Copyright (c) 2007 by Frank Vahid
(A synopsis of the book: How to Be
a Good Graduate Student -- Tips for succeeding in graduate school.)
Graduate school is the best kept secret in
America.
Many students, exhausted from their 4-6 years
of undergraduate courses, can't imagine why anyone would subject themselves to
2-6 more years of that torture to get a master's or Ph.D. degree, when a
bachelor's degree is sufficient to get good jobs. However, contrary to popular
misconception, graduate school is not just "more of the same."
Good reasons for going to grad school:
· You've already learned how to learn
· Professors run grad classes in a more enjoyable
manner, because students are mostly A and B students
· After finishing courses, you spend time
(months for a Masters, a couple years for a Ph.D.) doing research, which is
more like a fun job than "school."
· You'll work closely with great fellow grad
students who often become lifelong friends
· After all this, you get an advanced
degree, higher pay, more job satisfaction
Bad reasons for NOT going:
· You plan to work now and return to grad
school later. Good luck ever coming back -- it's hard to wean yourself from the
salary.
· You intend to get a masters while
working. Even taking one extra class can be tough on an already long work day
(plus family life), and stretches on for 6-8 years. Not particularly fun.
· You heard there are fewer available jobs
for advanced degrees. If quantity is your metric, McDonalds is hiring on every
corner.
· You don't want to delay starting a
family. But grad school can be a great place to start a family -- campus family
housing is inexpensive and convenient, fellow grad students are supportive
close friends. I got married before grad school, and had two kids while in grad
school -- my wife and I loved it, wouldn't change a thing.
Choosing a school is hard, but these are the
good choices in life (better than choosing which leg to amputate). There's no
"right" choice -- every school has pros and cons. So relax, don't
stress over this decision.
Many students look for highly-ranked schools.
To be frank, ranking does make a difference. Fellow students will be sharp,
making good friends to have in the future. If you plan to look for a job as a
professor, the ranking of your Ph.D. school plays a key role. But, you can do
great research at other schools too. Ranking is an important factor, but not
the only one.
If you have a preferred research area, you
might give more weight to schools with strengths in those areas. Check
department web pages, or ask professors you know.
Likewise, if you happen to have heard good
things about professors in your preferred area, that could help. But really,
most students don't know professors beforehand.
Apply to many schools; the cost of applying
is trivial in the big scheme of things. Admission offers often include
financial support that pay tuition/fees, and offer free money (fellowship, aka
scholarship), a teaching assistantship, and/or a research assistantship, for
some number of years. If you get multiple admission offers, don't just consider
the number of years of financial support -- most students switch to research
support from a particular professor after a year or two, so the difference
between a four-year offer and a three or even two year
offer may never materialize.
Some schools expect every student they admit
to succeed. Others fully intend to fail some percentage of their admitted
students. If that matters to you, ask around to find out which schools are
which.
It is unethical to accept a support offer
from one school with the plan to switch schools after a year or two. However,
if you are stressing out over the decision, realize that if you are truly
unhappy at one school, you aren't forced to stay -- you could switch schools
later if necessary.
You should plan to work hard in grad school.
But, take the easier classes first. That gives you time to adjust to your new
housing, new campus, new professors, even new country. It also gets you some
higher grades in the "bank" before you take tougher courses that may
lower your GPA. And, it can help with your motivation. Ask senior students if
there are professors with overly-harsh grading standards; consider avoiding
them altogether if possible.
Working as a teaching assistant (TAing) can
be fun and rewarding. Don't count on there being much training. Partnering with
an experienced TA, at least for the first few weeks, helps a lot. Read the
textbook before the semester; you'll already be way ahead of the students (who
may *never* read it). Learn to communicate heavily with fellow TAs and
professors, such as restating verbally agreed upon tasks in a followup email;
miscommunication (or undercommunication) is the source of many problems. IT'S
BETTER TO OVERCOMMUNICATE THAN UNDERCOMMUNICATE.
Young TAs (and young college teachers in
general) tend to grade too harshly in their first years, expecting students to
know as much as the teacher does. This not only is unfair, but demotivates
students, causing even worse performance. Good TAing is a balance between
giving students answers versus teaching them how to figure out the answers
themselves ("Feed a man a fish and he eats for a day; teach him to fish
and he eats for a lifetime"). Finds the balance is the art of teaching.
Motivation is also critical -- if you can motivate students to WANT to learn,
they'll learn much more. Speaking to a class requires speaking loudly --
practice this (it feels funny at first). Don't be put off by American students'
"coolness." High-school in the U.S. is socially brutal; a tough
facade helps the kids survive. Pay attention to grooming and clothing; you may
find students have more respect (why do you think airline pilots wear
uniforms?).
Help students help each other -- having them
work in pairs or groups, in class or out, can yield great results. Keep
"lectures" to 10 or 15 minutes at a time, then have students do
something active. Otherwise, their attention wanes. Remember -- lecture is
generally an ineffective mode of teaching. A bit of lecture, combined with
students actively doing something, seems to lead to more substantial learning.
Talk to fellow students and faculty as much
as you can. Never underestimate the importance of casual conversation; a huge
amount of information is learned just by chatting with people in the hallway,
in the mailroom, and at lunch.
Establish a habit of reading everyday, even
if just for 15 minutes, perhaps when arriving to lab in the morning, just after
lunch, etc. Read more when necessary of course, but stick to this minimum
habit. Have a stack of items that you want to read (papers, textbook chapters,
magazines, websites, etc.); reorganize the stack as priorities change. When you
read, first skim the item to get the main idea, and to decide whether a second
deeper reading is even necessary. On a second read, decide approximately how
much time you are willing to invest in this item (e.g., 10 minutes versus 1
hour), and read at the appropriate level of depth for that allocated time.
Your advisor oversees your graduate research
and approves your thesis. He/she is really more of a "boss" than an
advisor. Obviously, your advisor should be in your desired research area, but
other factors are important too.
Talking to a professor's current and former
students helps one learn if a professor is a good advisor. Does he treat the
students well, and do his students graduate and get good jobs? A good
student/advisor match may also require matching of personality, level of
guidance, work schedule, ethics, etc. It's more like dating than it is making a
rational choice like buying a car. Taking a course from a professor can help,
but doing a small project for a professor, perhaps an extended course project
or a volunteer project outside of any class, can help the student and professor
decide if there's a good match. In doing projects with professors, be aware
that professors are competing for students, so be careful not to
unintentionally suggest that you have affiliated with a professor before you
really have.
Time management is the job of balancing
multiple tasks that you must do. The key to balancing multiple tasks in
graduate school is: DON'T. Graduate school is a time to study one
problem very deeply, an opportunity you may never again have. Let yourself have
this enlightening and molding experience -- avoid taking on lots of tasks.
Maintain your personal life of course, but avoid overcommitting to other things
at school.
You will of course still have multiple tasks
competing for your time. Give priority to tasks on the path to your main goal,
which might be perhaps to get your Ph.D. and become a professor or get a great
industry job. Most students instead give priority to tasks with closer
deadlines. Be disciplined in allocating time. For example, given an on-path
task of writing a paper draft due next week, and an urgent task of grading
papers due in two days, allocate time to the former and do it FIRST. This might
mean you have less time to grade -- everything is a tradeoff. You can't do the
best job possible on every task, but rather the best job given the available
time, which you decide. Keeping a "to-do" list of tasks, either
electronic or in a notebook, can be a great help. Keep a notebook and write in
it often, taking notes at meeting, writing down new tasks, recording ideas,
etc. The trusty paper notebook is still essential; the only difference from 100
years ago is that today we might scan in the pages once in a while.
Avoid distraction tasks having little
importance, like frequent email checking, instant messaging, reading news
sites, etc. Create blocks of uninterupted time; 3 hours uninterrupted can be
far more productive than 6 30-minute work periods.
Get sufficient sleep -- it's critical to
clear thinking and to learning. Furthermore, strive to stay on a reasonable
schedule -- coming in late and working late may mean less time interacting with
your advisor and fellow students.
Your advisor has the main job of teaching you
how to do research. A few things can help. Take a baby step approach -- start
with a small clearly defined project, write a paper, submit to a non-stellar
conference, and present the paper if accepted. Gradually tackle more-complex
less-well-defined problems. Tackling too hard a project initially is a common
mistake, leading to little progress and to frustration.
Don't just work on a project; think
specifically about the contribution of your project to the research
community. A contribution should be: (1) new, (2) useful, and (3) hard. For a
given project, ask yourself what's new, why it's useful, and if carrying out the
project requires advanced knowledge and cleverness. If not, your later paper
might not get accepted, and even if it does, it may not have any impact. Coming
up with research projects that make a real contribution is hard -- your advisor
has the duty to help in your early years.
Meet regularly with your advisor. Don't wait
for him/her to set meetings; if he/she doesn't, request to meet. Meet at least
weekly. Come to meetings prepared, with a pen, your notebook, printouts,
materials from previous meetings, etc. -- don't just show up empty handed. Ask
questions -- pick your advisor's brain. Go to lunch or for coffee sometimes, as
those informal conversations are often just as important as formal ones.
Writing a good paper has very little to do
with writing, and much more to do with two other things: (1) Having a clearly
defined contribution, and (2) Organizing the subject for the reader. The goal
is to make a point, not to write good English. The latter would be like saying
that the goal of driving is to hold the steering wheel correctly.
Regarding (1), first think of the one main
point that your paper should make. What should the reader learn? It should be
summarizable in perhaps one sentence, e.g., "Smoking increases lung cancer
rates" or "My new cache memory design reduces power". Many paper
writers just summarize the work they've done ("Here's what I did for the
summer"), but the single main point isn't clear.
Regarding (2), after determining a paper's
main point, but before starting to write, you should organize the information
you will provide. The information should clearly support your main point. Too
many students throw in extra information because they spent time learning it or
creating it, but including it dillutes the main point. Focus, focus, focus.
Create an outline of the paper's sections and the subject of each paragraph.
Create pictures for main ideas -- "A
picture is worth a thousand words." Pictures also help convey the main
point to readers skimming the paper.
Only after all of the above is done should
you start writing English sentences. Holding off on writing sentences requires
discipline, but the resulting papers are far more comprehensible. It's like
painting a house -- disciplined painters don't just start slapping paint on the
walls. Instead, they do a lot of preparation work first -- washing/sanding
walls, covering furniture, taping, repairing holes, etc. The resulting paint
job is far better.
When learning to write, avoid potentially
vague references like "It" or "This means." Replace such
references by the explicit object being referred to, like "The
computer" or "Increasing transistor densities means" even if
such explicit reference means more words. An experienced writer learns to only
use references when those references are unambiguous -- a tough skill to
master. Also when learning to write, use simple sentences consisting of
subject, verb, object/prepositional phrase. Don't use contorted sentences with
lots of commas. The writing may not be artistic, but the point will be more
clear. Be sure to have your paper read and proofread by others before
submitting them for review -- a second set of eyes can find many ambiguities
and mistakes, which can otherwise kill a paper in the review process.
Be aware that reviewers rarely read a paper
thoroughly; many just read the abstract and most of the introduction and
conclusion, look at the pictures, and skim the content. Such skimming is not
because reviewers are lazy, but rather because they are busy. Try to make your main
point in the abstract, early in the intro, and through pictures. Think
explicitly about potential criticisms, and address them directly (briefly in
the intro, and in more detail in the paper).
Presentations are common in grad school, in
classes, for Ph.D. exams, at conferences, etc.
Being very nervous is normal. Nervousness
decreases with experience, so don't be concerned about it -- it will get
better.
Think explicitly about your audience, and
cater your presentation to them. Undergraduate students typically want several
different explanations of the same subject. They also want to be motivated. And
they'll appreciate a few jokes. Technical conference attendees typically want
to know the main idea and the results, and only want detail enough to
understand the main idea, not to re-implement your project. Don't assume
audience members are experts in your specific research area; think about what
most audience members would already know, and start from there working towards
your specific research contribution.
Having a clear main point is even more
important in a presentation than it is in a paper. Don't try to include
everything you did -- that's a presenter-centric view of the presentation
("I did this work and I want you to know it"). Instead, focus on what
the audience can learn from your talk, and emphasize that in the talk. Tell
them the main point up front, rather than unveiling it slowly -- you are
presenting technical information, not telling a TV story with a surprise ending.
Don't compete with your own slides. If you
create text slides and then speak the same things, the audience must decide
whether to read or listen. You set yourself up to compete with your slides.
Instead, use pictures and plots, and explain them to your audience -- now you
are the good guy who is helping the audience understand. Keep text on slides
short, supplementing pictures/plots just enough to organize information, remind
yourself what to say, and make a key point explicit.
For a conference/industry presentation, put
your name at the bottom of slides -- you are selling yourself as much as you
are selling your ideas. Number your slides, ideally like "5 of 12,"
so the audience knows how many more slides exist.
Start a presentation by engaging your
audience. Don't start by making "necessary" acknowledgements of
colleagues and funding sources or by giving a dry outline --
audience members will decide to tune out. Start with an interesting
fact, surprising data, a story, even a small joke in an informal setting --
audience members will perk up and decide to focus.
Practice talks extensively. A conference talk
should be practiced 5-10 times, ideally at least once in front of fellow
students. Note time throughout the talk and know times at milestones, so during
the real talk you know if you are short or long. More experience means less
practice is needed, but even experienced presenters should practice a couple
times.
Respect allotted time -- avoid going long,
which can destroy a schedule or keep people from their next appointment. If
questions may be asked during a talk, meaning you don't know how long slides
will take to cover, then know beforehand which slides you can skip. Experienced
presenters actually prepare a shorter talk than the allotted time to allow for
questions, and then include additional content to account for fewer questions,
and which the speaker optionally will skip. Don't be attached to your material;
your audience won't digest material that you plow quickly through while running
over time. Better to skip things, focus on the main point.
Following the above advice (even assuming it
was good advice) doesn't guarantee success -- there are too many other factors.
A key ability to success in graduate school and in your career is to tolerate
failure .
Do your best, and hope to succeed, but don't feel bad if you don't. Most
graduate students WILL experience failures along the way -- low grades in a
course, bad TA evaluations, rejected papers (LOTS of those), rejected job
applications, etc. The key is to tolerate those failures, learn what can be
learned from them, and move on. Eventually, successes may come, and they may
outweigh the failures. Even long-established professors and industry leaders
experience failure after failure -- it's normal.
A final note: all the success in the world
may mean little if you don't have good people in your life. Seek relationships,
nurture those you currently have, and you may find success to be much more
meaningful.
A book on the above subject is available: How to Be a Good Graduate Student.
The book covers the above subjects in more detail, covers more aspects of each
subject, and includes additional chapters on traveling and on preparing for an
academic career.
For undergraduate students considering
whether to attend graduate school, we at UCR CS&E have been using the
following slides for several years at our annual graduate school information
meeting: Is Graduate School for You?.