Author Archives: Jared W. Saltz

Picture belongs to Amazon and the Publisher. Taking a quick break from Grad School information, everyone should check out this book.  It\’s been out for awhile, but–unfortunately–Brill publications can be a bit prohibitive to anyone with a student budget.  Now that it\’s out in softcover it has jumped to the top of my \”to buy\”Continue reading “Next Up to Read: Writing and Literacy in the World of Ancient Israel: Epigraphic Evidence from the Iron Age”

Graduate School is an exercise in attrition.  Perhaps especially so during the application process. The process is long, grueling, and expensive.  You are trying to find that which will consume most of your time for 5-7 years.  It is fair to say that you are looking for a temporary spouse. So, just as must people doContinue reading “Applying to Grad School: Research”

I took the GRE last monday and now having taken both the \”old\” GRE and the \”new\” GRE I can say for certain that I prefer the newer rendition for a few reasons.  It\’s no long a CAT.  The CAT, or Computer Adaptive Test was a neat idea at first.  The concept was that itContinue reading “Post-GRE Observations”

I, like many, am currently seeking entry to Grad school.  I do have a leg-up in that I’ve already completed an in-field MA degree, but I still have to go through the same processes as anyone else does: do the research in various programs and schools, write all of the dozens of cover letters andContinue reading “Academic Catch-22”

I just saw a new book from the Cambridge UP that looks promising. Bruce Louden\’s Homer\’s Odyssey and the Near East looks to be an intriguing look at an ignored possibility.  Previous scholarship tended to believe that Hellas and the ANE never interacted prior to Alexander, but newer archeological discoveries and literary research now indicates thatContinue reading “Hellas and the ANE”

One of the most overlooked tools in a box of a student of biblical history is an outline. Yes, I just said an outline. \”What?!\” You might say, \”Why one earth would an \’outline\’ be such a powerful tool?\” There are a lot of other tools that are far more obvious to most of us:Continue reading “Tools for Students: Outlining”

Delicious Library is an excellent tool for anyone with a large amount of media.  It enables you to easily record, categorize, and share your library.  Whether your media is music, movies, video games, or books, Delicious can handle it.  I first started looking for ways to manage my library when my wife and I first decided onContinue reading “Tools for Readers: Library Management”

It\’s understood that one of the primary scales on which applicants for jobs, tenure—and sometimes even admission into programs!—are based is their publishing record.  Journal articles are a huge part of that scale, but in some schools (especially smaller ones), the \”hows\” and \”whys\” aren\’t emphasized or even explored. It\’s for that reason that IContinue reading “Publishing and Reviewing Journal Articles”

For most of those who read this blog, writing is (and will continue to be) a daily part of life.  We write papers as an undergrad, theses and dissertations as grad, and articles, book reviews, and books as professors and researchers.  Even for those who chose to pursue futures as preachers/ministers/rabbis/etc, they will end upContinue reading “Tools for Students: Word Processors”

An older (Oct 2010) study in the Wall Street Journal discusses the value of education.  Is it quantifiable?  Recently, Texas A&M underwent a fiscal evaluation that attempted to prove just that.  Each of the professors at the school were audited along the lines of how much money they brought to the school (research grants, student numbers,Continue reading “The Value of Education”