This weekend I went to a departmental conference that was held at a nice hotel near the beach. Usually when a bunch of biologists get together there are long sessions of talks followed by posters and eventually someone breaks out the wine. So I figured that this conference would go similarly and I prepared myself for a pleasant and predictable weekend.
The first part went much as I thought it would: A series of short talks followed by a break and then a poster session. Dinner, however, was the start of something a bit different. First of all, the food was good (anyone who's been to a conference knows that this is almost unheard-of). Then this random old British professor comes and sits with our table full of only students and we proceed to have great conversation. After most people are done eating and have moved on to some serious wine consumption, the program begins and a picture of our table's prof comes up on screen. Before our confusion goes much further we discover that we have been chatting and drinking with a renowned department chair who has published over 300(!) papers, dozens of chapters, and multiple books! And now he is receiving an award from the department as he steps down from the chair position!
We all feel rather silly now for not knowing who he was, and I sat there thinking, wow, this guy is so nice! He didn't expect us to fawn over his achievements, he just wanted to hang out and have a good time. When the dance party started (another surprise for a conference) he was one of the first ones on the floor, asking students and faculty to join him. And you know what, he and some of the other profs could really move! It was so much fun just being a bunch of people dancing and not caring about students and postdocs vs faculty. Usually there is a certain reservation that each group has about letting loose around the other.
In many ways, that is a good thing. I wouldn't want to see the faculty falling down drunk and I'm sure they don't want to see us dancing like we do in clubs. Therefore, we aren't completely letting loose, but I am beginning to have as much fun being somewhat reserved as I used to have going completely crazy. Is that a sign of maturity or just that I haven't gone out partying in a while? Either way, I like it. I suppose my spectrum of fun activities is shifting from where it was as an undergrad. On the tame end, reading a magazine was fun. Now, I can find pleasure in a paper. Having a wild night used to mean needing two Excedrin and a gallon of water the next day, and now it more often means going to a new bar or just meeting interesting people. Sure, I can still party like I did when I was 19 if I want to, but I just don't want to as much anymore. I've found my happy medium, and I hope to keep it roughly where it is.
Oh no, I'm turning into the stereotypical biologist! I only want to talk about research! I think the other scientists are "cool!" I like to read papers, for goodness' sake! Somebody stop me before I throw out all my heels and buy my own subscription to Nature! Aaaahhhh!!!
Sunday, February 7, 2010
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
The Way it Should Be
As my classmates, lab-mates, some professors, roommate, and now my sister know, I am less than satisfied with the quality of coursework at my school. (For anyone who doesn't know, I am in my first year of a PhD program in biology.) My expectations of graduate school were not defined in detail at the beginning of the year, but after a semester and a few weeks of pointless courses, I am now seeing what should be changed. These courses are all laid out in lecture format (even if they claim to be discussion-based) and the even the exams that say they require critical thought can be aced using rote memorization.
Now in undergrad, I would have thought these courses were stellar and probably raved about them. That is because an undergraduate bio major should be exposed to many general areas of study within the field and given a strong base of knowledge upon which to build a career. You won't get far if you don't know what transcription and translation are, for example. A graduate student, however, has already proven by virtue of obtaining a Bachelor's degree that he or she is adept at memorization of facts. The next step is discovering if said graduate student can think critically about a problem in order to ask an interesting question that can be answered using available methods and contribute in a significant way to a particular biological field. Critical thinking and logic are skills that every PhD will need no matter if they are in academia, biotech, science writing, science and technology policy, or patent law.
Here's a nice allegory to drive home my point:
Do you assume that every first grader can read because they have been exposed to books? Well some of them might pick it up without being taught; maybe Dad shows Johnny some of the easy words and that plus Sesame Street help Johnny get through most of "Go Dog Go." But can he read the tough words? Can he read a newspaper? Probably not without being taught, and even with good teaching it will take years before Johnny can read at an adult level. Now take this up to the PhD level and you've got the current situation at my school, with "Dad" being the PI, "Sesame Street" being talks and seminars, and I'm Johnny, only my teachers won't teach me how to read so how long do you think it will take me to get to the "adult" level?
So after all this ranting, what solution do I propose? I'm glad you asked. First of all, PhD students should have some classes all to themselves. Not all of them, mind you, because it is important that interaction occur between all levels and disciplines, but at least one course per semester should be just PhD students. This way the class can focus on reading papers and critically analyzing them (whereas that is not necessarily what Master's students were expecting from their program). Everyone reads a review or two of a field to get a general understanding, then a primary paper, and then does a literature search to come up with one or two other papers to read on his or her own. This ensures that students will not know all of the same background and therefore will have to explain things to each other. Class will be held in small groups of 10-12, preferably sitting in a circle or at a conference table. Technical questions on the reading will be first, then critical comments about the methods used and proposal of alternative methods with pros and cons for each. Then discussion on whether or not the authors had enough information to draw the conclusions that they did, and if not, deciding what additional evidence would be convincing. Finally, the class should discuss what new questions the findings bring up and talk about ideas for future experiments. Yes, this does sound kind of like a journal club, but has a couple of important differences: 1) It covers a wide range of fields that require different types of critical thinking. 2) The focus is on teaching the students, so incorrect or naive ideas are expected, not looked down upon.
If these changes were made I would be that much closer to becoming an independent scientist. Sadly, it looks like I'll have to wait for an underpaid postdoc position to learn by trial and error the skills that I am ready to be taught now.
Now in undergrad, I would have thought these courses were stellar and probably raved about them. That is because an undergraduate bio major should be exposed to many general areas of study within the field and given a strong base of knowledge upon which to build a career. You won't get far if you don't know what transcription and translation are, for example. A graduate student, however, has already proven by virtue of obtaining a Bachelor's degree that he or she is adept at memorization of facts. The next step is discovering if said graduate student can think critically about a problem in order to ask an interesting question that can be answered using available methods and contribute in a significant way to a particular biological field. Critical thinking and logic are skills that every PhD will need no matter if they are in academia, biotech, science writing, science and technology policy, or patent law.
Here's a nice allegory to drive home my point:
Do you assume that every first grader can read because they have been exposed to books? Well some of them might pick it up without being taught; maybe Dad shows Johnny some of the easy words and that plus Sesame Street help Johnny get through most of "Go Dog Go." But can he read the tough words? Can he read a newspaper? Probably not without being taught, and even with good teaching it will take years before Johnny can read at an adult level. Now take this up to the PhD level and you've got the current situation at my school, with "Dad" being the PI, "Sesame Street" being talks and seminars, and I'm Johnny, only my teachers won't teach me how to read so how long do you think it will take me to get to the "adult" level?
So after all this ranting, what solution do I propose? I'm glad you asked. First of all, PhD students should have some classes all to themselves. Not all of them, mind you, because it is important that interaction occur between all levels and disciplines, but at least one course per semester should be just PhD students. This way the class can focus on reading papers and critically analyzing them (whereas that is not necessarily what Master's students were expecting from their program). Everyone reads a review or two of a field to get a general understanding, then a primary paper, and then does a literature search to come up with one or two other papers to read on his or her own. This ensures that students will not know all of the same background and therefore will have to explain things to each other. Class will be held in small groups of 10-12, preferably sitting in a circle or at a conference table. Technical questions on the reading will be first, then critical comments about the methods used and proposal of alternative methods with pros and cons for each. Then discussion on whether or not the authors had enough information to draw the conclusions that they did, and if not, deciding what additional evidence would be convincing. Finally, the class should discuss what new questions the findings bring up and talk about ideas for future experiments. Yes, this does sound kind of like a journal club, but has a couple of important differences: 1) It covers a wide range of fields that require different types of critical thinking. 2) The focus is on teaching the students, so incorrect or naive ideas are expected, not looked down upon.
If these changes were made I would be that much closer to becoming an independent scientist. Sadly, it looks like I'll have to wait for an underpaid postdoc position to learn by trial and error the skills that I am ready to be taught now.
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Life is Like a Box of Legos
Imagine that everyone is born with a box of Legos, and life is recess. Some kids have bigger boxes of Legos than others but you only get to use your own box. Because there is a limited number of Legos in your box, once you build a castle there aren’t enough left to make a sailboat unless you tear the castle down. Well along with a limited amount of Legos you also have limited time (recess is short, remember?). So if you want to tear the castle down and build the sailboat, go ahead but you know that you’ll have less time to play with your creation than if you just stuck with the castle. Furthermore, you can see all of the things that the other kids are building with their Legos, so you might take some of your precious time to look at them and get ideas. Or you might use up most of your time wishing you could build whatever amazing Ferris wheel or dinosaur Suzy built but you don’t have enough Legos. Conversely, some kids only have a few Legos but they build super cool little robot-men and are so happy with them that they play and play and don’t give a hoot about the towers of Legos the other kids have.
So the moral of this story is that we all have limits in our lives, but if you strive to fulfill the potential of your own qualities then you will have way more fun being satisfied with what you have than wishing for more Legos.
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