. Hooray!

At least I think it will be "hooray" and not "groan". He would like to go more in the analysis direction so this should help him get there and give him training that would make his skills more broadly marketable. We are excited for the change in pace this will bring and are curious what going back to being a full-time regular student will be like after so long. And really anything would be better than what he is doing now because he is so burned out on his work and not thrilled with how his PhD career has gone.

It is a two year program, with some chance of being able to finish a semester early, but we aren't counting on that. Jeran will likely do an internship, teaching or research assistanceship, or part time job to make some money and gain applicable experience and network with useful contacts already in the field.

We will not have to move, although our intention is to gradually make some repairs to our house and then put it on the market next summer or so, so we won't be in a big rush to take any offer we get. Then if it did sell we would rent somewhere (which would also be weird to go back to).

In some ways, I've wanted to move for a while because we've had so many friends move away from us and we've long anticipated Jeran finishing his PhD and then needing to move, so not moving seems weird, but I think the change in his schooling will provide enough of a change of pace to satisfy me right now. And a Masters won't drag out indefinitely like a PhD can. It will be hard whenever we do move away because we have really liked the area we are in and our ward, although it goes through huge transition periods, is pretty much the nicest, friendliest church ward of mostly people in very similar circumstances to us. And the weather here is pretty awesome.

Anyways, we are both excited for this small but major change.