HEADLINES Lessons Learned
Stephanie Jarvis, YP-0125,
stephaniekjarvis@gmail.com
I nearly laughed out loud when I read the first sentence of Kristina Pourtabib’s column in the July/August/September issue of TPG (“Expect the Unexpected”): “Before beginning a graduate program… it is generally expected that you will be conducting the research that you discussed with your prospective advisor prior to beginning your program.” Yes, indeed, that is the expectation—ironic because it so rarely seems to happen that way. She goes on to explain her change of topics and obstacles that she has faced in her graduate work, maintaining that dealing with setbacks is a valuable life skill and inherent to conducting research. I could not agree more.
The statement struck me as funny because at the time I was reading it I was also working on my thesis defense presentation—a year after leaving cam- pus. What I like to call my “Master’s Saga” lasted 3.5 years and, now that it is over (yippee!!!!!), I am just starting to work the self-confidence back up to be able to look at it with the kind of positiv- ity Kristina has. I am also parsing out the life lessons I learned, or relearned, during the Master’s Saga. In the spirit of the student issue, I will share my thoughts thus far.
The Master’s Saga
A year into my program, I realized that if I did not switch advisors and proj- ects I was not going to finish my degree. Life lesson #1: Do not be so stubborn that it takes you a year to do what you realized needed to be done after a month. Then, though I had much simpler options, I decided to take on a whim of a side- project idea of a professor I had hardly met—who was about to leave for a few months for a research cruise and who had not worked with the fossils I would be collecting—on a topic I knew absolutely nothing about. Life lesson #2: You do not always have to choose the hardest route.
Thankfully, my new advisor turned out to be pretty awesome. However, a year of self-doubt does not just end. Life lesson #3: You are your harshest critic (at least, I am mine). I then spent what was sup- posed to be my final year trying to wrap my head around this new topic, working out sampling logistics, and making a lot of lab mistakes. All while taking too many classes and teaching. Life lesson #4: There is a critical limit to how much you can stuff in your brain and actu- ally retain, no matter how interesting you find the material. Life lesson #5: If you are going to take it upon yourself to completely rewrite sed/strat labs, make them easy to grade. It was summer before I really got into my lab work. A seren- dipitously timed temporary consulting gig gave me some great experience and much needed funding that fall. Life lesson #6: There will always be a learn- ing curve from classwork to real work, no matter how good your classes were. Events in my personal life unexpectedly took me across the country for most of that October. Life lesson #7: It is ok to put loved ones above deadlines. And it is ok if you need someone to reassure you that it is ok to do that. By November, I was done with lab work and anxious to get some time in at home before I moved on to wherever I happened to be going. I temporarily moved in with my parents and figured I would take a month or two to write and job search. The only thing I really accomplished was banging my head against the statistics wall, which led to the realization that I needed to go back to campus and rerun my stats. In January I swung through campus to redo the stats on my way to Denver for my new job. Again, I thought it would take me a couple months, at the most, to finish writing. Life lesson #8: Big tran- sitions, particularly when several are happening concurrently, are hard. They are not conducive to writing a thesis. I
ended up taking a few breaks of vary- ing lengths, only one intentional. Life lesson #9: Emotional/Mental wellbeing is a prerequisite to being productive, you can only push a work/relax imbalance so long, and stressing about something does not get it done. What finally got me in gear was the decision to pair my first half-marathon with my “thesising”. I signed up for a matahhon a month out (yes, I knew that was stupid), found a 4 week training plan, and made my goals—of finishing the race, spending twice as much time thesising as training, and getting my thesis to my committee by race-day— Facebook-official. I have always avoided setting goals and I once swore that I would never train again. The training part did not work out too well—I got shin splints after a week, took two weeks off, and ran a couple short runs the week before the race. Turning my thesis in to my committee by race day did not happen either. However, having that time goal and a daily schedule for something other than work did wonders for getting me past my mental block and I made quite a bit of headway on writing. As for the race, I could not have asked for more perfect weather or a nicer course. I won the poker draw and my age group. Total beginners luck! Life lesson #10: Goals are not necessarily bad, even when you do not meet them. Life lesson #11: Sometimes, the less thought and prepa- ration, the better. Though you may hurt afterward. I eventually got a draft to my advisor and then to my committee, pulled my presentation together, and went back to southern Illinois for Halloween week- end to defend. After a few edits and a lot of formatting stress, I got it submitted the day before the deadline.
Moving On
I have been doing a lot of thinking about what post-thesis life means, and these thoughts seem to be taking the
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