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Everything posted by Eigen
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Not exactly sure the point of this... But I'll bite. 4-5 years of undergrad research (depending on how long you take to graduate, more isn't definitely bad). As many as possible in one lab- although experience from several different labs isn't bad, I wouldn't work for less than a year in any of them. A major in your area of interest for graduate school. Good supporting advanced undergraduate/early graduate classes in your chosen field, as well as several related fields. Publications (if possible, depends on the field) Baccalaureate Thesis- sort of a publication, but really helps show that you had a project that you really carried through instead of a bunch of unrelated stuff. 3.9+/1400+ should sit well for stats, although you don't really need it to be that high. Then, find a school/research program that really fits your interest, get letters of recommendation from faculty that would be the most familiar with that program/research area, and will write you good letters.
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Personally, I ended up taking a 5th year so I could round out my courses... I think I had something like 190ish credits (semester system) when I graduated, and I spread them quite wide so I could get at least some background in most areas. I think it served me quite well during applications, actually. My boss was a Chemistry major with an Anthropology minor, and one of the other PIs I work with a lot had a double major in Chemistry and History, and actually did a masters in archeological chemistry overseas before he came back to do his PhD. Our department at least values the broad background, they feel like it centers you on the importance of your work and especially helps you a lot when it comes to writing and general communication skills. ::edits:: Gah! iPad autocorrects!
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I have a few friends at our medical campus working in your area- they work fairly straightforward 9-5 hours in the lab, although there are some variations when it comes time to do data processing and such.
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My point was that if you look at what a "liberal arts" education was meant to include, time and emphasis was equally placed between the science based fields and the humanities. Over the years, "liberal arts" has become synonymous with "humanities" and thus the equal emphasis that set a true liberal arts education apart has lost much of its meaning. At most schools, there are far greater humanities requirements than sciences- usually balanced between several courses in socio-behavioral sciences, English and literature, history, communication courses, and language courses- at least at my school, 4 semesters of English, 1 each of history and communications courses, and 3 classes in socio-behavioral sciences were required. The corresponding background required in the sciences is usually about half of that- one two semester course (usually intro biology or astronomy for most students), one second standalone science course, and the equivalent of college algebra. Of course, you can go past these to a major- but I'm speaking to the "core classes" required of any student at the university. Personally, I would think a more rigorous use of minors would be the best track, requiring students to take a minor that was outside of their college- STEM fields having a minor in the humanities, humanities fields requiring a minor in one of the STEM fields. It's not about what's necessary for a "job" teaching down the road, but what should be required to make someone a well educated member of society- and frankly, the amount of science and math (and the critical logic skills that often come with them) is quite lacking compared to the amount of humanities.
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The lab sciences really depend on the university, the department, and the lab. I'd say the "standard" would be around 30 hours per week of lab work your first semester, although it's not uncommon to do a good bit more than that. My general schedule was something about 9-6 most days, and I was in the lab working when I wasn't in classes. My wife just finished her first semester in Neuroscience, and I'd say her experience was pretty similar to mine. I think the handbook "mandated" 15-20 hours per week for rotations, but there was "strong encouragement" to be in between 30 and 40 hours. Most of the time, you can set a regular schedule- but often experiments won't cooperate, more often in Neuro than for me in Chemistry. Mice/Rat based experiments often have to be done on the right biological cycle for the rat- I've spent some 11pm-4 am work periods with my wife, because that's when it needed to be done. There can always be issues around scheduling time on shared resources that leaves you working early mornings or late nights, as well. Talking to people in the lab you are going to be working in is best, they can help you get a feel for what your PI specifically expects from his/her students- and that's the really important thing. Most PIs want their students to be in the lab when they come by (unless they're in class or something else), so you *generally* work at least during the time when they're around. The post-docs that are training you can help you get a good feel for when/how much you should be in, I would think.
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Oh, it's definitely possible for them to TA- they had changed the rules this year, and then clarified that TAing was allowed after a large outcry from departments. From a cynical point of view: you're probably right. I know my department doesn't require TAing if you have external fellowships, internal fellowships or RAships, we have no overarching requirements of some TAing prior to graduation. I know several other universities I interviewed at did have TA requirements regardless of the funding source.
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Greenlee: I think it's just as relevant to write, as a complement to the article, that those who have chosen to study the humanities could benefit from expanding their education into the STEM fields. It seems that he holds up the humanities as the end goal, when it's really the fact that he can approach things with an interdisciplinary background that makes what he does valuable. Many of the comments hit on that, encouraging double bachelors degrees in the humanities and sciences- being able to have the background in science/technology that helps to create solutions coupled with a humanities education that helps you to see both the implications of the solutions you create, as well as brings a better understanding of the problems that exist, is quite useful to a more successful, better rounded approach. It's one of the failings of our modern "liberal arts" education, in my opinion. The traditional liberal arts education required equal grounding in the humanities, math and the natural sciences, while a modern liberal arts education focuses on the humanities, without requiring in depth study of mathematics or the natural sciences. The point I think important reminds me of Einsteins quote: "Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind"... The same could be applied to the authors argument of a humanist vs. technologist perspective- "Humanism without technology is lame, technology without humanism is blind" as I might put it. Humanism acts to guide technological development (or rather, scientific development), while scientific development gives us the tools to advance as a humanistic perspective would have it. Deciding the right way for society to grow and interact without any insight into how to put it into practice is the flip side of random scientific development without any guiding insight.
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You'd really need to check with your department. It's not uncommon for programs to have a TAing requirement purely for the experience, but that varies from place to place. I assume you already declared tenure on your NSF grant for this coming year? In that case, you couldn't push off the NSF grant and get paid for TAing your first year, but your department might be amenable to you taking a gap year next year, and getting all of your TA requirements out of the way then, while being paid for it- something like 20 hours per semester for two semesters, or a full time TA appointment.
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You do realize that I'm a gradaute student and not an applicant, right? I'm saying that posts asking about your chances of admission in the "officially grads" forum tick me off, and make me less likely to give advice tha the post properly placed in the sub forum in which it actually belongs. Fuzzylogician is quite right, too many of these posts in the one small corner of this huge site devoted to current grad students will slowly drive them away. Asking for advice or asking what graduate life is like in the "officially grads" forum is completely different than the darned "what are my chances" threads. I should also point out that since stats vary so wildly from year to year in what is considered average that you will probably so better talking to those applying with you than those of us that are several seasons away from the application process. What got me in when I applied 4 years ago will probably not be what gets you in this year.
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I completely disagree. "Officially Grads" is primarily for current graduate students to discuss, well, grad school. The "applications" forums is to discuss "applications". Posting "what are my chances" threads in the Officially Grads forum will do nothing other than annoy the native population, and clutter it with threads that clearly belong in the forums that are dedicated to their existence. It's kind of like those special few that post 18 different "what are my chances" threads in all the different subforums to increase their chance of being seen- more people will see them, but it will also invariably frustrate more people, lead to more work for the mods, and probably in the end decrease useful feedback.
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I think in general that the graduate GPA will be more heavily counted by the adcom- but there is a definite possibility that you will run into "minimum undergraduate GPA" problems. I'd contact programs before you apply and ask if there's a cutoff GPA, just so you don't waste time and effort applying somewhere that can't accept you. For BMS (from my experience) your undergraduate and graduate GPAs are roughly equivalent relative to the program. Others may be able to post different experiences.
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Yeah, those greedy pig art professors. Let me tell you, they're pulling in the cash in PILES just like all the other college faculty!
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Since you don't give your GRE scores, how can any of us guess whether or not they'll hurt your chances? There's a large difference between a 300 V "abysmal" score and a 500 V "abysmal" score.
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They won't average them, they're for two different degrees. That said: 1) You might have some issues due to the sub-3.0 undergraduate GPA. Some schools have hard and fast minimum GPA requirements, and posts in the past have shown that it can even over-ride a higher graduate GPA- I recall one person that was denied admission with a 2.9x undergraduate GPA even though she had a 4.0 from her masters program. This is usually at the school level, not the adcom level, however. 2) Your two GPAs are actually fairly equivalent when you put them into perspective. At least in my field, a sub-3.5 graduate GPA would be about equivalent to a sub-3.0 undergraduate GPA. Graduate courses are higher, but the GPA requirements for continued enrollment are also usually higher- in the US, it's reasonably common for B's to be the lowest passing grade for a course, and 3.0 GPAs as minimum requirements, making a "B" average in grad school equivalent to a "C" average as an undergrad, or a "B+" average as a grad student roughly equivalent to a "B" average as an undergraduate. Just a few thoughts on your situation. You don't mention your field, which makes anything more specific difficult.
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MPB upgrades were earlier this year... There are rumors that the MB won't be upgraded, but rather will die out as a product line.
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The current rumors are that the new Airs, Mac Pros and Minis will come out with Lion. New iMacs and MBPs probably won't come out until early next year... Most of apples products are on a year-ish release cycle, with the different models staggered so they don't come out all at once.
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You don't say what discipline you're in, I think that might make a difference. In the lab sciences, it's much more common to have to go in at odd hours/on weekends, and that's much easier when you live close to campus. It means if I need to be in the lab to stop a reaction at 10pm, I can at least easily run home for dinner before I come back, instead of having to stay on campus the whole time. I had a 25 mile/30 minute commute all through undergrad, and it wasn't that big of a deal- having something that long would be much more of a pain now.
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I also have to add, none of what you describe would be unusual for an MS in my field... I'm not sure what's typical for an MFA, but 3 years, full time, no room for side jobs, no grade lower than a B-.... Those are all typical things. As is the fact that a lot of the "usual" campus services are closed or severely diminished during the summer- especially so at smaller schools. It's also typical to have grad programs set up such that missing a class will cause you to take longer than average- there are fewer grad students, so they offer fewer grad classes each semester. And honestly, $4700 is quite cheap for a semester... The tuition at my school is $23,000 per semester. Yours seems very affordable by comparison. As to the amount of work... 60+ hour weeks of work, not including classwork or homework, is common in my field, even for MS students. You seem to be expecting everything to stay as it was in undergrad, and that's not the case- graduate school is a step above in terms of difficulty, time, etc. Less services are offered because the students are treated more as adults/young professionals than college aged kids out on their own for the first time. As has been said, they are also things you could have found out before you went in with a modicum of research.
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Ok, just checked my PMs: The data you were referencing isn't the NRC rankings, but rather a collection of data on PhD.org. Without the original source, commenting on it seems rather silly. Statistics that say they're from the "NRC 2006" report without the actual data from that report is only so useful- it doesn't give the methodologies that would allow you to draw a useful conclusion from it. PHD.org collects statistics from a variety of reports, many from different years (200, 2005, 2006), which can make it difficult to compare. The actual NRC data is found on the NRC website in a report form.
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Hard to comment in general on NRC data- a lot of it has to do with timespan they're looking at for each criteria. The problem with most ranking systems when it comes to graduation rates is that a lot of times there are only a few graduates each year, which can make the data set very sparse. I was just wondering about topical areas since you were asking for books specifically to prepare for the GRE- the books you would use to prepare for the GRE are very different than the books you would use to get a good working understanding of the subject area, imo. For instance- Garret and Grisham is a good comprehensive Biochem text, but I wouldn't recommend it if you're just interested in learning Biochem on the side. Honestly, most textbooks aimed at undergraduates aren't the best texts to read if you're picking up topics in your spare time- I'd look at books written for professionals in the field, recent advances texts, or advanced undergrad/graduate texts in the field. For inorganic chem, as an example- I would recommend Shriver and Atkins as a "GRE Review book", but I'd recommend Crabtree's text if you wanted to learn organometallic chemistry on the side. Similarly, Levine is the physical book I would recommend if you wanted to review for the GRE, but I'd recommend McQuarrie's Quantum Chemistry if you wanted to pick up quantum mechanics in your free time. Books you use to prep for the subject GRE would, imo, be heavy on facts, light on understanding/discussion- when you're reviewing, you should already have a good feel for the area, you're just looking for a refresher, which is usually the equations, topics and common data that you've forgotten over the years. If you're reading about other fields in your spare time, you want something that focuses more on the general themes, background and discussion- something that is usually much more lacking in the general undergrad texts you'd use for a GRE review.
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I guess I should add: You'll find two very different definitions of "passive-aggressive behavior". The one I'm referring to is the following: Not the various types of diagnosable psychological disorders characterized by overt aggressiveness disguised under a calm facade.
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In an ideal world? It's not always the best. When dealing people that you can't easily approach directly? It can be a great way to go. It allows you to set boundaries and be professional without ever directly "defying" or questioning the other. It's usually only necessary when there's a definite imbalance of power between the two parties- ie, dysfunctional boss/project manager- who you can't directly confront (they're in charge), but who you need to set boundaries with. From my experience, most PIs are loathe to get involved in disputes between their grad students, and higher-ups even less so. You're expected to find ways to work it out between the two of you.
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I couldn't tell from your original post, but is this senior grad student in your group, or in another? I would imagine that changes things quite a bit. In the lab sciences, it's not that uncommon for there to be a very distinct hierarchy, and if your PI put him in charge, I'd definitely wait before going over his head to your PI. I think it's a problem that he seems to be on a power trip, but I'd recommend trying to work through it in a more passive-aggressive manner. There's always the possibility of "being in the middle of an experiment" during a proposed meeting time- it's usually a pretty defensible position, at least where I am. No one expects meetings to take precedence over experimental work unless you're talking like a once-a-semester multi-group update meeting. I agree you don't want to set the precedent for him being in control.... But if he's a senior grad student, in your group, who's overseeing the project... He sadly IS in control of it. A lot of this depends on how highly the PI thinks of him- if he's the protege or golden boy, there's a lot less you can do. The good thing to keep in mind is, if he's several years ahead of you he'll probably graduate before too long, and you won't have to deal with it forever. If you're worried about him stealing your work/he's making you do things that are unnecessary, you could go the route of setting up biweekly/monthly meetings with your PI to go over your work- let your PI point out that some of the work is duplicates/not needed, and then lay it at the feet of the senior grad student. This also lets you firmly set up what is your work, which makes it much harder to "steal" in the future. I would also start asking for explanations of portions that you think are duplicate/not needed- make him come up with a line of reasoning as to why you should do it. You don't have to do it in an argumentative fashion, phrase it by asking to learn. "I don't really understand why we need to do this experiment- it seems like it's the same data I collected already. Could you please explain why it's needed? I want to understand the bigger picture of our project." It's hard to get angry at these questions, but they can help to politely point out flaws in the experimental design. If he's not asking about times for the meetings, have you tried saying "I can't meet then, how about XX"? If so, how does he respond? From your post, I'd say you have a lot of room to politely set boundaries... But sadly, I also think there's only so much you can do if he's officially in charge. Some labs have much more distinct hierarchies than others, your lab may be one of those.
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I'd go with a Chase College Checking Account, where I you. https://www.chase.com/online/Checking/chase-checking-account.htm I have the Chase Total Checking, personally, and I don't find the minimum balances/deposits a problem... $500 a month direct deposit isn't really an issue on almost any stipend. I have found Chase very reliable, secure, and easy to deal with. I haven't hit any hidden fees, and they tend to be pretty above board about most dealings. The other benefit I've found is that they have ATMs nearly everywhere, which is a real benefit when you consider you usually have to pay fees if you use an ATM that isn't your banks.