I'm in grad school at the same place I went to undergrad, and I was telling a recent seminar speaker over lunch that the divide between college and grad school seemed much more pronounced. Then again, I have no other basis for judgement.
However, my first teaching experience was in a class that I had taken my junior year of undergrad, and my GSI was one of my current advisor's former students. He seemed pretty relaxed about class policies, given that we didn't do anything stupid, like take naps or text people. I think one of the best parts about the class was that everyone who was registered actually wanted to be there, and nobody was in that "I need an easy lab course to cruise through my senior year" mindset, which made life easier for both the GSI and the students.
Unfortunately cases like that are pretty much utopia.
I ran into that GSI about a year later, and found out that he was teaching the same class again. When asked how teaching was going, he gave a different response: students had become whiners. Granted, it was a lab class that met for four hours on a stretch, and lab activities aren't always going to be fun and games, especially if grades (and possibility of future schooling) is at stake. The biggest problem is that most of the students WERE in the "I need an easy A to graduate" mindset, and as a result, procured mediocre work and less-than-stellar behavior.
So what changed? The undergraduate biology program here requires all students to have at least 2 lab classes picked from a specific list. This class wasn't on the list when I took it, and suddenly it was, resulting in an influx of students that may or may not (most likely the latter) have wanted to take the class to begin with. The class always counted toward a biology degree, but since it wasn't on that specific list of labs, most people overlooked it.
One of things I struggled with a lot during my year of teaching was a huge conflict of interest between me and the students, or me and the institution. I wanted to students to care about the material they were supposed to be learning, and I expected them to put in the effort to do well in the class because they chose to take it. On the flip side, most students wanted an easy A and do just enough to cruise by. I had one student turn in his Google search list about Compound X as his bibliography about how Compound X affected embryonic development. I emailed him and asked him to redo it, which he never did. Two weeks later, he came into office hours in a panic because he claimed that he was "snowboarding in Canada" that day and didn't get the email. And also, "can I still get credit if I redo it now?"
Seriously? Why even bother asking that question? The answer is obviously no.
***
I was having a discussion with one of my friends about institutions of higher learning; I was angry about our current system and how much grade inflation there was. I think bell curves can be pretty fair, but right now our bell curve has shifted so much to the right; the average, instead of being a B- or B like some of the classes I saw in undergrad, is now an B+ or even an A-. How are you supposed to differentiate between the average students and the outstanding students then?
On the flip side, instructors get in trouble with admin if their class averages are too low. My professor for Orgo II got fired after her term teaching us. Student evaluations aside, she had one test that was so difficult that the class average (for 1000+ students) was a 42%. So part of this huge grade inflation problem stems from instructors wanting a bit of job security... I understand that at least in part. However, things get out of hand when a student who clearly deserves a C- or a C ends up getting a B... just so we can move the class average up a few points and avoid getting in trouble by admin.
No instructor wants to reward mediocrity, but it ends up that way because students are the ones who are paying... and therefore the customers. So what do we do?
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Thursday, December 16, 2010
2010 (Un)productivity
I haven't gotten very nostalgic lately whenever news broadcasts go into their annual "year in review" montages; more often than not, I can't wait for the year to end in hopes that 2011 will bring some real progress.
In terms of research and grad school, my verdict remains the same. Several of my labmates and I recently submitted fellowship applications to the NSF or NIH, which were due at the end of November/beginning of December. For me, it was like writing prelims all over again, except (a) the stakes were much higher, (b) my advisor edited it extensively, and (c) I had to relate everything I did to human health, which was slightly irritating. It wasn't too difficult to relate my work to the obesity epidemic, but sometimes it seemed like a stretch. One of my friends works as some sort of grant reviewer for the military, and I sent my (simplified) aims to him. Granted, he has an engineering background, so he didn't understand a lot of the language used in my writing. I used him to gauge what questions people might ask about my work in terms of human relevance; even so, sometimes I wonder if the relevance I presented in my application is a bit of a long-shot.
It seemed like the only things I did this year were teach and write. I taught during the term I took prelims, and then I went completely AWOL from lab for two weeks to concentrate on writing (and grading, but mostly writing). After I turned in the written portion, I was still teaching, but prepping for the oral exam. During this entire process, I think the only new data I got was that I could finally get bacteria to overexpress "my favorite gene," which I had been cloning for about 6 months. "My favorite gene" got translated in vitro to "my favorite protein," but I didn't get to test biological activity of the protein until June.
Summer was pretty nice; I tested "my favorite protein," and got some descriptive data. The minor problem was that it wasn't exactly full-speed ahead research. I got my thesis committee formed, but my project was still a bit hazy. So as a result, my advisor said to write a thesis proposal for my newly-formed committee. The proposal was similar to the one in my written prelim, but I could incorporate new data, so I had to do some rearranging/rewriting. At least I didn't have to go MIA from lab.
Until I got a surprise teaching assignment for fall term.
So somewhere in there I was teaching a heavier courseload and writing my application for the NIH. And somewhere in there I started feeling a time-crunch and data-crunch. What on earth did I accomplish in the past few months? I could summarize my entire year's worth of data in a picture and two graphs. Hardly what I would call a paper, and I'm halfway through my third year. O_o
The good part is that 2010 is almost over, and the road ahead looks less foggy in terms of project direction. The *really* good part is that I don't have to teach in January, so it'll be full-steam ahead from January until the end of August or even later. Here we go!
In terms of research and grad school, my verdict remains the same. Several of my labmates and I recently submitted fellowship applications to the NSF or NIH, which were due at the end of November/beginning of December. For me, it was like writing prelims all over again, except (a) the stakes were much higher, (b) my advisor edited it extensively, and (c) I had to relate everything I did to human health, which was slightly irritating. It wasn't too difficult to relate my work to the obesity epidemic, but sometimes it seemed like a stretch. One of my friends works as some sort of grant reviewer for the military, and I sent my (simplified) aims to him. Granted, he has an engineering background, so he didn't understand a lot of the language used in my writing. I used him to gauge what questions people might ask about my work in terms of human relevance; even so, sometimes I wonder if the relevance I presented in my application is a bit of a long-shot.
It seemed like the only things I did this year were teach and write. I taught during the term I took prelims, and then I went completely AWOL from lab for two weeks to concentrate on writing (and grading, but mostly writing). After I turned in the written portion, I was still teaching, but prepping for the oral exam. During this entire process, I think the only new data I got was that I could finally get bacteria to overexpress "my favorite gene," which I had been cloning for about 6 months. "My favorite gene" got translated in vitro to "my favorite protein," but I didn't get to test biological activity of the protein until June.
Summer was pretty nice; I tested "my favorite protein," and got some descriptive data. The minor problem was that it wasn't exactly full-speed ahead research. I got my thesis committee formed, but my project was still a bit hazy. So as a result, my advisor said to write a thesis proposal for my newly-formed committee. The proposal was similar to the one in my written prelim, but I could incorporate new data, so I had to do some rearranging/rewriting. At least I didn't have to go MIA from lab.
Until I got a surprise teaching assignment for fall term.
So somewhere in there I was teaching a heavier courseload and writing my application for the NIH. And somewhere in there I started feeling a time-crunch and data-crunch. What on earth did I accomplish in the past few months? I could summarize my entire year's worth of data in a picture and two graphs. Hardly what I would call a paper, and I'm halfway through my third year. O_o
The good part is that 2010 is almost over, and the road ahead looks less foggy in terms of project direction. The *really* good part is that I don't have to teach in January, so it'll be full-steam ahead from January until the end of August or even later. Here we go!
Sunday, November 21, 2010
The IQ Cutoff
My friend sent me an article a while back called "The Importance of Stupidity in Scientific Research". The author defined "stupidity" not as a lack of intelligence, but simply not knowing what the answer was... and devising ways to find out. He wrote that research is delving nto the unknown, and realizing that we'll never know everything about what's around us. Granted, scientists are making discoveries faster than ever, but the more we find out, the more we realize how much more we need to learn. There's always going to be phenomena that don't necessarily fit with our theories, and even as we learn new things, we can't say we've ever proven anything... just that whatever we discovered "supports" our preexisting hypothesis.
Unfortunately that's not my problem. I might not be fully aware of how much there is to learn, and I'm not too afraid of venturing out to learn something new. My biggest problem right now is that sometimes I feel stupid. And this time I mean lack-of-intelligence-howcome-I-can't-see-that-but-everyone-else-can stupid.
I'm currently writing a fellowship to be submitted to the NIH, and while the research strategy, experience, and rec letters are the most important, I still need to submit my list of science classes I took in college/grad school and the grades I got in them. I'm quite self-conscious about my grades; this problem happened when I was applying to grad school, when I was working as a rotation student, and it's happening again now. In college, I took liberties to challenge myself with multiple science classes (like any science major), but I might have underestimated what it was going to be like. Eventually I learned how to effectively divide my attention between three or four different science topics, but sooner or later, I would focus much more on the class(es) I liked, and as a result, the other subjects were set on the back burner. All in all, I was an "average" student.
Science might not be full of super-geniuses, but sometimes I wonder if there is a baseline level of intelligence and whether I'm floating around that line. My grades aren't saying much, and sometimes (like now) I get afraid that they might stand in the way between me and a fellowship. Do you have to be above average to succeed here? When do grades stop mattering at all?
Unfortunately that's not my problem. I might not be fully aware of how much there is to learn, and I'm not too afraid of venturing out to learn something new. My biggest problem right now is that sometimes I feel stupid. And this time I mean lack-of-intelligence-howcome-I-can't-see-that-but-everyone-else-can stupid.
I'm currently writing a fellowship to be submitted to the NIH, and while the research strategy, experience, and rec letters are the most important, I still need to submit my list of science classes I took in college/grad school and the grades I got in them. I'm quite self-conscious about my grades; this problem happened when I was applying to grad school, when I was working as a rotation student, and it's happening again now. In college, I took liberties to challenge myself with multiple science classes (like any science major), but I might have underestimated what it was going to be like. Eventually I learned how to effectively divide my attention between three or four different science topics, but sooner or later, I would focus much more on the class(es) I liked, and as a result, the other subjects were set on the back burner. All in all, I was an "average" student.
Science might not be full of super-geniuses, but sometimes I wonder if there is a baseline level of intelligence and whether I'm floating around that line. My grades aren't saying much, and sometimes (like now) I get afraid that they might stand in the way between me and a fellowship. Do you have to be above average to succeed here? When do grades stop mattering at all?
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Inception
The September 30 issue of Nature ran a piece about research sabotage at the University of Michigan, where a postdoc in a particular lab who deliberately ruined a fellow grad student's work by poisoning her cell culture media, among other things. Sadly, research sabotage is not unheard of, although in many cases it's an act of desperation.
A while back, one of my cohort members was talking about self-sabotaging labs, or labs that consisted mostly of postdocs. She called them self-sabotaging because of the intense competition between the members -- whoever has the best idea or approach to a problem gets funded. That's not to say all labs that have a lot of postdocs work that way, but sometimes intense competition fuels jealousy, which in turn leads to wrecking other people's work.
But where to draw the line? One of my friends went to a conference last year where the people present were so scared of getting scooped (having their ideas stolen) that they refused to interact with each other. Research is all about ideas... figuring out the right questions to ask in light of what's already known. And the best way to figure out if you have a good idea or not is to bounce them off the right people. For my case, it would be my labmates and my advisor. For the independent scientist with their own lab, it would be other people in the field. However, unless you already have decades of experience in the field, how would you know who would turn out to be a good collaborator versus someone who could scoop your ideas? Where do you draw the line at how much of your ideas to share versus what to keep hidden?
It would be an impossible ideal to have scientists collaborate with each other all the time. Grant money is tight and hard to come by, awarded to those with the best or most promising ideas...but unless you're a reclusive genius, good ideas are hardly the work of one individual. Which brings back the question... where does one draw the line between keeping it a secret and collaborating with someone else? Are there ways to minimize getting scooped?
***
In the movie Inception, the main character (played by Leonardo DiCaprio) states "what is the world's most dangerous parasite? An idea...it will consume you."
A while back, one of my cohort members was talking about self-sabotaging labs, or labs that consisted mostly of postdocs. She called them self-sabotaging because of the intense competition between the members -- whoever has the best idea or approach to a problem gets funded. That's not to say all labs that have a lot of postdocs work that way, but sometimes intense competition fuels jealousy, which in turn leads to wrecking other people's work.
But where to draw the line? One of my friends went to a conference last year where the people present were so scared of getting scooped (having their ideas stolen) that they refused to interact with each other. Research is all about ideas... figuring out the right questions to ask in light of what's already known. And the best way to figure out if you have a good idea or not is to bounce them off the right people. For my case, it would be my labmates and my advisor. For the independent scientist with their own lab, it would be other people in the field. However, unless you already have decades of experience in the field, how would you know who would turn out to be a good collaborator versus someone who could scoop your ideas? Where do you draw the line at how much of your ideas to share versus what to keep hidden?
It would be an impossible ideal to have scientists collaborate with each other all the time. Grant money is tight and hard to come by, awarded to those with the best or most promising ideas...but unless you're a reclusive genius, good ideas are hardly the work of one individual. Which brings back the question... where does one draw the line between keeping it a secret and collaborating with someone else? Are there ways to minimize getting scooped?
***
In the movie Inception, the main character (played by Leonardo DiCaprio) states "what is the world's most dangerous parasite? An idea...it will consume you."
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
More from the other side of the podium
I'm teaching again this term -- a lab class on animal physiology, full of overachieving premed students. It's a bit of a contrast compared to some of the stuff I had to deal with last term, but then again, it could be because my incoming schpeel was a bit different. I don't think anyone is super prepared to teach the first time around; no matter how prepared I thought I was, it still got to be a bit nerve-racking to stand up in front of 20-some kids and go through everything you expect out of them.
Even though it's a lot smoother this time around, I still see some of the nervousness creeping in. I'm teaching two sections, and sometimes I feel a lot more prepared for the second lab group. I write a list of stuff I want to cover in every class, but I tend to rush through things in the first class and go a lot slower (and cover more info) in the second. I'm hoping it'll get better as the term progresses.
*****
I told my advisor in August that I was interested in mentoring an undergrad research assistant, and he's been forwarding all these emails he's been getting from assorted undergrads looking for lab positions. Since they're going to be primarily working with me, I get to interview them and send the ones I liked to my advisor.
It was a little weird being the interviewer and not the interviewee; I had a few questions written down, but it wasn't just recording their answers -- it was gauging their interest in terms of voice inflections and body language. But while I was sitting there observing them, I'm pretty sure the reverse is also true. Just felt a little surreal being the person looking for a helper, and not the one looking for a helper position.
Anyway, I forwarded the resumes of two students to my advisor. He'll be interviewing them later and I'll probably start mentoring soon. :)
Even though it's a lot smoother this time around, I still see some of the nervousness creeping in. I'm teaching two sections, and sometimes I feel a lot more prepared for the second lab group. I write a list of stuff I want to cover in every class, but I tend to rush through things in the first class and go a lot slower (and cover more info) in the second. I'm hoping it'll get better as the term progresses.
*****
I told my advisor in August that I was interested in mentoring an undergrad research assistant, and he's been forwarding all these emails he's been getting from assorted undergrads looking for lab positions. Since they're going to be primarily working with me, I get to interview them and send the ones I liked to my advisor.
It was a little weird being the interviewer and not the interviewee; I had a few questions written down, but it wasn't just recording their answers -- it was gauging their interest in terms of voice inflections and body language. But while I was sitting there observing them, I'm pretty sure the reverse is also true. Just felt a little surreal being the person looking for a helper, and not the one looking for a helper position.
Anyway, I forwarded the resumes of two students to my advisor. He'll be interviewing them later and I'll probably start mentoring soon. :)
Friday, August 27, 2010
on staying motivated
Research at times can be tedious, and sometimes it's easy to lose motivation, especially when I have to repeat experiments because I completely screwed it up the first time. Even if I didn't screw up the experimental setup, it can get mind-boggling just thinking about what there is left to get done... and on some days it's hard just to get started.
I was talking to one of my friends (in a different department) a while back, and she was considering switching labs due to the lack of positive results --among other reasons-- and she asked me how I stay motivated about my work. Granted, I go alternate between super-productive mode and sloth mode, but I think the days I go into sloth mode are the ones where I start losing track of what the overall goal is.
Sometimes I'll get motivated by reading other papers that relate to the topic at hand, especially if it's a well written one. Other times it could be an episode of Planet Earth, or spending some time with people who have no idea what I'm talking about. And by "no idea" it means they studied something completely different or they don't even want to hear about my work.
A college friend of mine (who now works overseas) was a history and poli sci major, and now works in a business-related field. We have this unspoken rule on "no talking about science" which I think we've done a pretty good job of following. It's refreshing in a sense because (1) face it, talking about science 24/7 is dull and (2) I don't have to turn into a robot.
Don't get me wrong... I love biology and what I work on, but I don't want it to end up defining me. I think the two key components to staying motivated about research is to remind myself of the big picture (easier said than done) and to maintain my ties to my science-hating friends. I mean, my friends who would rather talk about something else. (Adam, come back to the States! I owe you coffee!)
I hope I can keep those two things in mind the next time I come home all cross-eyed from doing more than 100 dissections...
I was talking to one of my friends (in a different department) a while back, and she was considering switching labs due to the lack of positive results --among other reasons-- and she asked me how I stay motivated about my work. Granted, I go alternate between super-productive mode and sloth mode, but I think the days I go into sloth mode are the ones where I start losing track of what the overall goal is.
Sometimes I'll get motivated by reading other papers that relate to the topic at hand, especially if it's a well written one. Other times it could be an episode of Planet Earth, or spending some time with people who have no idea what I'm talking about. And by "no idea" it means they studied something completely different or they don't even want to hear about my work.
A college friend of mine (who now works overseas) was a history and poli sci major, and now works in a business-related field. We have this unspoken rule on "no talking about science" which I think we've done a pretty good job of following. It's refreshing in a sense because (1) face it, talking about science 24/7 is dull and (2) I don't have to turn into a robot.
Don't get me wrong... I love biology and what I work on, but I don't want it to end up defining me. I think the two key components to staying motivated about research is to remind myself of the big picture (easier said than done) and to maintain my ties to my science-hating friends. I mean, my friends who would rather talk about something else. (Adam, come back to the States! I owe you coffee!)
I hope I can keep those two things in mind the next time I come home all cross-eyed from doing more than 100 dissections...
Monday, July 26, 2010
the road ahead
I'm currently three weeks into my third year of grad school, and I'm asking myself how long it's going to be before I get enough meaningful data for my first paper, how many papers I need to graduate, and whether or not I can graduate on time (I'm aiming for May 2013). I'm currently unsure if I'm on track or behind; it just seems like everyone I know has more data than me...and by "everyone I know," I've pretty much limited it to other lab members. I want to get more data in a shorter period of time, but sometmes it can be difficult to strike a balance between being efficient and being high-quality.
I'm also in the middle of designing experiments for my thesis proposal. I finally got my thesis committee formed and the first committee meeting scheduled, but I'm not really sure what to expect. I'm guessing it's going to be a lot of questions on experiment design and controls (like prelims), questions on the validity of results (like prelims), and probably questions on the field as a whole (like prelims). My advisor send back some comments on my experiment design, and while his questions are quite valid, I sometimes wonder howcome I missed seeing it myself. In other words, the blanks I have to fill are a lot more obvious when they're pointed out to me by someone else. While this is all part of the learning curve in grad school, I sometimes wonder if (1) I'm a slow learner; (2) there are so many things that need to be considered in experimental design that it's mind-boggling, or (3) it's actually not mind-boggling.. it's just hard to see what else is important aside from the immediately obvious.
The good thing is I don't have to take classes anymore, so fall term is just a continuation of summer research. Right now it just seems like a long, hazy road ahead...
I'm also in the middle of designing experiments for my thesis proposal. I finally got my thesis committee formed and the first committee meeting scheduled, but I'm not really sure what to expect. I'm guessing it's going to be a lot of questions on experiment design and controls (like prelims), questions on the validity of results (like prelims), and probably questions on the field as a whole (like prelims). My advisor send back some comments on my experiment design, and while his questions are quite valid, I sometimes wonder howcome I missed seeing it myself. In other words, the blanks I have to fill are a lot more obvious when they're pointed out to me by someone else. While this is all part of the learning curve in grad school, I sometimes wonder if (1) I'm a slow learner; (2) there are so many things that need to be considered in experimental design that it's mind-boggling, or (3) it's actually not mind-boggling.. it's just hard to see what else is important aside from the immediately obvious.
The good thing is I don't have to take classes anymore, so fall term is just a continuation of summer research. Right now it just seems like a long, hazy road ahead...
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