Dr. Isis came home tonight after Friday night cocktails with her colleagues prepared to blog about shoes, how totally hot she is, or some other terribly important topic that you would inevitably find absolutely riveting.
Figure 1: Even though Dr. Isis has changed the topic she planned to write about, the shoes are too hot to not show you. Croc-embossed stiletto pump. $29.00 at Newport News.
But, as Dr. Isis sat at dinner with Mr. Isis, she found herself fascinated by a new topic. And though Dr. Isis is rarely distracted from a pair of hot pumps, she found this new topic sufficiently interesting that she'd like to share it with you.
Dr. Isis is a scientist and, as such, has been involved in the education of more junior scientists. She's taught some traditional lecture-style courses, but her favorite course is a class in methods in physiology. She loves watching students learn some of the fundamental techniques in her field, generate hypotheses, and test them.
Figure 2: An artist's rendition of Dr. Isis teaching Starling's Law of the Heart.
But Dr. Isis isn't reinventing the wheel in her courses. After her students test their hypotheses, they write a report in the typical article format with introduction, methods, results, and discussion sections. In terms of the content, the reports are almost entirely interchangeable. Some of the students are better writers than others, but the information is largely the same. Still, Dr. Isis thinks this process is extremely important educationally -- she thinks that good writing is much more difficult to teach than good lab technique (in contrast, her students are usually far more worried about learning good technique than to be a good writer).
Video 1: Dr. Isis is looking for "just the facts, ma'am" in a lab report.
Mr. Isis, by contrast, teaches writing and English for a liberal arts college. At dinner Mr. Isis shared with his blushing bride some of the results from one of his students' recent assignments. This is the beginning of their term and Mr. Isis asked them to do a bit of freewriting; he asked them to write about an author they felt they identified with. One student wrote about a particular novel detailing the protagonist's life after a sexual assault. She identified with it because she had been sexually assaulted. Another student wrote about his identification with a particular series of romance novels because they were all he could get in prison.
Figure 3: Mr. Isis's student is a huge Nora Roberts fan
Hearing Mr. Isis's students' responses made me reflect on the way I interact with my students. His students have shared with him some deeply personal stories and I wondered if it changed the way he interacted with them -- for example, can you give a "C" to the girl who turns in a paper about the abuse her mother suffered at the hands of her father, even if the quality of her writing warrants it? In this sense, hearing Mr. Isis's students' responses made me thankful for the boundaries the culture of science writing establishes. I can't imagine that any of my students would begin a paper with "I performed this experiment because I became interested in the topic during the 45 days I spent in the hole for shanking a bitch."
Not that I mean to make light of his students' experiences (I can tell you that I suspect one of my own students may have done a little time with Mr. Isis's student), but the accepted structure of science writing removes much of the personal quality. In that sense, I don't come to know my students in the same way he does. The pragmatic scientist in me is hugely thankful for that. The educator in me, however, wonders if it limits the degree to which I can benefit my students. It may be easier to write about a topic in a paper than to come see the extraordinarily hot Dr. Isis in her office when you're struggling. Being the domestic and laboratory goddess, I am acutely aware of how linked one's professional and personal successes truly are.
But even as I write this, and ponder the potential benefits of knowing my students better, my gut tightens a bit. Once one alters the current conventions of science writing with students you a) do them a disservice later in their career and b) potentially open a whole new drama-filled can of worms that the domestic and laboratory goddess is not prepared to deal with.
I think, in this case, the domestic and laboratory goddess is going to sit back, pour herself another glass of Shiraz, and watch what Mr. Isis does.
Video 2: Dr. Isis suggested Mr. Isis's students' writing might benefit from watching this educational video. Dr. Isis has considered taping $2.53 to the back of her next manuscript submission to "seal the deal."
Education & Careers
Medicine & Health
Comments
Huh. This post has given me something to think about. How well do/can/should we know our students?
Posted by: The Ridger | November 8, 2008 6:33 AM
I also think professors ought to relate differently to students (in general) and their advisees (in the specific). A professor should be able to permit all sorts of conversation within the advisor relationship as students' personal concerns do effect how they interact with material.
Posted by: Academic | November 8, 2008 8:50 AM
I am teaching adults in the boonies and I am often faced with this type of problem. What do I do about the student who missed a test because his usual ride did not turn up and he had a 5-mile walk though blowing snow (there being no taxis in the community)? Or the one who has an abusive husband, two children but no reliable baby-sitter and no parents? Another missed a week because she had to accompany her grandmother to the hospital a 90-minute flight away.
Problems like the last one are quite common because the young adults in the program are generally more responsible and reliable than the majority who drift around all day, but they get tugged by the competing demands.
There is no easy answer. On the one hand, there are standards that should be maintained yet because of their situation few students can meet them. I try to be reasonably accommodating but in practice there is normally between a 50% and 80% attrition rate during a 4 month course.
Posted by: Richard Simons | November 8, 2008 9:11 AM
As someone who teaches both math and philosophy, I find this a very interesting topic!
I imagine that many educators struggle with how to deal with the non-traditional students that are struggling with family, finances, and the challenges of returning to college. (Not that traditional students do not have problems!)
It is tough to balance school with other competing demands in life. And I find that sometimes I cannot look a student in the eye and honestly say that passing my exam is more important than having time to express grief over the loss of a cat. As educations, I argue that we have more responsibility then just teaching our subject matter expertise. We have a responsibility to be responsive to teaching people, when the need arises, how to appropriately balance education with living life. Any class a student takes should be about enhancing their life, not dominating it.
Granted, not every student is ready for what we have to teach them. At some point we do have a responsibility to ourselves and other students to back off and admit there is no more we can do to help someone.
I’ve been experimenting with various grading systems that I hope allow students to make their choices to balance life with demonstrating to what level they have mastered the knowledge or skills taught in the course. Some strategies that seem to work: add in extra quizzes so that a small number of quizzes can be dropped, offering the option of take-home exams (with ample warnings that take home exams are harder and cheating is a no-no), or having an optional in-class comprehensive final exam.
I’m curious to know how other people handle the professional / personal divide between students, and what techniques do you use to help students balance education with other aspects of life.
Posted by: Michael | November 8, 2008 9:33 AM
Richard, these are interesting thoughts. Because I have always been at large universities non-traditional students have always comprised a small proportion ofthe class population. As an adult with a family and "rel life" responsibilities, I find that I am often very sympathetic to the struggles they face in obtaining an education. On the other hand, Michael makes an excellent point that the grief a traditional student is feeling over the death of her beloved cat is probably as real to her as the struggles the non-traditional student faces in trying to find child care, etc. Why shouldn't I value both? Yet, I think that science education at large universities, by its very nature, sometimes limits the degree that we know our students and the onus is upon them to seek help. Seeing Mr. Isis interact with his students has given me pause to reflect.
Posted by: Isis the Scientist | November 8, 2008 9:48 AM
For Dr. Isis, a student's perspective. It wasn't quite what I was planning to write today, but oh, well.
Posted by: Stephanie Z | November 8, 2008 11:41 AM
It's very difficult as a young female professor, too, to figure out where the line is in offering vs. giving help when asked. I'm finding a strange interaction with the balance between knowing when I should let people know that I am ready to give them guidance and patience, and when I need to hold back because they're crossing a line. I've already had a lot more students drawn to me for idealistic/role-modelish reasons than my male recent-hire colleague even though he is a very, very nice person (and possibly less scary than I am sometimes). So I guess everyone needs to be dealt with on an individual basis, because while most of them have been naturally gravitating and genuinely wanting my interaction, a few others have been disingenuously trying to see if I would give them an easier time than the dudes.
Posted by: Arlenna | November 8, 2008 11:49 AM
When I was a junior faculty member, I used to get much more involved in student's lives. Mostly because I was closer in age to them. While I still hear great gossip in the lab from my own students, I tend to want to learn these items less first hand and more second hand.
Dr. Isis: Have you made the transition away from going to social events events thrown by postdocs or grad students yet? At what point does a P.I. move from a slightly older yet youthful example for younger labbies, to someone who needs to spend more time with people from their own decade?
Dr F
Posted by: Dr. Feelgood | November 8, 2008 12:38 PM
My Physics professor wife and I have been searching for a sexy black leather lab coat as an alternative to her boring white lab coats. But she is too sensible to wear even very pretty stiletto-heels shoes. Getting to the main point of this thread, though...
American public schools -- a report from the trenches on the front line of the war against ignorance.
I've just finished grading midterm exams from my predominantly African-American students in a charter school run by African Americans, in a predominantly African-American neighborhood. 8th grade home room, 9th grade Chemistry, 10th grade Biology, 11th grade Anatomy & Physiology. For the previous year, I was a substitute teacher in Pasadena-area high schools and middle schools.
I've taken a break from my being an Adjunct Professor of Astronomy at Mt. San Antonio College and Adjunct Professor of Mathematics at an expensive private university (Woodbury University, Burbank, CA). Evenings, 4-8 p.m., I'm again after 1/3 century a grad student (Charter College of Education of California State University Los Angeles) in order to meet the insane "No Child Left Behind" requirements and be allowed to be a full-time secondary school teacher of mathematics (wherein, as I say, I've been a professor). So here's the bottom line, based on close to 2 years of secondary teaching, and the dumbed-down Teachers College curriculum:
The United States of America, notwithstanding Brown v Board of Ed, 1/2 century ago, is DE FACTO resegregated by income and race.
This is symptomatic of a nearly complete failure of the public school system in urban settings, and the feeble relative success of white and Asian enclaves in neighborhoods of cities and in suburbs.
This is, say my friends in Singapore, Bangalore, and the like, connected with the collapse of the American Empire, which America cannot admit, and the consequent abandonment of cities, as exemplified by George W. Bush's indifference to New Orleans.
Be that as it may, there are, for school-aged Americans, 2 Americas. The paradox of American education is that the best here is unexcelled anywhere in the world, while the mean and median have plummeted to 3rd World status.
Teaching requires a balance of 3 things:
(1) Instruction (duh!);
(2) Management (lesson plans, administrative organization, classroom environment);
(3) Assessment (USA has gone madly in favor of badly-conceived standardized tests, at the expense of actual education such as I received at Stuyvesant High School in New York City, which today would be called a "magnet school").
This year's rankings of the top universities in the world begins:
(1) Harvard
(2) Yale
(3) Cambridge
(4) Oxford
(5) Caltech (where I went in 1968 upon graduated from Stuyvesant).
The bifurcation of education in the USA is a tragedy, a monstrosity, and must be dealt with.
Fortunately, Mr. and Mrs. Obama AND Mr. and Mrs. Biden have -- all 4 of them -- worked as professors or otherwise in schools.
Change that we can believe in. Let's see what happens...
Posted by: Jonathan Vos Post | November 8, 2008 2:23 PM
Stephanie -- a very thoughtful and touching post. Thank you for choosing to share it with us.
Jonathan -- you send that wife over to see Dr. Isis. We'll have her sexed up in no time.
Dr. Feelgood -- I am in a unique situation in that I am housed in a clinical department. We don't have the same social structure that one would find in a basic department and alot more technicians, nurses, etc. So, that said, I largely socialize with whoever I find most interesting at the time.
Posted by: Isis the Scientist | November 8, 2008 3:08 PM
As a nontraditional student at a very large MRU, I'm hoping I can bring some insight from the other side into this discussion. I'm not all that much older than the traditional students at my university, but it's a huge divide in life experience and maturity. I sit in class on 9/11 and listen to them talk about it, realizing that I was in college when it happened and they were as young as 10 or 11 years old. I still can pass for one of them, and I'm often mistakenly thrown into their mix by professors.
I went from a small campus of a large state university when I was 17 to a community college, to the huge MRU I will be graduating from in December. In all of these settings I searched for a mentor. I only found one at the community college. I think that all students who are seeking a path in academia are starving for a mentor. We need someone who is doing what we want to be doing to get to know us on a personal level. But we find ourselves in a bind. Everyone knows that a highly ranked student at a large university is seen as more valuable to graduate admissions committees than the number one student at a small college. But when us highly ranked students attend a large university, we find that our interactions with professors are severely limited. For my doctoral applications that are going out as we speak, I have two letters of recommendation coming from professors at my MRU - one of whom I have met with several times but has never let me get a word in edgewise and assumes he knows everything about me already, and one of whom I admire greatly for her accomplishments and has a lab that I have worked in for 6 months. She has only ever met me once. The third letter is coming from my mentor at the community college, who I have frequent contact with even though I am no longer a student there, and who I took several classes with.
Most of you are probably thinking right now, "Why would she ask for letters from those two professors at MRU?" Believe me, I know. But at a large MRU, you very rarely get to take classes with full professors. They are more often taught by graduate students. Also, when you seek out a research assistant position with a professor, you often end up doing work for one of their graduate students as they complete a master's thesis or dissertation research. Maybe it's lack of time, but full professors at big schools don't seem to have much interest in getting to know undergrads. So to answer your question, I didn't have a choice.
Ideally, a professor would seek out individual meetings with students from his or her classes who are majors in the division for which they work. Ideally, this would take place at the very beginning of each semester. Students are constantly reminded of how busy full professors are, and how we should never bother them unless absolutely necessary. Most professors tell students at the beginning of a course that email is really the only way to get in touch with them other than the two office hours they are available each week.
As a student, what is the likelihood that I am going to walk in to a professor's office hours or make an appointment with them, doing so for no other reason than, "I just want you to get to know me better?" It would take a special and rare kind of confidence for an undergrad to do that, and even then it would more than likely be construed as arrogance. Sure, I could pretend I'm having problems in the course, but then I might appear needy. I have tried the approach of asking questions that probe much deeper than the class lecture went, but then I find myself on the receiving end of another lecture instead of a discussion.
Papers such as the one Mr. Isis asked his students to write are a great way for students to present the personal side of themselves to someone they admire. I think that anyone who is comfortable and willing to reveal information like a history of sexual assault or time in prison is writing those things as an attempt to form a connection with someone they admire and respect. It was a similar assignment that led me to connect with my mentor initially.
I've written a bit of a novel here, but it's an issue that is very close to my heart. Undergraduate students need you. We NEED professors in our field of interest to get to know us as human beings and help guide us in accomplishing our goals. Advisors are often assigned arbitrarily and switched around by the university when needed. Mine left for sabbatical 6 months ago after we spent time getting to know each other. Even then, I don't feel our relationship is such that I could ask her to write letters on my behalf while she is away from campus for a year.
We need you guys. Some of us would be your unpaid personal assistant and lackey if it meant forming a relationship with a person we admire and respect. But how do we, as students, walk into your office and say, "I will do anything you want me to do if only you'll spend some time getting to know me?"
Posted by: JLK | November 8, 2008 3:44 PM
as a grad student, i can say i think we face a question on the flip side of this. how much personal info does one share with someone who is there to teach you to be a better scientist? i thought it was strictly my business and did not need to be discussed. but inevitably, the stuff affects you, whether you intend it to or not.
i went through months of clumsy, inconclusive biopsies at uni hospital and my coping mechanism was complete mania- i worked myself to death but got nothing done. i should have picked up on the tension between the boss and me being related to this, but my mind wasn't right. when i finally disclosed what was going on (i was pointedly asked), i got so much support. i should have learned from that, but i didn't.
later, it was a particularly intolerable episode of something else. and that was the breaking point, where i finally started putting certain things out in the open. that knowledge really did change how we interacted. i think it gave a lot of insight into how i work and probably a lot about my motivations. i guess the boss did need to know some of this, to know how to advise me as an individual. we get along great now! no more misunderstandings.
my husband is a nontraditional student at a technical college, and has gone to great lengths (and several different schools) to achieve his future degree. i have found the instructors in this system to be truly amazing in supporting him, especially his program director at the school that will grant his degree. husband has never been afraid to discuss why he is where he is in life, and i think that ability to put oneself out there goes a long way in interpersonal relationships. many scientists tend to be a little more introverted and this is harder for some of us to do.
Posted by: leigh | November 8, 2008 3:54 PM
We need you guys. Some of us would be your unpaid personal assistant and lackey if it meant forming a relationship with a person we admire and respect. But how do we, as students, walk into your office and say, "I will do anything you want me to do if only you'll spend some time getting to know me?"
JLK, I would suggest you do just that--you walk into a professor's office during office hours or by appointment and say, "I will do whatever scut you want if you let me learn from you." I would point you to the pile of dishes in the lab sink. You'd do scut, but eventually you'd learn something cool. I think you'd find most folks are impressedby enthusiasm.
Posted by: Isis the Scientist | November 8, 2008 4:53 PM
I seriously think I must have been JLK a few years ago.
Even now, as a grad student, I have trouble with the "how much should I bug my advisor" issue. I can never figure out what I'm 'allowed' to ask for help with. It seems like I should just be able to do it all (write up research proposals, plan the experiments, run the experiments, write up and publish the experiments, network with collaborators, develop my own education and professional skills...).
(incidently, I think this relates to Clueless Student Syndrome, where you feel like your PI doesn't do anything. I'm not sure it's easy to tell the difference between highly skilled mentors who are constantly challenging you so that you'll learn more and highly inept mentors who consistently neglect you).
I am also perpelexed by the question of how much closeness there should be with an advisor and student. I'm much more comfortable now that I have a mentor who doesn't pry too much and keeps his professional distance than I was with other "buddy" advisors. But that may just be because I've gotten burned pretty badly.
leigh- I think working exceptionally hard unproductively is a way to doom an advisor/student relationship. You feel frustrated, they feel frustrated. It can be very hard not to blame each other. Now, if only I could figure out a way to pratice what I preach...
Posted by: Becca | November 8, 2008 6:45 PM
"I performed this experiment because I became interested in the topic during the 45 days I spent in the hole for shanking a bitch."
I'm writing a lab report for one of my courses right now, and you have no idea how tempted I am to start with that. Must resist.
On a serious note, I'll second JKL on everything. I'm an undergrad at a very large university and after almost 3 years the only prof I've talked to outside of class has been one that is an advisor for a student organization I'm involved with. And despite him being in a different area from the one I'm interested in, he has been important in helping me decide to work on getting into grad school.
Posted by: LostMarbles | November 8, 2008 7:54 PM
Dr. Isis, that's what I did that ended up with me working in a lab for a graduate student instead of the professor who was running the lab. I was told that the work I did for the graduate student would translate into a relationship with the professor. It didn't happen, though she still agreed to write letters on my behalf. She also made a point of telling me that those letters would be very limited in what they had to say. It was discouraging because I had only ever wanted to work with her in the first place. The result was not for lack of effort on my part.
I think it's very difficult for professors to remember how important they are to us "little" guys. Your careers involve so much more than undergrad teaching, and heaven knows if you're seeking tenure, your undergrad students are essentially irrelevant. I have no doubt that Dr. Isis is an exceptional mentor, and if I wasn't so dedicated to the social sciences I would switch to physiology and try to figure out where she is so I could work with her.
In my case, working full-time and going to school full-time has forced me to prioritize. I have sacrificed a personal life and even a marriage in order to pursue my goals. I have a ridiculous gpa and I know that I am more than capable of doing graduate work and research on my own. But I am at the mercy of the professors writing letters when it comes to getting into graduate school. I have done all but throw myself at their feet and beg for opportunities to prove myself, but I have been shunned to some extent. Graduate students at MRUs get all of the attention of the professors, which is understandable to a point. But the grad students are already where they need to be, and us undergrads are just trying to get a foot in the door.
It probably sounds as though I'm just complaining, and I really don't want it to come across that way. I guess what I'm trying to say is that not all of us undergrads are the same. Not all of us are there on mom and dad's dime, partying on the weekends, walking around with a sense of entitlement to the education that we are afforded.
The issue of how much personal information to disclose is an individual one. My mentor knows that I separated from my husband this summer, and she knows that I am a first generation college student whose parents divorced when she was 16. She knows what I do for work and what I do in my spare time. She knows how much I admire and respect her and that I would do anything for her if she was to ask. Professors at my MRU know that I am a really good student who always comes to class and wants to go to grad school. I have asked for one-on-one time with a few of them, but to no avail. My mentor, in contrast, has offered to meet over lunch on the weekend.
At the end of the day, I think it's all about availability. Community college professors make themselves available outside of class, through email, over the phone. MRU professors state their office hours and don't want to hear from you outside of that. I have been directed to speak to graduate students to discuss the grad admissions process. It's incredibly frustrating.
I think that for undergrads pursuing academia, there are professors and researchers that are absolute "rock stars" to us. We want to know how to do what you do. Your grad students, on the other hand, are looking forward to replacing you. LOL. You guys are our source of inspiration and direction. Grad students already know where they're going and have their eye on the PhD prize, with or without your help. Us undergrads want you to tell us, "Yes, I think you have the right mind for this work, and I would like to help you get there."
Posted by: JLK | November 8, 2008 9:33 PM
JLK wrote:
I think that for undergrads pursuing academia, there are professors and researchers that are absolute "rock stars" to us. We want to know how to do what you do. Your grad students, on the other hand, are looking forward to replacing you. LOL. You guys are our source of inspiration and direction. Grad students already know where they're going and have their eye on the PhD prize, with or without your help. Us undergrads want you to tell us, "Yes, I think you have the right mind for this work, and I would like to help you get there."
Wow.
JLK, professors who aren't willing to give you some time are not worth spending your time on. You don't need a letter from a "rockstar" full professor to get you into grad school. A really good letter from an enthusiastic and supportive mentor and/or assistant professor will blow a tepid letter from a "rockstar" out of the water. Every time. Unfortunately, tepid letters, no matter how well meant, are often deleterious.
Posted by: Odyssey | November 8, 2008 9:56 PM
"But even as I write this, and ponder the potential benefits of knowing my students better, my gut tightens a bit. Once one alters the current conventions of science writing with students you a) do them a disservice later in their career and b) potentially open a whole new drama-filled can of worms that the domestic and laboratory goddess is not prepared to deal with."
Dr. Isis, I have only started reading your blog since you joined Sb, but what exactly do you mean by this? How could it possibly not be beneficial to know your students, the ones who take a deep interest in what you do, better. I just graduated from a large research University and can relate with what the undergrads commenters are saying. The professors who actually took the time to have conversations with me, sharing ideas and listening to mine are the ones who got me through college and made it all worthwhile. I understand that from a Professor's perspective, especially if you are involved with heavy research projects, teaching must often seem like a chore. But with tuition being what it is and students facing debt accumulation upwards of $100,000 after graduation, students sometimes feel embittered about the education process when they have professors who don't seem to want to give them the time of day. If professors are procedural and aloof, it's hard to stay motivated to do the work necessary to engage in and complete the learning process.
You're there to educate, right? By providing positive reinforcement to students by adding a human touch to your curriculum, you can achieve that goal in a much more efficient and successful way.
And...if you can't bring yourself to do it in real life, at least you can do it anonymously in blog form?
Posted by: Arikia | November 9, 2008 1:31 AM
Arikia, if the undergraduate wants the college experience you describe they should not ever, ever, ever enroll in a MRU. Never. SLAC if possible, perhaps a smaller state U and community college if necessary.
The situation has nothing whatsoever to do with undergraduate tuition and therefore what the under graduate is "owed". Nor that teaching "seems" like a chore to some professors. It is the case that the contingencies that shape the behavior of the MRU professor are such that it is almost impossible (or career suicidal, more accurately) for that person to act like a SLAC professor when it comes to undergraduate instruction/mentoring.
Posted by: DrugMonkey | November 9, 2008 1:41 AM
Brother Drug, thanks for fielding this one for me. I think you nailed it square on the head. I am teaching this semester in addition to my research. I don't see teaching as a chore, in fact I rather enjoy it. However, there is a difference between the time it takes to guide or mentor a student who is interested in a particular field and to be counselor to every student dealing with a personal problem. I simply don't have the resources. As nurturing as I think you'll find me to be, I don't have the resources to have a close personal relationship with 50 students. Thats the trade-off between studying at a SLAC and an MRU.
Posted by: Dr. Isis | November 9, 2008 1:54 AM
...
Wow. All so serious and stuff here in the comments...
Here I was ready to give you props for foisting strongbad on us.
Hey, nice pics as always. Some things never change.
...tom "the lean-n-mean harem member"...
...and you thought I was sleeping in the back row..!!
.
Posted by: ...tom... | November 9, 2008 1:54 AM
{{{{{...tom...}}}}}
I am so glad you're here! And that you get StrongBad!!!!!
XOXOXO,
Isis
Posted by: Dr. Isis | November 9, 2008 2:01 AM
Reading some of the comments makes me realize how fortunate I was in my choice of university for my first degree. I went to a small department in a small British university that none-the-less had some internationally recognized people on the faculty. Every morning the entire department, including the undergraduates, the cleaner, technicians, post-graduate students, lecturers and the professor (equivalent to a permanent department chair in the US) met in the large entrance hall for free tea, coffee and cookies. There were no tables or chairs so everyone just milled around and talked about courses, research, sports or whatever. Apart from being a good time to catch any particular person, I think it was really good for us undergraduates in terms of giving us the confidence to ask questions and to present our opinions. A later colleague said she could always identify students from that program because of the way they approached new information.
Years later I went to a large, well-known department looking for a position. As I looked at everyone rushing around like bluebottles having no time for anyone else I decided that even if they offered me something I would not accept as it clearly was not the place for me and I felt sorry for the students, especially those who had the least bit of shyness.
Posted by: Richard Simons | November 9, 2008 7:42 AM
i also find myself fortunate to have attended a small college. (little did i know my humble beginnings would be such a benefit!) there is zero national name recognition, but i did research and worked one-on-one with my mentor for almost 3 years- and got to know several professors who vouched for me as an excellent candidate. these mentors came from giant labs at MRUs with good national connections.
that's indirectly how i ended up in a MRU for grad school, and how i had the confidence to apply to them. though i do have to put up with crap from my PI now and then about where i come from, i'm still proud of my roots.
i have mentored several undergrads in my time at the MRU - grad student mentoring of undergrads is pretty much the rule around here. we grads have a hard time getting any time with the boss some parts of the year (and we're the ones who are using the grant money and publishing the data!), so we end up being the only realistically consistent accessible mentors to undergrad students. undergrads take a lot of energy to mentor (i'm never as productive when i'm teaching an undergrad), and often your PI isn't as familiar with a bench-based technique as the grad student, so this is the situation that is proposed. this is not the worst situation in the world, once you get settled in. you become affiliated with an entire group of people that is effectively the machine directed by the PI. also, there is no magical close relationship with the PI that suddenly occurs just because you're a grad student. as i mentioned above, i struggled with building a relationship with my boss for quite some time. becoming part of the research group should be your operative. if you do good work and your PI values the opinion of the grad students, you will get valuable rec letters. the experience alone gets attention on an application.
you're right, JLK, we grads do have our eyes on the phd- but so do you, on a differing timeframe. we are the ones who went through the admissions process recently as students, our opinions on that are fairly relevant. we know the members of the admissions committee and we know the students that just came in last year. grad students can give you some pretty valuable insider knowledge, too.
fwiw, just some of my experiences/opinion...
Posted by: leigh | November 9, 2008 10:48 AM
Interesting discussion, this....
I would point out that is possible to find programs, even at MegaStateU, where professors are more accessible than is described in this thread. One approach would be to look for those that require a research experience (capped off with a paper, presentation, or similar outcome). These do exist, even at EnormousUni (I know, I mentor undergrads in one such program).
For the Profs/PIs/RockSuperstarResearchers reading this, do any of you ever get approached by parents (irate or otherwise)? I ask because I am a parent who is shelling out ungodly sums of cash to a couple of schools, and I have always imagined that I would, at the drop of a hat, contact and if necessary berate, bitch-slap, or otherwise express my displeasure at, a professor or program who treated my kids with the aloofness and disinterest that I read here. (Thankfully, I've never had to actually do this.) Are parents ever part of this picture?
Posted by: Art | November 9, 2008 11:30 AM
I went to a large research school for undergrad. I found a great way to get to know professors was to catch the kernel that they dropped about their research in class and then go ask them about it later! I landed summer internships by keeping my head up in class. (Or at least, knowing that the low-hanging fruit was mine to pick.)
Posted by: Academic | November 9, 2008 12:21 PM