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“I could always do data science if academia doesn’t work out.” It’s a recurring thought many graduate students and postdocs experience, especially if their work involves hearty servings of programming and statistics, the core elements of data science. Data science can be a rewarding alternative to academia, and academics do have many qualities that make them attractive candidates for data science roles. However, there are also often large holes in academics’ skill sets that can deter them from being hired straight off the bat.

Writing this in September 2017 after the new first-years have arrived on campus, I realize it’s now been four years since I started the PhD. Back in 2013, I had just finished a year in Germany on a Fulbright scholarship, studying social and antipredator behavior in birds at the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology. The work I had helped with there was on its way to being published in Animal Behaviour, as had my undergraduate senior thesis work. I had just received an NSF-GRFP fellowship – a great vote of confidence from the federal government – and had spent the last weeks of summer traveling and enjoying the Behaviour conference in Newcastle, UK.

Year three. If an American PhD takes 5-6 years, then this is when you pass the halfway point. You’re now in the thick of the weeds. The big picture science that originally got you into this PhD gets harder to remember. The questions you set off to answer years ago really need to stand up to the second guesses that come from when you start dedicating hundreds of hours to answering them. It gets hard not to hear those quiet voices asking if there’s a better way to do things: is academia the path of most happiness for me, what’s consulting or industry like, am I actually doing interesting work? And of course, the eternal question of investing in automation versus doing the mind-numbing manual work! (See xkcd for the right ratio of investment to payoff!)

The 2nd year of the PhD felt like being a teenager. You’re no longer new to graduate school, and you’re starting to feel the pressure of having something to show for your time here. Within your second year, you go from a PhD student interested in a topic, to a PhD candidate who understands the topic well enough that he can convince others it’s important. This transition has felt a bit like growing up: a loss of naivety and the addition of responsibilities, but also a legitimization of who you are as a researcher. This blog post describes my experiences during this year and what I’ve learned from them.

Sometime within the first two years of a North American biology PhD, grad students take an exam that determines whether their research ideas hold water or whether they should leave. No pressure! This rite of passage is called the generals, qualifying, or preliminary exam (“generals,” “quals,” and “prelims”), and it’s analogous to a Masters defense in the European system. The specifics of the exam vary greatly between universities but tend to involve a written literature review and thesis proposal, sometimes a written exam, and a multiple-hour oral exam by the thesis committee. The committee, which consists of 3-5 professors who read your proposal, will ask you questions for around three hours and then decide whether you should stay.

The story behind Couzin et al. 2011: “Uninformed individuals promote democratic consensus in animal groups”

Couzin ID, Ioannou CC, Demirel G, Gross T, Torney CJ, Hartnett A, Conradt L, Levin SA, Leonard NE. 2011. Uninformed individuals promote democratic consensus in animal groups. Science. 334: 1578-1580.

The first year of the PhD is over… I guess! It doesn’t really feel like your second year until the new first-years arrive in September, and work hasn’t suddenly stopped with the end of the semester, unlike in college. If anything, this summer is when I’ll actually make any progress on experimental ideas I’ve been developing since I first e-mailed my advisor two years ago. But enough time has passed that I think I can share some reflections on my first year that can hopefully help someone else starting or considering starting a PhD in biology.

You are not sitting next to me right now as I type these thoughts. You’re most likely not in New Jersey, and you might not even be in the U.S. The fact that it’s even possible for you to be reading these words right now highlights the power of communicating ideas through writing. Effective communication is the difference between you growing bored and leaving halfway through this blog post to explore other parts of the internet, and you reaching the end (before moving on to explore the rest of the internet!).

In the sciences it’s easy to get in the mindset of “go to college, go to grad school, get a postdoc, be a professor” for your career. While this trajectory works, I want to talk about the crazy idea of breaking from the path for a year or two before you throw yourself into a PhD program. This applies to people applying to professional schools like medicine or law, as well!

Hi all,

[Note: Dr. Bergen has since completed his Ph.D. and is now a Strategy Insights & Planning Consultant at ZS.]

[Disclaimer: I received the GRFP during the 2012-13 application cycle, which might not reflect what the current GRFP is looking for. But hopefully the broader themes in this post still apply!]

At this point in the year, with grad applications closing and the waiting process beginning (or continuing for some of us), this post might not seem all that relevant to the college seniors who have hopefully figured out how to apply to graduate schools. This post may seem early for juniors who are interested in grad school but figure they have time before they apply. Maybe the occasional freshman or sophomore who stumbles across this blog will think that grad school is so far in the distance it’s not even worth thinking about right now. However, the following advice is a general path for leveling up as a researcher and figuring out what about biology interests you, knowledge that will serve you well regardless if you pursue grad school.