This post originally appeared at Gradhacker.org on May 10th, 2013.
One of the major aspects of academia is sharing your research throughpublic presentations. While public speaking can be stressful, it is a great opportunity to communicate your research and ideas to a wider audience and can be quite satisfying. No matter what kind of subject matter you are covering, there are a few simple hacks that you can use to improve you public speaking abilities. Continue reading
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You may be asked to diagram you ideas, so be prepared. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
This article originally appeared at Gradhacker.org on April 26th, 2013.
While my last Gradhacker post focused on the written aspect of comprehensive exams, for many graduate students there is another, equally dreaded component: the oral examination.
For even the most prepared students, this can be an intense and difficult experience. However, with enough preparation and the right mindset the oral examination can actually be an enjoyable experience where you get to talk about your ideas with members of your committee.
Having just completed this hurdle myself I’d like to go over some of the things that worked and those that I wish I had known before undertaking this process. This advice is the most relevant for those of you defending a written document that you’ve had time to prepare, but some of this will be applicable to more generalized oral examination formats. Continue reading
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The idea for this blog started once I realized I was answering a lot of microbiology questions for friends and family. Questions such as “why won’t antibiotics work when I have the flu?” or “how do viruses move?” These questions didn’t have yes or no answers, and while coming up with a good response I realized that I truly enjoy communicating science to the public. I also realized quite quickly that communication needs to increase between the people doing research and the people who will be affected by the developments that result. Continue reading
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