Whether beginning a graduate program directly after completing a BA or returning to post-secondary education after a hiatus, there are numerous written and unwritten rules for surviving grad school. Even the most prepared students are startled by the many idiosyncrasies and stresses of graduate student life. The popularity of Piled Higher and Deeper (PhD Comics)—which has inspired books and a film about grad student life—and the recent publication 57 Ways to Screw up in Grad School, (University of Chicago Press) suggest that the graduate school experience can be as entertaining as it is exasperating.

At SFU, History professor Mark Leier has collaborated with artist and SFU Alumni, Sam Bradd (BA: Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies) to create Grad School: An Illustrated Primer. The project takes selections from Leier’s “Graduate School: Now That You’re Here”—a list of informal advice for graduate students that Leier has compiled over the years—and renders the material in comic form. Leier says the project is a chance to share some honest and humorous tips for staying sane and being successful at grad school. Ranging from the general to the specific, the panels instruct grad students to really “read the graduate handbook,” “eat your vegetables,” and “become a pedantic crank on the accepted style for footnotes, bibliography, italics, serial commas, numerals, newspaper, book, and article titles, ships’ names, quotation marks, and the rest.” The comics also illustrate best practices in grad lounge etiquette, note-taking, and interacting with professors (hint: don’t call them at home!). 

The truths expressed within the grad school comics are pointed, but also subtle and laugh-out-loud funny. The panel, “Become a Pedantic Crank,” explains that being accurate with your grammar and/or citation is “especially important,” to both please your professors (who might resent correcting small mistakes), and to show that you can do your job well (impressing even library staff who are experts in formatting theses and adhering to style guidelines). The panel “Nobody Likes a Jerk,” points out that while “being smart is a GOOD THING,” showing off your knowledge of complicated theoretical terms and references will not garner you respect or admiration among your peers.

Bradd, who also has a Masters in Education from UBC, says much of Leier’s advice resonated with his own experiences. “I would say the notion of librarians being on your team was a panel that really rang true for me. Also, the “Nobody Likes a Jerk” panel, because we’ve all seen that person or (worse) been that person. But, rather than just ridicule the jerk for being a jerk, I think the panel tries to slowly introduce the idea of the self-reflecting moment, using humorous truth.” 

When asked what his “grand vision” is for the project, Leier laughs and says, “for it to be published, sell millions of copies, and become a best-seller, of course.” Leier says what he really wants is to see academic communities “move forward progressively, working together to be more human and more democratic.”

The world of graduate school has the potential to be intimidating and isolating. In terms of welcoming students into that world, Graduate School: An Illustrated Primer takes multiple steps to humanize that experience: to encourage laughter, hard work and dedication, but also self-reflexivity. As Leier puts it, “Sam’s comic panels are small windows into situations that really do have the potential to open hearts and minds.”