Shop Talks

Are you just beginning your master's program at Texas State? Come listen to the wisdom and advice of experienced master's students as they discuss things they know now that they wish they had known when they began their degrees!

Are you just beginning your doctoral program at Texas State? Come listen to the wisdom and advice of experienced doctoral students as they discuss things they know now that they wish they had known when they began their degrees!

In this Shop Talk, participants will learn to integrate strong design principles into their academic work, enhancing the effectiveness of conference posters, presentations, proposals, and digital/print content. Key topics include graphic design fundamentals and the psychology of design with a focus on crafting impactful materials and engaging online presence. The session is suitable for students at all stages, aiming to elevate the visual quality and clarity of their work.

Presented by: Kate Malazonia, Marketing and Communications Specialist, The Graduate College

Graduate school is time-consuming, and balancing academic, work, and personal life is challenging. This session will provide attendees with tips and techniques for evaluating and managing their time and attention. Students will learn mindful productivity strategies to increase time for deep work and reduce stress and overwhelm. Both print and digital tools will be introduced.

Elevate your professional presence on LinkedIn with essential strategies. Discover how to craft a standout profile, strategically network, and unlock hidden opportunities in the job market. This Shop Talk session will provide actionable insights to help you navigate LinkedIn with confidence and maximize your career potential.

Negotiating one’s salary is an important skill that will come in handy throughout your professional career when it comes to ensuring that you are getting paid what you are worth! However, these conversations can be an unfamiliar and uncomfortable topic for professionals at any level. Negotiation is a skill, and like any skill, it takes practice. Join us for this Shop Talk that covers the basics of salary negotiations including taking an evidence-based approach to maximize your value, marketing your graduate degree to potential employers, and leaving emotion out of the interaction.

Many applicants to external fellowships, scholarships, and grants fail to provide the level of specificity needed to make their academic background, research experience, personal history, and career plans relevant to a funder's mission and goals. This Shop Talks session will teach participants how to recognize and address this problem through interactive exercises on the following topics:

• avoiding generic language
• detailing vague language
• using examples strategically
• making space for specificity

The knowledge and skills participants gain during this Shop Talks session will be broadly applicable to many pursuits.

This virtual workshop will equip you with the communication tools you need to effectively engage with professors, peers, and advisors. Learn how to craft professional emails, navigate office hours with ease, and handle advisor relationships with confidence. We’ll also cover best practices for collaborating with classmates, ensuring you make a positive impression in all your academic interactions. Join us to sharpen your skills in professional communication and build the confidence to handle any situation that comes your way!

In this session, students will learn about preparing for the Graduate Student Research Conference (GSRC), held by The Graduate College. The GSRC will be a live in-person poster conference. This Shop Talks session will provide an overview of the conference, details about how to create an excellent poster, and information about submitting the poster for the conference. We hope to have lots of graduate students showcase their work in the GSRC!

Comparison and perfectionism are difficult to avoid in graduate school. This webinar will not only provide information about these issues, but it will also include activities and a discussion about how to cope with perfectionistic tendencies, as well as comparing oneself to peers.

Everything you ever wanted to know — or didn't realize you needed to know — about the process of submitting an IRB Application at Texas State: how, what, where, when, and why does it take so long?
We are here to help graduate students, faculty supervising thesis or dissertations, and faculty or staff researchers understand the process from A to Z so you can submit well-prepared applications that get approved on the first review.

Are you publishing or presenting research in your discipline? Do you want to make your research more impactful? Develop an online researcher profile and make your research more discoverable by researchers globally..
Online tools such as ORCID, ResearchGate, Web of Science, and Google Scholar Citations can be useful for establishing a successful online academic profile. They can increase the impact of your research, ensure credit for your work, and streamline the publishing and grant-funding process.
In this Shop Talks session, we will show some examples of successful online researcher profiles and the impact you can make by managing your online academic environment.

Think of this Shop Talks session as Formatting 101! We will cover the document structure of a thesis or dissertation, discuss specific requirements, and end with “how-tos” to help graduate students successfully format their theses and dissertations.

Learn the secrets of successful graduate students. In just one hour, you will understand advanced search queries, effective research, database tricks, and library services you never knew existed.
This workshop covers finding unique databases, identifying important articles through citation analysis, using citation management tools, exploring a topic with knowledge graphs, and locating opportunities for publishing your scholarship and building your research identity.

At this workshop, Arlene Salazar, librarian for the College of Education, will cover search tips that can help when searching library databases. No matter what discipline you’re in, these search tips will help you conduct more effective searches. The workshop will also cover related library services and resources, as well as citation management tools & software that you can consider incorporating into your research to help keep you organized.

This workshop combines reflection activities with practical strategies to increase your confidence as a writer and improve your writing productivity. The session will challenge common writing myths and address typical pitfalls that often hold writers back, such as waiting for inspiration, “binge writing,” all-or-nothing thinking, and more. Participants will identify their own attitudes and beliefs about writing, learn techniques to shift their writing mindset, and practice exercises to build writing stamina and promote positive writing experiences. Participants will also have the opportunity to build their own writing community by signing up to join a writing group. We recommend bringing materials to type or write with to this session!

This Shop Talks session is designed for doctoral students seeking tenure-track and lecturer positions at four-year colleges and universities. It covers the last part of the interview process, namely job offer negotiations. Specifically, we will discuss which factors to consider when evaluating a job offer, what questions to ask, and how to negotiate the terms you were offered. In addition, we will discuss concerns of dual career couples and international students.

Graduate school is exciting but also very busy. Many graduate students are balancing work, school, caregiving for loved ones, and much more. Maintaining a work-life balance in graduate school is essential for preserving one's physical and mental well-being and progressing in coursework. Achieving this balance is easier said than done! In this session, a panel of faculty and students with personal experience in “balancing it all” will share their tips and resources. Attendees will leave with several important resources to help them manage their commitments.

Take your career to the next level with Building Your Brand, a Shop Talk designed to help you craft and showcase your personal brand with confidence. In this session, you’ll learn how to create a powerful elevator pitch, effectively sell yourself in professional settings, and make a lasting impression on potential employers, collaborators, and mentors. Whether you’re networking at conferences, applying for jobs, or connecting with key industry players, this session will give you the tools to confidently present your skills and stand out. Don’t miss this opportunity to shape your professional identity and make your mark!

Nervous about or unsure of how to take your job search to the next level? Don’t give up! You just need a plan. Find out how to organize your search and target the high-impact activities that will accelerate success. Come learn to use these “tricks of the trade” to uncover exciting job leads and professional contacts. The content for this Shop Talks session is tailored for graduate students.

This Shop Talk will address a common challenge in academia: rejection. Whether it is for funding, a publication, or academic employment, rejection is a normal part of the application process. While these experiences often cause grief, this presentation will help attendees develop strategies for processing rejection and responding to feedback through engagement with the following concepts:

• acknowledging the negative impacts of rejection
• understanding the benefits of non-selection
• interpreting negative feedback as constructive criticism
• building on feedback to move forward and persevere

Budgeting in and beyond graduate school comes with many challenges. This session provides an opportunity to explore grad school and post-grad expenses and strategies to manage them. Also in this session, you will gain access to an example budget and be able to follow along with the presenter as they demonstrate different strategies.

New to setting up a survey in Qualtrics? Come learn how to set up a project, some of the tools, and some basics of survey design that will bring back the information in usable form. Come with a project or use ours to practice.

Presented by: Tricia Boucher, Librarian, University Libraries