“What is one thing you wish someone had told you
when you were starting grad school?”
Responses from Current Faculty in Ecology and Evolution. Asterisks separate individual responses.
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You're not an undergraduate anymore.
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1. Read the literature. Develop an appetite for browsing current issues of the top journals related to your field (and a few that are tangental). This is the best way to figure out what the important questions are, who's asking what, in what system, and how. Figure out a system for taking notes or filing electronic reprints,etc. and think about how to categorize what you read.
2. Practice talking science. Find other students, post-docs, faculty who are smarter than you, and hang out with them if they'll tolerate you. Meet with seminar speakers one-on-one. Enroll in every journal club you can. During seminars, try to think of at least one good question to ask. (Better still, actually ask the question).
3. Think about your writing and work on improving it. Take a writing class. Practice writing grants. If you can't write clearly, you probably aren't thinking clearly. But by practicing your writing, you are also training yourself to think.
But here's one (several) that I wish I had learned earlier: 4. Make sure you leave enough time for exercise, friends and family. Resist being sucked into the 10-14 hour day pattern. Learn to be more efficient and focus on quality, not quantity. I really believe that one really good paper every other year will take you further than two mediocre papers each year. And make sure your social circle includes people who are not grad students or scientists. There's a fine line between being fully engaged by your career and losing your identity to it.
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I have no good advise about picking a mentor -- I think you have to go with gut feelings (i.e., who do you feel the most comfortable around who also has funding and an interesting lab group). For a successful career in grad school and beyond -- PUBLISH EARLY AND OFTEN! Interact as much as you can with fellow grad students and faculty -- these are going to be your colleagues for the rest of your life. Work hard, but don't be afraid to take time off and do things you enjoy (i.e., of course you should go skiing on a powder day!).
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Interact as much as possible with fellow grad students, postdocs and faculty; start research and journal-reading early; attend national and international meetings as soon as possible, and present papers there; begin to publish thesis work in good journals as soon as possible; meet key people in field of research; write proposals for funding graduate and postdoc research.
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1) find the biggest problem you can and attack it from a different perspective
2) it's ok if you are wrong; it's not ok if the fear that you might be wrong stymies your imagination
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Read: Macrina, Francis L.. 2000. Scientific integrity : an introductory text with cases. : ASM Press, Washington, DC. Link to Dartmouth library.
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The one thing that comes to mind first is something that you and I have joked about for years. Advisors are not bosses, they are kings and queens. Not that I feel like a king, but like my advisors, I am much easier to get time and help from if I am treated like a benevolent benefactor rather than like a boss who owes you something for your efforts. This is also the root of the expression "there's always another signature"
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Read:
Stearns, S. 1987. Some modest advice for graduate students. Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America, 68, 145-149.
Huey, R. 1987. Reply to Stearns: some acynical advice for graduate students. Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America, 68, 150-153
Binkley, D. 1987. Some advice for graduate advisors. Bull Ecol Soc Am 68(2):10-12.
Witz, BW. 1994. Some pragmatic advice to graduate students: a hybridization of Stearns, Huey, and Binkley. Bull Ecol Soc Am 75(3):176-177.
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Read: ("Some Modest Advice for Graduate Students")? There's a companion piece called some modest advice for graduate advisors.
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