Eigen

Also, don't overstudy. Take a practice test, see where you rank, and study accordingly. The GRE is such a small part of your graduate applications, that you definitely shouldn't spend more time on it than absolutely necessary- put the extra time into writing samples, SoP, research experience, reading papers of faculty you're interested in working with, etc.

Technically, the fellowship is the stipend, not the school paying for fees. 24,000 is amazingly high for just fees. Are those just fees, or some tuition and such mixed in? Also, generally, insurance wouldn't be covered under the NSF COE, as it's not usually a required fee. One other thing to consider is the time for payment- my school usually doesn't process their payments until midway through the semester.

Your reasons for going for a PhD seem a bit weak, which would likely make a PhD alot harder. Generally, if you want one of the jobs that you can only do with a PhD (Professor, senior researcher, etc.) then you'll need to go for a PhD. If you're happy doing tech-level BS or MS work, then those are fine career paths. Similarly, a lot of your happiness in a PhD program will correspond to what program you pick, and what you look for when you pick that program. The friends of mine that are the most miserable picked programs on ranking and prestige, and some of them are so burned out that they won't be making use of that ranking and prestige in continuing on past a PhD. Personally, I have quite enjoyed graduate school- there are times that are difficult and stressful, but overall I've gotten paid a decent salary to learn and do what I enjoy doing. BioTech jobs are in a pretty good position, if your PhD is applicable to those openings. Pharma can be iffy as a whole, you'll definitely want to make connections. R1 academic jobs (heavy research faculty) are insanely competitive. But there are a lot of other faculty positions out there that are less so. Overall, you need to have a really good idea of where you're heading, what you want out of your PhD, and what you want to do after you get your PhD to decide if it's the right path for you.

So it sounds like you need to go to the PI on your fellowship, who will likely be in the Provost's office or Office of Research- you can find their name on your fellows page. They're likely who needs to be the one to apply pressure. Also, in relation to Oregon State, part of that is due to their low tuition. May or may not be similar in your case.

I would take the department administrator the page from the program guide that says they are required to pay or waive the fees. Have you asked *why* the policy is changing? Are all the fees mandatory, or are any optional?

Small and large whiteboard, desktop PC for modeling, a bookshelf for, well, books, as well as all my lab notebooks and such. File cabinet for paperwork, change of clothes for when it rains, coffee mugs slowly accumulating, some good speakers for music. Don't have much food in the lab/office, that stays mostly in the breakroom.

Please don't double post identical topics. Your last one has several replies, so I'm locking this one.

We didn't need to topics on this, please refer to the other, identically titled, thread in this same forum.

As has been mentioned in the past, and in this thread, please do not ask for copies of copyrighted materials.

One of the other ways to look at this, is that the first paper will make yours more viable, especially with their names on it. My supposition (since you said Advisor 1 is young), is that Advisor 1 was worried about the position of his (and your) research going into major journals, and wanted to get some of the findings out early to claim them. Additionally, Advisor 2s name on the paper will help it get accepted, while at the same time associating Advisor 1s name with the project. At least in my field, 2 faculty and a graduate student is really tricky authorship. If a grad student and faculty member coauthor, it's assumed that even with the grad student as first author, the faculty member is in the advising role. Similarly, if two faculty publish together, it's assumed that they relatively equally coauthored. In the sense that Advisor 1, with you as his/her student, You, and Advisor 2 publish together, assuming the order is You, Advisor 2, Advisor 1, then the assumption would be that Advisor 2s role was very minimal, which might not have worked for them, and might not have given the name recognition factor to the work. If they were under the impression that the paper wouldn't completely undermine your work, but might actually make it more viable long term, I can see this type of arrangement working out for all parties. Similarly, you might ask Advisor 1 about authorship- they might say you don't need to include Advisor 2 as an author, but just in the acknowledgements or through citation of the original authorship.

I strongly second Fuzzylogician's sentiment.

Truthful.

Not really. Might make your first semester a bit easier, but I wouldn't say it's necessary. Courses are a very small part of a Chem degree, with the big part being research. Lots of research experience, and letters attesting to your competency are what will get you in.

I could be wrong, but I took the OPs situation to be more similar to Advisor A having an instrument (IE, the telescope) and letting both Advisor B and the OP use it for research, rather than Advisor A and Advisor B use data that the student collected to write a second paper. Same material objects, but from the OP, no overlap in her work and theirs, just on the same area/same artifacts, but not artifacts the OP collected physically, just ones they were using with permission from Advisor A. I could be wrong about this though, and would need clarification from the OP.

Late to this, but the advice I have heard is if you're applying, to use the proposed lab for which your proposal is strongest. You are not tied to the project, the lab or institution once you are funded. You do, however, need to have accepted at a specific institution by the time you accept. The idea is that you are being funded based on your ability to come up with a novel and well thought out research proposal- they are not funding that project, specifically.

Complaining to my cohort mates, finding tangents or side projects that are more interesting, re-organizing and cleaning the lab, taking on an undergraduate to work with. Slumps are a fairly regular and consistent part of the life of every graduate student I know, in a number of different programs and disciplines.

Take my advice with a grain of salt, as I'm from a different field: I don't see that you could really get away with not publishing with at least Advisor 1, as they are his samples, his funding, and he seemed to help direct your analysis of the samples. If you were a quite senior researcher, you might be able to get away with an acknowledgement rather than a co-authorship, but I don't think that's likely as you were also advised by them. Advisor 2 is a trickier case. They didn't technically help you with this project, but it depends on how involved they were in training you for the analyses, as well as field norms. In my field, both would definitely be included, but the same might not apply for yours. As to your last question, I don't think you can really separate advice given as an advisor from consultation given by them as an academic. If anything, the fact that the advice was given to you as an advisor seems to make it more applicable to include them on the publication than less. Also, in my field, them taking some of the same samples and doing some of the same analysis and publishing wouldn't be that unusual. It undermines part of your thesis, but from what you've said it's only part. Similarly, they didn't use any of your methods or data, so it's not like they "stole" anything from you. I can think of several reasons they might have wanted to push and get it out- using Advisor 2 as a name to establish Advisor 1 in the area of methodology, or using it to "stake a claim" on the area against other researchers.

It depends strongly on the school and program. But in Neuroscience, it's not uncommon for schools to have 1 year, no-thesis masters programs (mostly to attract pre-med students who need some extra development). When you get a consolation MS, it will be one of those- hence, not equivalent to a terminal degree. Also, many schools don't *offer* a masters program, outside of the one you get for dropping out of a PhD, making it fairly apparent. And keep in mind, as I mentioned above, that you may end up paying for a portion of your consolation masters anyway. You won't be meeting all the MS requirements in 2 years of a PhD program. Definitely not the thesis. So you'll need to stick around to do that, and depending on the school, since you're no longer a PhD student, you might not get funded for that portion. As has been said, the first two years of a PhD program is not very similar to a MS program.

Yes. A failed PhD is not the same thing as a strong, terminal MS.

No, it really wouldn't. Trust me, I've seen people try it. And you'd still have to be on good enough terms to finish out what will probably be, on average, another year or so to do a MS thesis and accompanying research. And there's a good chance they might not keep your stipend for that. Or, you'll get the consolation prize MS, which will just look like you couldn't cut it.

Sure. It would look like you're a student who failed a PhD. That doesn't look the same as getting a masters. Else, you'd need to transition from a PhD, to completing a solid, thesis based masters degree. And that would require not looking like a student who just didn't finish a PhD. Most neuroscience programs will not award an MS part way through (unlike some other fields). You'll either fail out at some point, and get what will be obvious as a consolation MS, or you'll finish and have only a BS and a PhD, with no corresponding MS.

I would say, in general, bioengineering is fine. Depends on exactly what area, but most of the work should be translatable. I'd worry more about the fact that you only have a summer of research experience. At my not-close-to top ranked school, most of our incoming graduate students had several solid years of research experience. Generally, top programs (all programs, really) are looking for graduate students that can be given a lab space and a problem and get to work without a lot of oversight. So a strong research background, both in actual techniques and in the ability to direct your projects is key.

My experience is that there's usually something extra for grad students. In some cases I've also seen different grading scales/expectations. Most common that I've seen is getting the grad students (when they're in the minority) to teach a lecture towards the end of the class. Good experience for them, and fulfills the extra requirement. I have found being in a primarily undergrad class as a grad student to be less ideal than a predominately graduate class, as the discussion is usually better in the latter. That, and undergrads are far too worried about grades, rather than getting into the material.

You really don't want to use letters from grad students unless you have no other options. I know I would tell ny of my undergrads who asked that they need to find a professor.

3 professors willing to say that you were a great student and a capable researcher.