EPTHello fellow TL netizens. I'm Zaranth, and I'm going to be sharing my graduate school know-how with you and this is the Part 4:
You can find Part 1 here!
And Part 2 here!
And Part 3Here!
You’ve done it - you got past the interviews, you chose a school, and now you’re on the way to getting a PhD and getting called “Doctor.” But what should you expect during grad school? How do you navigate through this long, sometimes confusing process? Never fear, Zaranth is here! This blog post is going to cover a lot of different parts of grad school, so it will be long, but hopefully very informative. Enjoy!
Note: This post will be heavily influenced by my own experience. UMass has an umbrella program, which means students are accepted to the graduate program, and they pick their department based on which lab they decide to work in. It is possible to generalize my experience to almost all graduate programs in the US, but the details will differ. I invite people who have different grad school experiences to post in the comments, so folks can see the kind of diversity that exists.
Note: In this section I will introduce an abbreviation some of you may not know: PI, which stands for Principal Investigator. This references the professor of the lab you choose to join. (PI comes from the last author listed on biology papers, which is the professor.)
Year 1 - Courses, Rotations, and Selecting a Lab,
Year 1 is very intense. There are multiple levels of stress that you will have to deal with. Most likely, you have moved away from where you did your undergrad. You’ll be searching for new friends and getting used to living in a brand new city. You will be dealing with classes, and expected to do better than you did in undergrad. You will also be rotating through labs that you will possibly join for your thesis research. Each of these things is important, and you need to succeed at all of them at the same time. Let’s start with moving to a new place.
Getting Settled in a New City
The grad school should be able to help you with this. If the school does not have student housing, or if you choose to live off campus, you should be able to get some recommendations for apartment buildings that are close to campus and affordable. The school may send out a list of first year students that are looking for roommates. If you want a roommate, get on this list. It’ll be good to room with someone going through the same things you are. Realize that you will be living in this city for 6-7 years, so you have the ability to move around. If you live somewhere that you don’t like, use the time to scope out the area and find a better neighborhood to move to next year.
Coursework Year 1
At my school, there is a full load of coursework in your first year. There are two types of courses, lectures and paper discussions. The lecture courses are graded through homework and exams; the paper discussions are graded via participation and knowledge. My school requires a grade of A or B. A student who receives a C must repeat that course and obtain an A or B. If a student receives two C’s, they are kicked out of the school. If a student outright fails a course, they are kicked out of grad school. About half to three-fourths of your time the first year is spent on coursework and studying.
The coursework will be more difficult than you had in undergrad. Mainly, this is because you will be expected to learn and memorize all aspects of science research in a short period of time. You will be flooded with information, and each lecture will present a new topic and its associated details. In one lecture, a professor went through 65 extremely detailed slides in 45 minutes, and then went through another 60 in the last hour. It’s a lot of information to take in.
The courses are taught by faculty. At UMass, a different faculty teaches on different topics, meaning that it’s common to have a new faculty teaching each lecture in a course. This also creates diverse grading during exams, since each faculty grades their own questions. Therefore, you have to determine how to answer each question based not only on the material you learned, but on the faculty that will grade you. Some faculty want you to write a two-page essay answer, while others want one sentence and a diagram. This only creates additional stress during exams.
Another type of class you’ll probably be exposed to is based on reading primary literature and discussing it in a group setting. The idea is to learn how to understand and dissect scientific publications. These courses are usually pretty easy, since the focus is on group discussion and comprehension. The hardest part is getting used to reading and interpreting the papers. Once you’ve got a few under your belt, the rest should be pretty simple.
Lab Rotations
Besides surviving the rigorous coursework, you will be going through rotations. Rotations are short periods of time (anywhere from 4 weeks to 3 months) that you spend in a lab, working on a mini project and deciding if you want to join that lab for your thesis research. Many incoming students wonder how many rotations they should do before settling down in a lab. I would suggest doing at least three. Just because you like the first lab doesn't mean that’s the one you should pick. There may be better labs out there, and there may not be. This is the most critical choice you will make in grad school, so it’s better to err on the side of caution.
To pick a rotation lab, first check out the faculty’s web site. Does their research sound interesting? Read the most recent publication or two from the lab. Do you like what you read, or did you find it boring? How many publications does the lab have, and when did the most recent one come out? How big is the lab? Once you have a few candidate labs, e-mail the professor and ask for a meeting. Wait for a few days, then e-mail again. If you don’t get a reply, go ahead and stop by the professor’s office. If you don’t get a friendly answer, don’t bother rotating there. During your meeting, discuss the projects that are currently underway in the lab, and ask about any ideas the professor has that a new grad student could take on. It’s a good sign if there are a few projects ready and waiting to be picked up by a new student.
Once you’re in a rotation, it’s important to get a good feeling for the lab. Most likely, you’ll be working with another grad student or a post-doc for the rotation. This lab member will show you the ropes and help you get your hands wet at the bench. Some schools focus on the result of that work as a measure of competency. It’s important to keep in mind that along with impressing the professor, you are judging the lab. Is this a place you could work in for the next 5-6 years?
Choosing a Lab
At the end of your rotations, you will have to choose a lab in which to do your thesis research. There are a lot of considerations at this point, and I’ll address some of them here.
1) Try to avoid working in a lab where you are the only grad student (exceptions are small labs just getting started). If the lab has been around for a while and there are no other grad students there, it may be a sign that it’s not a good lab.
2) Listen to the gossip about professors. If you hear about PIs who are harsh on their students, who hound them for results, it is a good idea to avoid that lab. I’ve talked to a few students who regret joining their labs because the professor is pushy and controlling. They’ve actually told current rotation students not to join the lab.
3) Make sure your professor is around and available. I’ve heard stories of students going months without even seeing their bosses. That’s too long. You should feel comfortable enough with your PI that you can walk into their office at any time and sit down to chat about your progress. Your PI should be in their office most of the time. They are there to act as your mentor, so find one that will.
4) Think about the quality of research you could produce in that lab. Does the lab work with a model organism? If so, which one? (Mice take forever to work with, flies are irritating, yeast is easy, human cells can be very tricky.) Is there a pet technique that the lab uses? What type of science will you be learning and doing, and how will you use that in a future career? If you didn’t like the type of experiments you performed during your rotation, don’t join the lab.
5) How big a name is your PI? This has pros and cons. If your PI is a big name in their field, they’ll be traveling to a lot of meetings, but they also know a lot of people and can connect you for future employment. If they are a small name, they’ll be more accessible, but also may not have great contacts. This may or may not influence your decision, but it’s something to consider.
Overall, think carefully about this decision. Consider what type of support and friendship you will get from your labmates; the type of mentoring you’ll get from your PI; the type of research you will produce and publish; finally, consider how long it will take you to graduate. Make a good, smart decision!
Year 2 - Qualifying Examination
In your second year of grad school, you may be taking one or two advanced topics courses, but your main objective will be to prepare and complete your qualifying examination.
What is a qualifying exam? Again, this will differ from school to school, but what I have to say will generally pertain to most programs. Typically, the qualifying exam consists of a written portion and an oral portion. At my school, the written portion takes the form of a grant proposal. The oral portion consists of your committee members (more on this in a sec) and you sitting in a room for two hours while they ask you questions.
Choosing Your Committee
At most schools, you will have the freedom to choose most, if not all, of your committee members. This is a decision you will need to think a lot about. You will need to have between 3-5 members. Your members should be other professors from the school that work in your field, or a closely related one. You want them to understand your project, and you also want them to be able to contribute and enhance it with their knowledge. Your choice of committee may have to be approved by the dean. Make sure you know the specific rules and deadlines set up by your school.
Personal story time! When I had my qualifying exam, I picked the minimum number of committee members: 3. It’s easier to schedule 3 people, and I thought it would be nice to field questions from fewer people. My oral exam was scheduled for 10 am. At 9:30, I got my computer set up (I had a PowerPoint with slides describing my proposed thesis research), got my food ready, and began to wait. Two of my committee members showed up on time, but the third (and my chair!) was not there. We waited for about ten minutes. I went to his office - no one there. I checked in with his secretary, and she told me that he was out of town for a conference. WHAT!?! I couldn’t believe it. How could the chair of my committee completely forget about my qualifying exam (which I had been working on for three months)? I felt very upset. Since the school required three members to be present, we abandoned the exam, and I went back to my lab literally shaking with emotion. About ten minutes after that, the missing chair of my committee walked into my lab. He had forgotten the start time, and thought it was eleven instead of ten! I called back the other two members of my committee and we held the exam. I passed. The lesson I want to share is: always have more members than the minimum. Even though it is a pain to schedule everyone, you don’t want to run the risk of having to cancel your exam because a member forgot the start time, or had a personal emergency and couldn't make it.
The Written Exam
Most schools will have a written portion of the qualifying exam. At my school, this takes the form of a grant application. Basically, you write up what you propose to do for your thesis research. To complete this portion takes a couple of months. First, you will have to do a lot of reading. You need to familiarize yourself with your chosen field’s literature. You should start by reading reviews, and continue by reading primary research papers. It’s important to keep these papers organized. I suggest using some sort of annotated bibliography method. I like to summarize the paper on a sticky note and put that on the front page of the paper. Then I file the paper according to subject. Endnote is a popular software for organizing papers, and there is a free Firefox plug-in called Zotero that does a similar job. As you write the exam, get help from fellow students who have passed their qualifying exams. They can give you advice and help you with the layout. At my school, you cannot get help from your PI. You will need to hand in your finalized proposal to your committee before you have your oral exam, so they can read it and prepare questions for you.
The Oral Exam
This exam can also take many different formats. At my school, the oral exam can technically cover any and all course material you learned in year 1, as well as the written research proposal. In reality, most of the questions are about the written proposal. We prepare a PowerPoint presentation that augments the written proposal. The presentation includes figures from published papers that support our hypothesis, experimental procedures and hypothetical results, and possibly preliminary data that you or someone in your lab has already produced for this project. Be prepared for this exam to last a long time. The committee should ask a lot of questions, since they are testing the depth of your knowledge about your chosen research topic. They also want to make sure that your proposal is reasonable and can be completed in 5-6 years. They will offer alternative experiments, and may request that you completely get rid of one of your aims. Basically, you need to be prepared for anything.
Many students provide food for their committee. If the exam is in the morning, coffee and donuts are typical. Some of our students even provide Panera sandwiches if the exam is at lunchtime. Find out what the norm is at your school and follow it. You want your committee to be in a good mood!
Some schools or departments require their students to qualify on a topic that is not related to their thesis research. I think this is a horrible idea, but it’s not in my power to change the system. Be aware that this may be a factor for your own exam. If it is, you will have to do the work twice - once for your qualifying exam, and once for your thesis research.
Years 3,4, and 5
These are the middle years. You should be producing a lot of data. At this point, you’re basically grinding away, trying to get some publications out, and trying to make all your experiments work. There are a few things that I can address during these years.
Career Development
Huh? Why should I be worrying about what I’ll do when I graduate, since graduation is literally 4+ years away? Actually, this is the time you should be thinking about this the most. If you leave it until your 5th or 6th year, it will be too late (trust me on this one, folks). I will be speaking about career options extensively in Post 5, but it’s important to mention here. If you want to go into teaching, begin to search out teaching experience (if it’s not required of you already). If you want to go into business, find someone to shadow. Begin networking. Take extra classes if necessary. Figure out what you want to do when you graduate, and begin getting the experience you need now.
Going to a Meeting
At some point, your PI will have decided that you’ve done enough work to present it at a meeting. Scientific meetings can be large or small events, and they can last anywhere from a few days to an entire week. It’s common for students attending a meeting to prepare a poster, and if you’re lucky, you may be asked to give a short talk. You’ll have to submit your poster/talk abstract well in advance of the meeting, so make sure you know the deadline and get your abstract submitted! I think this is a good spot to discuss building a poster.
First, time - you should start working on this poster at least two weeks ahead of the meeting, and you should give yourself one week to get it printed (unless your program has a poster printing machine and can do it for you in an afternoon). Make sure you check the size standards of the meeting. Don’t bring a poster that is too big for your assigned space. Next, you need to think about the layout. There are a lot of details that go into a poster, including color schemes, font and font size, and whitespace. It’s very important to get the design right, otherwise no one will stop at your poster.There’s a website offering free PowerPoint poster layouts here: http://www.posterpresentations.com/html/free_poster_templates.html. Alternatively, your lab may have a template you can, and should, use. Remember to put your school’s logo in the top bar, along with the logos from your funding sources. I’m going to direct your attention to the following websites for detailed information about designing a poster. I think together they cover everything you will want to think about during the poster design. There should also be a department on campus that can help you if you get stuck.
http://chem.virginia.edu/graduate-studies/test-links-pg/how-to-make-a-scientific-poster/
http://www.cns.cornell.edu/documents/ScientificPosters.pdf
http://sustainable-energy.ksu.edu/files/cse//CSE Symposium PosterPresentation 2011.pdf
Writing a Paper
Hopefully, you will be in a position to write at least one paper in these few years. Paper-writing should be a collaborative effort between the first author (hopefully, you) and the last author (your PI). Sometimes this is not the case. There are some PIs who will write the entire paper themselves, and others who leave it entirely up to the graduate student. Each paper-writing situation is different. Here’s a nice overview of writing a scientific paper: http://classweb.gmu.edu/biologyresources/writingguide/ScientificPaper.htm
Committee Meetings
Depending on the school, you will have meetings with your thesis committee on a regular basis. At UMass, we are required to meet with our committee at least once every year. Your thesis committee is not necessarily the same as your qualifying exam committee - again this will depend on the school. The job of your thesis committee is to make sure you are producing data and staying on track to graduate on time. For each meeting, you should prepare a presentation detailing the work you’ve completed, the work you are currently doing, and the work you plan to do in the future. You should also have a few back-up experiments tucked up your sleeve, in case your committee hates what you are currently doing.
Motivation
Some of you may have read a blog post of mine entitled “Grad School Ruined My Confidence.” http://www.teamliquid.net/blogs/viewblog.php?id=352064 (Actually the inspiration to create this TL Knowhow in the first place; lots of people are interested in grad school but don’t really know what it’s about. I should mention that I feel better now!) This is a common occurrence in the later years of grad school. How do you keep your motivation up when you’ve been stuck in a rut? What if that critical experiment just doesn’t work? What if all you obtain are negative results that cannot be published? What if you wake up one morning and realize that you hate you life and never want to see a Pipetman again? What if someone publishes a paper on exactly what you are working on?
Been there, done that, got the t-shirt. And let me tell you, it fucking sucks. You don’t want to be in lab, and when you are there, you spend all your time browsing TeamLiquid. All grad students think that this will never happen to them, and all grad students are wrong. How you respond to this situation depends on your character. For me, I was able to work through the slump. Sure, I was not being very productive, but I got some things done. It helped that I was having weekly meetings with my boss, so he was checking in on my progress regularly. When you hit the wall, you’ll have to do whatever you can to get over it. You may need to take a week off and get away from the lab entirely. You may need to remind yourself why you started grad school in the first place and what you want to accomplish. Get support from fellow students, friends and family. I am lucky to have a very supportive and understanding boss. It’s gonna happen, it’s gonna suck, and you will have to pull yourself out. Consider this fair warning.
Year 6/7 - Dat Thesis
This is the final piece of graduate school. By this time, you should have a few papers of first or second authorship under your belt. You should have presented your research in a professional environment. You have worked really hard to expand the knowledge of the human race. It’s time to write it all up and create your thesis.
A thesis is a book containing all the work you’ve done in your graduate career. It contains chapters that pertain to the experiments you did and the results you obtained. Basically, it’s like 6 Cell papers all wrapped up into one bound volume. Each university will have their own rules about thesis writing, so I will share my knowledge and depend on others to add to it in the comments!
At UMass, it’s your thesis committee (yes them again) who will decide when you are ready to write. Sometime in your 6th or 7th year, you will get the coveted check mark next to the box “Permission to Write” on your committee form. There will be much rejoicing, and then the pain begins. Once that box is checked, you have four months to write, edit, and defend your thesis. You’ll start with a clear plan of attack. You’ll put together the easy chapters first. Basically, you can modify the papers you have written to become chapters. If you have unpublished data, that can become a chapter as well. You will need an introduction, discussion, and future direction section. Then you need to add in all the references. At this point, you’ll probably be sick of everything you’ve ever done. Then you’ll need to edit and review the thesis before handing it to your PI for review and editing. Your PI will suggest numerous changes. You will edit again, hate your life, and finally hand it off to your dissertation committee for their input.
“Dissertation committee?” the astute among you ask. So far, there’s been the Qualifying Committee, the Thesis Committee, and now the Dissertation Committee. At my school these are all unique! One of the main differences in the Dissertation Committee is the requirement for an outside member. This person is basically a PI at another institution that will read your thesis and come to your defense and offer an outside opinion. The point is, be aware that there can be a lot of requirements, and you need to be proactive in figuring out what they are.
Anyway, you’ll eventually get your thesis written and orally defend it. Hopefully, you will pass your thesis defence no problem, and now you are officially DOCTOR. But what to do now? Where can you go in the world? Coming up in part 5 I will address perhaps the most pressing question: What can you do with a PhD in biology?
