Graduate school is where you meet people who discuss teaching ethics and morality or theoretical physics over coffee and continue the conversation when you walk down corridors to classes. Does this sound like an idealistic notion Sal Khan will expound on in an interview? I was one of the people who believed this when I started out. The truth is the closer your experience is to the description above, the more likely you are going to have the time of your life while in school. I hope to tell you about some lessons I have learned during my time here; admission blogs miss out these key components to figuring out grad school.
If you were admitted into grad school, you probably belong to one or more of three categories. Your parents always mentioned your relative with the fancy degree from an Ivy League and led you to believe it is the key to success and a happier life. You were inspired by the Facebook posts of a college senior (the admit, the late-night project submissions, the Microsoft internship converted into a full-time offer, the perfect GPA, graduation photos, and the Mercedes-Benz three months later, possibly in that order). Your research work with a professor opened your mind to new possibilities in your field of interest, and you set out to explore one in depth. Whatever your reasons for pursuing an advanced degree, school is likely to give you what you want if you seek it passionately.
Professors are an integral part of school life, so I will begin with an insight into how they work. The ratio of professors who talk to the blackboard, read from PowerPoint slides, think his/her course is most important, and set unreasonable assignments is the same in the United States as any other country. It will be a folly for one to think that attending any one professor’s lectures alone will inspire them to do Nobel Prize winning work. However, professors often give students the option of approaching them during office hours. One of my former advisers confessed to scheduling these hours at an unearthly time, so he could focus on writing grants. Another professor
spoke of how he used office hours as a discriminating parameter to determine grades. He felt that once he got to know the student during office hours, he could use his discretion to raise the student’s grades beyond what the numbers suggested. Most often, students think it is a waste of time to go to office hours to ask for help, and this leaves professors swatting flies.
Academic integrity is not a given in graduate school. You read right: people do cheat on assignments and exams. Where I went to school (University of California, Santa Barbara), if anyone was given the option between spending time on the beach and doing homework, I think we have a clear winner. However, being ethical (read: doing work in solitary confinement) has its charms. You are likely to find all the secret hideouts around your school where you can do your homework without being disturbed. For me, it was the steps leading into the water from the local pier. You are more likely to have ‘aha’ moments which lead to the completion of gruelling problem sets while you have uninterrupted views of the Pacific than while you are stuck in a library. The other advantage is that you become something of a hero when exams are around the corner. The change in expression on your classmate’s face when they comprehend some concept you explained, is priceless. Understanding homework sets can also lead to a stellar performance on interviews; my friend was hired by Google’s speech recognition team merely because he had focussed on and understood the theory behind a bonus problem on an assignment.
No article about graduate school can be complete without the mention of roommates. After the initial euphoria of group selfies and Starbucks check-ins subsides, reality sets in. The most organised and peace-loving roommate is called upon to make a chart enlisting duties (cooking and cleaning). Two weeks into the semester, only one person is following the chart, and everyone else is almost always busy with coursework. The person who cleans and cooks is seen as unfocussed and lacking ambition. If that person is you, please don’t think for a minute that you are making a mistake wanting to live in a clean environment. Go ahead and do your bit; you could potentially inspire your co-inhabitants to do the same.
Your roommates could also rattle your nerves by asking you to settle finances the night before your midterm (God bless Splitwise). However, they will also be the people to whom you end up confiding your professor frustrations and secret crushes.
Even the most reasonable roommates can flare up at you unexpectedly. Imagine a scenario when you make tea for your roommate, and he/she flares up at you, sans reason. To think that you are responsible for this sudden outburst is unwise. A harsh professor, never-ending problem set, a feud with the boyfriend/girlfriend could all be behind the random snapping. Your roommate chose to take it out on an unsuspecting you because, for them, you are what is sometimes called a minimum impact target. Yelling at you will not affect their higher priority relationships, you just let these incidents pass and doing so will result in a world of good. I like to think of school as a boat filled with insecure people belonging to the same age group. How efficiently each person combats his/her insecurities without affecting others gives a measure of success outside of school.
A key aspect of the school experience is funding or lack thereof. Having and not having money put you in two different economic strata. To have money means not having to think twice about spending on a latte in Starbucks on a mere whim. In most public schools, money can be hard to come by. TAships are mostly reserved for PhD students (whose advisers have run out of funds temporarily). I have heard my friends say things like: Is baar funding milegi, toh Siddhi Vinayak paidhal chalungi (translate: if I get funding this semester, I will walk to the Siddhi Vinayak temple as a thank-you gesture). It is interesting how funding drives you to strike bargains with God.
Getting an internship is the top priority for most in engineering school. You hear fellow-students discuss it outside classrooms, during coffee social, and parties. I once stayed away from a Diwali event because everyone who attended was discussing internship salaries (Yes, it was Diwali!). The ones who land up with an internship often walk around wearing it as a badge of honour. They will analyse salaries, perks and even potential trekking spots around their companies, whenever they are given a chance. I wish these intelligent souls spared a thought for those languishing without, and didn’t gloat about it. Doing research with a professor is often considered a soft option because of the non-existent financial payoff. However, it could motivate you to enroll in a PhD programme or pursue a research career. Getting an internship is not purely based on GPA or an extraordinary skill set; that, my friends, would be a meritocracy. Landing an internship is also about knowing
your uncle’s friend who works at Facebook or being touched by the Goddess of Fair Fortune on the day of the interview.
Graduate school is the place you can make true friends who will stick with you, no matter what. If you are a stickler for integrity and want to find people with a common value system, you have got to search carefully. I found that I could have meaningful discussions not only about engineering but also about life philosophies with students I met during TA office hours or while hanging out in the computer lab. Note that some of these eccentric geniuses are closed to interaction, and you have to step out of your comfort zone to approach them. When you are stuck with a problem, however, they will miraculously rise to the occasion, and restore your sanity. These friends will express their opinions as is, sort out your thought processes, and be your all-encompassing support system during your time at school, and hopefully always.
Have you heard the adage that you find happiness and make it your own? Nowhere or in no phase of life is this more applicable than in graduate school. If you are reading this at 4 a.m. on a submission deadline day, you are probably dreaming of a happy time in the industry when you don’t have to work such long hours. When you graduate, you will look back at all the happy moments: the end-of-semester celebrations, the perfect score on an assignment or the award winning presentation, and woven between these moments like some delicate fabric, a profound and pervasive love for a living.
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