The Shumate Guide To Graduate School, Part 1

(NOTE: I wrote this while suffering from a cold. I had a fever of 101, so this may not be my most coherent piece. I would apologize for any factual errors, but I’ve never done that before, and wonder why I should begin now.)

My students often ask me about graduate school. “Is it really that hard?” is a common question, as is “Just what can you do with a Ph.D. in chemistry?” I have really good answers for them, until they add “Besides teaching?” to the end of that last question. I can still tell my students about graduate school, though, and why it’s the best choice for them.

Instead of having to re-tell the process of graduate education, however, I thought it’d be best to just write it down once, and reference it later. This is something I learned in graduate school, naturally: how to do as little work as possible. Without further adieu, here it is:

Walter Shumate, Ph.D.’s Handy Guide To Graduate School, Part 1

I’ll assume you’ve already chosen a school. You can do what I did and research the schools that are performing the research you’re interested in, or you can do what my best friend did: send a drunken email to a professor, asking him if you can join his group. Both methods are equally valid in that they get you into graduate school, and the latter shows you’re capable of working while impaired.

You have to take a few tests when you get to graduate school, to show that your Bachelor’s degree wasn’t just handed to you for showing up to class for four years. I had to take four tests, each one covering one of the four main disciplines in chemistry. I did particularly badly in organic, to the point where the test committee asked me if I actually knew what organic chemistry was. “I think it has to do with carbon, and the Grignard reaction^*.” That was a good enough answer to let me stay in graduate school, provided that I never took an organic class.

The tests passed (or spectacularly failed, as is the case with organic), the entering class moved onto orientation. All graduate students in all fields had to do this. I think we were supposed to learn our way around the campus, be given important phone numbers and review the chain of command for academic disputes. I only remember a lengthy discussion about sexual harassment that made me, as a man, feel slightly dirty as I left the room. It may have been recommended that we just go ahead and dip into the stockroom’s saltpeter supply, just to be sure.

That was the end of the first week, and I was already tired. What lay ahead, though, was the cornerstone of my graduate education. Tomorrow, we discuss classes, teaching and the fledgling research efforts you can expect.

I may also talk about how to handle the occasional flirt, if I can clear it with HR.

^*Grignard reaction is almost always the answer to a question about organic chemistry.

Tagged as: humor