Graduate Student Program

Study Objectives

Your goal in the essay that follows is to limit yourself, as much as possible, to talking about what you would like
to do when you are in the United States. Focus your study plan on the program of study and on the nature of
the course work you want to take. Your prospectus below should be as detailed as possible, because your
preparation in this regard, understanding what your project entails, is the most convincing evidence that you
will be able to complete the project.

Those issues of your personal accomplishments that you feel might also clearly demonstrate this will be
addressed in other parts of the application, and do not need to be repeated here.

It is best to write this essay on either a three or four paragraph form. Below is my sense of the best way to write
it in four paragraphs.

This essay will likely be the most important part of your application; it is worth taking a long time to write, and
to try many different drafts before you are satisfied with it. Like your narrative vita, if it is possible, ask for help
from older scholars, as they may see links and facets of your project that otherwise you might have missed.

Paragraph one: Here, in a short but detailed paragraph, spell out what scholarly work you would like
to accomplish in the United States. The first sentence should read something like “I wish to study in
the United States so that I might (complete whatever your project is).” It is not enough to say that you
would like to receive a master’s degree; a master’s degree will require that you write a thesis, and this
paragraph should tell, as clearly as you can imagine, what such a thesis would be about. Spell out your
project, and locate it in the realm of your field; talk, if you can, briefly, about in what way your thesis
will benefit your field, and the way in which you intend to undertake it. But keep these comments
brief, as you will have a chance to return to them later. This first paragraph is all about you, and your
project, and will demonstrate how well you understand it.

Paragraph two: Here, talk in as detailed a fashion as you can, about why this project needs to be
undertaken in the States, and cannot be just as easily completed at home. Though your inclination
might be to talk about how and why you cannot complete your project at home, it is better to make
this claim through contrast, telling what resources and opportunities you feel might be available to
you in the States. Again, if you can, talk not only about infrastructure issues (research libraries, for
example), but what, if any, impact being in a foreign culture might have, and how it will positively
impact your work.

Paragraph three: Here, bring together the two above, and show the way general trends in the United
States have very particular products in the States that might help your work. If you know of theorists,
scholars, or scientists who are doing work there which is not being pursued here in Ukraine, then this
is the place where you should mention them. Also, here is a place to talk about how being part of an
American University might help you complete your work more readily than if you were to stay in
Ukraine.
It is important to note in paragraphs two and three that you are asked to not request that you be
placed at a particular University. This, though, does not prevent you from making your preference
known, in terms of people whose work you admire, and who you might like to work with; though this
is unlikely to guarantee you will work with these people, it does go a long way to showing that you
know your project, and are aware of the ways in which study in the United States might help to
advance it.

Paragraph four: Here, in your conclusion, talk about the project you introduced in the first paragraph.
But where in that introductory paragraph, you spoke of it on a theoretical level, here talk about it on a
practical level. What will your project look like when it is finished (a book, a study, something else
altogether), and why is it reasonable to think that you will finish it in the time allotted to you. Here,
more than anywhere else, express why you think you are the person to complete this task, and tell us
briefly why your project will benefit both the larger field of your study, and Ukraine, when it is
completed.