I am not sure what the statistics are on mothers in PhD programs. It's probably a very small (but growing) minority of PhD students, and of mothers. There is probably an even smaller contingent of us whose spouses are in the same field of science. How about mothers who have gone back to get their PhD after their spouse has done a postdoc or two? Recent studies have shown that being part of an academic couple does not hinder men the way it hinders women: women tend to be the "trailing spouse". I am a trailing spouse. I had my first child towards the end of my master's degree, then worked as a technician (health insurance, yeah!) and had our second son while my husband finished his PhD and did a couple postdocs. Now we are at a new university, where my husband finally got a tenure-track job, and I am writing my PhD dissertation from afar. I have also taken a lecturer position at the new university, so am "faculty" as well. My husband is an awesome husband, father, and scientist. He has endless energy and takes really good care of the kids when I am busy. He also volunteers in our sons' classes, which is some of the explanation for what happened today.
My 9-year old son did a science unit last week where the kids made collages, word clouds, poems, and wrote letters about what it means to be a scientist. Here is my son's letter to his teacher:
9/11/2014
Dear Mrs. H.,
I consider myself to be a scientist. My dad is a scientist and sometimes I go into his lab. We do experiments. One time I did a science convention in Alabama with my friends and dad. We did an experiment on the Global Conveyor Belt.
Also in Alabama my dad came into my class to do experiments. We did an experiment on phytoplankton. We saw if they reproduced better in four conditions. These conditions were cold and dark, light and cold, hot and dark, and light and hot. They reproduced the most in the cold and dark condition, so they like the cold and dark the most. We also even made goo!
Sincerely, your future scientist,
I.
Other than being insanely proud of my son's great grammar, sentence structure, spelling, enthusiasm, and the fact that he remembered (OK, not completely accurately) the results of his class's experiment, I have to admit that I felt a little hurt. Hurt at the fact that he never mentioned that his mother is a scientist, too. And the fact that I was at the "convention" in Alabama too, driving the kids there and helping the kids with the demonstrations. And the fact that maybe I felt like I just haven't had the time to spend in my son's classroom starting up new science programs, because I'm so busy juggling my PhD coursework, insane fieldwork, and transporting my kids to/from activities, just being "Mom".
I asked my son after reading this, if he knows what I do for a living. He looked confused and said, "I know you're an Ecologist, but I don't really know what you do." He acted a little embarrassed. I told him that's OK, it's not a quiz or anything. He went off to read his book. But I feel sad about this. My kids can't come on the boat to do fieldwork with me, but I have told them stories and shown them pictures of me in the field. They have been to the lab where I did my PhD research dozens of times. My older son helped me prepare equipment and even weigh samples on some days off school. I have shown them the animals and samples I work with, and they have been on a public boat trip in the Reserve where I work. I spend a lot of time on the computer and going to conferences like my husband, and now I am teaching undergraduates like him. I do not have my own lab, and haven't brought experiments to my older son's class.
And so, my son doesn't think of me when he thinks "scientist".
I wonder what he thinks I am doing all day?
Tuesday, September 16, 2014
Saturday, June 29, 2013
Prospectus #2
I can't believe it, but my prospectus was finally approved! Here I am closing in on the 3 year mark of my PhD, and about to take comprehensive exams (written and oral). Why are these milestones so stressful and time consuming? Am I really becoming a better scientist by doing these things? I guess they require you to read broadly and analyze. But the uncertainty and pressure of knowing your committee can ask you anything they want and grade you on your answer, is a little daunting. I really do feel like marine science graduate students work harder for a smaller payoff than almost any skilled profession. Mentally and physically. I don't even want to discuss the muck-covered cinder blocks and PVC and wire cages we will be lugging into and out of boats, then power washing and storing. I have 10 years of post- high school education. I get paid $18,000/year. People get annoyed with me when I ask for work travel reimbursements. I spend 5/7 evenings per week and at least 1 weekend day, working. Last week I stayed at work until 9 or 10 each night. And now I have to prove to my committee members that I know the details of sea-level rise, the nitrogen cycle, isotope geochemistry, bivalve shell formation, shellfish safety and epidemiology, carbon storage and the extent of herbivore of different marsh and sea grass species........
Oh, while I am processing highly sensitive samples using a method no one in my lab has used before, trying to figure it out on my own and get the samples ready in the next week.
So, yay, I completed my prospectus.
Thursday, June 27, 2013
Whatever gets you through the night
To-do list: too long.
Stress level: too high.
Here's what is getting this science student, researcher, intern manager, wife, and mom through the long days and short nights.
• Podcasts Fresh Air, This American Life, Nature, On Being, Freakonomics when doing repetitive labwork
• Fun. On Pandora when crunching data
• Celtic radio on Pandora when word smithing or reading papers
• High protein and fiber food to keep me full: Greek yogurt, Great Grains cereal, apples, nuts. But if I sit long enough, I crave Cheez-Its and Strawberry Pop Tarts
• Coffee! Starbucks iced coffee or Nescafé. I know.
• To wake me up in the morning: Bodycology body wash in Gardenia scent. My husband picked this out and the whole family has been using it! Smells like summer.
• When I get home: reading books and snuggling with my boys at bedtime
• On DVR: As Time Goes By - my favorite BBC comedy. Master Chef - love watching with the whole family. Too tired for movies or intense dramas right now!
• Anytime Rob cooks something homemade for dinner!
Right now my family is definitely taking care of me. I'm not sure how long it's sustainable for me to be so absent physically and mentally. But the little things are helping get me through.
Sunday, December 30, 2012
Writing
It's unavoidable. To be a successful scientist, you must be a good writer.
You don't have to start off being a perfect writer (improvements will come with practice), but you have to LIKE writing. Enjoy sitting by yourself with the bum in the chair. Be one with your computer. Be an expert at picking out the perfect blend of music that is energizing without being distracting (or no music). This is why scientists are such major coffee drinkers: it's not from all the lab and field work! Think about the major term papers you wrote in college, and how much you had to focus on them, every day, for weeks at a time. How you probably said "no" to social events and sleep to get it done. This is the life of a principal investigator (PI)!
As a busy graduate student, wife, and mom, I find it very difficult to sit and focus on writing. Field work keeps me busy, but when I choose field days and put them on the calendar, I just get it done (with a lot of help from my labmates). Labwork is similar: you show up in the lab and just DO it. Luckily, I have enough different components of my project that I always have a lot of different tasks to do in the lab, and I don't get bored. Again, I have a lot of helpers and people I can talk to while I work. At the end of the day, I go home. But writing.... writing is a solitary enterprise. It's just you. Any failings are solely your responsibility. It's daunting. And kind of like managing a household, with writing, you're never finished. There is always something to be tidied up, looked at again, re-organized.
I'm still early on in my writing "career", but my husband gave me an amazing Christmas gift this year: the gift of peace and quiet to write. He sent me to my parents' house (on a plane!) with all my papers and computer and warm clothes, so that I can get my prospectus DONE. Away from him, our children, his parents who are visiting, and all the responsibilities of planning activities for the family, cooking dinner, cleaning the house, laundry... I set up a card table in my parents' living room, and they have been good about leaving me alone. I haven't left, except to eat and sleep. And I have been so productive!! This is great news for the family because it means when I get home, I can relax and have fun with them on New Years' Eve without being grumpy and stressed, and still have a few days before the kids go back to school and I go back to work. It seemed like an odd Christmas present, to send Mom away the day after Christmas... but Rob knows me so well. He knows what I needed career-wise, and that it would have a good effect on the family as well (less stressed Mom).
The thing that worries me is that there will be a LOT more writing like this in my future, if I expect to continue in academic science. I'm not always going to be able to sequester myself from my family and responsibilities in this way. I'm going to have to find a way to focus on my writing, and somehow have it mesh with the rest of my life. It's not fair to ask Rob to pick up the family slack every time I need to write a manuscript or proposal. Somehow, he has found a way to focus on writing while sitting at his desk in our house, and he makes it work! I am lucky that I have such a great model for scientific work ethic in my own home.
So, if you are considering a career in science, don't just think about those lab classes that you enjoyed, or field trips to the marsh or on the boat where you got to use cool equipment, make observations, and take data in your notebook. Think about days and days, weeks and weeks, months and months with your bum in the seat, staring at a screen. Get a reliable computer and a comfortable chair, lots of coffee, and the most willpower you can muster.
You don't have to start off being a perfect writer (improvements will come with practice), but you have to LIKE writing. Enjoy sitting by yourself with the bum in the chair. Be one with your computer. Be an expert at picking out the perfect blend of music that is energizing without being distracting (or no music). This is why scientists are such major coffee drinkers: it's not from all the lab and field work! Think about the major term papers you wrote in college, and how much you had to focus on them, every day, for weeks at a time. How you probably said "no" to social events and sleep to get it done. This is the life of a principal investigator (PI)!
As a busy graduate student, wife, and mom, I find it very difficult to sit and focus on writing. Field work keeps me busy, but when I choose field days and put them on the calendar, I just get it done (with a lot of help from my labmates). Labwork is similar: you show up in the lab and just DO it. Luckily, I have enough different components of my project that I always have a lot of different tasks to do in the lab, and I don't get bored. Again, I have a lot of helpers and people I can talk to while I work. At the end of the day, I go home. But writing.... writing is a solitary enterprise. It's just you. Any failings are solely your responsibility. It's daunting. And kind of like managing a household, with writing, you're never finished. There is always something to be tidied up, looked at again, re-organized.
I'm still early on in my writing "career", but my husband gave me an amazing Christmas gift this year: the gift of peace and quiet to write. He sent me to my parents' house (on a plane!) with all my papers and computer and warm clothes, so that I can get my prospectus DONE. Away from him, our children, his parents who are visiting, and all the responsibilities of planning activities for the family, cooking dinner, cleaning the house, laundry... I set up a card table in my parents' living room, and they have been good about leaving me alone. I haven't left, except to eat and sleep. And I have been so productive!! This is great news for the family because it means when I get home, I can relax and have fun with them on New Years' Eve without being grumpy and stressed, and still have a few days before the kids go back to school and I go back to work. It seemed like an odd Christmas present, to send Mom away the day after Christmas... but Rob knows me so well. He knows what I needed career-wise, and that it would have a good effect on the family as well (less stressed Mom).
The thing that worries me is that there will be a LOT more writing like this in my future, if I expect to continue in academic science. I'm not always going to be able to sequester myself from my family and responsibilities in this way. I'm going to have to find a way to focus on my writing, and somehow have it mesh with the rest of my life. It's not fair to ask Rob to pick up the family slack every time I need to write a manuscript or proposal. Somehow, he has found a way to focus on writing while sitting at his desk in our house, and he makes it work! I am lucky that I have such a great model for scientific work ethic in my own home.
So, if you are considering a career in science, don't just think about those lab classes that you enjoyed, or field trips to the marsh or on the boat where you got to use cool equipment, make observations, and take data in your notebook. Think about days and days, weeks and weeks, months and months with your bum in the seat, staring at a screen. Get a reliable computer and a comfortable chair, lots of coffee, and the most willpower you can muster.
Friday, October 26, 2012
Game of Telephone
Remember the game as a kid, where everyone sits in a circle, then the first person thinks of a short phrase, and whispers it to the child next to him? Each child in turn whispers the phrase he hears (or thinks he hears) so that no one can hear except the one being whispered to. Usually by the time the phrase gets back to the beginning, it has significantly changed.
"I wish we could all go on a plane to Disney World" slowly changes to
"A fish swims on time to Disney World"....
and so on. Before you know it, Disney World isn't even mentioned.
Why does that happen? Is is because we are hard of hearing, or because we hear only what we want to hear?
This "broken telephone problem" is a rampant problem in the news media as well as in science. People's background and view of the world affect how they receive information, and scientists are not immune. Our background, training, and belief systems affect our presumably logical reasoning. This is one reason why the scientific method is so important: it gives scientists a framework for formulating, testing, and evaluating hypotheses. The peer review process is a related system of checks and balances that helps results of experiments become accepted knowledge through the repetition of experiments and evaluation by qualified colleagues. Results become conclusions, which through repetition, become facts, and eventually theories.
Almost all current scientific writing draws on past scientific facts and theories to provide background for, justify, compare or contrast with the experiments being presented or proposed. Scientists receiving funding support from a granting agency need to justify the necessity of the supported project and how it will advance scientific knowledge or provide answers to questions for the common good. Justification of an idea can come through a clear and logical explanation, but most scientists use the results and conclusions of previously published research to justify similar research or conclusions. The more scientific literature I read on a common topic, the more it reminds me of the law field, where lawyers or even Supreme Court justices use logic to evaluate a present situation and apply the conclusions of a similar decision from the past.
Drawing from the knowledge and conclusions of past research and building upon it is vitally important for the advancement of science, but this system will only work efficiently if the logical links between past and current research are accurate. These logical links go something like this:
Past paper: Hypothesis -> Test of hypothesis -> Results -> Conclusions (support/do not support hypothesis) ->
New paper (generally in introduction and/or discussion section): Evaluation of past paper's hypothesis
-> Critique of whether methods were appropriate, results were reasonable, conclusions were supported by results -> Synthesis of past paper with other past papers -> Translation and application to new problem or the next step -> Justification for new research
That is a lot of logical links. A lot of people in the game of telephone. A lot of potential for broken wires. There is even more potential for breakage when this process is sped up.
Ten or twenty years ago, the publishing process was faster and there were a lot fewer papers being published. Therefore, the conclusions of one paper could be addressed reasonably by a similar study a year or two later, and there was some dialogue between scientists in the literature. Even ten years ago when I started my MS degree and was writing my prospectus, I had to visit the library to photocopy the papers I looked up by title in a database, but I could copy and read the major papers on the topic in a day or two. Over the course of my MS, I added maybe 5-10 papers to my thesis that were recent publications that had come out since my prospectus. I had some time to assimilate the information I read, formulate my own research questions, conduct the experiments, and write up the results as they related to previous work in the field. Now I am writing my prospectus for my PhD, and every time I search the literature (ahem, Google Scholar), there are 5-10 more papers for me to read. Do I read them all? No. Could I possibly? If I did nothing else, maybe!
What happens when scientists are overloaded with reading in the field, reading in related other fields, and sitting in front of Google Scholar with 30+ recent abstracts in front of them while they write the introduction to their paper? Do they individually download, read, and evaluate each of these studies before drawing conclusions that can be addressed in their own manuscript? What if there are some older "classic" papers in the field that should be acknowledged in the introduction, but that are not online? What if your institution has gotten rid of most of its paper journal collection to save space, in favor of all electronic journal databases? What if some of the papers needed are in a journal not supported by your institution's database? Would you get an interlibrary loan for those 30+ papers? Would you pay cash for the electronic version?
What if the papers you do have cite that older paper as evidence for the phenomenon you are looking to describe, but you can't find that older paper?
I'll tell you what many scientists do. They cheat. They either (1) ignore the difficult-to-find paper that keeps coming up in the database and look for a different paper to cite, (2) use just the abstract from the paper to draw a conclusion that is cited, or (3) use the secondary source (someone who cites the primary data collector) and either use the secondary source's reference, or misattribute the data to the secondary source rather than the primary source.
It seems like an innocent (though admittedly lazy) process, but it can result in real problems. Exaggeration of conclusions, giving credit to the wrong authors, even completely getting it wrong by mis-reading or mis-quoting a sentence or two. But is this really cheating? Is it lying? Is it misconduct? Probably not in the same way as falsifying data or plagiarism, but it does cause similar problems in the scientific process. It causes erosion and breaks in the logical chain that advances scientific knowledge. It causes paradigms to be created that are not supported by reason. It causes misunderstanding and mistrust of science by the general public. It can result in policy decisions based upon consensus belief rather than data.
My husband, Rob Condon, is working on a paper with colleagues addressing the "broken telephone" phenomenon as it applies to the paradigm of jellyfish blooms increasing worldwide. The belief in this paradigm by the public as well as the scientific community is astounding, considering the lack (so far) of scientific data on the subject.
Some other students and I have been getting frustrated at the number of broken logical links and misattribution (AKA "citation trail") we have been finding during our literature searches, so we have been talking about starting a published list of the broken telephone offenders that we find. Maybe it will bring a little more recognition to the topic.
In conclusion:
- Don't be lazy
- Go ahead and skim the abstracts, but if you're putting something in your paper, make sure you've read it thoroughly
- Remember that the author you are citing might very well be your reviewer
- (On the other hand) Many, many papers play the broken telephone game and make mistakes, and the only way to keep from magnifying this misinformation is by going to the original source and evaluating their data and their conclusions for yourself
- Getting caught would be really embarrassing and you don't want to end up on our List of Broken Telephone Shame.
I would like to acknowledge my advisor Ruth Carmichael for encouraging lively discussion on this topic in her Scientific Communication course, and Kelly Robinson for her Facebook status update inspiring me to finally write something about this pet peeve!
Please submit examples of misattribution, misquotation, exaggeration, and other breaks in the scientific telephone line in the comments below! The more specific you are, the better. Thanks!
"I wish we could all go on a plane to Disney World" slowly changes to
"A fish swims on time to Disney World"....
and so on. Before you know it, Disney World isn't even mentioned.
Why does that happen? Is is because we are hard of hearing, or because we hear only what we want to hear?
This "broken telephone problem" is a rampant problem in the news media as well as in science. People's background and view of the world affect how they receive information, and scientists are not immune. Our background, training, and belief systems affect our presumably logical reasoning. This is one reason why the scientific method is so important: it gives scientists a framework for formulating, testing, and evaluating hypotheses. The peer review process is a related system of checks and balances that helps results of experiments become accepted knowledge through the repetition of experiments and evaluation by qualified colleagues. Results become conclusions, which through repetition, become facts, and eventually theories.
Almost all current scientific writing draws on past scientific facts and theories to provide background for, justify, compare or contrast with the experiments being presented or proposed. Scientists receiving funding support from a granting agency need to justify the necessity of the supported project and how it will advance scientific knowledge or provide answers to questions for the common good. Justification of an idea can come through a clear and logical explanation, but most scientists use the results and conclusions of previously published research to justify similar research or conclusions. The more scientific literature I read on a common topic, the more it reminds me of the law field, where lawyers or even Supreme Court justices use logic to evaluate a present situation and apply the conclusions of a similar decision from the past.
Thomas Kuhn, philosopher of science, coined the term "paradigm shift" (http://www.molwick.com/en/scientific-methods/041-scientific-methodology.html)
Drawing from the knowledge and conclusions of past research and building upon it is vitally important for the advancement of science, but this system will only work efficiently if the logical links between past and current research are accurate. These logical links go something like this:
Past paper: Hypothesis -> Test of hypothesis -> Results -> Conclusions (support/do not support hypothesis) ->
New paper (generally in introduction and/or discussion section): Evaluation of past paper's hypothesis
-> Critique of whether methods were appropriate, results were reasonable, conclusions were supported by results -> Synthesis of past paper with other past papers -> Translation and application to new problem or the next step -> Justification for new research
That is a lot of logical links. A lot of people in the game of telephone. A lot of potential for broken wires. There is even more potential for breakage when this process is sped up.
Ten or twenty years ago, the publishing process was faster and there were a lot fewer papers being published. Therefore, the conclusions of one paper could be addressed reasonably by a similar study a year or two later, and there was some dialogue between scientists in the literature. Even ten years ago when I started my MS degree and was writing my prospectus, I had to visit the library to photocopy the papers I looked up by title in a database, but I could copy and read the major papers on the topic in a day or two. Over the course of my MS, I added maybe 5-10 papers to my thesis that were recent publications that had come out since my prospectus. I had some time to assimilate the information I read, formulate my own research questions, conduct the experiments, and write up the results as they related to previous work in the field. Now I am writing my prospectus for my PhD, and every time I search the literature (ahem, Google Scholar), there are 5-10 more papers for me to read. Do I read them all? No. Could I possibly? If I did nothing else, maybe!
What happens when scientists are overloaded with reading in the field, reading in related other fields, and sitting in front of Google Scholar with 30+ recent abstracts in front of them while they write the introduction to their paper? Do they individually download, read, and evaluate each of these studies before drawing conclusions that can be addressed in their own manuscript? What if there are some older "classic" papers in the field that should be acknowledged in the introduction, but that are not online? What if your institution has gotten rid of most of its paper journal collection to save space, in favor of all electronic journal databases? What if some of the papers needed are in a journal not supported by your institution's database? Would you get an interlibrary loan for those 30+ papers? Would you pay cash for the electronic version?
What if the papers you do have cite that older paper as evidence for the phenomenon you are looking to describe, but you can't find that older paper?
I'll tell you what many scientists do. They cheat. They either (1) ignore the difficult-to-find paper that keeps coming up in the database and look for a different paper to cite, (2) use just the abstract from the paper to draw a conclusion that is cited, or (3) use the secondary source (someone who cites the primary data collector) and either use the secondary source's reference, or misattribute the data to the secondary source rather than the primary source.
It seems like an innocent (though admittedly lazy) process, but it can result in real problems. Exaggeration of conclusions, giving credit to the wrong authors, even completely getting it wrong by mis-reading or mis-quoting a sentence or two. But is this really cheating? Is it lying? Is it misconduct? Probably not in the same way as falsifying data or plagiarism, but it does cause similar problems in the scientific process. It causes erosion and breaks in the logical chain that advances scientific knowledge. It causes paradigms to be created that are not supported by reason. It causes misunderstanding and mistrust of science by the general public. It can result in policy decisions based upon consensus belief rather than data.
My husband, Rob Condon, is working on a paper with colleagues addressing the "broken telephone" phenomenon as it applies to the paradigm of jellyfish blooms increasing worldwide. The belief in this paradigm by the public as well as the scientific community is astounding, considering the lack (so far) of scientific data on the subject.
Some other students and I have been getting frustrated at the number of broken logical links and misattribution (AKA "citation trail") we have been finding during our literature searches, so we have been talking about starting a published list of the broken telephone offenders that we find. Maybe it will bring a little more recognition to the topic.
In conclusion:
- Don't be lazy
- Go ahead and skim the abstracts, but if you're putting something in your paper, make sure you've read it thoroughly
- Remember that the author you are citing might very well be your reviewer
- (On the other hand) Many, many papers play the broken telephone game and make mistakes, and the only way to keep from magnifying this misinformation is by going to the original source and evaluating their data and their conclusions for yourself
- Getting caught would be really embarrassing and you don't want to end up on our List of Broken Telephone Shame.
I would like to acknowledge my advisor Ruth Carmichael for encouraging lively discussion on this topic in her Scientific Communication course, and Kelly Robinson for her Facebook status update inspiring me to finally write something about this pet peeve!
Please submit examples of misattribution, misquotation, exaggeration, and other breaks in the scientific telephone line in the comments below! The more specific you are, the better. Thanks!
Tuesday, October 2, 2012
Naked Science
5 am, Rob is on a Skype conference with 4 international collaborators in the kitchen. Tristan wakes up and goes down to see Daddy. I hear T get up and go down in my PJs to get him. Then T realizes he is wet, and starts crying and trying to get his wet PJs off, in the bathroom directly behind Rob and in the line of vision of the camera. So before you know it, Rob's pajama-clad scientist wife and half-naked son are displayed on screens in Spain, Australia, and England simultaneously. Hi, Carlos Duarte!
Sunday, September 30, 2012
Wanting to Love Math and Computing
I love science, but it doesn't necessarily come naturally for me. The logic part usually makes sense, the scientific method was an easy fit, and I never really had trouble memorizing long lists of biology vocabulary words. But despite my chosen career being Science, I still have problem with the "Math and..." part of this field. I keep hoping that, like chemistry, the more I force myself to do math, the easier it will get.
In eighth grade, I knew I wanted to be a marine biologist, even though I was always better with words than numbers. After taking Life Science in 7th grade and going to a summer marine biology camp (marsh mud!), I was hooked. I tested for the county magnet high school for math and science, and did not get in (hmmm... maybe the MATH part??). I went to a good high school and had some great teachers who encouraged me (hi, Mr. Mensh!), and forced myself to take advanced track math and AP science courses. Oh, the math. From algebra onwards, I struggled. Geometry and Trigonometry were OK. Pre-calculus and Calculus, I struggled some more. My dad tried to help me, my boyfriend tried to help me, I cried, and I dragged myself through it. I managed to get by with OK grades, but I had to work. But I still didn't get why I would need to be so good at math to have a career in science, because so far, the most math I needed in high school science classes was a little bit of algebra. I did great in my science classes without much math acuity.
Meanwhile, that mathy boyfriend of mine was getting into gaming and writing computer programs with his guy friends, which to me seemed pointless (unless you wanted to be a software developer or have a startup and make lots of money, which some of his friends were already doing). It wasn't relevant to my chosen science career.
In college, I took one calculus class (which was pretty much a review of AP Calculus I took in high school) and one intro to statistics class to fulfill my math requirements. The science classes I struggled the most with were organic chemistry and genetics, and this had nothing to do with math (more like the amount of memorization needed for all the classes to complete my double major conflicted with my social life).
Even in my masters' program, I took the required courses (including statistics and some physical/geological courses that used a little math), completed my thesis, and probably used calculus all of about 3 times. Then I worked for a biological modeler, and he did all the math. But I started seeing how really useful it could be.
If I can master these mathematical functions, and get them into computer code, there is so much I could do. I could use my files and files of data to start describing biological and physical phenomena as a pattern, and compare this to other patterns, in really elegant ways. I could predict future results. I could write papers without doing experiments. I could do virtual experiments! I wouldn't be limited by existing statistics packages that charge a lot of money and never quite do what I want them to do. I WOULD BE ALL-POWERFUL! BWAH HAH HAH HAAAAHHHHH!
Now I'm starting to sound like that high school boyfriend.
So, now that I'm doing a PhD and am hopefully going to be an academic, I need to up my skill level and challenge myself. I've been hearing people talk about the language R for a while, and when a fellow student passed along the link for a free online course starting last week, I thought I would check it out. I had looked at R before, but it didn't seem very intuitive, and I never had time to play around with it. I didn't think I would ever teach it to myself, and no one is teaching it at our institution. So I signed up for the course, which is through Coursera and Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. Apparently 40,000 people signed up. It's a 4-week course, with video lectures and online quizzes and assignments. I feel pretty lost, but I am working really hard at it, because I've seen how powerful R can be. I want to be that girl who can type up a command in R and make a pretty graph, or call a function with a few commands at the drop of a hat. The only remotely similar experience I have with a computer language is with SAS, and that was a long time ago. R is hard. Or maybe this course is making it hard. But once again, I feel like I am struggling the way I struggled in high school with calculus. I am trying to hard to recognize patterns (didn't I say I was good at logic? Not so sure anymore!), and spending probably 10x longer with it than most people taking this course.
I'm thinking that stretching my brain in this way is good for me, like doing crossword puzzles or Sudoku, so I will be less likely to get Alzheimer's. In the meantime, I am tired, and honestly, find Facebook and blogging much more interesting!
In eighth grade, I knew I wanted to be a marine biologist, even though I was always better with words than numbers. After taking Life Science in 7th grade and going to a summer marine biology camp (marsh mud!), I was hooked. I tested for the county magnet high school for math and science, and did not get in (hmmm... maybe the MATH part??). I went to a good high school and had some great teachers who encouraged me (hi, Mr. Mensh!), and forced myself to take advanced track math and AP science courses. Oh, the math. From algebra onwards, I struggled. Geometry and Trigonometry were OK. Pre-calculus and Calculus, I struggled some more. My dad tried to help me, my boyfriend tried to help me, I cried, and I dragged myself through it. I managed to get by with OK grades, but I had to work. But I still didn't get why I would need to be so good at math to have a career in science, because so far, the most math I needed in high school science classes was a little bit of algebra. I did great in my science classes without much math acuity.
Meanwhile, that mathy boyfriend of mine was getting into gaming and writing computer programs with his guy friends, which to me seemed pointless (unless you wanted to be a software developer or have a startup and make lots of money, which some of his friends were already doing). It wasn't relevant to my chosen science career.
In college, I took one calculus class (which was pretty much a review of AP Calculus I took in high school) and one intro to statistics class to fulfill my math requirements. The science classes I struggled the most with were organic chemistry and genetics, and this had nothing to do with math (more like the amount of memorization needed for all the classes to complete my double major conflicted with my social life).
Even in my masters' program, I took the required courses (including statistics and some physical/geological courses that used a little math), completed my thesis, and probably used calculus all of about 3 times. Then I worked for a biological modeler, and he did all the math. But I started seeing how really useful it could be.
If I can master these mathematical functions, and get them into computer code, there is so much I could do. I could use my files and files of data to start describing biological and physical phenomena as a pattern, and compare this to other patterns, in really elegant ways. I could predict future results. I could write papers without doing experiments. I could do virtual experiments! I wouldn't be limited by existing statistics packages that charge a lot of money and never quite do what I want them to do. I WOULD BE ALL-POWERFUL! BWAH HAH HAH HAAAAHHHHH!
Now I'm starting to sound like that high school boyfriend.
So, now that I'm doing a PhD and am hopefully going to be an academic, I need to up my skill level and challenge myself. I've been hearing people talk about the language R for a while, and when a fellow student passed along the link for a free online course starting last week, I thought I would check it out. I had looked at R before, but it didn't seem very intuitive, and I never had time to play around with it. I didn't think I would ever teach it to myself, and no one is teaching it at our institution. So I signed up for the course, which is through Coursera and Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. Apparently 40,000 people signed up. It's a 4-week course, with video lectures and online quizzes and assignments. I feel pretty lost, but I am working really hard at it, because I've seen how powerful R can be. I want to be that girl who can type up a command in R and make a pretty graph, or call a function with a few commands at the drop of a hat. The only remotely similar experience I have with a computer language is with SAS, and that was a long time ago. R is hard. Or maybe this course is making it hard. But once again, I feel like I am struggling the way I struggled in high school with calculus. I am trying to hard to recognize patterns (didn't I say I was good at logic? Not so sure anymore!), and spending probably 10x longer with it than most people taking this course.
I'm thinking that stretching my brain in this way is good for me, like doing crossword puzzles or Sudoku, so I will be less likely to get Alzheimer's. In the meantime, I am tired, and honestly, find Facebook and blogging much more interesting!
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