SOME ADVICE FROM FACULTY - TIBBS



SOME ADVICE FROM FACULTY

As a former graduate student and now faculty member, what advice would you give to an incoming student to help him/her succeed in the program?

Don’t be afraid to ask questions! Too many students shrink from asking questions in their classes or in the lab, because they’re afraid they’ll look stupid. . In fact, there are NO stupid questions! Nobody will criticize you for not knowing some particular thing and asking about it. In fact, if you don’t ask any questions, your teachers and lab colleagues will conclude that you’re not very interested in what’s going on and that you don’t really care about learning new things. I’m convinced that a willingness to ask questions is one of the most crucial attributes of successful grad students, and of successful scientists in general. In grad school, people are not going to be telling you exactly what to do a lot of the time; if you don’t ask for clarification, you’re not going to know what’s expected of you.

Be willing to ask questions of both senior students and faculty. Start reading the literature (Nature, Science, have very good reviews in the front of each issue). Attend seminars in as broad an area as possible. The first year is your chance to get exposed to different types of scientific approaches and techniques; try to do that.

Work hard, read, go to seminars, work hard.

Graduate School has the word school in it but it is a misnomer. You are in professional training and what you put in is what you will get out. You are in competition with your peers and eventually with students at other institutions as you move through your career. You will be judged by your ability to bring projects to completion and get them published. The sum total of your efforts in graduate school (how clever you were in designing experiments, how careful you were in doing experiments, how critical you were in interpreting experiments, how hard you worked, how you got along with other people, how well you discuss and present your work) will all be summed up in the recommendation letter you receive from your graduate advisor when you attempt to get a position after graduate school. If you view yourself as a student trying to figure out the minimum requirements to get a PhD you will not be very competitive. You should use your training to develop the confidence to be an independent thinker. In Graduate School we require that you test ideas through your own research efforts, but ultimately you will get a PhD for your ability to think and eventually you will be competing for jobs based on your ability to think through and lead a research effort. People who just want to work in a lab as their career goal do not need a PhD.

Stay determined-don’t be afraid of hard work-don’t get easily discouraged-communicate clearly and often.

Work hard, think about what you are doing and don't hesitate to ask about anything that you don't understand completely.

Treat this as a job, not as a continuation of undergrad. That means fall, Christmas and spring breaks should be carefully considered -- take some time off, but also take advantage of the quiet and focus on your lab work etc. Become a very active member of the lab -- speak up in lab meeting, go to talk with your mentor about data, work to generate your own ideas.

You have to be extremely self-motivated. This is not a part-time career and the returns are proportional to the effort you put into it. Although there are usually no set hours those that put in more are the ones that succeed. It’s not that you have to be in the lab all the time, but the more effort you put into this career, the quicker you move on and the more competitive you become for the better post-docs and ultimately faculty position. You have to be aware that you are surrounded by equally bright, if not brighter, individuals than yourself so don’t pretend to know everything. Be courteous to lab mates, don’t put anyone down or try to make it appear your superior to anyone-including non-degree workers like dish washers-it will come back to haunt you. Ultimately, you should find a project that is so interesting you can’t put it down at night and can’t wait to start on it the next morning-anything short is a recipe for mediocrity.

Expect to enjoy graduate school and to work hard. Appreciate all the new things you are learning instead of complaining about all the studying that you have to do. The people you meet are important. Realize that some of these people—students, postdoc and faculty may turn out to be life-long colleagues.

How might a graduate student make a positive impression on his/her mentor?

Thoughtful questions that show you’re thinking about what you’re doing will make a really positive impression.

Coming to talk about rotations after reading papers and preparing.

Don’t wait for your mentor to come to you and ask how your experiments are going. When you have a result that’s interesting or that you need help in interpreting, go to your P.I. and initiate a conversation about it. That’s how he or she will know that you are interested in what you’re doing in the lab and that you are thinking about it, not just doing what you’re told.

Read the background of your project. Try to get answers to the simple questions (what went wrong with this experiment?) from people in the lab. Participate in group discussions (at lab meetings).

Work hard, try to actually accomplish something, forget about “numbers of hours”, engage the P.I.

Ask questions. Everyone knows you are a new student so there is no need to be embarrassed because you don't know as much as people who have been here awhile. We can teach people who are interested in learning and the best way to let us know you want to learn is to ask questions. Read the related papers from the lab. You may have to read them several times and ask questions after each reading to develop enough of a knowledge base to really understand them. Don't be passive, you need to play an active role your in your own instruction.

In the long run:

A. Look at data critically. Know the difference between a good experiment and a bad experiment. Learn how to design proper positive and negative controls.

B. Learn the biology of the system. It is too easy to become limited to the technical aspects of bench science, which are demanding enough. However, it is important to understand the why of an experiment (also called the Big Picture). An important step in your development is when you start designing your own experiments based on your own ideas about how a biological system works. Not everyone will be able to reach this level during their graduate career but it is an essential part of being an independent researcher.

C. Be interactive. Science is a community of people, from working in a lab to going to meetings to providing peer review. You need to be a positive contributor to this larger community by your ability to make a lab a better to do science (this does not mean being in charge of picking out the CDs or keeping up on everyone's gossip), always being willing (and able) to discuss your own work, providing critical analysis of the work of others in a constructive way, and contributing to the ongoing process of training that is a feature of University laboratories.

D. Work hard

Take initiative-communicate –demonstrate efforts to think for yourself-ask questions-work hard-make research a top priority.

I am always pleased when a student takes the time to read around their project and in particular develop an historical perspective about their area of research so they can understand how ideas developed and how their work fits in with what has been done before.

Get excited about the research, be extremely motivated-don’t put out anything less than 110% effort. If you’re in the middle of an experiment, don’t leave just because its 5pm-clock-watchers are never wanted. Be inquisitive, don’t hesitate to ask why!

Show a burning curiosity; don’t be afraid to participate in lab meetings and journal clubs, i.e. ask questions especially if there is something you don’t understand. Work hard on your lab project but also work smart. If you don’t understand how to do something, be sure to ask, and ask more than one person if necessary. Do not be afraid to ask the PI of the lab!! Ask the PI and the person you may be paired with during the rotation for the most important papers to read. Also take initiative to look some things up yourself on pubmed. Finally, if there is something not right about the rotation or something that the lab can do better, please bring it to the attention of the mentor. They can’t fix a situation if they don’t know about it.

What mistakes have you seen graduate students make in their first year that could have been avoided?

Sometimes new grad students take too long to figure out that grad school is a full-time commitment. In many ways, being a grad student is much like having a regular full-time job: you’re expected to be “at work” all day, every day of the working week. When you’re not in class, you should be in your “home” lab (either rotation lab or permanent one), doing experiments, reading and thinking, or studying. Students sometimes make the mistake of hanging onto an undergrad mentality and thinking that they’re “off” when not in formal classes or that they don’t need to show up when classes are not in session. That’s a really good way to make a negative impression on your mentor and other faculty members.

Students sometimes talk only to each other and not to the faculty, which is a mistake. For example, a student who is really interested in joining Professor X’s lab will decide that it’s not possible and won’t even approach Prof. X about it, because the word on the “student grapevine” is that Professor X will take only one student and has already promised a slot to another student. It’s crazy to pass up an opportunity to join the lab you really want, based on second- or third- (or twentieth-) hand information. It may well be that Prof. X was planning to take only one student, but could be talked into taking two if both students are truly committed. Whatever the case, it’s important to find out exactly what the situation is, and not to rely on gossip when such important choices are involved.

Another mistake is to be too passive, and to wait until your teachers or lab mentors seek you out before you tell them what’s going on with you. If you have a problem, or are feeling uncertain about what you’re supposed to be doing, take the initiative and go talk to someone appropriate (your Graduate Director, rotation mentor, course director or lecturer) about it. Don’t wait and do nothing while the problem gets bigger and bigger. In general, the faculty are eager to be of help to you and will spend as much time as needed with you. However, they are going to expect you to be active rather than passive, and to let them know when you need help.

Don’t be afraid to “rotate” in many different labs to find the right one. Most programs allow you to continue trying labs out during the first summer. This is much better than choosing a lab and then changing it a year later.

Don’t spend all the time in the lab and do poorly in courses.

Taking rotations too lightly. I think we ought to instill the notion that they should actually strive to complete a set of experiments. Also, I don’t think we do enough to encourage students – might be more true of department students – to take a good look at the variety of courses offered by different departments, including Biology in the college.

Being timid. Take your professional training seriously from the start.

Not asking questions-not keeping an organized notebook-not being committed enough to stick with the experiments until they work.

I don't think there is much scope for making mistakes in the first year. Students need to do adequately in their classes and use their rotation choices wisely to find a suitable lab. In my opinion the most common root of all problems that graduate students encounter is in choice of project. Projects that are dependent on development of some key reagent or experimental system (in the past this could have meant purifying a protein, cloning a gene, now perhaps it might be making a knock out mouse) are a very bad idea. Projects that take some solid observation that can be built on in a logical way are a much better vehicle for student training.

Reading novels and surphing the web during incubations - better to read a science paper or talk to people in the lab about their projects.

Working the bare minimum, not showing up when expected, being passive and waiting to be told wht to do.

Spending more time on their cell phone then they spend working in the lab or thinking about science.

Pretending they know more than they really do. Not taking the research serious and acting like they are still taking an undergraduate course. Not being anal! Not being extraordinarily precise-not taking detailed notes, and not knowing what is being done before starting. Spending too much time on the computer.

Not communicating enough with the PI or others in the lab when/if there is a problem.

How many hours per week do you feel a student should devote to working in the lab?

This is a complicated issue, since it depends so much on the student’s other commitments. For a first-year student who is taking two courses, doing rotation reports, etc, I would expect at least 20 hours a week working in the lab or reading papers directly related to the research in the lab. I don’t believe that a student needs to be in the lab every evening and every weekend, but do expect a willingness to work outside of “regular” working hours when necessary to keep experiments moving forward optimally.

The issue of how many hours a week a more senior student should spend in the lab is also complicated, because it also depends on the efficiency of the student’s work. Some students who spend minimal time goofing off or schmoozing with other students and who are highly organized are able to get a great deal of work accomplished in a 40-45 hour week. There are sometime students who spend a lot more than that amount of time in the lab, but who don’t ever seem to get as much accomplished. My expectations are usually defined in terms of how much gets accomplished, rather than a set number of hours that I expect students to be present in the lab.

When a student is full-time in the lab, it is a full-time job. Number of hours depends on efficiency. Be willing to come in the night before (or on the weekend) to set things up so you will have something to do. I have people who work when they are there (little socializing, well-organized) and 8 hrs a day is plenty; others are there 12 hrs a day but do less. However this is something to check out since each lab is different. Some will insist on long hours. The main thing is to be willing to put in the extra effort to keep the project moving. During the first year at least 10 hrs a week and probably 20 if one is not teaching during that time.

As many as possible – seriously, I hate to think of it as number of hours – sounds like a job. I’d like to think that they will be immersing themselves in their science as much as possible. I think we should tell them that this is their first opportunity to really throw themselves in science, and that they should work in the labs as much as is consistent with passing their courses.

In every field, not just science, the people who work the hardest are more competitive than those who work less. Graduate School is not school but it is not a job either. If there are many things outside of your professional training that are important to you then you should be honest with yourself and your advisor about how much (or little) time you are willing to devote to your career. At the other extreme you can view a career where you have the responsibility of generating new knowledge as a privilege, be mindful of how tough the competition is and choose to commit yourself to your career wholeheartedly. In the end it will be obvious how much you worked by how much you got done so it is best not to be confused about how much effort you think you are making. If you look around you will see that the most successful people are working pretty hard. If you would like to maximize your chance of having a successful career in science then I would suggest working 60 hours per week for 50 weeks a year. During your rotations, showing your interest and enthusiasm with many questions and hard work will give you your choice of labs to choose from for your thesis work.

During semesters with coursework at least 40; with no coursework – 60 to 70.

Scientific research is a highly competitive and difficult endeavor that involves competition with others who are most probably brighter than you and quite likely have greater experience and resources. Things don't always work out. If you care about your science, the only way you can deal with failure and retain your sanity is to know that you did your best. If you don't care about failing then this isn't a good career choice. If you do care then you have to make the commitment to do put in the intellectual and practical effort required to make you competitive with others around the world who are doing the same. How many hours you spend in the lab is a part of this but frankly when I have ever had to have a discussion about lab time with a student it was always the beginning of the end. If you care about your work then the hours will take care of themselves.

When not taking classes and during summer rotations 50 hrs is the minimum; some reading and thinking at home is probably going to be needed as well. If you really are really unfocused and spend a large part of your day doing e-mail, taking walks to the coffee bar and talking about last nights TV, then you will to be there longer. During rotations the amount of time you spend in lab really depends on classes -- they matter so don't ignore them. On average you should probably spend 20 hrs per week - meaning some weeks you might take time to study whereas other weeks you will be in lab more.

Your not training for a hourly job, so treat is as such. Including course time, 40 hours should be considered a minimum! Not to say 80hours are needed or desired, but it definitely takes more than 40 for even the most skilled and brightest students.

As much as possible while still doing well in courses. At least 15-20h/week with a full load of courses. If the student is doing research full time—the usual 40h/week is NOT enough. Remember the lab is open evenings and weekends if needed.

Any other advice or information you feel would benefit a new graduate student

Talk to students and postdocs about different labs. Labs tend to have their own personalities and the relationship between student and mentor is complex. What will work for you is not what works for someone else.

Have confidence in yourself. Everyone who gets into graduate school is smart enough to be successful in science. Ultimately other things will determine whether or not you are successful, things that you have a lot of control over. If you are productive, interactive, and critical in your thinking you will succeed in science. Work hard to be those things. Finally, there will be disappointments along the way in exams, papers, grants, recognition, etc. If you believe in yourself you will bounce back quickly from these disappointments and learn from them.

You MUST be interested in and excited by this field, i.e. have a passion for it-if you are to succeed.

Seek out the very best people as advisors and mentors. Know your place in the world, it’s a humbling experience but by measuring yourself against the best you get a sense of what you should aspire to.

Pick one thing outside of school that really matters to you - this can be family, a hobby, a community activity, or exercise and make that a priority. Sacrifice on other things so that making progress with your education doesn't fall so far down the list that you are establishing yourself as a mediocre graduate student.

Be a team player-if you see someone else in that lab performing experiments that will take a long time and your not busy, offer to help-it will be paid back more than you realize. The number one priority at this point should be lab work-nothing; absolutely nothing should be more important if you’re serious about succeeding. Get and read the book: The PhD Process: A Student’s Guide to Graduate School in the Sciences by Bloom, Karp, and Cohen (1998). It has many actual case scenarios and was written by recently finished biomedical PhD students. It provides a very realistic view of life in the lab and what is expected.

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