tony clennell on mon 31 mar 08
Pick your teachers not the length of the program. There has to be a
fit like buying a pair of shoes. If you are going to walk for 2 or 3
years in a bad fitting pair of shoes it's going to be painful. I
always told my own kids to pick the teacher and not the course. Life
is like a roll of toilet paper. The closer you get to the end the
faster it goes. I would advise your friend to look at the teachers and
not the length of the program.
Grad school is not a place to go learn to be a studio potter. The
estimated cost of a year at USU is $22,000 so times 3 you're looking
at $66,000 plus lost income. A studio potter such as myself with home,
cars, insurance etc needs to make at least $50,000 a year to survive
so kiss that good bye for the duration of your degree. Yes, there are
assistantships, scholarships, fellowships and other kinds of ships but
the boat you're going to float is not a free ride.
Read Pete Pinnels article in Clay Times about grad school. His advice
is if you want to be a studio potter take the above money and invest
in a full blown studio.
Going back to school is a tuff grind but having been a full time
studio potter for 2 decades I'm accustomed to flush times and dry
times. I love teaching and want to teach at the post secondary level
and that's why i keep my eye on the ball. I'm green with envy that
Kelly is finishing up. I'm in a 3 year program with Spring 2009 as my
ETA.
Cheers,
Tony
USU was well represented in the Yunomi show- prof Dan Murphy and new
studio head Joe Davis and my fellow students Joe Singewalt, Lindsay
Oesteritter, Todd Hayes, and yours truly . I feel like I'm in fine
company and couldn't have landed in a better school.
http://sourcherrypottery.com
http://smokieclennell.blogspot.com
Lee on mon 31 mar 08
Tony,
The other reason to go to school is the love of learning.
That is the only reason I would go back for an MFA.
One of the advantages of an apprenticeship is being paid to
learn. If you apprentice with someone successful, you can be paid
well.
It will take me a while to get back up to my salary during my
last year of apprenticeship. The young Japanese that apprenticed
beside me had hardly any expenses and they apprenticed for five years
with a yearly raise, so they had a next egg to get their workshops
going with which was probably well above what is needed for tuition at
a 3 year program like yours.
But those kinds of apprenticeships are getting rare.
--=20
Lee, a Mashiko potter in Minneapolis
http://mashikopots.blogspot.com/
"Ta tIr na n-=F3g ar chul an tI=97tIr dlainn trina ch=E9ile"=97that is, "T=
he
land of eternal youth is behind the house, a beautiful land fluent
within itself." -- John O'Donohue
Nobody Special on tue 1 apr 08
On Mon, 31 Mar 2008 20:31:32 -0400, tony clennell
wrote:
---snip---
>Grad school is not a place to go learn to be a studio potter. The
>estimated cost of a year at USU is $22,000 so times 3 you're looking
>at $66,000 plus lost income. A studio potter such as myself with home,
>cars, insurance etc needs to make at least $50,000 a year to survive
>so kiss that good bye for the duration of your degree. Yes, there are
>assistantships, scholarships, fellowships and other kinds of ships but
>the boat you're going to float is not a free ride.
>Read Pete Pinnels article in Clay Times about grad school. His advice
>is if you want to be a studio potter take the above money and invest
>in a full blown studio.
---snip---
Tony...
I don't recall Dr. Pinnell's article, but couldn't agree more with his
conclusion. I have a finance degree and held many positions at a stock
brokerage, so can't help but take out my calculator when I see situations
like this.
If a 21 year old undergrad were to put $50,000 into a no-load mutual fund
and leave it there until age 65 rather than spend it on an MFA, at 8%, the
average return of the S&P 500 over the last 50 years, he or she would have
nearly $1.5 million U.S in the bank at "retirement" age. Working backward,
this means that the MFA would have to earn over $4100 more per year than he
could have without the degree in order to break even, and this is without
counting anything for the 2 or 3 years of lost income. The later you start
the grad program, the more "extra" you need to earn every year to break even.
It seems obvious that if the MFA gets you a teaching position that you could
not have obtained absent the degree, then the fringe benefits alone would
likely more than make the payoff. I'm not much of a studio artist, but it
seems equally obvious that as a potter the degree likely won't count for
anything in a direct financial sense. If you are trying to make it as a
so-called "Artist", the math could well be different, as from my very
limited perspective an MFA seems to be a large part of the price of
admission. BTW, the math for an undergrad degree is even worse!
Cheery, ain't I?
All the best.
...James
Lee on tue 1 apr 08
On Tue, Apr 1, 2008 at 7:03 AM, Nobody Special wrot=
e:
> anything in a direct financial sense. If you are trying to make it as a
> so-called "Artist", the math could well be different, as from my very
> limited perspective an MFA seems to be a large part of the price of
> admission. BTW, the math for an undergrad degree is even worse!
Hey, where is you guys hearts? If you are so enamored with "funny
math", get an MBA and move to wallstreet. ;^)
Aren't we are artists to spite "the math"? In a land
enamored with quantity and consumption, we need to foster quality and
creation.
--=20
Lee, a Mashiko potter in Minneapolis
http://mashikopots.blogspot.com/
"Ta tIr na n-=F3g ar chul an tI=97tIr dlainn trina ch=E9ile"=97that is, "T=
he
land of eternal youth is behind the house, a beautiful land fluent
within itself." -- John O'Donohue
Nobody Special on tue 1 apr 08
On Tue, 1 Apr 2008 07:48:34 -0500, Lee wrote:
>On Tue, Apr 1, 2008 at 7:03 AM, Nobody Special wrote:
>
>> anything in a direct financial sense. If you are trying to make it as a
>> so-called "Artist", the math could well be different, as from my very
>> limited perspective an MFA seems to be a large part of the price of
>> admission. BTW, the math for an undergrad degree is even worse!
>
>Hey, where is you guys hearts? If you are so enamored with "funny
>math", get an MBA and move to wallstreet. ;^)
>
> Aren't we are artists to spite "the math"? In a land
>enamored with quantity and consumption, we need to foster quality and
>creation.
>
>--
Lee...
Did that, and survived! Someone told me once to "forget theory and just
make pots". Let me tell you that an MBA is as useful to a trader as I
believe an MFA is to a potter. Your first day in a trading room or on the
exchange floor ALL of the nonsense you learned in school goes right out the
window!
I can think of many reasons to pursue an MFA, and am even (foolishly) toying
with the idea myself, but nothing changes the fact that none of those
reasons make any financial sense at all unless it leads directly to a
teaching position. Going to school for other than a technical career makes
no financial sense, and, as you say, is purely an affair of the heart. This
is not a bad thing as long as one goes into it with eyes open.
...James
Hank Murrow on tue 1 apr 08
On Apr 1, 2008, at 5:48 AM, Lee wrote:
> On Tue, Apr 1, 2008 at 7:03 AM, Nobody Special
> wrote:
>
>> anything in a direct financial sense. If you are trying to make
>> it as a
>> so-called "Artist", the math could well be different, as from my
>> very
>> limited perspective an MFA seems to be a large part of the price of
>> admission. BTW, the math for an undergrad degree is even worse!
>
> Hey, where is you guys hearts? If you are so enamored with "funny
> math", get an MBA and move to wallstreet. ;^)
>
> Aren't we are artists to spite "the math"? In a land
> enamored with quantity and consumption, we need to foster quality and
> creation.
Well, Hank has to jump in here to suggest a middle path.
My grandfather always said that one should invest 10% of one's money
each year in a growth fund like MIG. He even gave me and my siblings
$1500 in 1956 to get us started. He said if we kept it up each year,
we'd be millionaires when we really needed it.
Well, I 'needed it' a few years later (1961) when I wanted to start
my own PotShop in Venice CA, so I used it to build wheels and a
gallery among other things. The 50 or so memberships took care of
operating expenses and I got to fire kilns nearly everyday. It was a
great learning situation, but began to pale after three years because
I sort of knew more than anyone there..... and I was eager to learn
from others. So I sold it and went to school at the U of Oregon where
I had started in architecture...... this time to study clay full
time, and finish both the BS and MFA degrees.
On reflection, Grandad was correct. I have checked the price of MIG
stock over the years, and I would indeed be a very rich person by now
had I heeded his advice. On the other hand, my 'investment' has paid
off for me ten thousand-fold in other ways. When my dad died, I had a
small kitty to work with, invested it in Socially Responsible funds,
and it has doubled in five years......... so Grandad's advice and
lesson has finally taken hold, and there will be enough there to get
by on and even travel with if I can't make ware someday.
Meanwhile, I am creating capital...... from and for my heart, and
also for my wallet...... every time I sit down with the clay or stack
a firing. A woman customer from back in the 60s wrote to me the other
day saying she used my work everyday and loved it as much or more
than she ever has in those intervening years. I am sending her a
chawan for her new study of Tea. So the circle does come
'round....... somehow. Heart and body....... got to care for both, Lee.
Cheers from Eugene,
Hank
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