GEARS:

Why a Postdoc is basically needed in Academia

2012-02-17T08:41:00.002-05:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I discuss why a postdoc is pretty much mandatory to succeed in academia. In a nutshell, YIAs are, in my opinion, supremely biased towards faculty that have had long postdoc stints which screw over faculty such as yours truly who didn't postdoc.

The Business Bag

2011-12-06T09:37:00.001-05:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I discuss the business bags for daily use and overnight travel. Check it out here.

Success Breeds Success

2011-11-29T15:15:00.004-05:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I discuss how success breeds success in research and discuss two methods to help enable your success in the lab and professionally.

Grad Students: Conference Etiquette

2011-11-28T08:39:00.003-05:00

Last week, I posted on Engineer Blogs how I was thankful for conferences. Ok, I know it was cheesy but I was going to post about conferences anyway. Rather than harp more on conferences, I thought I would give out some tips to graduate students/postdocs and what they should do at conferences. For more senior grad students, who've been to several (many?) conferences, this should be a no brainer, but for first-timers, conferences can be an eye opening experience.

This year, to show of my new tenure track hotness, I decided to take a few students with me. I did this for mainly three reasons. 1) I'm taken more seriously now that I have a TT position and am managing a group (personal benefit). 2) The students can really get a feel for what is relevant in the field and what sort of problems need solutions. This is something that is difficult to describe in meetings/discussions on campus but is in plain sight at conferences. 3) Students can use conferences to get new ideas, get added motivation to do good research, and can meet potential employers. There's also another added bonus for me which is once I take a few students, the next year, those students can show the new students the ropes. That ends up freeing my time because I don't have to introduce them to everyone.

Aside from that, there's other things that students should know before entering the conference arena. I'm just going to list a few main ones that come to mind.

Be approachable and outgoing: At many conferences, you have people that tend to be high up in a particular field. Make sure your initial impression to someone else is that you're approachable (and outgoing if you have that personality). You never know if that someone is the head of R&D of [insert large company] or CEO of [insert company]. It's ok to be shy if you're not the outgoing type and the easiest thing to mention is that you're new to the field and that this is your first conference. That's generally a good ice breaker statement. Presumably, if you're talking to a more established person, they're going to more easy going and friendly if you mention you're new.
Be excited to talk about your work: This should be a no-brainer but if you're excited and enthusiastic about your work, it will show. And like #1 says, you might be bending the ear of the head of R&D. However, if you're concerned about IP stuff with your work, make sure to ask your prof what you can and cannot say. The prof should know this but it will help you play your cards closer to your chest.
Sit with different people: At conferences, there's going to be coffee breaks, lunches, dinners, and cocktail hours. Make sure to make the rounds and sit with different people at different tables. This is a surefire way to meet new people. If you have the opportunity to go out with other people than from your lab, make sure to do so. You don't have to drink (I think GMP wrote a good blog post about this but I could be wrong) if you're not a drinker. But going out with people is better than sitting in your hotel room. Trust me. I have been out with many well respected people in the field that do not drink and that's fine. Going out with people shows that you're social and you have a life outside of work.
Accept the free drinks/food: Often, senior people in the field (or your prof) will pay for your drinks and/or food at a conference. Unless your university/lab has a policy against it, say thank you and accept it. If you're out in a group, someone may be able to count the meal as "business dinner" and get compensated for it. Other times, it's simply the older crowd being nice to the younger crowd. They remember what it's like to work for peanuts as a graduate student and they know conferences are expensive. If they feel like paying, let them. Your time to pay will come in a few years when you're making a real income with a real job and you're on the opposite side of the table with the new group of grad students.
Find the other grad students: If you want to be active in the field, get to know the other grad students. As time goes on, these people will be your peers and can help you get a job (or find out who's hiring). If you become active in the society, they will be in planning meetings with you and it's better to be friends than mortal enemies.
Take Notes on every talk and poster. Learn to know what each company is doing. Learn to know who are the higher-ups at each company. This will serve you well when you're hunting for ideas or what to talk to someone knowledgeable about a problem you're seeing.
Find the universities in the area: Presumably, you're going to a conference not next door. If that's the case, search the local university's website to see who is working in a related field. If you find someone, ask your prof if they know that person (or anyone else). If you're at the point where you are presenting posters and give talks, this is a prime opportunity to resume pad. Contact that prof at the local Uni and say "i'm in town for this conference and I've never been to this town/city. I'm working in [closely related field], is it possible to get a tour of your group and see what you are doing?" Chances are, that prof will say "sure. Do you want to give a talk about your research?". And your response should be "That would be fantastic". And Boom! you've just added an invited talk to your resume. This is a great way to see how other groups operate, get new ideas, get more exposure, and those other Uni's are always looking for potential candidates. If you give a great talk, chances are you might get to come back for an interview if they're hiring in your area.

That's all of the things that I can think of at this time. Any more that I'm missing?

This is why the US govt is broke...

2011-11-22T13:59:00.002-05:00

I have to travel for a review panel and I've received my plane ticket from the US's travel agent. The cost of the ticket is ~$1200, whereas the same ticket through Orbitz is ~$400.

Having to go through expensive, pre-determined, preferred vendors is just one of the many examples as to why the US govt is broke.

Thankful For Conferences

2011-11-22T11:53:00.001-05:00

This week, at Engineer Blogs, we discuss what we're thankful for that relates to engineering. I'm pretty thankful for technical conferences. Follow the link to see why.

Midterm Self-Assessment

2011-10-28T08:17:00.004-04:00

As we roll in to the middle of the semester, I'm starting to get a clearer picture of the hard data (grades) from what I have observed via anecdotal evidence. There's a clear Gaussian distribution of students of what I would call the average 70%, with 15% on either tail, making up the very good and very poor students. So far, I'm very pleased with this for a number of reasons.

The pressures to curve the class are non-existent. This is pretty important to me because that's a direct correlation to whether I have the class on the right trajectory. I feel like the average engineering student should be getting between an 80 and a 90 in a class, with the below average in the 70s and the above average in the 90s. If the entire class is in the 90s, then I'm not making the material difficult enough for the very good students and that's a disservice to them. If everyone is failing during the midterm, not only is there pressure to curve the class upward but it also drops morale, which can erode student confidence and evaluation scores.

Most students are pleased with the class, based on informal polling. I ask for feedback anonymously (or not if the student doesn't mind) after every large assignment. A handful of students use this to vent with things like "this assignment sucks" and "I didn't learn any of this crap". But the majority of the responses have been positive in the form of constructive criticism. Comments like "I think this aspect wasn't explained clearly and the notes were equally unclear. Can you give a better example next time?" are things that I can directly use during the next course to make improvements. Also, after these assignments, I do let students know about some of the changes for subsequent semesters so they know their comments haven't fallen on deaf ears. I'm thinking this could be a key part to get good evaluations which always looks better than bad evaluations.

I feel like I've covered more material and required more work from the students and they've responded positively. I've added some changes from previous semesters, beefed up the writing requirements, and had more lectures. Students have grumbled a little bit (who doesn't love more work) but most have grudgingly admitted it's been for their benefit. This also means I have a heavier time commitment for this class than previous semesters under different instructors but I think it's been positive for both the students and myself.

Now, with that said, there's definitely room for improvement. I've been waiting until the last minute to make up assignments and lab manuals, which is not a good trend to start. Also, there are a few more topics I should have covered during the lecture part of the course which would have benefited the students and probably saved me a few headaches. I've been late on getting information to the TAs but I don't require grading from the TAs so I don't think they're totally mad at me yet.

Overall, I'm fairly pleased so far. I only hope that I can keep this up for the rest of the semester and have the students be successful in the course.

Research Group Dynamics

2011-10-25T10:50:00.002-04:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I discuss the dynamics of building a research group and put forth a few key ideas that I focused on in the beginning. If you have comments, they're greatly appreciated.

More on the Vibram Five Fingers

2011-10-19T08:34:00.004-04:00

Yesterday, I had a relatively off topic post at Engineer Blogs discussing why thinking outside of the box is a good thing for engineers. I used the Vibram Five Fingers shoes as an example of how this can not only be a concept but come to fruition (and the the market). I thought I would go completely off topic today because I'm dealing with stupid BS that I don't want to deal with and I would rather talk about something enjoyable.

I'd like to say I'm an avid runner but I just don't have the time any more. I'm probably more than a weekend warrior but less dedicated than someone with a regular training schedule. I used to have a bunch of minor foot/ankle/knee/hip problems that were always nagging me. That was until I bought a pair of Nike Free.

Slipping on the Nike Free was like a caressing glove for my foot. Two things were immediately apparent after my first run in the Free: 1) the separation of the sole compartments means your foot conforms to the road and you feel more and 2) there's no way in hell you can run heel-toe in these shoes. Maybe smaller runners don't have this problem but I'm nearly 200 lbs and there's not enough padding in them to support that kind of impact. This essentially forced me to run completely on the ball of my foot, which is no easy task. It took a few weeks but I definitely can see the difference between running only on the ball of my foot versus heel-toe. Many of the annoying aches and pains in my feet/ankles/knees/hips have mostly gone away. Also, it forced me to change my stride to be more efficient and my running times have dropped significantly.

But I still wanted a more natural feel, so I tried a pair of the Vibram Five Fingers and went on my first run two days ago. My initial impression of the Five Fingers was that they were extremely weird. There's no padding or cushioning and depending on the model, you either get a nearly flat bottom or a modified tire tread. In these shoes, there's no margin for error with heel striking. If you cannot run only on the ball of your foot, then you're not ready for these shoes. Also, the separated toes aspect is insane, crazy, and totally works. I thought I would have issues with my toes slipping out of their little compartments but had no issues with it.

For a test run, I did my normal 4 mile loop, which is all on the side of the road or sidewalks. My normal time is somewhere between 27:30 and 30:00 depending on how hard I'm pushing it. The course is mostly flat with only minor hills. For the first 2.5 miles, the shoes were great! I was able to feel the road more. I definitely felt more twigs and small rocks that I normally don't. And it's very hard not to run fast in these shoes. I had to constantly restrain my effort because I was concerned something might go wrong and I didn't want to have to walk 2 miles back to my house. After about 2.5 miles, I started to notice a few problems, namely blisters forming under my big toes. Part of this problem was from me pushing it too much (I should have only ran 1 or 2 miles) and part of it was having the trail version of the shoes which has a significant tread under the big toe. You can see how that looks in the figure below.

I slowed down and tried to run on the grass next to the sidewalk, which was pretty difficult because it was dark and I couldn't see where I was stepping. I hit a few ditches (com'on people! fix you lawns) and decided to deal with the blisters and stay on the sidewalk. Even then, I was still under 29:30 which is at least an average run for me. In the future, I plan on using these on the trail runs that I do on weekends where the toe will (presumably) sink in to the ground and not cause blisters.

The last comment that I'll make about the Vibrams is that they are definitely not for the inexperienced runner. I run exclusively on the ball of my foot, even for long runs that last an hour or more. Also, my guess is I'd be somewhere near 5 minute mile run if I was really racing that distance. I'd like to think that qualifies me as someone who isn't bothered by the lack of heel striking in the shoes. But nothing could prepare me for the cramps, aches, and overall workout that my calves feel right now. The 2nd day after a race or hard run is really when you feel it and I'm definitely hobbling around. My calves haven't had a workout like this since I started with the Frees, and even then it wasn't this bad!

Hey You Kids, Get Off My Lawn!

2011-10-12T17:19:00.002-04:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I discuss why older engineers' perspectives of young engineers are ridiculous. They're akin to saying "Hey you kids, get off my lawn!" and they have no idea how good they've had it for decades.

What's the difference between 18 and 27?

2011-10-03T12:57:00.003-04:00

Now, I know what you're thinking... 9. On the surface, that technically is correct. But those of you who are astute will say "0" is the correct answer. Let me add a little more context to the question. When you're thrown in to the deep end and you're floundering, does it really matter if the pool is 18 ft deep or 27 feet deep? Nope, you're either going to sink or swim.

I raised this classic tenure-track-sink-or-swim question in this frame during a recent round table discussion with the other new engineering profs and some senior/established profs. Because I really feel like it's either sink or swim and that's it. That's not to say I think SnowU is the type of institution that hires 5 junior faculty and will ultimately fight it out for one tenured position. I think that's a ridiculous way to run an academic institution. But rather, I get the general feeling that either a person has it or doesn't have it, and it's not going to be something the institution does that determines that.

Needless to say, this definitely got some strange and awkward looks from the other newbies. Aside from being shocked that I had a more cutthroat view of academia, the common comments from both the newbies and round table leaders was that they didn't think it was a good thing to jump into the deep end. That, using the same analogy, I should find the stairs and take a more measured path towards the deep end, but ensure my head stays above water.

While I think I was/am prepared for the position, I feel I am continuously tested/challenged by the amount of work, scope of the work, and depth of the work. On the sink-or-swim scale, I'd say I'm treading water, but definitely waaaay in the deep end, which has the potential to be good but also the potential for a spectacular failure.

But if this approach is successful, (and for those of you who have done this) do you think it will have better lasting effects than if I just waded into the pool and learned how to swim that way? For example, I see it similar to higher salary effect for starting a new job. That is to say, if I can swim in 18 ft or 27 ft, then when I'm established, handling the even higher workload with being a tenured faculty member will be easier.

For those of you who have passed the tenure hurdle, how crazy is this approach? Is my assumption correct that handling more in the beginning will mean I can handle even more later? If you're just starting out like me, what has your approach been? Is it similar to this or different?

Blogging is hard...

2011-09-20T12:34:00.002-04:00

...when you have a bunch of shit to do. My post for today, over at Engineer Blogs.

First Classroom Lecture Report

2011-09-02T08:51:00.003-04:00

Well, I've survived the first day! Actually, it wasn't so bad. I started out with a PowerPoint that covered the course objectives and syllabus. There was a lot of information regarding TAs, labs, lab rooms, etc, that didn't want to skip and so even though I dislike PowerPoint, I went along with it.

I tried to reiterate the relevant stuff about 3 times so hopefully some of it sank in. I got a few laughs at my jokes that seemed at least mostly genuine. Probably the best part of the PowerPoint portion of class was when I reviewed the Academic Honesty Policy with them. I told them this is something profs babble about on the first day and then most students don't think about it again. But for me, as a prof, if I suspect someone has cheated, it's about 20-30 hours of insane paperwork and meetings that I would gladly go through walking barefoot on hot coals if it meant dragging down a cheater. The class got very silent about that for a few minutes as I paused to let that sink in.

One student was brave enough to ask if I was serious and I responded by smiling gleefully and saying "Yes". I think they got the message.

The only other things to report on are that the students (being seniors) are a rowdy bunch and the room was over 85 degrees, which is too hot to teach. After the PowerPoint, I had to roll up my sleeves and loosen my tie for the Chalk'n'Talk section (GMP's phrase, not mine). The few undergrads that I have met prior to the class which are department helpers mentioned to me after that they thought the class was very good. So some initial praise was nice.

I only covered about 40% of the material that I wanted to cover but that's ok because I don't have set material to cover for the course (since it's labs/projects). That also means I have lecture 2 done so I'm ahead of the game. :-D

All-in-all, it was fine. My nervousness and sleepless nights seemed all for naught, although I didn't sleep again last night and I might have a fever so that could be the reason why I'm not sleeping...

First Day of Teaching!!

2011-09-01T09:21:00.001-04:00

Well, the time has finally arrived! In about 20 minutes, I will enter into my first classroom as an assistant professor. I've had to rip up labs and course planning twice in the last week alone, but I think I might be good to go.

I don't really feel too nervous because I've given plenty of talks/presentations/one-off-lectures before. However, I get this spider sense that I'm just completely missing something that I was supposed to do. Also, I'm teaching seniors so presumably they'll be able to smell bullshit from a mile away.

When I started blogging back in February, September seemed so far off but now that it's here, I'm actually glad. I've had 3 sleepless nights but after the first day, I'll probably finally get some rest.

I'll report back with how it went later. Wish me luck!

The Economics of Academia (Part 1)

2011-08-30T08:18:00.003-04:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I discuss a reader's question on the economics of academia. Essentially, the reader asks why can't we have 20:1 class ratios and lecturers being paid $100/hr and not worry about bringing in research money.

It's not an easy question with a short answer so expect a few posts on this topic. I start out by comparing those constraints to a typical community college model.

Lesson Plans Down the Drain

2011-08-29T08:56:00.003-04:00

Today, I thought I would be writing to say "Yay, I got a few lesson plans done so I won't be totally scrambling in my first few weeks". It turns out, last night, I found out my first Lab Module for my class, and first two lectures are completely wrecked. Plus, all my subsequent labs/lectures (which build on the first one), are all screwed too. I need to back up for second to give some context.

Part of the Lab Course I'm teaching will deal with data acquisition and signal processing. Currently, many of the students use LabVIEW but hate the interface. So, as part of the course, I was going to introduce them to Data Acquisition in Matlab, something I've been doing for the better part of 4 years (and talked about my love of Matlab here).

I wrote a whole new lab based on using Matlab as the data acquisition and data manipulation environment. I made fancy pictures, charts, snippets of code, etc. Then, last night, as I was working on my lectures to compliment the lab, DrWife had a great idea. We were giving NanoGEARS a bath and she was playing with some rattling toys. As she was shaking them, the pitch (obviously) changed when she was loosely holding it versus tightly holding it or when it was underwater. DrWife suggested that would be a great classroom demonstration. I could tie in damping (via water) or adding stiffness (holding tighter). And, because it was audible, it's much more interactive than just showing sine waves to the students.

I could use Matlab to acquire the signals, analyze the signals in the Fourier Domain. Add filtering, etc. So last night, as I was trying to acquire a simple audio signal with Matlab [using instrhwinfo('winsound') ], all hell broke loose. It turns out, in the new x64 version of Matlab (R2011a) only CompactDAQ devices are supported!?!?!? WTF? So all that legacy code that I've built up over 4 years is entirely down the shitter. So none of my sound examples will work using the standard code (now called legacy interface). And basically any DAQ card you purchase from NI, Agilent, or any other vendor won't work. CompactDAQ devices are such a small part of the possible hardware spectrum for data acquisition that this is a joke.

And the beauty of all of this is the computer lab at SnowU just fucking upgraded to x64 Matlab R2011a. So none of those computers can use Matlab to acquire signals with the data acquisition toolbox. Basically, I've planned 5 labs around using a used-to-be-mainstay piece of software that now is completely worthless. Now I have to scramble to make new lectures and a new lab manual centered around LabVIEW (another worthless software).

I've emailed, I've called, I've posted on the forums but I can't get any response as to when Matlab's going to fix their problem. And it is a fucking problem. Researchers want the new x64 Matlab because it supports 8+ GB of RAM, meaning much higher computation rates and memory. But for researchers dealing with instrumentation, like me, I also first need to acquire the fucking signals!

I would love to rant more but I have lectures and labs to redo. Fuck!

Freshman Advising

2011-08-22T21:03:00.003-04:00

One of my service tasks that I am scheduled to do this year is freshman advising. At SnowU, they take freshman advising very seriously, whereas I'm not so crazy about it. I mean, apart from the social transition (and that can be a bitch for many students), the actual academic advising portion should be straight forward.

In engineering, unlike the Arts, students have to take 96% of their classes within their major (or general engineering). In other majors, you could have as little as 30% of your classes within that major (think Anthropology, History, or Communications). The one think about Mechanical Engineering that is so nice is you have this great little chart that says "Oh look, these are the 4-5 mandatory courses you have to take. No room for electives." Your decision is already made for you.

As incoming freshman, they don't know this, which is where I guess I come in. And I know things can get more difficult when you factor in skipping classes for AP Calc and Phys, etc. but even then it's not that hard.

So all in all, this shouldn't be so hard. But if you dig a little deeper, there's definitely a flaw with me advising freshman students. It's the blind leading the blind! How am I supposed to advise them on a graduation track that I don't fully understand yet?!? Yes, I should be able to get up to speed very quickly and this will help me get used to the curriculum. But still, I feel like these freshman will be like "Oh yeah, well my advisor doesn't know shit because he just started working here."

Any thoughts/advice/words'o'wisdom for me?

Writing in Style

2011-08-16T07:56:00.003-04:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I discuss how I love sketching with my fountain pen and how my colleagues think I'm weird for doing so.

Procrastination to the Nth Power

2011-08-09T08:05:00.003-04:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I discuss Procrastination to the Nth Power which is a combination of procrastination, deadlines, perfectionism, and biting off more than I can chew.

Don't want to write, don't be an engineer

2011-08-08T08:35:00.003-04:00

I apologize to my readers for being such a slacker. I've managed to keep up with my Engineering Blogs posts but my own posts have been seriously lacking. I've had a quasi-political BS thingy at work that forced me to submit for a different request-for-proposals with a closer deadline (and less money!!) than I really wanted to. In the midst of working on that proposal, I got asked to talk to a prospective undergrad about our engineering program since everyone else is basically taking the summer off, so it seems.

Two thoughts came to mind while talking to Prospective UnderGrad (aka, PUG!). 1) did I really start looking for colleges during my junior year of HS? I know I didn't visit any (lack'o'$$$) and I don't think college crossed my mind until senior year. Probably, the really smart kids in my HS started then but I was not in that group. Anywho, thought number two is more important.

PUG was nice enough to mention a few Unis he was considering and visiting. I tried to stress the focus and direction of SnowU and why I decided to join them, hoping to convince him and his mom that SnowU would be just as good as the other fancy-shmancy schools they were considering. For you Oatmeal readers, I definitely focused on using a modern sales pitch. One of the things I mentioned to PUG was that he should expect 100x more writing that he would ever believe possible.

I think my line went something like this: "I know you're very interested in building stuff but you should also expect to write, a lot. Basically, if you don't want to write, major in English or Literature or History but don't major in engineering." (I also went on to say that this is true at any university, not just SnowU.)

So, this was me trying to be Sincere, Helpful, and Knowledgeable. Now, I know I reached PUGMom because she appreciated me being forthcoming about the expectations of UG engineers. She said of the few schools they already visited, everyone else focuses on the "cool, hand's on stuff" like Baja, labs, and ASME projects but no one mentioned writing. I focused on those things too but I said I wanted to make sure he was fully prepared to enter into engineering and know what the expectations were.

So, do you think it was stupid for me to lay it all out there for a high school junior that engineers spend just as much (if not more) time writing as they did building cool shit? Were you told this before you entered into engineering? What are the odds that he'll actually come to SnowU? Any takers?

The Daily Grind

2011-07-26T12:31:00.002-04:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I discuss the daily grind of a professor and toss in some work-life balance issues. A nod to GMP with her post on work-life balance. What do you think? Naive, realistic, or not possible?

STEM Employment Data

2011-07-19T11:36:00.002-04:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I respond to Ken Cid's comment about the administration's STEM jobs report. There's charts and tables and all sorts of fun things. You should really check it out...

GEARS Consulting LLC

2011-07-18T09:34:00.002-04:00

I've been a huge slacker over the past few weeks about posting. However, good marinades take time, which is what I've been doing. Basically, I've been making contact with local companies for possible research avenues and with colleagues that are initial collaborators. Aside from them, I was contacted by another colleague of mine to do some work that's too short to use for a project through SnowU but could bear fruit for a longer project if we're successful. This brings up a fourth aspect to being a professor that I didn't discuss at Engineer Blogs the past two weeks (part 1 and part 2): Consulting.

I didn't mention it there because consulting is not part of your activities through the university. But, many universities allow profs to consult provided it's within the stipulations of your contract. I thought I would discuss two things: why would a university let you consult and how to go about setting up a LLC. Today, I'll tackle the whys and on Wednesday, I'll tackle the hows.

Why allow consulting? Up until a few years ago, I wasn't really sure why universities let their profs consult. I knew my profs did during UG and Grad school (occasionally missing lectures) but it seems at odds with their normal job of professing. I think the reason with the biggest misconception is because profs would make more in industry so if you don't let them make something on the side, they'll eventually jump ship. While this is somewhat true, I don't hold to that school of thought that profs (especially in engineering) don't make anywhere near what they could in industry. My guess is there is a 5%-10% premium on industry jobs for the same level of competency. And while a worker at a company may get stock options and profit sharing, profs get summer salary and consulting. In the end, I think it's a wash.

But that still doesn't answer the question of why profs are allowed to consult. As near as I can tell, I think the main reason is there are often project available from companies that need to be completed in a short timeframe. This is too short to be a university project and probably not enough money to fund a prof+student+equip+50% overhead. Rather, short projects that are successful by the prof can turn into longer projects at the university. Essentially, you (as the prof) help them fix an immediate problem and they look to you to solver longer term problems through a partnership with the university.

If successful, this is a win-win for everyone involved. The prof gets some extra salary for consulting. The company gets their immediate problem solved. Also, the company has a partner to look at future problems that may/will arise but don't have the internal resources to commit to solving them. Rather, they can fund the prof and their student(s) to solve them in a more university-like pace. The university wins because they will get their 50% overhead on whatever the company sponsors at the university. And, because this money wouldn't normally be available to the university, it's an extra source of funding. Plus, it only came about because the prof did consulting on the side.

The last thing I'll say about this aspect is that funding from companies is generally much more flexible than agency/foundation funding. When you're getting money from the government, you need to explicitly spell out everything that you'll spend money on, even before any research has been done. This has the potential to hamstring you because you may commit X amount to travel each year but you actually need to travel more in the latter years rather than the early years. But when you get funding from a company, to them, it's just $X amount out the door. If you need to shuffle things around to get the research done, they don't generally care. That's very good from the prof's perspective because there's a lot of flexibility in there to work with.

Declining to Review

2011-07-07T09:24:00.002-04:00

Over the past few days, I've had a few requests to review show up in my inbox. I accept that reviewing manuscripts is a part of my academic service and it's something you're supposed to do for the good of the global community. There is also some personal benefit because reviewing other work helps you critique your own and makes you a better writer. Unless I am travelling, I have always accepted the reviewing assignments I'm given.

Except today...

This was a fortunate case (for me) where you can see the manuscript in its entirety prior to accepting/declining to review. Some journals only let you see the abstract and then it's more difficult to decide because the abstract may sound like it's in your area but the manuscript is actually not in your area. (On a side note, I have had this happen several times and it's a bitch to do a good review.) Being able to see the manuscript in its entirety was crucial. From reading the abstract, I thought "Hmm, well this is definitely my area. Guess I have another one to add to my pile." Once that PDF was on screen, it was an entirely different story.

After skimming and picture hunting, the manuscript failed to pass any of the normal publication requirements like does this really need to be published, is the topic/data highly relevant, and isn't this just combined piecemeal from multiple places? So I took the easy way out and just said "Nope, not reviewing". I feel bad about it because I'm shirking my duties as an academic but it would have (at best) been annoying and time consuming to review.

So, for any of you out there that have done a lot of manuscript reviewing, how often does this come up for you? What do you end up doing? Is it right or wrong to just decline to review because at first glance you think there's no shot at getting it published?

Academic Breakdown

2011-07-06T13:50:00.003-04:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I discuss why professors live and die based on their funding and give some rough indication of the amount of funding needed to sustain a research group.

Official Tenure Track: Day 1

2011-07-01T08:58:00.004-04:00

Well, the day has finally arrived! Today starts my official tenure track position at SnowU. Officially, I switch from visiting assistant professor GEARS to GEARS, assistant professor of mechanical engineering and optics. (You'll notice a few changes to my bio and an added disclaimer just in case.)

I'm pretty excited and nervous, just like I was my first unofficial day. But, to tell you the truth, it's pretty anti-climactic. I've already been working here for a few months, submitted papers and my first proposal, and have my first grad student. Plus all the people here already assumed and acted like I was official.

My office is still a work in progress (see left). I'm still awaiting furniture, a whiteboard, and my new laptop. Also, I need to decide about adding extra chairs and a conference table or should I go with a small loveseat and a coffee table. I'm thinking the latter but not sure. Plus, I have to get my Worth Demotivator poster.

Other than that, it's the same routine for me here. Figure out which grants to go for, finish papers, work on completing prior commitments, and brainstorm for new ideas. Hopefully I'll pass muster when it comes my time for tenure review in a few years, but we'll have to wait and see how that plays out.

Proposals: Initial Thoughts

2011-06-29T09:25:00.002-04:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I discuss my first proposal experience. Hopefully, when I'm an old and feeble tenured prof, I'll look back on this post with nostalgia.

On Diversification: with Dr. Anna Garry and Professor Ursula Keller

2011-06-23T08:55:00.006-04:00

When I posted on Diversification in STEM Fields, I mentioned Professor Ursula Keller's article in February's OPN. I reached out to Professor Keller with a few specific questions hoping to gather more insight on what a junior faculty member such as myself can do and what are the specific aspects of STEM academia that are keeping the door closed for women and minorities. Dr. Anna Garry, who works with Professor Keller on the issue of outreach and retaining talented women scientists, was kind enough to respond back with some very thought provoking responses.

If you haven't read Professor Keller's article, it can be found here (not pay link). I suggest you do so not only for the context of the questions but also for just general insights into the diversification problem in STEM fields. I've posted my questions so you can see the specific context with the shortened question and response below.

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[Original Question: I completely agree that senior male and female scientists/engineers will carry the most weight in changing the culture in STEM fields. However, as a tenure track faculty member who fits the stereotypical profile (white, male, American), how can I be an ally even in my early career stage for eliminating sexism and discrimination? Are there particular steps to take for someone in their early career to buffer themselves from outside influences which may lead to a more discriminatory view in the future? (For example, you start out with good intentions but change over time to get into the good ‘ole boys club.) ]

1. How can a new male tenure track professor buffer themselves from outside influences that can lead to a more discriminatory view in the future?

[AG] I think that the key here is to keep an open mind always about attitudes and assumptions that you see and hear. In addition you can speak up when you see something uncomfortable. Often women are told to lighten up, or not to take things so seriously, or that a person didn't mean it. If a male colleague/member of staff says that what is happening/said is not right, or that it's discouraging - this is really reinforcing for women, they feel supported and respected. For women the environment they work in matters enormously, the old "take it as a joke" attitude is very wearing if the joke is always on you.

Specific examples: I am not a physicist, I am a political scientist, educationist and writer. I am used to being in a more balanced workplace, gender wise.

In the current environment I hear general statements like "I cried like a girl" and there is also a common attitude of competitiveness that is not a natural approach for a lot of women. You have to be very confident in this environment to be different, and not become isolated.

In addition, because I am a woman I have (for the first time in my life) experienced the initial assumption, from men and women here who don't know me, that I work in a secretarial, assistant capacity. This is an awful experience (I have a BSc, MA and PhD), and it hasn't happened to me before. Dealing with this in an angry way would not work, because you are dealing with unconscious thoughts, and who do you talk to about this, if it is an underlying assumption. What I did was set out on a campaign of clarifying the situation to the right people. It worked, all is clear. But I am an experienced, confident, person who could do it, even though it made my heart sink that I had to (and may have to deal with it again). What I was dealing with was subtle, unconscious assumptions, rather than open minds about what the range of roles a woman can take.

I am also hearing from young women scientists that they have to deal with the uncomfortable situations where male colleagues will not/cannot look them in the eye when they speak, and that some men talk only to the men in the group. For male scientists to include women all levels in these group situations is vital and, ultimately, very encouraging.

As you are aware, I think it may be very easy for a successful male academic to adopt the communal departmental mind, if all the colleagues in a department are male. A second thing that is necessary for male scientists to realize is that women (and the research has shown this) are often very self-questioning, unconfident and perfectionist in their work. They may think they are not good, even if their marks are excellent. If they are not discouraged at this stage of initial nervousness, they can produce great work. Positive reinforcement and encouragement really helps in the retention of women.

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[Original Question: After reading your article, I agreed with the overall points you are attempting to make. Identifying borders, changing the work culture, and becoming an advocate of a new scientific culture all sound good but how do we go about initiating this change? Do you think there are individual differences and borders between STEM fields or are the obstacles to change largely uniform across all STEM fields?]

2. Are the obstacles similar across the STEM fields, or are their individual differences?

This is a huge question and I don't have the answer to this, but we will consider this question as we work. Certain areas of STEM have been studied more than others. I haven't, however, seen a great deal of work about the situation in Mechanical Engineering. One of my neighbours is a researcher in the ETH Mechanical Engineering department. There are two women there out of 40 researchers.

I think one answer is that the academic career has common issues across all of the science subjects in the sense of how a scientist deals with the obligations of scientific research, publications, conferences and dealing with family life.

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[Original Question: Another point you make in the article states that women are opting out of academia as it is now defined. And from that, I presume that some men do not opt out of academia, either because they are OK with its current definition or are willing to work in a system that has some significant drawbacks (tenure and funding rat-race, perpetual postdocs [specifically science fields], pressures to publish, to name a few). What is it about an academic position that is driving women away but not driving men away? Is it simply a numbers game where there are still enough men within the system that there will be some pursuing academic careers regardless of the drawbacks?]

3. Do women and men opt out of academia in different numbers?

[AG] This, I think, is an important question and I am trying to address this in my work. I haven't seen any figures or studies on this. My aim is to interview all the scientists I can, across our network, on key decision moments in their careers and identify then the attitudes of men and women to idea of remaining in academia, and the situations that cause them to leave.

My sense is that a lot of men opt out of academia too, for many reasons. It may be that we are also losing the type of men that would make a real contribution to changing the scientific environment for the benefit of the retention of women and minority groups!

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[Original Question: From your profile in the article and your current position, I see that you have lived and worked in multiple countries with different cultures. From my own experiences in the US and Europe, I have seen a dichotomy arise within STEM fields resulting from more cultures mixing. As the cultural diversity increases, the natural progression is to suggest discrimination over time will decrease due to the diversity. However, as more cultures are represented with differing views on societal roles for males and females, I find the progression has stagnated. From your experience, do you think this could be one (of many) reasons for why discrimination persists?]

4. The impact of cultural diversity on the stagnation of the situation for women scientists

[AG] This is an enormous question, and there hasn't been much investigation of this. There are certainly anecdotal stories on the problems that different cultural views of the role of women create. I don't think it is possible to answer this, but it is certainly something that we are alert to. It may be that someone who we commission for the OPN "Reflections on Diversity" column, from a minority scientist point of view will address this topic.

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Ok, interview over, back to my normal GEARS voice. Dr. Garry has also mentioned to me that OPN will be launching a column in the near future called "Reflections on Diversity", discussing Women and Minorities in Science.

While there is a lot of information to digest in Dr. Garry's responses, there's two items which immediately jump out to me: the lack of eye contact (Q1) and that men which may make a real contribution to changing diversity might be the ones leaving academia (Q3).

I definitely have been in interviews and meetings where the speaker will not make eye contact, and from asking around, most people seem to say the same thing. I'm not sure why people don't make eye contact (without staring!) but when you're talking to someone and they're talking to the wall, it's very annoying.

More importantly, I think Dr. Garry brings up a hugely interesting suggestion in Q3. Because academic jobs are limited, there will always be people leaving academia after their PhD/Postdoc. But maybe the men that are leaving are the ones that would be the type of person to try and effect change. But since they leave for industry, the majority of men left in academia are of the type that perpetuate the current standard or focus on their research without thinking of things outside of it. I'd love to see some evidence of that but it is a very interesting proposition.

I would like to thank Dr. Anna Garry and Professor Ursula Keller at ETH Zurich for taking the time to respond and for giving some thought provoking insights. More information on Professor Keller's group can be found here.

Diversification in STEM Fields

2011-06-22T08:17:00.003-04:00

One of the reasons I started blogging was to share my tenure track experiences with others. And like all other bloggers, you start reading other blogs and get a lot (well, sometimes) of useful information for what other tenure track faculty did in certain situation. Underneath all of that info though, there is an undercurrent always discussing the topic of diversification within STEM fields. This isn't just limited to blogs but in real press as well.

In February's OPN (pay link), Professor Ursula Keller at ETH Zurich tackles the topic by proposing that senior faculty (both male and female) need to be the main advocates for diversification. Professor Keller also states that we need to change the present working culture, something which I think is nicely summarized by GMP's post on Work-Life Balance. The thing is, I'm just a n00b at all of this (no seniority) and I have no real insights into how to effect change because I am a stereotypical, white male engineer.

This same exact question was asked by Hermitage: "What would you like to see from tenure-track and not-yet-tenure-track menfolk? How can they pitch in?". [For details see] However, the respondents didn't really come up with any profound ideas (not trying to offend...), but rather stuck to basically saying stop being an asshat. There were other items mentioned like try to disassociate the sex of the author when reviewing/judging/commenting and to speak up when you see an obvious case of sexism.

But what else can someone in my situation (young, male tenure track engineer) do to not perpetuate the norm?

In a professional world, I don't think someone should be characterized as a humorless bitch, nor is asking is it that time of the month. On one hand, I'm actually shocked that faculty members would ask that but on the other, I can't say I'm surprised - we can be asshats for no reason. But is that essentially the list of things a male faculty member can do to help?

Treat female faculty members (and other minorities for that matter) as just "normal faculty". Their record should speak for themselves, not their outward appearance.
Maintain professional courtesy even when women/minorities aren't around.
Just work based on the work, not the authors.
Try to more vocal about your work-life balance.

The first three to me seem like they should be a no-brainer. I'm married to a female engineer with a PhD so I don't need any other justification for woman's competency in engineering (and all STEM). But I think the 4th item on the list can really go a long way to making a difference. That's especially the case for my situation because I'm in academia (flexible working environment) whereas my wife works in industry (structured working environment). I expect I'll be doing my fair share of dr's visits (like today!) and staying home with a sick child, and so on.

But that brings me to a grand question that I can hopefully get some answers from the blog'o'sphere.

Are male faculty members that have female partners in STEM fields better allies for diversification than those whose partners are not and does that make for a better work-life balance?

Would a postdoc have helped?

2011-06-21T09:15:00.002-04:00

Sorry for not posting in a while. I've been swamped with proposal work and traveling. Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I've posed the questions Would a postdoc have helped? It's a question that's been on my mind since I've been working on this massive, multi-university proposal. More to follow on that today or tomorrow.

The worth of employee knowledge

2011-06-14T08:50:00.001-04:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I follow up on the question I posed a while back on "Where's the column for Knowledge Learned on the balance sheet?". This question was essentially posed in a NY Times article on why companies are spending more on equipment than employees.

Grad School, Is it worth it?

2011-06-07T08:48:00.001-04:00

Today, at Engineer Blogs, I respond to Blogger Helena's comment on whether it's worth it to go to Grad School. I definitely think it is for those that can hack it.

The Unknown Adversary

2011-06-06T20:12:00.003-04:00

When you get that initial letter (or email in my case) that states you're getting a tenure track offer, it's essentially life-changing. As you can barely restrain yourself in your office chair (or in bed checking your iphone at 3 am...), you want to rejoice in pure happiness. There's fireworks going on in the background. You're having delusions of grandeur thinking you're going to hit 9 out of 10 proposals. You're going to be an awesome teacher with near perfect reviews. Blah blah blah.

Fast forward a few months. You're settling into your new position. Working on your first proposal. Finishing those last few papers that you need to do otherwise you'll never get them done. Oh, and then DrWife reminds you to finish submitting your relocation reimbursement. So, you collect your receipts and head to the department administrators who will undoubtedly help out the new guy. You're handed a folder with a bunch of papers from the interview and hiring process. You start browsing the paperwork as you're chatting with the secretary when you notice something very peculiar.

There's a misplaced piece of paper in your folder with the information of another interviewee of the university; someone they've passed over. You can help but look at the name, address, and current institution. And it turns out this is someone that you've met before and has a "name" in your field...

And then it dawns on you. There are a lot of people that submitted for this position and you're the one that got it. But it doesn't stop there. There are also people that you probably know and they were passed over for you. And eventually you'll want to make a splash in your field and undoubtedly some of the people that were passed over may resent you for it. Killing your proposals, negative comments in professional societies, etc etc.

So that begs a few questions. If you're in academia, do you eventually find out if other people applied for the position? And if those persons reveal themselves, have they been good sports about it? Or should I expect some backlash during some of my proposal reviews, paper reviews, etc etc? If you're out in industry, how does it work out there? I have no clue if things are as tight-knit as they can be in a specific academic field.

Be all you can be... for free

2011-06-01T09:18:00.003-04:00

Today, at Engineer Blogs, I discuss why you should be getting paid to go to grad school. Those of you paying to go to grad school have it all backwards.

Negotiations

2011-05-27T08:28:00.003-04:00

Lately, I've been getting settled at SnowU. I'm up on the faculty page in one department (and hopefully soon on the other). My permanent office was just vacated by its previous occupant. Now all they need is a new coat of paint and my furniture and I'm good to go on that front. The other stuff is going decently well too. There's a fellow new faculty member in one department and we're trying to work out logistics between the two labs, costs for remodeling, and establishing a 3-5 year plan for our spaces. I'm not too worried about that as I think it will get worked out shortly.

That does, however, lead to the main topic of this post: negotiations. When I originally discussed the App Package (part 1 & part 2) and the rest of the interview process, I realized I never mentioned much about the negotiations. From what I've heard and from my (limited) experience, everything is negotiable. If it's something that is a deal breaker for you, definitely bring it up now because you would be able to do it later. However, most negotiations break down along a few lines, namely: Startup, Students, Lab, Office, Salary, Extras. First, I'll start with some general thoughts though.

General Info

Have specific targets in mind for everything. I need "X" amount of lab space, roughly "Y" students salaries for at least two years, and I'm a rough startup pile'o'cash of "Z". If you're needing specific equipment, come prepared with a list during your interview. Also, look up student salaries and tuition expenses to get a rough idea of the cost per student. I didn't really have to show the specifics during my interview but they definitely glanced at my rough startup outline and were impressed that I had what appeared to be a detailed list. It shows you've thought about what you'd need, estimated costs, and are prepared for the job.

Startup

I know the whole thing is called your "Startup Package", but this is really the money part. How much do you need to get the ball rolling on your operations? What's the minimum amount you need to grease the wheels. If you throw out a huge number, be prepared to back it up with hard figures (even quotes if necessary). The university you're interviewing at will have some ideas about your research field and they'll know roughly what to expect from you. If you low-ball it, they'll probably not take you seriously. If you high-ball it, just justify it and negotiate from there. Remember, most (decidedly most, but not all) don't want you to fail in your tenure track period. They want you to succeed because you're expensive for the university. But if you don't ask for it now, it's not going to matter at tenure review when you say "well I didn't have enough to start the ball rolling." Have a rough number in mind and then round up by 30%. Hey, it's negotiations.

In my case, startup money, students, and summer salary got lumped into one total pot that I can draw from so I don't have to stick to 3 students and X in money. I can change it to 2 students and X+dX in money if I want. If you can negotiate that, do so because it will make things more flexible for you.

Students

I specifically separated students and startup money because tuition is expensive and 4 years X $$$$ tuition X some students = a lot of startup money. In practice, that will probably come in the form of tuition waivers and things like that. It doesn't matter how the university does it, just make sure you budget for students. Also find out the policy for tuition waivers (if any) or if you get TA support as per normal faculty.

Inquire about the average cost per student per year ( (tuition+salary+taxes)*overhead). This may be a key factor in deciding where to go if you've got multiple options. If you're planning on having a big group (say 10 people), the difference between $100k/student/year and $85k/student/year means $150k difference in your needed funding per year. If you're running a 10 student lab then you're in the $1M+ in research money turnover per year. To some profs, the difference between $850k and $1M in research money per year may not seem like much but as a new faculty member, that scares the shit out of me. That's a lot of money to have to bring in every year to keep things going.

Lab Space

Your lab space is directly coupled with the startup package and the size of your group. How many students are you planning on supporting right away? What equipment do you need and how much floor space does it take up? What are the requirements for your lab conditions (temp control, lighting, humidity, fume hoods, whatever)? Once again, a detailed list is better here. It shows you've thought about it and they you're not in over your head. I probably wasn't too specific on the size but I had very specific requirements on the lab conditions.

Salary

I've heard two different schools of thought when it comes to salary. One is: don't negotiate on it and save all your chips for more space/bigger startup/more students. Two is: only mainly negotiate on salary because the rest won't matter too much in the end.

I can definitely see the logic in (1). You're probably going to make decent money anyway and you'll probably do some consulting on the side. So your academic salary + summer salary + consulting should be enough to live on. Plus, instead of taking some extra money, you can get possibly an extra student or more equipment or whatever. That will help you get tenure (and more output, recognition, etc) and a higher earning potential.

However, (2) also makes sense. Here's the point reason. They're going to give a startup package so you will get some stuff. If you've asked appropriately in the beginning, even if they low-ball you, you're going to still get a nice package. So, this will be your only time to really ask for more money. And, to tell you the truth, I'm not so sure an extra "X" amount in startup or 1 extra year of a student salary is going to make or break tenure. If you're that close to the "go/no go line", then a lot more has gone off track than your initial negotiations.

In the end, make sure to ask for summer salary for at least your first two years. You're not going to have much research money coming in before then. After that, it's up to you.

Office

I'm not sure how much it matters (although I'm not in FSP's office) so I just asked for the same sort of office space that all the other tenured/tenure tracks have. I did ask for a nice coat of paint and a carpet though. Basically, I would try to make sure you're on professor row where you are visible like the other profs. Young students don't want to forage around in the dank basement for your office. That's going to make it harder to attract good students.

Extras

I wasn't sure what extras you might negotiate on until this past week, which is ultimately what spurred this post. PARKING!!! Maybe this is just me but I don't think you should have to pay for parking where you work. And I don't think you should have to deal with BS about which car you take on a given day. This is the one thing I did wish I negotiate for and forgot to do so. I think all faculty (and probably all employees) at a university should get a hang tag free'o'charge from the university when they start. No fuss, no bullshit, and no dealing with parking which seems like an entity unto themselves with universities. And, if all the new faculty start asking for it and get it, they might change the policy at the university.

So that's all I have on the subject for now. Anything else I missed, please comment below. Feel free to add other tips and thoughts as well.

The Next Big Thing

2011-05-24T10:19:00.002-04:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I discuss the 5 technology items that changed my generation and put forth the question: What's the thing that will become the norm for our children's generation?

Age matters

2011-05-20T13:03:00.001-04:00

Chris Gammel had a great post at Engineer Blogs about the valuable resource that older engineers bring to the table. I think this is a great post but there are some other things that could be added to his list. One of those is the "applied" nature of life. For instance, most people in my parents generation probably worked on cars non-stop during HS and college and engineers even more so. The same could be said for sparkies with transistor radios and computer engineers in the old computer clubs in silicon valley before it was Silicon Valley.

The one area where I would say there's a shift towards younger engineers is dealing with computers. That's not to say older engineers cannot use computers but younger engineers who, for the most part, grew up with computers, they're second nature. New version of Solidworks, Pro/e, MS Office? No big deal. Even the transitions from Office 2003 and Office 2010 are fairly easy even with the interface changes. My suspicion is this is more difficult for the older generations of engineers. Plus, my generation and younger has basically a wired-24/7 attitude. And while you can argue the pluses and minuses of that, you can also see how we get things done in a different manner.

For instance, I use skype regularly to video chat with colleagues. Their screen share function is great and it's much easier to visualize a lot of things rather than just describing them over the phone. But I can see why that would be somewhat different from older engineers. At the same time, I am probably more awkward on the phone in a professional sense because I'm much more used to using email as the first contact. Older engineers, however, grew up talking on the phone and they are more versed in that sort of social conduct.

It is a shame though that most older engineers have to go into management to get the respect (and pay) they deserve.

Proving Vs Disproving

2011-05-19T08:11:00.005-04:00

Some of the most fruitful work I did during my PhD studies was with a Postdoc. Working with SuperK was the classic East-meets-West in middle and total opposites attract (no, not in that way). Quiet, determined, calm, yet surprisingly funny versus loud, persistent, obnoxious, and a bumbling idiot at times. Can you guess who's who?

Anywho, SuperK and I worked on a bunch of topics, wrote a bunch of papers, and traveled to a bunch of conferences together. After SuperK moved on, I was pretty upset because my sparring partner in the lab and the one person who understood me academically was no longer there. We still keep in touch but SuperK's at a company now doing other cool things but it's all secretive.

When SuperK left, there were still a ton of experiments to finish and things to prove in the lab. The end goal of all of this was to prove the uber simple system and have our industrial partner pay the university (and us) an 18-wheeler full of $100 bills to license the technology. I tried to do as much as I could but I was saddled with my main PhD project and other projects and ultimately we didn't have the funds at the time. Right around the time I defended last fall, OldEuropeU hired NewPhD to finish working on that project. I agree to mentor NewPhD and things were going great....

... until yesterday.

Aside from building a demonstrator in the lab, we also needed to make sure the theory matches the results. Before building the final setup, we spent a few months to building different systems and making sure the more known methods indeed worked. Plus we had a few conference proceedings to write and we wanted to do a comprehensive paper with each system at the end.

Well, some things changed with the setup and things got sidelined in Europe. We needed to get a key component fixed in order to prove the final setup. In the meantime, I moved back to the US and am now trying to start new stuff here yet finish stuff from there. That left NewPhD to finish the system characterization while I worked on the theory. Before I left Europe, we did some rough calculations and I was pretty confident.

I should really learn to check my math. It turns out, the ideal system (for practical reasons) will not theoretically work for all cases, so it will not be robust enough for transferring to industry. And, to add some fuel to the fire, we guess wrongly with our intended results and were accepted for a talk at a conference and the paper is do ASAP. We were fairly vague in our description in the initial abstract but now our proceedings that was going to prove something actually disproves our initial ideas.

I'm pretty bummed about it this. The really sad part is this technology could be adapted to a bunch of different systems and widely applicable.

Reality vs Virtuality

2011-05-17T08:33:00.002-04:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I bash Controls Engineers for not living in the real world. No, I'm not joking. They really do live in a parallel universe where simple concepts are made to be unrecognizable and more difficult than necessary.

The Honeymoon is Over

2011-05-16T08:36:00.002-04:00

This past week has been crazy busy for me and the rest of the family. Our stuff in the shipping container arrived (waaaay ahead of schedule) which now means endless days of unpacking. NanoGEARS definitely likes it though; she's crawling all over boxes and reaching into everything and pulling out stuff. (Her way of helping.)

So now that our stuff is here and I've been officially-unofficially working on campus for two weeks, I can definitely say the honeymoon is over. Don't get me wrong. It is totally fantastic to have this opportunity and I am looking forward to the next set of challenges but it is definitely overwhelming. I know I'm not officially working for a few months so I have time to finish other, prior work. But that's a lot of work and with meeting my new colleagues, learning the area, and general living issues like unpacking, I don't have nearly enough time to do what I want to do. Hence my lack of blogging.

One thing that has been weird is the lack of need for an alarm clock. If you're trying to get up early and you hate waking up to that alarm clock, just sleep with the curtains open. Or don't have curtains like our current situation. Since the sun is up at 5:30 am, I haven't had to wake up to an alarm clock since we've moved. I used to think that Philips Wake-up Light was total BS. But maybe not. If the sun is up early where you live and you need to wake up early, just use that rather than your alarm. You'll end up feeling better without that grogginess.

Well, I'd like to blog more but I have meetings about my lab space and future research projects. Look for me tomorrow on Engineer Blogs, where I discuss the difference between real engineers and virtual engineers.

Pro/e, How I love and hate you

2011-05-10T09:30:00.001-04:00

Yesterday, over at Engineer Blogs, I discussed why I hate Pro/e and yet owe everything to it. Check it out if you're interested.

Low Hanging Fruit, Salami Style

2011-05-03T11:23:00.003-04:00

Today, over on Engineer Blogs, I discuss my dilemma with low hanging fruit and salami slicing for publishing in academia.

Official Unofficial Day 1

2011-05-02T22:21:00.002-04:00

I know I haven't posted in a while but I hope to get back on the right track this week. With moving, house hunting, car shopping, daycare issues, and watching Fast Five, I've been swamped lately. Actually, it's been very frustrating because I am definitely a creature of habit. I like my daily routine, where I know roughly what to expect in the morning, day, evening, and night. And I've had no routine for a few weeks, and I'm getting crabby about it :-\

But that's ok, because tomorrow is officially the unofficial first day on the job!! I'm meeting with the lab coordinator to see that my lab is up spec. I move into a temporary office until my official office is complete. And I've got an appointment with SnowU's grant support staff to get started on some NSF grants.

I feel like I have the jr high to high school, day-before-first-day, new-guy-at-the-new-school jitters. Things will most likely go smoothly but I'm nervous nonetheless. Wish me luck!

New Car(s) Dilemma

2011-04-25T21:36:00.003-04:00

Test drove a new 2012 Civic Sedan. Drove nice, nice dealer but visibility is baaaad. I have to sit way back due to my height and the beam between the windshield and side windows is huge.

Also, I wanted to drive a Focus to see how it drove next to the Civic, but the dealer was a psycho. Never leave your real phone number on an internet car dealer form. They'll call you all the time. I'm scared to go into the lot.

Between an Outback and a Forrester, the Outback clearly wins. Getting a nifty rearview camera on it.

As for the second car, oddly enough it's tied between a Subaru Impreza or a Chevy Cruze (that's the odd one). The main tradeoff is a bigger engine and AWD in the Impreza vs gas mileage and cheaper sticker for the Cruze.

Any thoughts?

Fantasy Curriculum: Physics is OK (for the most part)

2011-04-21T21:29:00.004-04:00

My delusions of grandeur with my fantasy curriculum continue. Yesterday, I discussed how I would change the math part of the curriculum. Today, I'm tackling physics. If yesterday was a blindsided, no-holds-barred tackle, then today is more like a two-handed-touch tackle.

Physics really isn't a major issue for most ME curriculum. Probably, most programs have two physics classes, one on basic physics (equations of motion, etc) and another on electromagnetic theory and maybe optics. My basic physics class was ok but I would have liked to see the math stuff tied in a little more. For instance, yesterday I stated that I didn't get the relationship between derivatives (vel, accel, jerk, snap, etc) in math. I only heard about them in physics. I'd like to see that link strengthened significantly.

The bigger issue I had with basic physics was the EM theory part. Rather than rant and say all physics is terrible, I'm going to chalk that up to a terrible professor (RMP has literally 1.5 stars for ~140 ratings). Out of 100 students, there was a total of 1 physics major and my guess is this prof didn't like engineers.

Aside from the prof not appearing to care, EM theory can be taught from too high a level. I mean, do young engineers really care about the derivation of Maxwell's equations? No. That doesn't mean they're not important (they really are!). But that doesn't mean you should waste 4 classes with endless derivations to get 4 equations that are in every physics book.

This brings me to my only issue with physics. And it's basically the fundamental difference between physics and engineering. Physics is all about the journey to the answer and understanding those concepts that get you there (ie: endless pages of derivations). Engineering is all about using tools that are in a toolbox to solve a problem. The method and end results means two different things for engineers and physicists. Thus, there is some source of disconnect would could be improved.

If I explain it in higher terms, an Engineer with a 2% error away from their initial assumption would say "I'm good to 2%". However, a Physicist would back correct their initial assumption by 2% to reach the goal of 100%. In physics, it seems more about your initial hypothesis whereas in engineering, it's all about how far you are from you're desired target.

To me, it seems that engineers and physicists talk about the same things but there's a miscommunication. For engineers to really grasp physics concept though, physics needs to be explained how an engineer would think and then slowly build into more physics concepts. If you don't do that, you risk a complete miscommunication between both parties and the education level will decrease.

I'm not sure you'd make a complete overhaul to the physics concepts discussed, rather, the teaching style should be addressed. Maybe only seasoned Profs who knows the quirky differences between engineers and physics should teach it, or maybe someone totally green should do it to see if they can come up with something better. What do you think?

Fantasy Curriculum: All out assault on Math!

2011-04-20T21:18:00.004-04:00

A few weeks ago (7 eons in internet time...) I posted on Engineer Blogs a snippet of ideas for how I would change the mechanical engineering curriculum. This mainly focused around one thing: have all ME required courses taught by ME faculty. It's pretty simple. If you're a ME student, you probably have ~120 hours of ME degree courses that you need to take. If they're all not taught by ME faculty, you're getting shafted in your education. That's just my opinion. However, it seemed from the initial comments that there's bunch of people that would like that.

In my original post, I picked on a few non-ME courses that I would like to see changed. Today, I'm going to specifically discuss the Mathematics and Statistics curriculum parts of a typical ME program and how I'd like to change them. I realize I'm totally biased and haven't had a good math teacher in college but I'm also going to assume I'm not alone in this boat.

The biggest reason for swapping math profs for ME profs is the application of the math. When you're in a math class (even math for engineers) it's always math for the sake of math. I took a graduate math course called "Advanced Applied Engineering Mathematics". There was never any actual applying of the math. Engineers don't care about math just because it's math. They want to use it. If you don't have examples of it, you're talking to zombies. Math prof's don't give practical examples. However, ME profs can.

This brings me to the second biggest reason for changing profs. Math profs want to teach math students who think like them and approach problems like them. ME profs want to teach to ME students who think like them and approach problems like them. It's pretty simple and basic but it doesn't make sense. And ME profs are as qualified (if not more qualified) to teach engineering math courses because they use it on a regular basis.

Most universities have the math courses front-loaded before the ME courses. A better approach is to actually teach the math in the same course where it's applied. I'll give you an example. One of the basic things about derivatives (and 2nd derivatives) and integrals is the relationship between position, velocity, and acceleration. I don't ever remember hearing those three words in my basic calc classes. That's a shame. Probably these concept should be taught as part of the basic physics course.

Now, rather than rant forever, I'll try to discuss some constructive things. I'm going to assume a student needs the following math courses (some universities may vary)

Calc I

Calc II

Calc III

Diff Eq

Linear Algebra

Statistics

For Calc I and II, I'd combine those into one course called Engineering Calc. I would keep derivatives, integrals (only shorthand methods), partial derivatives, equations of motion, and complex numbers/conjugates. Everything else, deep six it. You're not going to remember it anyway and if you need it later, you can learn it later. Also, I would hack down Calc III and Linear Algebra and combine them into one class called Multivariable Calc. You can only take some much of vectors intercepting a plane is space for so long before you kill yourself. And when you're talking about multi-variable problems, it probably good to introduce some matrices.

Statistics, I would kill completely. Totally useless course except for the first 2 concepts you learn about standard deviations and distributions. Everything else in the course was of the theory of statistics persuasion which is useless for UG engineers. Instead, I would tack that on to a lab course. I'll go back over this when I talk about chemistry.

Lastly, Diff Eq. Wow, words cannot begin to express how much I disliked Diff Eq. However, it is needed for Fluids, Vibrations, and Heat Transfer so it has to stay. It depends on how the curriculum is set up, but I think most students take this during their Sophomore year. Instead, I would pick whichever class needs it and shows up first (say Fluids) and have it co-taught with that class. This way, you'd take 6 hours of Diff Eq and Fluids but the profs would have to work in tandem. I know it's tough but we're trying to get the students to learn more useful information.

I think the math curriculum can be trimmed from 18 hours to 9 hours with some supplemental stuff added to a few courses. That frees a lot of space for other courses. I'm slowly building to my complete Fantasy Curriculum. Over the next few days, I'll tackle some more subjects. Thoughts on my assault on math?

Solving the World's Problems

2011-04-19T19:39:00.002-04:00

Today, on Engineer Blogs, I solve some of the world's problems the engineering way. Check it out if you like a good political debate.

There's no place like home

2011-04-18T11:41:00.003-04:00

Ok, my blogging hiatus from moving is finally over! I'm back on US soil and it feels very good to be home. I can understand the language here, you know what to expect at stores, and prompt service is back.

Before the memories fade into oblivion of this move, I thought I would share with you my thoughts on international moving. Some of these may be tips, others rants, but hopefully there is some good information in there for anyone looking to relocate internationally.

Before the Move

Get a big plastic folder with dividers. That will help you keep track of everything. If you're moving with a family, household items, and pets, you're going to need to keep track of passports, flights, hotels, rental cars, shipping container, other mailed packages, copy of your (and significant others') work contract, pet vaccines, residency information, etc etc etc. There's sooo many papers and you will need to keep them handy. Make sure to travel with that in your carry on baggage.
Decide what absolutely need and what can come later with the rest of your household goods. Remember, even if you check extra bags, you'll still have to lug that stuff around. Between two adults, one NanoGEARS with stroller, and three animal crates, taking 3 checked bags and four carry on bags is a lot. If you can do with less, try to do so.
If you're traveling with pets, book their ticket(s) early and repeatedly call the airline to make sure they have a spot. You don't want to be stuck at the airport waiting for a flight and there's no seat for Fido. Also, take spare treats, food, and litter with container if you have cats. That can add a bunch of weight to your checked bags.
Check the weather at your new location to make sure you bring appropriate jackets. Going from 70 F to 30 F climate is completely reasonable in April, so it happens. SnowU was aptly named as we had two days of flurries when we arrived.

During the Move

Have as much patience as possible. You're going to be traveling, dealing with changing time zones, cranky partners, kids, animals. The more stress you make for yourself, the more it's going to aggravate you. These things compound on each other.
Get to the airport way early. Like 3-4 hours early if you're traveling with pets. Also, if you can have a friend with you to help with luggage, that's a plus. We would have been so screwed if we didn't ask a fiend. We had no way to handle it all plus watch a baby and animals. We arrived 3 hours early and made it to the gate 15 minutes prior to boarding (20 mins before takeoff). Animal check-in (at 3 locations!) plus excess baggage check and passport control can add a few hours.
When you land, make sure to have money in the local currency (dollars in this case). I didn't have any and didn't have time for an ATM (don't ask why...). A very friendly homeless guy actually ended up helping me (common for this airport) and I would have tipped him $20, but all I had was about $6 in quarters for tolls. Let's face it, international moves are expensive. The added $10 for expensive currency exchange is water under the bridge at this point.
Taking an international flight, then hopping in a car and driving 7 hours (across a major city during rush hour traffic) with 1 dog and 2 cats in the car can be done. Very dangerous, and I don't recommend it but it can be done. A better option would be to crash at a Motel 6 for 2 hours, then drive. Even if you're not staying for the night, $60 on a hotel room is still water under the bridge.

The Day After

This is where traveling with a pad of paper and pens is handy. Start making lists for everything you'll need. If you're solo, it's not so bad. If you have a family and a little one, you'll need to be very efficient in getting groceries and other items and still let NanoGEARS nap and snack when she wants.
Immediate things you're probably need: Phone (preferably mobile), Food and basic household snacks, dishes & utensils (paper or GoodWill), a few pots and pans. If you're living in a short term rental (as we are), it's probably not too clean so you will need cleaning supplies, possibly a vacuum, laundry detergent, dish soap, etc.
Try to get into a routine as soon as possible. Yes, I know you're tired but that doesn't mean you should sleep all day. You're only delaying the inevitable.

Other Thoughts/Comments

Food: Waaay more choices and waaay more expensive here than in Europe. Both good and bad. When you don't have those choices, you don't spend as much. At the same time, you miss having choices. Resisting the urge to splurge on every vice you've missed for the past 4.5 years is hard!
Customer Service: I'm sorry Europe but it's waaay better over here.
Rental Cars: If you have a dog that sheds, bring a lint roller with you. If not, it may cost you 220 euros for them to vacuum the car. It's a ridiculous charge and bullshit but you've got a plane to catch and no time to run to a garage to vacuum it.
Paperwork: There's a lot of unnecessary fat in it in the US. Maybe it's me, but signing 9 different forms for a place that you're only staying at for 6 weeks is ridiculous. Our sue-happy culture sucks. I'm going to miss Europe in those respects.
Apartment Complexes: Have no idea how to layout a kitchen properly! I love cooking but it's not going to be pretty in this thing.
And lastly, there's no place like home.

Busy with Moving

2011-04-07T14:32:00.003-04:00

I am currently preparing for my move to SnowU. I hope to continue my posts about my Fantasy Curriculum shortly, however, I wouldn't expect daily updates. This should all be over in about a week or so.

Classes taught within your discipline (General)

2011-04-04T06:31:00.006-04:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I discuss Classes taught within your discipline, specifically for ME. Over the next few days, I'll add to in here so check back if you're interested.

Abuse of Power

2011-04-01T15:11:00.002-04:00

If you've been following my twitter account (@profgears), undoubtedly you've seen a flurry of tweets about student expectations, terrible advisors, and politics of publishing. This stemmed from GMP's post the other day over at Academic Jungle and DrugMonkey's post on the subject clearly in GMP's camp. DrugMonkey's post heading The Care and Feeding of your PI: a tip for grad students and postdocs should tell you all you need to know about their position on the matter.

I clearly disagree.

As a grad student, you're not there to serve a professor at their beck and call. As a professor, you're not there to wipe the nose of your students. Both should have expectations and duties that are clearly laid out. I've already discussed this a few weeks ago. The professor (or PI, or whatever you want to call them) is supposed to be the student's professional mentor. The prof is supposed to be the student's guidem helping transition from a student to being a autonomous researcher.

This clearly breaks down when there is a lack of communication between both parties. For instance, the prof expects the student to publish as many papers as they can before graduation. But you'd be surprised how many students don't know that and how many profs don't tell their students that. So you have a prof that's expecting paper drafts and a student wondering what to do with their data. The student tries to schedule meetings but the prof has little time to discuss it. Months go by. Still no paper. There is increasing frustration on both sides.

Inevitably, a downward spiral happens and things turn to shit. The prof did a bad job of mentoring their student, yet from the prof's perspective, their student is a slacker. The prof thinks their student isn't working enough and so the student gets even less time than the minuscule amount the prof already gives them. The student gets frustrated because their mentor and career guide doesn't respond back to them and now the student starts worrying about graduation deadlines and whether they are even going to get a recommendation.

At this point, both are in the wrong because they didn't communicate with each other. But the professor is always in the power position and it should never be abused. And it sure sounds like some Profs/PIs do abuse that power by holding graduation and recommendations over their students' heads. Those are the same Profs/PIs that are supposed to be mentoring their students. That's a terrible situation to be in if you're the student because the one person you're supposed to go to for advice is giving you shitty advice and guidance. In the odd chance that student makes it to the next level, how likely is it for them to mimic their advisor's behavior? I say that's highly likely and I sure as hell don't want to be that kind of prof.

-------

On the topic of publishing and who gets coauthorship, it's very hard to describe in 140 characters. My general feeling is this. Anyone who contributed to the writing, data gathering, interpretation, and oversight should be a coauthor. However, everyone one of those people should be capable of writing a significant chunk of the article. That doesn't mean only the person who wrote the article should be the sole author.

Here's how you test it. Ask each person if they could write the draft. If someone says they could probably get 60% of is done, that's fine (that's a significant chunk). If they said 10%, they don't belong as a coauthor. That's what the acknowledgements section is for.

In practice, most groups aren't that strict because everyone needs more papers to be considered successful. But if I adhered strictly to that, I'd be missing my prof on every paper. And for me, when I'm in that same situation, I want to be involved enough to always pass that test. Otherwise, I would and should expect my student to submit it without my name on it because I haven't contributed enough. But if it comes to that point, then there's obviously something else going on in our advisee-advisor relationship and there's a bigger problem at hand than coauthorship on a paper.

Reflections and Journeys

2011-03-31T01:15:00.000-04:00

Today is officially my last day at OldEuropeU! Generally, I’m not nostalgic about these things; I tend to look forwards rather than backwards. However, maybe 20 years from now, I’ll look back on this post and feel some nostalgia

Like most PhD students, I’ve had my fair share of peaks and valleys along the way. I wouldn’t say I’ve had the best advisor but I have heard of others having worse. And the difficulties along the way have definitely made me a better researcher and a better academic. This includes good things like finding alternative methods to communicate with someone better which helped me grow as a person. And some bad instances, such as doing things in spite of someone else to prove you’re a top researcher and you deserve more support. Motivating a PhD program on rage and vitriol isn’t so great but it can help during the slog of long hours in the lab or wee hours of the morning writing papers.

A little over 4 years ago, I set out to get a PhD and obtain a position in academia. You don’t graduate and get a position in academia without some key support from your PhD advisor, and I got it when I needed it most. And I guess whatever was in those letters to the numerous search committees worked. It’s only after the fact that you realize those things. Now that I’ve reached that marker in the road, I’d be lying if I said didn’t have a successful PhD program, including the ups and downs.

But I’d also be lying if I said I wasn’t glad the “big European adventure” was almost over. I am looking forward to being back in the US and working at a top tier university. I don’t mind the uphill trek towards tenure ahead, I just hope I embark on a path that doesn’t have as many hills. .

Manufacturing and Corporate Responsibility

2011-03-30T02:44:00.003-04:00

The New York Times had an interesting article a few days ago stating the Future of Manufacturing is Local by Allison Arieff. It’s quite an interesting article and it brings up many good points. Overall, the article describes how in two (expensive) cities, San Fran and NYC, local manufacturing and production businesses have sprung up, which are different from our traditional notions of manufacturing. Rather than large manufacturing plants like traditional setups for cars, airplanes, etc., these companies have smaller, just-in-time manufacturing facilities that are more able to adjust to changing demands.

This is another example of how manufacturing in the US can change to meet today's new manufacturing environment and be successful. I'm reminded of another example of how novel manufacturing techniques can put the US back on the map as a manufacturing power. I used the example of high speed machining in my first Engineer Blogs post. Apple changed from using folded sheet metal and rivets/screws to single body aluminum frame for it's notebooks. Not only is the design lighter, stronger, and cheaper to make than its folded counterpart, but all of the chips from its single aluminum block can be recycled and melted down to make new aluminum billets. They have a video of it here. While I think Apple, the Brand, is sooo pretentious, I have to commend Apple, the Company, on using this technique.

What I don't like about Apple is that they still manufacture their stuff overseas, where they do not have to consider the environmental impact of their manufacturing processes. This is the so called "green manufacturing. Last fall, I was at a conference where the keynote speaker was from GE and he made no attempt to say they were switching to green manufacturing and avoided the questions about manufacturing in the US. (GE as a company is in my doghouse because GE doesn't pay taxes like everyone else.) These local companies appear to care about their environmental impact and are trying to employ green manufacturing.

And in addition to green manufacturing, the people managing the companies are coming together to help support each other to maintain their products are greener and more locally sourced, which helps them directly impact their local community. Providing jobs, increasing local commerce, renovating derelict buildings, etc. That's something you don't see big companies doing now. These companies seem to be willing to sacrifice a significant portion of their bottom line to have a greater local impact. Large multinationals should take notice.

As someone who grew up in the greater NYC Metropolitan Area in NJ, I have seen and grew up around the ruined husks of once large manufacturing hubs like Newark, Jersey City, and Hoboken. I think it is a fantastic idea that these companies have focused on making their products locally to try to revive local manufacturing. Sure, they pay more in property taxes and their employee costs are more than overseas manufacturing. But they also don’t have to worry about shipping costs from around the world and they are better positioned to deal with changes because they are overseeing the complete manufacturing process.

And as I move to a Rust Belt city where SnowU is located, I'm hoping to connect with local companies And I will adapt my research topics to help impact them. And I will hope to get them more involved in the university (if they aren't already), which can help further strengthen the local community.

On Networking and Jargon

2011-03-29T09:08:00.002-04:00

Today, over on Engineer Blogs, I make some sarcastic comments on networking, business jargon, and describe my mission statement. You can check it out by following this linky.

(Software) Tools of the trade

2011-03-28T00:22:00.004-04:00

Now that I've finished my PhD program and I will be spending my last day at OldEuropeU this week, I've also found out that I must return my 4 year old laptop. This tank is archaic, with under 100 GB of disk space, a wireless card that's on the fritz a lot, and a fan that reminds me of my knees after I've ran a 10k. Yet, at the same time, this computer is my life blood. I've managed to wrangle another few more months because I won't get my new SnowU computer until I officially start in a few months.

One of the things I'll have to do with the new computer is transfer data and reinstall a bunch of software. This post will help me do two things. One, this forces me to categorize my main software tools. I'll probably have to update to newer versions but at least it's a start. Two, you can suggest different software tools that you use and why they might be better than my current stuff. I'm always looking out for the easiest software tools to perform a particular task. Here goes:

Basic Internet Tools:

Chrome with Gmail Notifier (great for not having a browser open) and Minimize to Tray for Chrome (allows you to free up your taskbar). Generally, I leave an incognito window in my taskbar for GEARS stuff (email, twitter).
Dropbox is great for file sharing. NewPhD introduced me to it and it has worked really well for keeping up with the latest data sets. I'm contemplating getting the 20 GB extension unless I can figure out a better way share whole folders in Google Docs/Sites. Dropbox is a $5 monthly for whereas Google charges $5/year. I'm cheap like that.
Skype: in-laws need to see NanoGEARS while we're overseas. Also, I hired a PhD student over it and DrWife had her interviews over it as well. Would be better if my wireless didn't suck.
AIM and MSN for keeping up with old friends. Can't we pick just one instant messaging program and stick with it?

Productivity Suites:

MiKTex 2.7: I know I need the newer version but it is a hefty 7 GB download and I can't handle that right now. MiKTex, for those that don't know, is a LaTeX distribution for typesetting and making professional documents. I used it for my thesis and for all of my journal papers. It's great. I'll probably upgrade at MiKTeX 3.0.
Crimson Editor: General purpose text editor. It handles everything. Tex/bib files for LaTeX, M-Files in Matlab, C/C++, Java, tons'o'other programming languages. It's fast and compact. The downside is you have to make batch files to link your LaTeX compilation to your command prompt. Once you have it set up though, it's fine. FYI, never crashed on me once. I think they've stopped upgrading it or working on it.
JabRef 2.4: Fantastic reference manager. Natively supports LaTeX and it's free! Can export to a bunch of file formats including EndNote and Office. Helps organize all of my references and papers that I've read. They're up to 2.7 now... I think I need to upgrade.
MS Office: Yes, I mainly use it for PowerPoint and making presentations. I could use LaTeX but that's much more time consuming. Also, I'm working on a book with a colleague and we've agreed to use Word. Sucks but that's life sometimes.
MathType for MS Office: I wasn't sold on MathType but it was required for this book. But, now that I've used it a bunch, it's not so bad. Still a clunky interface and prone to MS Word crashes but when you have know choice, you make do.
Inkscape: Inkscape is the open source Illustrator or Corel Draw. I need it for EPS figures and making line drawings. It's still not a version 1.0 (or even 0.5 for that matter). The interface isn't intuitive at all and it never actually takes the dimensions that I want. With that said, it's easier to use than Illustrator and cheaper. I've managed to use it successfully for simple line drawings but anything advanced is way over my head.
Adobe Suite: I have the full suite but I mainly use Acrobat and Illustrator. Illustrator is a clunky interface but it can save EPS figures so I need it. Acrobat is something I use sparingly because there is...
Foxit Reader: Waaaay Faster than Adobe Acrobat. Also, blocks the "section reading" attribute for PDF files which is great. When I click and drag the page with the hand tool, I don't want it to resize or zoom in.

Power Tools:

Matlab and Simulink: I've already posted here about how I love Matlab for templates. I use it for data analysis and plotting. I'm probably not the power user that DrWife is but she's slowly converting me.
Labview: I use Labview less because I think Matlab does everything that Labview does and does it better. Graphical programming is terrible and it's supposed to make things easier for non-programmers but I find it only makes it more confusing. There is one caveat. The NI FPGA module can only be programmed via Labview so when I want to use that, I have no choice. Oh, an it's default 3-d surface plot format is better looking than Matlab.
Solidworks: Wow, about 7 years ago, I was introduced to Solidworks as an alternative to Pro/Engineer, Pro/E2 and Pro/E Wildfire and I've never looked back. Even better if you can afford COSMOS, their FEA package.
Ghostscript: Ghostscript is good for converting EPS to PNG pictures and is a general tool in conjunction with LaTeX.
Keil uVision: Software for programming the microcontrollers that I use. It's C and I hate C, but ehhh, gets the job done. The software is fine. C Sucks.

System/Miscellaneous Tools:

7-Zip: Better zipping program than native Windows XP and it's free. Works well with ZIP, RAR, JAR, and tar-balls (you crazy linux folks...).
Eagle PCB: I don't do it often but when I need simple PCBs, I turn to Eagle. I use it in conjunction with the Texas Instruments Analog Design software and FilterPro for making and proofing simple circuits. Also, for checking the Gerber files, I use GC-Prevue.
HijackThis: Sometimes, you just need to take back Windows XP from itself.
InfraRecorder: Simple CD/DVD burner software.
Daemon Tools: Ever have an ISO file that you don't want to burn to a CD? Use this to emulate a CD rom drive in a windows folder.

What are you go-to software tools? Any suggestions for better software?

Giving everyone an A is a terrible idea.

2011-03-25T04:01:00.002-04:00

A few days ago, Cherish the Scientist tweeted out an article (@mareserinitatis) on how Everyone Should Get an A. David MacKay brings up a few interesting points in the article. These are largely centered on two themes. The first is the rate at which a student learns in conjunction with their starting position. If everything is linear, this is the classic Y = mX + b where Y is the level you’re trying to obtain, m is the rate at which you learn over time, X is the time it takes, and b is your offset starting position. (Yes, whenever you use an equation, you should explain the variables…). The second theme is there should be a minimum obtainable threshold that students should achieve. Thus, if students are “forced” to achieve an A to graduate, they should be allowed to take longer. The first issue is persuasive but has a problem when applying it to real life. The second argument, on the other hand, has some serious holes.

I don’t have any hard evidence for this but the thought process should fit match most anecdotal preconceived, prejudiced notions. Your b value when you begin in college is a very important aspect. If students took more AP classes, generally they’re going to start with a higher b. The same could be said if your parents were highly educated and/or come from an upper class economical situation. Students who aren’t fortunate to be in those situations often have much lower b values and generally have other issues to contend with once they get to college. Working a job on the side to support themselves comes to mind.

In principle, if you could test a student’s knowledge in the beginning and in the end of a course, and come up with a slope-o-meter, that would be a good to obtain an accurate picture on how someone learns. That would be very good for assessing the effectiveness of a teacher and identifying the potential of the student. This, in theory, could go a long way towards helping the educational system improve how it is educating its students.

There is one slight, 800 lb gorilla sitting in the corner of the room. Life doesn’t work like that.

Figure 2 in MacKay’s paper shows a prime example of this. Let’s assume you have some miners trapped in a coal mine and instead of it being exam-time, it’s actually people-are-going-to-die-time. Who do you want deciding where to drill the hole? A, B, or C? If it’s my life, I’m going with A because they, at this given point in time, know more than the other two. Sure, eventually B and C will surpass A. But now you’ve got a bunch of explaining to do to a family on why their loved one died.

Look, it sucks that B and C started out in a more disadvantaged position. It can certainly be argued that is a combination of social, economical, and educational factors. And yes, society as a whole should strive to correct those. But if we’re talking about university and graduate level education, you have to draw the line at some point. This brings the second theme, allowing indefinite time to finally get your A.

If you’re allowed indefinite time to get an A (or whatever you want to call the achievable mark), you’ve just given no incentive to learning how to get stuff done. This is a huge problem at OldEuropeU where the students are allowed to take a class as many times as they want to get a passing grade (6 out of 10 BTW, not even an 8 or 9). In an educational system that is nominally free for the students, that’s a huge overall tax payer drain. I have colleagues that took 10+ years (in a 5 year program) to get a BS and a MS and they spent that whole time in school. They didn’t take time off for work or family or whatever. They just spent too much time partying. If they were in the US system, they would not have been engineers after year two. They would have failed more than the allowable amount of classes, had an insanely low GPA, and would have been kicked out of any ABET engineering program. I’m sorry but not everyone should be an engineer just because they want to.

In the real world, you have to deal with meeting deadlines. It sucks. Everyone hates it. And it’s a shame that we don’t have a culture of saying “No, we can’t move on because this thing isn’t ready yet. We haven’t learned enough to make this product fully do everything we wanted.” Everything from software (security flaws), to baby strollers (safety recalls), to cars (stick accelerators and faulty air bags), to food (E. coli and salmonella poisonings) has their issues because of deadlines. But, unless you’re going to change how the world works, people cannot be afforded indefinite time to do everything. Nothing would get done then.

So no, I don’t think everyone should get an A.

Senior Engineer vs Tenured Faculty

2011-03-24T03:33:00.002-04:00

On Tuesday, over at Engineer Blogs, I guest-posted about how universities are changing their new shiny into User Facilities. An Old Engineer posted a (loosely connected) comment on how some of the undergraduates are “in college only to learn the basics”. An Old Engineer then goes on to discuss how my generation doesn’t know anything. Kate summed up a response that I knew was coming: "The old folks always bitch about the young ones not knowing anything and wanting to move up fast. The young folks always bitch about the old ones not ever wanting to change anything."

I thought more and more about An Old Engineer’s comments, specifically on young engineers expecting to be senior engineers within 5-10 years. I didn’t want to be rash which is why I didn’t post yesterday. (I know, shocking. For those that know me, I sometimes “see by the light of my burning bridges [Terry Pratchett]”).

And you know what? If I pursued work in industry, rather than academia, I would expect to be promoted to a Senior Engineer within 5-10 years if I kept to the same standard that I hold myself to now. The main reason is because within 7 years, I’ll either be booted from SnowU or have tenure, which to my eyes is the same thing as being labeled a Senior Engineer.

I can do “bolt torque calculations” and I don’t need any help setting up proof-of-concept experiments. Oh, and that is after I’ve built my system by using my skills on a mill and lathe. And once I’m done with the experiment, I can write it into an effective report (or in my case, journal paper). I have numerous instances of that. And lastly, once I have the results, I have no problem standing in front of a crowd and saying “these are our results, look at how cool our research is.” That’s the sales aspect that you need in academia and in industry.

I’ve spent extra 6 years in school, wrote effectively 2 books (MS Thesis and PhD Thesis) on two entirely different topics. I’ve learned how to juggle class work, several research projects (even self initiated ones), publishing, academic politics, mentoring students, occasionally teach, and serve on committees in the university and the community at large. And the few universities that did manage to look past my lack of a postdoc on my CV and application package thought I was good enough to bring in for an interview and ultimately offered me a tenure track position.

So yes, if I keep on the same track, I would expect to be a “Senior Engineer” in 5-10 years. I’ll have to prove that I can bring in research money, successfully mentor my graduate students, and effectively reach undergraduates, some of whom might only “be in college for the basics”.

How is that any different, in principle, to what would be expected of a Senior Engineer? What do you expect Senior Engineers to do? How would that be different from Tenure Faculty? What are the correlations between the two? Thoughts? Comments?

The Dreaded User Facility

2011-03-22T07:40:00.002-04:00

Today, over at Engineer Blogs, I discuss how User Facilities at universities are stifling academia.

Where’s the column for Knowledge Learned on the balance sheet?

2011-03-21T03:42:00.001-04:00

My PhD research was part of a project jointly between OldEuropeU and two nearby Institutes. Like most projects, towards the end the money became scarcer and equipment was harder to obtain. One of the things my colleagues at their Institutes had to deal with that I didn’t was charging hours and making sure they had sufficient budget to charge those hours to the project. This was a completely foreign issue for me and caused a “point of contention” at certain instances when the equipment budget was sacked for more working hours.

This was very frustrating at the time and still perplexes me to this day. There are two reasons for this. The first is you have the dichotomy of finishing the project because you need the “deliverable” and you can’t finish the project because you cannot find more money to make up for the time needed. This dichotomy is why every public works project ALWAYS runs waaay over budget. The argument is simple. You need to deliverable and you’ve already spent X. Either you waste X and don’t have your deliverable or you spend (hopefully only) delta X and then the problem is solved.

While this is distasteful, especially when used to the general contractor’s advantage (I’m referring to those massive, multi-million dollar public works projects), I can understand the logic. It’s the perfect sort of argument for always asking for 15% more than you need to complete the job, because you’re never going to budget perfectly.

The second reason is the more perplexing issue. Maybe this has something to do with some management theory. I already mentioned that the equipment budget was swapped with more hours for the project. But at the same time, most institutes have the same mantra about building versus buying. It goes something like this: “It’s too costly for me to figure something out based on my time (say $200/hr). Even though it will only take a few days of my time ($200/hr x 3 days x 8 hr = $4800), our workshop is too expensive because it’s a User Facility (more on that later), so we should just buy the equipment we need for $5000 and wait 6 weeks for it to be delivered”. But we just sacked the equipment budget for more hours so we can’t buy what we needed. Plus, we lose the 5 weeks (or whatever time) due to delivery times.

What I’ve come to realize is that managers and other idiots who think this is the way to run a research group in an institute/company treat their employees as pawns with no ability to learn, adapt, and grow. How much knowledge do researchers gain by doing something by themselves versus just buying the solution? Probably, that knowledge would be very useful on future projects. Who knows, maybe during the course of tackling this mini-project, the researchers come up with some new greatness that the company can profit from.

It seems that we’re so focused on the quantifiable results that we’ve lost the ability to think in terms of qualifiable, abstract, intangible results. I know there is no place on the balance sheet for Knowledge Learned but maybe there should be. Now, some of you who are reading this have transitioned from a university setting to a corporate setting where you have to deal with this on regular basis. Does your company operate with this philosophy? Was it difficult to grasp? How does your company quantify knowledge?

Two extremes from the same paper

2011-03-18T01:21:00.001-04:00

I recently received a follow up email from a journal for which I regularly perform reviews asking me to review and comment on a revised manuscript from a previous review. This is not something unusual in my experience and since I reviewed the article once, going over a revised manuscript on the same topic is par for the course.

The first thing I did is review my comments to the authors and then I looked at the comments from the second reviewer. What I saw actually shocked me. I had extensive comments, particularly about basing their entire support for their method on a non-peer reviewed white paper, and it was clear (to me) several things needed correction prior to acceptance. Scientifically, the article was actually very good. But the presentation, references, and supporting discussion needed work. The second reviewer just had a stirring recommendation to accept because this was the greatest engineered piece of work since the machine that slices bread. The second reviewer had no other comments.

In my experience, I have never seen an article 100% perfect for publication and neither have the other reviewers (from the review reports I've seen). Also, I've co-authored enough articles to know there are always things you can make better, either by better graphs and figures or by improving the discussion. And, in fact, when I submit an article, I freely expect the "once these changes are made, I expect this article will be suitable for publication" comment. There are a few reasons for this.

No one does anything perfect the first time, at least not me (or I? my grammatical skills are terrible!). I have a colleague who has, along with his 5 co-authors and 2 reviewers, missed a misspelling in the article title and it was only caught during typesetting.
Fresh eyes always bring new things to the fore.
You're going to have a stupid mistake. Everyone does.
Reviewers, and by reviewers I mean Everyone, likes to nit-pick at other peoples' work.

That brings me to a couple of questions I have on the subject. When you submit an article for publication, do you expect minor revisions or do you expect it to be 100% accepted? When you review an article, do you ever accept without any changes? What should be the normal amount for both?

Independent Studies for One and All

2011-03-17T05:55:00.005-04:00

I haven't blogged any this week because like anything that goes up, it must also come down. I finished last week on a decent high and Saturday was my birthday so I thought it was all going well. And then NanoGEARS caught some daycare baby plague and promptly passed it on to me. She seems to be fine now though, thanks for asking.

I'm somewhat disappointed that I didn't post earlier this week because writing usually clears my head and gives me some time to relax. And I know all of you were fretting that my daily post wasn't showing up in your RSS reader so I want to apologize to my ten(s) of fans out there.

Now, on to the topic at hand.

There was an Op/Ed in the New York Times on letting kids make up their own high school curriculum by Susan Engel that had some very interesting things in it. Essentially, 8 students who spanned the spectrum of high school success got to plan their own curriculum for a semester. It talked about the increased student motivation and how they set goals that were at least as high as a typical AP class. It's an interesting study and I think has some potential as an educational method.

One place that I would like to see this curriculum model applied to is at the graduate level. The reason I say this is because I took traditional courses (and wrote a MS thesis) at UGU whereas, at OldEuropeU there are no defined classes for your PhD. So I've seen both types of systems personally which both have some definite pros and cons. I'll tackle the traditional system first.

I ended up taking 8 classes at UGU during my MS work to satisfy the coursework part. Of those 8 courses, I only really learned anything in 3 of them and none of that stuff I learned is knowledge I really use now. I still remember the stuff from those 3 should I happen to need it but I really couldn't tell you what was useful in those other 5 classes. I remember doing work for them (and a lot of work for that one stupid graduate math course that was the biggest waste of....) and taking tests and getting good grades but nothing really stuck with me.

Taking 5 classes that were essentially useless for my previous research and my current research (I made a big left turn when starting my PhD) seems like a lot of wasted time and effort on my part and the part of those professors. It seems like going through the motions for the sake of going through the motions. I read all these blogs and hear all of these professors discuss how much work their doing for teaching, research, and proposals. Maybe not teaching unnecessary classes is the way to go.

On the contrary, at OldEuropeU, I didn't have any classes for my PhD work. This is a blessing and a curse. The good part about that is you don't have to take any unnecessary courses. You can spent all of your time doing research, which is what you and your advisors really want anyway. Without classes your first two years, you can really make headway on your research. This will hopefully translate to more papers, more conferences, and a competitive advantage for you when you finish your PhD. Also, you really focus on the things you need to learn for your research. You don't get sidetracked by "the new shiny" that occurs when you do take a class you like.

There are some extreme downsides too. You need to be 100% self motivated to learn something. Just going through the motions so you didn't ruin your graduate GPA isn't enough. You end up lacking in something. In some cases, this is diversity, i.e. you weren't exposed to different concepts and different ideas because you had to take new classes. In other cases, you lack a basic and fundamental understand of the field. This is where I lack because of not taking PhD classes. I started out with some basic assumptions which allowed me to skip over the whole fundamental background in the field where my PhD subject rests and now it's hard to go back over to learn that.

I think graduate classes should largely be based around independent studies in predominately your research field. For instance, I took a controls class that I couldn't tell you a thing from it. Yet, during both my MS and PhD work, I had to build working control systems. In both cases, I managed to get them working but that was mostly though trial and error. Rather than taking a book-heavy course on controls, it would have been much more useful for my class to be a study on this particular control system. In both cases, I didn't need an advanced understanding to get it working nor for papers and such, but it would have been to my betterment to gone through it more thoroughly. Once I had a real system that I was using, then I could apply all of those textbook things like loop shaping, and overshoot minimizing, etc etc. It wouldn't have been entirely necessary for my research but it would have expanded my actual knowledge in an area that I should have known something about.

I think most graduate students could pick about 4-6 topics in their research and do independent studies more thoroughly on the subject than if they took a class on it and just went over the theory.

What do you think? Would you rather have defined your own series of independent studies than taken classes? How many classes during your graduate work have been useful for you and your research?

What a way to end the week

2011-03-11T16:35:00.003-05:00

This week was a more difficult, and more productive than most weeks. This was highly unexpected because DrWife was traveling, leaving me to take care of NanoGEARS on my own. Hopefully this hasn't scarred her for life... I ended up being a workaholic, basically working from getting up in the morning until I went to sleep with the only time off spent taking care of NanoGEARS as needed. She was at daycare, so it's not as if I left her alone all day.

Any, I managed to get a paper out to our internal review committee. I don't suspect there's any problems with publishing and it should have no problem through peer review. Another paper that's out at peer review got positive comments back and I expect that to be accepted any day now. Combine that with a 3rd paper about 90% done and only last might formating editing left before internal review, and it was a pretty good week.

Oh, I'm not done yet!

If you've kept up this past week, I spent a decent amount of time bitching about Word, Powerpoint, and all things Office. Hopefully, I managed to give out some good advice along the way. But even more so, that conference proceedings which brought on the MS Word tirade and much twitter bitching (@profgears btw :-D ) is basically done. I'm pretty happy about that because NewPhD is getting some good experience writing publications. And we have enough measurements and results for a full publication, which is great.

But wait, there's more!

I talked to some potential students at SnowU and I think I've found my first student. Very excited about that. Along the way, I found a very good contact at SnowU for supporting my research in a unexpected place. Also, DrWife, who was visiting her new company, checked out SnowU and saw the work in progress on my lab. Time to get excited.

One last thing!

It's my Birthday tomorrow, so if you have some Balvenie Doublewood, I'll raise a glass to that. If not, anything from Rogue is great too. I could go for a Dead Guy or a Hazelnut Brown Nectar.

Templates, Why Matlab is the Awesomeness! (Part 3)

2011-03-10T03:58:00.004-05:00

Powerpoint is ok for making basic graphs, as I explained yesterday. I still prefer to hardcode in LaTeX, but you can use something like Inkscape instead, which is open source and works with EPS files and is full vector graphics. When you need to plot data though, that's where Matlab comes in handy.

I hear from a lot of my colleagues that Matlab is too cumbersome to make consistent plots for their thesis's (is that the correct plural of thesis?). If you didn't take the time to make a proper template, then yes, it is too cumbersome to make consistent plots. But if you take the time to build a proper template, like yesterday with Powerpoint, you will be able to churn out nice graphs with relative ease. Let's face it, if you're working with large datasets, you're using Matlab anyway...

Basic Figure Setup

I'm going to assume you already have a plot on the screen. Prior to changing the figure properties, you an actual figure to work on. To build a test figure, I'm going to assume we have two datasets ( X and Y) that we want to plot with respect to time (t).

>> h1 = plot( t , X);

>> h2 = line( t , Y);

I typically work with colored figures so I want to change X and Y to blue and red. This is why I plotted them using separate line commands. If you want to change the MarkerStyle, and MarkerSize, and LineWidth, here's your chance.

>> set( h1 , 'Color' , [0 0 1] );

>> set( h1 , 'Color' , [1 0 0] );

The next step is to change the axes to fit the data. So if t is from 0 to 50 seconds and X and Y both range from -10 Volts to 10 Volts, then you need to set the axes to these limits. After setting the axes, it's good to go ahead and make sure you have enough tick marks and label the axes.

>> axis([0 50 -10 10]);

>> set( gca , 'XTick' , [0 : 5 : 50] );

>> set( gca , 'YTick' , [-10 : 2 : 10] );

>> xlabel( gca , 'Time [s]' );

>> ylabel( 'Signal Noise [V]' );

So now you have your figure with the right axes, tick marks, and labels, with the lines the colors that you want. But the figure size is scaled to fit your screen, and your fonts and font sizes are all off. Scaling to a particular width and changing font attributes are generally routine tasks that need to be done for all figures for publications. So I make a separate M-file called "Figure2c.m"and put it in a Path folder. Then I can just run it below my figure when I'm plotting my data.

>> Figure2c

Matlab will then just execute the commands in the file called "Figure2c". The 2c stands for two columns. I have other ones for log plots and wider figures as well.

Start with the Figure Properties.

This sounds eerily like yesterday. But if you know you only have 8.5 cm (sorry but I work in metric) of width to work with, you should start by making your figure only 8.5 cm wide. In you Figure2c file, you want to put the following text:

>> function Figure2c

>> set( gcf , 'PaperUnits' , 'Centimeters' ,...

'Units' , 'Centimeters' ,...

'PaperOrientation' , 'Portrait' ,...

'PaperPositionMode' , 'auto' ,...

'Position' , [2 1 8.5 4.5] );

>> PAPER = get( gcf , 'Position' );

>> set ( gcf , 'PaperSize' , [PAPER(3) PAPER(4)] );

The function command means the file runs when called from another file. The next block changes the current figure properties by grabbing the current figure (GCF). Matlab, by default, plots things relative to your screen size, which you need to change to real units. So I've switched them, and all other units in the figure to centimeters. Then I change the paper position so it start 2 cm from the left edge of the computer screen, 1 cm from the bottom and the figure is 8.5 cm wide by 4.5 high. I find this aspect ratio quite nice for figures. You can go higher if you want. The next two lines get the figure wide and change the maximum paper size to the exact figure size. When you save your figure, you won't have any excess white space around the figure because of the paper. This is critical for saving EPS figures.

Change the Axis Properties

After making the figure the right size, the next trick is to make the axes essentially fill the figure. This takes some trial and error (good thing I've done it for you). Like the figure properties, you need to change the current axis properties to work with your real units. So use the following...

>> set( gca , 'Units' , 'centimeters' ,...

'Position' , [1.3 1.1 6.9 3] ,...

'FontSize' , 8 ,...

'FontName' , 'NewCenturySchoolbook' );

This changes the axis units to centimeters. Now you need to position the axes within the figure box, and include space for the axis labels and tick marks. This where some trial and error can occur. I've found for most figures, the actual plot is 6.9 cm wide by 3 cm high and should start about 1.3 cm from the left edge of the figure window and 1.1 cm up from the bottom of the figure window. Then I change the fonts to 8 pt, New Century Schoolbook.

The last step for this part is to change the axis labels to the right font, fontsize, and color (if needed). To do this you need to first copy the previous label name.

>> holderX = get( gca , 'xlabel' );

>> holderY = get( gca , 'ylabel' );

Then you need to reset it based on the string from your original plot. That's what the first attribute is below. The next two change the font size to 9 and the font to New Century Schoolbook to match the other properties.

>> xlabel( get( holderX , 'String' ) ,...

'FontSize' , 9 ,...

'FontName' , 'NewCenturySchoolBook');

>> ylabel( get( holderY , 'String' ) ,...

'FontSize' , 9 ,...

'FontName' , 'NewCenturySchoolBook');

And there's so much more you can do

Using a template like this, I add gridlines in a light grey, but still have axes that are plotted in black (which is somewhat tricky to do). Also, you can add a format for you legend to make sure you have the right font and font size. You can do two Y-axis plots fairly easily with this and do color coding, etc etc.

The last step: Exporting

So now you have your beautiful plot and you need to save it. Since you're running this in M-files anyway, you might as well save the figure via the M-file as well. I export everything to PNG (portable network graphics) which is good for bringing it into Powerpoint. For papers, I use EPS figures with is a vector format. The two commands I use are based on print which prints the current figure.

>> print -r600 -dpng -loose filename.png

>> print -r600 -depsc -loose filename.eps

-r600 makes sure I have 600 DPI on the figures. -dpng/-depsc are the switches for which print driver to use. Matlab has both by default. -loose is very important. Don't forget that. That ensures the paper size and position that you specified in the beginning will be used for the bounding box. That's crucial for importing EPS figures and working with LaTeX. The last bit is the filename.

There you have it. It's a basic template but it works. If you have any questions or want some more tips on Matlab plotting, let me know.

Templates, Powerpoint Tips/Tricks (Part 2)

2011-03-09T11:09:00.006-05:00

Yesterday, I discussed how typesetting your thesis and journal publications in LaTeX can make your work look much more professional than anything thrown together in MS Word. But there are instances (like my current one), where you have no choice but to use MS Word. This is either because you must submit it in *.doc format or because you need to work with track changes and things like that. If you’re working with MS Word and you need to trade text and figures with a colleague, then you’re probably going to use PowerPoint to make your figures. Below I’ve outlined a few steps that I take when making PowerPoint figures for documents to make them look professional, at least as professional as raster graphics can look.

1. Scale your figure right from the start

Typically, you know your size constraint right from the start. There’s nothing more annoying than resizing your figure, changing all of your font sizes on the fly. If you’re writing a two-column journal article, you probably have 3 inches of width or about 8.3 cm to play with. For single column journals (like Optics Express), the columns are a little wider 5.3”/13.3 cm. Each university thesis template varies but you generally have more space than that.

Start your figure by building a box a few inches tall with the maximum width allowable by your intended publication. In PPT, go to properties and check to make sure your set your figure width in inches (or cm). When drawing your figure, everything must fit inside that box. If you go outsides of the box, you have to resize on the fly, which screws up your text sizes. This gives you and idea of what you can fit within one column and if you need to make a figure that spans two columns. Remember, you can always go taller (to a point), so think about your figure layout and if you can make it taller than wider, as necessary.

2. Set your fonts and font sizes to match the template

Once you have your maximum box size, it’s now time to put something in that box. Most figures have some text, which must conform to publications standards. Probably, your text shouldn’t be smaller than 9 pt or 10 pt font and you should select a font that closely matches the main text font. Maybe I’m picky, but seeing a Times text font with figure labels in Arial just really stands out to me. This is especially the case when you can tell there was some effort put forth to make a good looking figure.

With the outline box and the right size fonts, you should have a better idea of how your figure needs to be displayed without making things too crowded.

3. Remove textbox borders in PowerPoint

A common problem when copying your figures from PPT into Word is the textboxes show up outside of your figures. You can see this below where the text box is extended outside of the outline.

When you have grouped your figure and copied it into your document, you get an overhang which makes your figure wider than desired. (FYI, Blogger scales the figure to "medium" so it doesn't exactly match the other two.)

To remove this, Right click on the Textbox, go to Format Textbox. Under the Textbox heading, make all of the internal margins zeros. If you want, you can make this the default setting by Right clicking on the Textbox again and select Set Autoshape Defaults. All of your properties for this box (font, fontsize, linestyle, fillstyle, etc) will become the new default for PPT objects. Once the margins are zero, you can reduce the size of the box to make it just bounding the text. This will remove the overhang.

4. Import your figures as BMP, JPEG, PNG, or TIFF.

That means never use “MS powerpoint object” or “Windows Enhanced Metafile”. MS Office likes to link all of your documents which, in principle, would be great if it wasn’t so bloated. But Office products have a hard time staying open on their own, let alone when linked between different files. I always paste special and select either BMP, JPEG, PNG, or TIFF (depending on how my figure was saved). Also, make sure that figure is “in line with the text”. If you still have overlap or disappearing figures, make sure your line spacing for that figure is set to 1. If it’s set to “exactly” or “multiple”, your figure might appear under the text.

Tomorrow, I’ll discuss some Matlab templates for figures. Do you have any additional tips for drawing figures in PPT? Comments?

Templates, Because MS Word Makes it Hard Enough (Part 1)

2011-03-08T03:55:00.005-05:00

Yesterday, Cherish the Scientist (@mareserinitatis) was kind enough to indulge my twitter (@profgears) rant about how I hate MS Word. It all started when I had to review a paper for a conference proceedings and the only template they offered was either *.doc or *.docx. NewPhD, just starting out, has a brand new laptop with Office 2007 on it. Meanwhile, I have the 4 year old tank laptop with lowly 2003 on it.

And MS, in their infinite wisdom, decided to change their proprietary format, so converting back between *.docx and *.doc destroys any formatting you thought you might have done. Now, I'm not going to keep ranting about this (at least for this post), but rather, I'm going to spell out how students writing their first publication should approach things like pictures, figures, and graphs.

A few days ago, I post about Advisor-Advisee Expectations, which included things like making sure to communicate, to respond rapidly to emails, etc etc. One of the things I forgot to add for students to do is Learn Compatible Software and one of the things I will teach them is How to Make Templates. I'll tackle the software stuff first.

One of the best things I've learned during my PhD studies is "if it looks professional, people will treat it professionally". This is very important for two aspects, namely written work (thesis and papers) and for presentations. If you want to make professional documents, the best way to go IMHO is with LaTeX. Latex is an open source typesetting system for preparing professional documents. I use the MiKTeX distribution. It has a high learning curve but once you get the hang of it, it makes everything easier. LaTeX is something that I would strongly advise any student starting out to learn. I know it seems crazy with all the other stuff you have to do, but once you start, and your peers start, you'll be able to help each other and rapidly climb the learning curve.

For large documents, the content and the format are largely independent. For instance, once you make your thesis template, you'll never have to change it. If you add more content, you just recompile the document and it's done. And, most journals and universities have LaTeX templates for their publications. In those cases, you don't even have to make the template, you just add content. I watched DrWife bitch and moan about MSWord changing fonts, section headings, chapter spacings, you name it while she was writing her thesis. Everything in MSWord is linked and you have no control over that. In LaTeX, everything is still linked, but you have full control over it. Fonts and Sections headings don't change because of the moon rise. Also, the files are a lot smaller, so you don't have to worry about it crashing.

Another reason why LaTeX is great is because it gets you making *.EPS (encapsulated postscript) pictures. Just google vector graphics or check out the wikipedia page. This is the real reason why I wanted to use Latex. I wanted my figures to look professional and be resizable with issues. That's really useful for transferring journal figures into presentations, which need to be scaled larger.

Over the next few days, I'll talk about how I set up templates and what programs I work with to make figures and drawings for publications.

The Rite of Passage

2011-03-07T04:53:00.001-05:00

Over at Engineer Blogs, they've had a theme week, focusing on their favorite classes. I thought I'd chime in and tell you about the most difficult but decidedly the best class at UGU.

Junior Design.

It's not really a class, more like a Rite of Passage. At UGU they have four design classes in the UG ME curriculum and three lab classes. Nothing can quite compare to Junior Design. Right in the middle of hell semester with Thermo, Fluids, Materials, and a Hard Lab Class sits the most difficult class in the curriculum.

Have I built it up enough?

Basically, it combines everything you've done up until that point. You've had all this theory (and some machine shop stuff) and now you've got to do real engineering. The tasks for the class all center around building a robot/vehicle of some sorts. Mine was to build a vehicle to drive over an obstacle course and deploy a bridge to hold a weight 10 times heavier than your vehicle. Alone the way, you had to climb a 30 degree incline. Oh, and you only get 4 AA's to do it. And you vehicle has to fit in a specified shoebox-like volume.

You have to work in groups, build your own controls and electronics, and do all of your own machining. Oh, and there's a written portion to this class as well with weekly lectures, reports due throughout the semester, and three presentations to give.

You have to back up all of your design decisions with calculations proving it will work. You have to make your drawings with tolerances. You have to calculate the power needed to propel your vehicle. You have to design your electronics for controlling your vehicle. And you have to work together as a group, which is a lot harder that it seems.

When you're going through it, it is total hell. When it's over, you really appreciate it and even miss it. Because it gives you your first taste (at least in my case) of real engineering.

Office Artwork

2011-03-04T09:23:00.005-05:00

I fount it! Demotivational poster for my future office at SnowU! What do you think? Nice and subtle right?

Advisor-Advisee Expectations

2011-03-03T06:01:00.005-05:00

A few days ago, I posted about Submitting it Anyway, which was a dig at advisors who take forever to give comments on papers. Or in my case, take forever to the paper and say "I have no idea what's going on but it looks good. Submit it".

If I take a step back, that's a somewhat terrible relationship to have with your advisor. That's really good way to sow dissension amongst the minions. Students don't want to work for you. You appear (as their advisor) to not give a damn because you're some really uber busy professor. That's why when I posted about my research group and number of students, I didn't think having more than 4 or 5 students was worth it. With the downward spiraling of academic funding, I don't think it's easier to maintain more than that. You're too focused on funding rather than your students, your teaching, and your research.

Later tonight, I have a presentation over the interwebs for first year grad students at SnowU who are looking for an advisor. In this presentation (and in the future), I lay out what I expect from students and what they should expect from me. If there's a discord in the future, then we should both be adults about it and discuss it to make things right. Miss MSE's comment on my post that she had to involve her department chair and graduate coordinator in her advisor's lack of involvement is very unfortunate. I'm speculating (and you can tell me if I'm wrong) that if Miss MSE's advisor was approachable and available, that they could have discussed this issue to iron out some kinks.

Below are the main points that I want to get across to first year students looking for an advisor. They should know what their advisor expects from them right from the start and they should know what to expect from their advisor.

As a Grad Student, I expect you to...

Show up, be diligent, be willing to try new/odd experiments, be creative
Treat this like a job. When you have your PhD, you'll have to anyway
Get comfortable in the lab, you'll be there often
Write journal papers and attend conferences (it helps both of us)
Present your research regularly, both internally and externally.
Support your colleagues as needed
Not be afraid to ask for help from myself or any of your colleagues. We should be willing to say I don't know

As a tradeoff, you will learn a ton of things along the way, such as...

Lab Skillz. When you walk into any lab in the future, you will feel comfortable
Multi-disciplinary approach to problem solving. See that soldering iron? It works for mechanical engineers, optical engineers, physicists, just about anyone.
How to write and review journal papers, critique your work, write tactful answers to dumb reviewers
To give presentations where no one will be asleep
To be confident about your research and your abilities
Enough knowledge to give you a sizable base for a career in _______

But you should have expectations from me. As your advisor, I will strive to...

Answer your emails in a timely fashion
Show up in the lab (frequently!, daily?!)
Help you transition to be an autonomous researcher
Work with you to achieve your career goals, whether they're in industry, academia, or national labs
Get you connected in our greater research community
Be available, approachable, and reasonable.

If, for any reason, neither of us are living up to this, then we should be able to discuss it like adults and come to a suitable conclusion.

To beard or not to beard?

2011-03-02T03:10:00.002-05:00

DrWife and I have recently been having discussions about appropriate working attire and grooming for new faculty members. For the past few years, I have generally kept my hair from very short to none at all. While this is very easy from a maintenance perspective, DrWife says this could make me less approachable for students because I look more intimidating. So, I have somewhat agreed to at least start my new position with quasi-normal guy hair. While I am pretty much set on that, I am now in the process of asking myself the age old question which every male professor asks at some point.

To beard or not to beard?

Do I want to look like just another engineering prof? You know the look. Non-matching sport jackets and slacks. Terrible ties (if any). Short sleeve button down shirts. Unkempt hair. And, most importantly, a huge bushy beard?

Or should I go with the look of a modern engineering prof. Clean-cut, business casual attire (no pleats!). Rocks a nice tie when needed. Iphone in one hand to stay connected.

Ok, so it’s probably not as generic as that. And it’s not that I’m trying for some hipster or post modern look. I guess I’m basically asking a question that I’ve heard a lot from women in a similar situation. How should I appear where they will take me seriously but I can still be myself? Beard, no beard, hair, no hair, that makes no difference to me. Hell, I used to have a blue mohawk about 6 years ago. But should I appear as a prof to be taken seriously or should I appear modern to not get thrown into the “dinosaur” category.

I’m only a few years older than the new grad students. I don’t want to be mistaken as some kid in over their head (that discussion is for another day) but I also don’t consider myself in the dinosaur prof category either. Or am I just thinking about it too hard because the students don’t give a damn as long as they pass the class?

Submit it anyway

2011-03-01T02:39:00.001-05:00

I’m tired of hearing about poor graduate students whose advisors don’t take the time look over their papers or don’t give timely comments on their work. If it’s about to be submitted for a journal, then it should be important for the advisor and they have an obligation to look at it and give extensive comments in a timely fashion. If your advisor is failing to do that, then they’re doing a bad job of advising in my opinion.

Contrary to anything you might hear otherwise, all authors on a paper are treated equally even though some think they only have "management/guidance" roles. All authors should know the research and should be willing to help. More importantly, all authors get the same amount of credit no matter how much work they individual contributed. So if you are working on a paper and feel like someone's not contributing their part, then say so. If you think you've got a good start, just say so. Publishing helps all authors equally so we, as co-authors, should be willing to write some of the work.

Let’s take a paper with 5 authors on it. The breakdown is usually as follows:

Author 1: Main author, did most of the writing and research. Can explain the technical aspects, chug through math, models, data, etc, but has limited scope for the overall picture.
Author 2: Generally the main author’s partner in the lab, immediate mentor, or fellow PhD student who helped gather/analyze data. Helped with some of the writing.
Authors 3 & 4: These two Authors contributed some technical aspects and offered advice. If you’re ever looking for these two Authors, my money is on them not being in the lab.
Author 5: Often the main advisor, grant getting, knows the overall plan for the project but (all too often) doesn’t know the technical details.

Officially though, everyone is equally counted as a co-author on the paper, and that’s the aspect that I disagree with. If Authors 3 and 4 only gave a little bit of advice, then thank them in the acknowledgements. If Authors 1 and 2 have kicked the paper around for a while, Author 5 should have the decency to comment within a few days. Otherwise remove their name! I think it’s fair for you (as the main author) to send the work and say I need comments within X number of days or a very good reason why you can’t do that, otherwise I’ll just remove your name and submit it anyway.

You may be a graduate student but this is why we have peer review. There’s no reason why you need a professor’s name on the paper to get it published. In certain instances it helps. But if your work is good enough, then go for it. If it passes peer review, then it’s good enough and then maybe your advisor will take notice that you’re not messing around and you’re not just a lab minion.

Quirky New Engineering Prof Seeks Passionate, Creative Student for a Professional Research Relationship

2011-02-28T02:29:00.001-05:00

While I haven’t officially started at SnowU, I am essentially preparing when I do start. Aside from looking over class notes, preparing a new lecture, and lining up my proposal schedule, I need to find students. SnowU has been very good about identifying potential students for me and I will get a chance to pitch my research to new students before they generally make their decisions about a PhD advisor.

So this past weekend, I worked on a few advertisements about the first few projects I want to run. I initially started with the generic Background, Project Description, Responsibilities, etc. After writing a little bit, I took a break and then looked them over. There were two things that struck me upon rereading the advertisements: 1) these say nothing about my personality or about how I would run my group and 2) I certainly wouldn’t want to work for myself based on what I read.

I scrapped those and started over again. I started to go with ads that were essentially personals. One of the headlines for a laser project was Wanted: Cute Redheaded Laser seeks crafty Engineer for a Controlling Relationship”. I know it sounds cheesy but that’s certainly more eye catchy than Project Title: Control of Red HeNe Lasers. I thought those might get me into a little bit of trouble, so I started over again.

In the end, I settled on a format that shows a little bit of personality, a little bit of my quirkiness, and tells a little bit about what I expect from students, while still mentioning the basics like project description, etc. These are much more to my liking, while still be on the good side of professional.

When you were a first year student roaming the halls, what caught your eye on the bulletin board? If you didn’t have a specific advisor in mind, would you take a chance on “The New Prof”? I tend to think (and did so for my MS) students prefer to work with a well established Prof because they think that will help them in the long run. For my PhD, I worked for a new Prof, was still successful, but was almost in spite of my Prof. Is that still the current sentiment? Would you work for a Prof whose position advertisements start with Quirky New Engineering Prof Seeks Passionate, Creative Student for a Professional Research Relationship?

Dual Advisor Conflicts

2011-02-25T05:24:00.002-05:00

Currently, I’m in that grey area as far as my job/research is concerned. Mainly, I’m trying to finish a few more papers before I officially move on. One of my other tasks is mentor the next PhD student to continue this current research trend. So with NewGrad, I’m trying to get a few more experiments completely, enough for maybe 1-2 papers and we collectively have a few conference proceedings submitted/accepted.

Research with NewGrad is going well. I expect a lot from my mentees and I give them a lot of tasks, but I also support my mentees much more than other PhD/Postdoc students do for their mentees in my group.

But as I’m slowly faded out of the picture, it’s time for the real Advisor (also technically my advisor) to take over. Since I’ve been pretty autonomous as a researcher for the past ~2 years, I’ve had to set my own path for the research, so I know where it should go. Not to toot my own horn, but I have been pretty successful at doing so. Advisor does not have nearly as in depth knowledge about the research topic as I do and thus, Advisor doesn’t exactly know where it should go. And Advisor wants NewGrad to go in a different direction than the direction I’ve set forth. These are also the same wonky decisions Advisor steered me toward.

Concerning my future, I am not so worried. Once I have moved to SnowU, I will be guiding my own research, unless I get myself as a grad student. In general, I will be able to proceed down the path I want on this topic.

I am more concerned about NewGrad and how this will change NewGrad’s situation. There is clearly a disconnect between myself and Advisor and NewGrad is aware of that. Also, NewGrad knows that I’m leaving shortly and Advisor will be the main person to turn to for the rest of the PhD project. And NewGrad does not want to run the risk of alienating Advisor so early in the project.

I think it is a weird situation to be in for the both of us. What would you do if you were in NewGrad’s shoes? Have you been part of a supervising tandem where you had conflicts with the other supervisor? How did this affect your underlings? Thoughts? Comments?

The Engineering in Movies

2011-02-24T02:33:00.001-05:00

This past weekend, DrWife and I decided to watch a few movies. At my behest, I convinced DrWife to DVR “Blow Away” because I remembered it to be an above average, 90’s action flick. Sadly, I was splicing together the characters of Blown Away with the plot of “The Jackel”, but I digress. For those of you that haven’t seen it (spoilers!), Jeff Bridges plays a member of the Boston Bomb Squad and faces off against his old mentor from his previous IRA days, played by Tommy Lee Jones.

There’s some pretty ridiculous scenes in the movie where a bomb goes off, leveling a car, with people standing ~10 ft from the blast. Car shoots 15 feet in the air, but the person who was just running to the car and was close enough to spit on it is miraculously OK, without at scratch. In the end, it depicts the typical Hollywood scenario of massive explosions and people running away and getting knocked down from the concussion of the blast. But no one gets hurt.

The next night, we decided to compare that to another bomb squad movie, The Hurt Locker, which was also on the DVR for a while. In The Hurt Locker (spoilers!), Jeremy Renner plays a character who disarms IED’s in Iraq with a manic, but deliberate, fervor. The movie depicts several scenes of attempts to disarm IED’s with extreme caution and the destruction caused when one goes off.

In short, The Hurt Locker is a great movie. Great dialog, great story, great characters, and a fantastic job by Jeremy Renner. The fact that last year’s Oscar race was down to Katheryn Bigelow/James Cameron and The Hurt Locker/Avatar is a joke and insults the intelligence of everyone who watches movies. FYI, I love the world of Pandora, but I digress. What really strikes me is the realism of the situations and the explosions didn’t appear to be over-engineered.

Now, mind you, I’ve never been around an IED explosion but based on what Hollywood typically shows and what’s shown in this movie are two vastly different things. In the first explosion, the bomb is about the size of a large fire extinguisher. A bomb that big usually levels an entire block in movies, along with the low-flying helicopter flying overhead. This has bomb has an explosion twice the size of a “Hollywood hand grenade” yet kills someone more that 50 meters away, wearing the full bomb suit. The scenes have such believable realism, that it’s difficult to watch.

I know this post only has loose ties to engineering, but this is just another example of how society skews engineering (or scenes of engineering) to be something that it’s not. Iron Man 2 had another great example. Mickey Rourke’s character, Whiplash, designs a harness and rig for whip-like tendrils that can cut a Bentley in half. Yet, he’s later described as a “brilliant physicist”. Ok, maybe as a physicist, he could theoretically model that system but I don’t know many physicists that actually build stuff. That’s a perfect example of engineering.

Why does that name “engineering” get sidelines for “physicist” or “scientist? Is it because “engineer” has been used to trump up other, less reputable professions? Sanitation Engineer (Janitor) and Radio Show Audio Engineer (Audio Technician) easily come to mind.

How PowerPoint ruins America’s STEM Education

2011-02-23T02:35:00.001-05:00

On Monday, I alluded to some things that could be changed about America’s Higher Education system, particularly focusing on STEM Education. One of those changes would be to wipe PowerPoint from every computer, in every university, and pass out some chalk.

Ok, well that’s not entirely fair. I do believe in fair arguments so there are times when PowerPoint is a great tool for teaching. PP is great when used as an accent. Having trouble describing a system on the chalk board? No problem. Show a picture of it in PP. Need to demonstrate a little gizmo? Build a small animation in PP. PP is also great for presentations. It’s the standard medium for most (all?) conferences. It helps keep you on track and gives your audience something to look at while you’re explaining how great you are.

The problem with PowerPoint is that it’s taken for granted. Everyone expects you to give a presentation and it is soooo common, that no one teaches you how to do it effectively. Luckily, at UGU, they stressed giving presentations so you learned how to convey your information in PP without getting lost in PP. I was one of the fortunate ones. A lot of people I talk with didn’t get that during their education. Making graphs? Be sure to change the axes and font sizes. That’s a common mistake that kills me every time I see it. You know when you’re standing in the audience that you hate not being able to read the labels, make sure to fix it for your own presentation. You spend more time trying to figure out if it’s “nm” or “mm”, rather than focusing on what’s important.

Equations + PowerPoint = Knife in my Temple. Sitting through PP lectures in STEM fields which rely heavily on math makes me want to kill myself. As the student, an equation *magically pops up and on the next slide, it’s *magically in the form you need it. Those 4 pages of derivation? Don’t worry about those. Most times math is presented in PP missing huge steps and little tricks/transformations/substitutions. That’s where some real learning occurs.

If you have the PP and the note, what’s the point of going to class? Read it on your own time. Students shouldn’t be reading the PP before the class. They should be reading the textbook, otherwise why assign it? It’s like looking at the Cliff’s Note before the class and saying you’ve read the book.

On the professor side of the equation (which I’ll have to deal with soon enough), I think PP makes you a less effective teacher. You are already stressed with proposals, papers, and students. Who has time for teaching? Oh, lecture at 1 pm today… hmmm.. there’s that presentation that I gave a few years ago… maybe that’ll work. That’s an unfair oversimplification but I think it gets my point across. Once you’ve made your PP slides and tweaked them after the first semester or two, you probably rarely go back and change them. And that leads into a downward spiral where you assume you’ll remember the lecture once you’ve seen the slides so you don’t need to prepare. I was the culprit for this once. I gave a guest lecture one year and was asked to give it again the following year. I assumed I’d remember the material once I saw it, but that wasn’t the case. It was one the worst presentations I’ve ever given.

When PP is not used as an accent and is the sole medium for conveying information, that’s when you have problems. And, as more and more distance learning/web learning is pushed at universities, you’re going to have more and more problems. Apparently, PP is a huge problem for the US military (albeit for different reasons). Let’s not make it a huge problem for education.

Making Mods

2011-02-22T05:01:00.002-05:00

Ok, So I'm watching NanoGEARS today so I don't have time for a normal post. I'm still working on the site layout. Hopefully a new avatar and some background pictures will materialize out of thin air at some point...

Let me know what you think.

Fix what you know is already broke

2011-02-21T02:36:00.004-05:00

In Sunday’s paper, and by paper I mean the Washington Post’s iPhone app :-D, Daniel deVise had an interesting article on Eight ways to get higher education in shape (linky). The 8 methods are:

1. Measure how much students learn at every college

2. End Merit Aid

3. Standardize the three year bachelor degree

4. Revive Core Curriculum

5. Bring Back Homework

6. Tie Public fund to finishing college

7. Cap athletic subsidies

8. Stop re-teaching high school in community college

I think from the descriptions, most of you should be able to figure out the basis for the arguments, so I’m not going to do that here. Instead, I’m going to rip a few holes in the arguments because these might fly for non-technical degrees but these will do little to help in the engineering/science areas. At the end, I’ll name a few that should be considered for engineering (and STM) programs.

Measure how much students learn at every college: While in principle, I’m not against measuring how much students learn at college, qualifying how much engineers have learned is not an easy thing. Plus, you have that endless battle of theorists versus experimentalists for engineering supremacy. Personally, I’ll take the person who knows how to use a wrench rather than the person who can FEA the wrench the best. But how would you test that on a piece of paper?

End Merit Aid: This is one that I’m on the fence about. I wasn’t good enough to receive merit aid in HS but I did have a friend go to Yale because of Merit Aid. He was also an athlete, thus, he couldn’t get reduced tuition price. Yet his parents were generic, middle class. My wife’s (henceforth, DrWife) cousin goes to Princeton on Merit Aid and her parents are also generic, middle class. While both could have gone to state schools without a problem, Merit Aid allowed them to go to Ivy schools. I know it’s supposed to be for poor and maybe they should cap it saying families with over X income per year cannot receive Merit Aid, but I don’t think that should apply to the middle class. Obviously, I’m biased but I don’t think it’s that simple as ending, just capping based on income level.

Standardize the three year bachelor degree: What? Are you kidding me? An engineering degree in 3 years? What is this? Europe? Actually, that last part wasn’t a joke. Most European institutions have their engineering bachelor’s degree in 3 year programs. I’ve seen what happens in those and I’m not impressed. Besides, even here (FYI, I live in Europe right now…) no one finishes in 3, or even 4 years. My UG (in the US) had 127 credit hours and thinking back, it probably should have had about 3-5 more classes in it. Maybe you should beef up your paltry Communications or Poly Sci degrees from 30 credit hours to a respectable 60 or 70??? I mean com’on. 30 credit hours in engineering is an easy year and it’s their whole degree program. That’s terrible. Maybe for non-STEM degrees but in STEM degrees, 3 years is a joke. It’s so laughable, I’m not even going to waste time flaming it more.

Revive Core Curriculum: While you’re reviving core curriculum, why not add a little engineering/problem solving to it?

I’ll admit that the core classes I had to take for my general degree requirements were a joke. I remember taking a freshman US history class to satisfy my general degree requirements during my senior year. The big term paper was 2 pages, single sided, double spaced. And those history students, who will spend the rest of their careers reading and writing complained about it.

Also, it’s a little hard to pack in more “core curriculum” into programs with 120+ credit hours. If they did so, those classes should be added and taught for senior level. By that point, you’ve been in college for a few years and you’ve probably learned a lot (even if they can’t measure it, see #1). If you had core classes during your senior year and taught at that level, they would be much better than having a few seniors in freshman courses.

But, if I have to read ancient literature (and we know my feelings on Shakespeare), then some Lit major should learn a Mohr’s Circle and have to build a balsa wood bridge.

Bring Back Homework: Ummm, last time I checked, you don’t graduate with an engineering degree without doing homework. Homework never left engineering curriculum. ‘Nuff said.

Tie Public fund to finishing college: This can never be. You’ll always have students who drop out for money, transfers, can’t take it, jobs, other “life” things. Also, the first two years of engineering is full of weed-out classes. And those students are weeded out on purpose. But, if they implemented this, you wouldn’t be able to weed out students who can’t hack it because you need the money.

It’s the same issue at the MS and PhD level. Some students pass simply because the state gives X amount per graduated PhD student. And sometimes that X amount is really needed. Implementing this means you’ve just relaxed your education standards.

Cap athletic subsidies: I think athletics versus academics is an entirely different beast. I’ll leave this alone for now.

Stop re-teaching high school in community college: Engineering isn’t really a community college thing. Not applicable here.

How could they really fix higher ed, focusing on things they know are already broken?

Fix the current research funding system: Maybe if professors didn’t spend 80% of their time writing proposals, students would get taught, graduate students would learn more, and professors could actually get in the lab once in a while.

Stop hiring un-qualified TA’s to teach classes: I once took an EE class that was taught by a Math grad student. That’s pretty messed up, but it obviously made perfect sense to the university. TA’s are assistants, not lecturers. If you make them lecture, pay them like a lecturer and hold them accountable. Remember, some people paying many thousands of dollars for an education expect to be taught by qualified people.

Get rid of PowerPoint! I’ll save that for tomorrow.

Lab Wars

2011-02-18T03:55:00.001-05:00

It’s smaller than I thought…

How’s that for an opening line?

I recently received the floor plans and was asked for my desired modifications for my new lab space. When potential lab space was discussed during my interview, I had an estimated space in mind and I do believe the University (I really need a nickname) did meet my initial size estimation.

However, I think I low-balled the amount I needed. The space is manageable, for now. In subsequent years, I would hope to pick up a handful of students, which means there’s going to be a shortage of space.

Part of yesterday’s post on courses to teach stemmed from my reaction to my newly allocated lab space. Another reason for teaching a self-imposed lab class is the potential to carry out experiments in that space over the summer or when the course is not taught.

I know Lab Wars (cue the music) is a common activity at universities. Hell, I generally go through that on a weekly basis (and win =D ). But the University did meet my requested space size and are willing to make modifications to enhance the space for my specific research needs. So I think I’m somewhat stuck. Hopefully, I can wow them with publications and results within the first few years so I can plead my case for more space.

And so it begins...

2011-02-17T02:20:00.001-05:00

In preparation for starting at my new position and university in a few months, the Chair was kind enough to pass along the specs for my new lab space and asked about my desired modifications. Additionally, I’ve agreed to teach the first year and take my free semester during year two. The first class I am teaching is a senior level laboratory class. I know Profs during my UG used to bitch about laboratory classes and the amount of workload. I’m not too worried (right now) because this University (BTW, I need a cool, recurring nickname…) is a lot smaller than my UG and by the time their seniors, most of the weeding should be done. Also, as an experimentalist, laboratory classes are something that I should promote because I hated learning from people proclaiming their greatness in front of powerpoint. For instance, in Controls, we always started knowing the frequency response (or transfer function) of the plant. That’s a helluva lot harder to get in real life, and IMHO way more difficult than actually designing the control loop.

There is a point to all of this; I’m just taking my sweet time today. So in the spring, I have to teach another course, but this time a course of my choosing. Currently, I have two courses in mind. Course1 is a lecture-based course with some in-class demonstrations on a topic that I am very familiar with. During my PhD (and now in my short PD) I’ve taught at least 3 MS students and 4 UGs on this topic. Sure, I would need to make formal lectures and plan, etc etc, but it shouldn’t be any more different than a normal course.

Course2 is a laboratory-based course encompassing all of the Shit I Wish They Taught Me (SIWTTM). SIWTTM would be significantly more difficult to set up. I would need some financial support from the department(s) and I would probably have to beg companies for software/hardware donations. Also, it would require some teaching lab space and significantly more time from me to debug labs, write lab procedures, etc etc. I’ve pitched this idea to a few colleagues (not at the new University) and they have said this course is a good idea and it’s something they wish they had in the late UG or early MS.

So I’m in the process of writing a proposed syllabus for both classes, as well as descriptions for the labs. The Familiar Lecture syllabus was fairly simple to write because it’s a topic that I’d like to write a book on someday so I already have an outline of topics I want to cover. SIWTTM is a little more difficult but the more I think about, I think it’s a class that would be very rewarding to teach if successful. Plus, it resonates with my experimentalist side and will really test my skills as a teacher.

If you were a senior UG or an early MS student, would you rather take an elective lecture from a n00b prof or would you rather take an elective laboratory class? If you were Chair, and your newest prof hands you two proposals, one for a standard lecture and another for a laboratory class, which would you assign? Would the workload for the laboratory class (second lab class in a year) plus the startup inertia combined with all the trappings of a tenure track position mean this is career suicide from your newest prof? Or would you, as Chair, see this as a chance to add something to your curriculum that you probably have desired but cannot find anyone to champion?

There can be only one

2011-02-16T02:30:00.001-05:00

It’s about that time of year again, conference abstract submission time. Actually, this year isn’t so bad. Unlike most years, most of my research that I want to present is actually completed and the results are already known before submitting the abstract. That’s great because I can show data in the abstract submission, rather that speculating about what I might get done in the next 6 months. Also, I have two very good research results on topics that are linked, but not the same. At this conference, however, both would fall under the same category and be competing for a presentation.

Sessions for this conference are usually split into 4 or 5 presentations of about 15-20 minutes each. There’s no chance of my talks taking up 2 slots in the oral session, which means one will be relegated to the poster session. Unless I manage to convince the session chairs to give me an extended time slot (which I severely doubt), I’ll have to choose. In terms of Highlander, There can be only one.

So my question is, do I choose the project which has the highest impact to the end user and relegate the cool, physics stuff to the poster? Do I use the cool, physics stuff to tease the end results for the user and tell them to come by my poster for more info? Or, do I plead my case with the session chairs for an extended time slot?

The other question I have on this topic is about when is it right to publish something. For instance, I can imagine these research topics completed, with proceedings written in the next two months (well ahead of schedule). Then, the next step is to beef them up from their mini counterparts to full journal papers. This won’t be too difficult because we have a plethora of results. However, should I wait to submit them for journal publication until after the conference? Also, this is research performed at my current PhD/mini-Postdoc University prior to moving to my tenure track university. But it won’t be submitted and presented until after I’ve moved on. Should that count towards publications during my tenure track period? It seems pretty unethical but the people I’ve spoken with seem to suggest it is fair game. Thoughts?

Screw Shakespeare, Learn Engineering Skills

2011-02-15T04:51:00.003-05:00

So FrauTech in her guest blog at Scientopia discussed why there aren't more engineers in the blogging. One of her first comments was by Colin who brought up the very valid point that US schools are falling behind in STEM fields in high school but in fact, most high schools don't teach engineering. DrugMonkey followed up with a comment that engineering didn't necessarily need to be in high school. I couldn't disagree with this statement more. This brings up the point I would like to make:

Screw Shakespeare, Learn Engineering Skills.

Learning literature skills like interpreting Shakespeare is waaaay less important for students to learn in high school than engineering skills. The world needs more people to be able to build stuff and advance society rather than another person working on yet another interpretation of The Taming of the Shrew (10 Things I Hate About You is great, but I digress).

Aside from teaching the specific discipline topics (mechanical, civil, electrical, chemical, etc etc), engineering teaches PROBLEM SOLVING. What does the world have plenty of right now? Problems. Clean water, clean energy, food sources, climate issues. I don't think having students recite Macbeth to a contaminated well is a good way to clean it. However, showing the students how to build a filter and a mini-windmill to pump the water will teach them real skills, like solving problems.

I remember reading an article in the paper a few years ago about a study done about 10-15 years ago for junior high students. Half of the students took the normal curriculum, whereas the other half had 1 task in their "science class" (why couldn't they call it engineering?). Their task was to figure out what it takes to launch 15000 lbs into space and what minimum velocity it takes to orbit earth. I can't find the link to the study right now but basically, an overwhelming majority of those students went on to university degrees in engineering and science (most engineering), and a significant number went on to get advanced degrees. The control group had only a hand full of students go into engineering/science careers.

That study was a clear indicator of what happens when you introduce engineering (under the veil of a "science class") at a young age. We need more of that at a young age in society and a lot less Shakespeare.

It's Ok to say I don't know

2011-02-14T04:54:00.002-05:00

For engineers, it is sometimes difficult to say that you don’t know, especially in academia. An engineer at a basic level is supposed to solve problems and come up with ideas. Academia can be pretty cutthroat with funding drying up and the pressure to patent, publish, and build a research group. Saying you don’t know goes counter to being a solutions-oriented person.

In an interview, and particularly in a difficult interview, the most effective way to not get backed into a corner is to say you don’t know. During my interviews, I have one clear instance where there was no way I was going to impress this faculty member and had no choice but to switch from promoting my abilities to trying to limit my losses. I’ll try to remain as generic as possible but the rough scenario was the following.

Day 1, I met HardProf with the other Profs in a quasi-informal setting (although you, as the interviewee, treat everything like an interview). Most of the other Profs were bantering with me about side topics; sports, experience abroad, traveling, lifestyle, family, etc etc. Sure, some of these things aren’t officially allowed to be interview questions but they’re going to come up so you might as well answer them. Anyway, HardProf did not seem to join the banter but would continuously switch topics to research/teaching/group setup/experience. I found this odd, but went with it. I was a little uncomfortable with rapidly adapting to new topics while focusing to keep as socially and politically neutral as possible.

Overall, Day 1 interviews went very well so I ended the day feeling very positive. I had one awkward interview but that is easily classified as neutral compared to this. Day 2 rolls around where I meet with HardProf early in the day. Usually, the interview starts with a few minutes of banter just to get the flow going. This was not the case with HardProf. From minute one, HardProf starts firing broadsides and I had no choice but to duck and cover. From my talk the previous day and from discussions with other Profs, HardProf knew I did not have experience in this one field. However, one of the classes I suggested I wanted to teach contained a lot of that field. Previously, I answered that question stating something like “Currently, I am not fully up to speed on that particular topic. However, it is an area that I know I need to brush up on. Thus, why not put myself forward for teaching a class that has it to make sure I really learn it.” Most Profs usually respected that I admitted I did not know and that I was willing to learn. However, HardProf decided to go line by line through the course syllabus over 30 minutes, fully knowing I had experience with only a few topics.

Now, I tend to think I’m fairly good at coming up with BS on the spot when needed. But in an interview, BS is definitely an area you want to stay away from. So when HardProf asked, I shrugged and said my usual line about willing to learn. And with the next question, I shortened it to “I don’t have experience with that topic”. And a few questions later, “I don’t know”. And because I didn’t fumble around for a reason and stall for 10 minutes, I came out of the interview knowing there was no way I impressed HardProf but I don’t feel like it was my fault HardProf’s time was wasted. After 10 minutes of questioning, you’d figure the interviewee would get the point you’re trying to make and move on to something that was more useful. In the end, HardProf told me to enjoy my stay and good luck in the future, which is a nice political way of saying “get lost”.

So what were your hardest interviews/questions? How did you respond and did you think it ended up helping or hurting your overall performance?

Finding Your Champion

2011-02-11T02:24:00.001-05:00

When preparing for the interview, it is standard practice to read the website bios for each faculty member and to see their research interests. When doing so, make sure to ask for an interview schedule and specifically prepare for those people with whom you are meeting. If necessary, read their last few papers to see what they published recently.

Aside from looking for things to jog your memory while you’re meeting with them, you’re also looking for who is going to be your best champion when the committee makes their decision. Usually, there is a senior faculty member who has research interests that align somewhat with yours and they will likely be more enthusiastic about bringing you on over someone that comes from way out in left field. Some might see this as a little internal competition but that’s why you work on explaining how you two can work together. Let’s face it, even when you’re good enough to land a tenure track position, you’ll still need mentoring and support along the way. Someone who has similar research interests will definitely make a better mentor than someone who has no idea what or why you are working on your specific research.

During my prep, I found this to be rather easy and indeed when meeting people who I targeted to be my champion(s), I definitely found it easier to talk with them because we did have more research aspects in common.

The other thing to do in this stage is figure out who you can impress the most and who is going to be the hardest to win over. For instance, if there are 10 faculty member interviews you probably want at least 2 people to be really excited to land you. For the other members, you probably need 6 to say that you have what it takes, they could certainly work with you, and that you’re willing to contribute to the faculty for teaching and academic service. There’s probably going to be 2 people that you’re not going to win over. However, the closer you can get them to feeling at least neutral about you, the better.

Usually, the faculty members that are going to be the most difficult interviews either have a candidate they’d rather see or they have a philosophical difference with your research/teaching style. In those interviews, you can usually tell that finding common ground is difficult, which immediately puts you on the defensive. For instance, when I came across that, I focused on not getting upset or defensive but rather explaining my position on why [a chalkboard lecture was better than powerpoint] and why I thought it could reach students, but that I was willing to adapt as I got more experience with [teaching]. It shows that you’re not an idealistic prick who wants everyone to learn like you learned. Aside from philosophical differences, if you get backed or back yourself into a corner on something that’s out of your area, just be honest and say you don’t know.

Interview Essentials

2011-02-10T05:19:00.001-05:00

So you’ve worked very hard on your app package. You’ve applied to every university that has an opening and you’ve been waiting for weeks [months], anxiously hoping you get noticed. And then the day comes. You get that email/call saying you’ve made it to the interview stage!

Now what?

The easiest thing to say is: Don’t Screw It Up. The best thing to say is: Practice. A simple Google search should produce numerous “typical”interview questions. Be prepared to give answers on any of these questions. Some people suggest writing out full answers but I tend to think you sound like a robot in those cases. It seems like you’re “too” polished. What I did was jot down ideas/thoughts on a question but stopped short of memorizing a 2 minute monologue/answer. Also, make sure that you can answer the generic “give me 2 minutes about yourself” and “why do you think you’re ready for this position” questions. In two, all day interview sessions with 15+ people faculty members, be prepared for those in at least 50% of the interviews. Once you have practiced your questions, it’s time to practice the actual interview.

By now, you should know some faculty members who are willing to help you out. See if they have a faculty friend who maybe knows of you but doesn’t really know you and ask them to give you a mock interview. Treat this like a real interview. Set up 30-60 minutes and come prepared with copies of your app package for them to look at. Ask them to treat you like they would any other candidate.

I only did this with two people I knew but I got some very good feedback, especially from one Prof. When it was over, I thought I did will. Prof thought otherwise, saying to fix X, Y, and Z and come up with a better SoR and research outlook otherwise I’m not going to get the job. It was quite damning but sometimes tough love can be a good thing.

The other thing Prof did (and I didn’t even notice) was goad me into a minor argument. That’s one way to kill your prospect as a candidate. If it comes down to even a minor argument (that you win), you still lose. Sometimes this happens for political reasons like you’re not the candidate that this particular faculty member wants. They really want candidate B or C. If you argue with them, they’ll definitely take that back to the committee meeting and say “Candidate A seemed to argue over everything. I don’t think she/he is the right person for here.”

This leads to two points: make sure to do your background on the faculty to find your champion and it is ok to say you don't know. I’ll discuss those tomorrow. Did I miss any interview background topics? Any other tips?

Getting the "In"

2011-02-09T02:46:00.003-05:00

The most difficult thing about getting a TT position is getting your foot in the door. I do think, however, it is a misconception that you have to be “groomed” for a TT position or that you need a direct “In” from your advisor or some other mentor. I’m not suggesting that it doesn’t help to have it, but it’s not 100% necessary.

The best thing about contacts at a university that you want to apply for is that you might have a source for a little extra, off-the-record information. For instance, at my ideal university, I suspect they had some specific people in mind when they advertised their open position. Even so, I applied anyway. I did not make the cut, but at least it was good to go through the motions. Also, I was able to speak with the Search Committee Chair regarding my application package and I got some good advice on things to accent in my app package.

At the other places I applied to, I did not have an “in”. They were the random online submissions, where I had originally guessed that the Send button was just a mask for Delete because they already had someone in mind. In those cases, it is generally submit and then hope for the best.

While I know it sounds crazy but if your app package says you’re ready for a TT position, the search committee will see that. If you are ready, but your app package doesn’t say that, then they’re going to think you’re not ready. That’s why is hugely important to have spent a lot of time and effort on preparing your app package.

In my experience, most of the online submission pages do not list the search committee chair. In those cases, I do think it is good to check with the department secretary to make sure your information is received in full. If they do list the committee chair, then you should inquire with them after a reasonable amount of time (maybe 1 month) to “check the status of your application” and if there’s “any more information that they need before reviewing it”. There’s no need to elaborate further on it. Doing this once is acceptable. If they don’t respond, then either you didn’t make the cut or they haven’t reviewed the applications yet. Also, it’s very easy to brush aside an email. It’s probably better to just pick up the phone and call them. It also shows that you’re proactive. However, do not become a stalker over this. That’s a surefire way to get you un-considered for the position.

In the end, just be positive about it but also realistic. While we’d like to think we’re the special candidate, on paper there are probably 10-15 other candidates at your level that look just as good. The committee is only going to pick 3-4 for interviews. Your CV, SoT/SoR, and cover letter will get you to the 10-15 person cutoff, but it takes some luck to be picked in the top 3 after that. And once you’re in the interview, there’s your chance to shine.

The App Package (Part 2)

2011-02-07T02:22:00.001-05:00

After the CV, the next two critical documents for your application package are the Statements of Teaching and Research. During my preparation, I received the whole gambit of advice from having short 1-page statements for each to having multi-year, elaborative exposés on your future plans. In practice, this usually gets sorted out based on the position for which you are applying.

For instance, if you’re looking for an assistant professorship, they aren’t going to expect you to have gobs of info on teaching. Thus, a lot of the places have a limit of 1 page each or 3 pages total. In those cases, you only have enough space for the core points in the SoT/SoR. For teaching, it helps to show you have a teaching philosophy. By now, you’re probably either an experimentalist or a theorist. But in engineering, you’ll need to be able to teach both. Also, you should have an idea about the core program classes that you can teach. These core classes should be pretty common in some shape or form in most engineering programs. Lastly, you should mention a few ideas about classes that you’d like to develop.

On the research side, when space is limited, I think there are only two things you need to get across. The first is that you have larger plan for where you want to be 5-10 years for now because you think the technology is headed in that direction. The second is that you have a series of projects already outlined which help you plan out that 5-10 year period. One thing that I learned (and was asked during an interview question) was “How is my future research different from my current group?” In my case, that was fairly easy to answer but for others, that may be difficult. If you’re not doing something new or there is a research group focused on that already, how are you going to get funding?

And speaking of funding, that bring me to topics that should be included in your SoT/SoR that should be considered if you have sufficient space. On the research side, in addition to outlining where you believe the technology is going and having projects which lead in that direction, you also have to show that you know how to get there. In academia, that’s via funding and group management. Naming key grants that you will go after during your tenure track period and defining how you will set up your group will go a long way to showing your future colleagues that you’re ready for this challenge. This includes the number of students and a rough idea of the cost per year of running such a group. Lastly, adding a section on your previous research can give an indication that you’ve already been trained for this type of research and you’re the right person to lead it in the future.

For the SoT, space permitting, having some good grandiose ideas about novel classes that would greatly add to the curriculum shows that you haven’t just focused on research. These should be treated differently than your suggested courses that you would add because these ideas should be a department or college initiative. This could be something like a minor or specialization within a degree or a course which would take some significant support from the department. Also, look for higher education teaching grants. This would show the department that you’re serious and that you think there are additional support mechanisms which would help you get this started.

The last piece of the puzzle is the Cover Letter. In general, the Cover Letter should be customized for each position. It should specifically draw connections from points in their advertisement to why you fit the position. This is where you can get specific about why you fit this exact position. The SoT/SoR should largely be independent per position for which you are applying. Some other considerations are that this should be addressed to the committee chair if it is publicly known but you should expect the rest of the committee to read your letter. Also, some people say a two page cover letter is fine but I think at this stage in your career, one page should be enough.

The last thing I’ll say on this is to be hopeful but don’t get your hopes up too high. I ended up applying for 10+ positions and received no reaction from almost all of them. All of those positions that I wasn’t successful for didn’t even have the common courtesy to have a form letter rejection saying they were “going in a different direction”. I think that’s a little improper, but that’s the world we live in. If a semester has past and you have followed up several times and you still haven’t heard anything, it’s not looking too good. This can be the most frustrating aspect (not officially knowing) but it takes persistence to get a position. Also, it [sometimes] helps to know someone on the faculty. More on that tomorrow.

The App Package (Part 1)

2011-02-04T13:25:00.003-05:00

Let’s face it, academia is a tough world. But if you’re that good and you present yourself as being that good, someone will take a chance on you even if you didn’t come from the best lab/university/professor. Presenting yourself as being that good is as important as your technical ability because you’ll eventually need those skills for commanding a conference hall, a classroom on a daily basis, and you have to inspire your students. Underneath all of this research and teaching is a business. A Tier 1 research university, on some levels, in nothing more than a business. It’s your job to bring in money so you can play in the lab and the university can function (and give you a lab in which to play). If you’re good but not good at showing people how your research relates or how efficient your research group is, you’re not going to succeed.

The most important way to get this across is your application package and, if you are lucky, your interview and presentation. For now, I’ll stick with the application package and discuss interview stuff over the next few days. The app package usually consists of four items: CV, cover letter, statement of teaching (SoT), and a statement of research (SoR). If you’re good at graphics, then make a fancy (but tasteful) cover with an explanation of what it shows. They don’t want to see abstract art, but if you have a few pictures or drawings that summarize your research, then do it.

Let’s start with the CV. Critically assess your CV. If you’re looking at academic jobs, you have to know you’re good enough. If you have a few publications in OK journals for your field, then it’s looking dicey. The easiest way to check is find the newest assistant prof in your department and ask them how many papers they had when they were higher. If you’re equal or greater, then you’re off to a good start. Also, NEVER have a “papers in prep” section. That’s basically saying “Yeah, I was going to do that but I never got around to it”. It screams of saying you’re not a closer. At the very least, don’t give them a reason think poorly of you.

Another good tip for papers is to separate journal publications and conference proceedings. Most reviewers will try to divvy them up anyway, so they’ll thank you for helping them out. Putting them together is a lose-lose proposition. Assuming you have only one or two journal papers and you hide them with 8 conference proceedings, it is going to look like you’re hiding the fact that you didn’t publish enough. Even if you had 8 journal papers and you intersperse them with a bunch of conference proceedings, they’re going to say “Wow, this person has done a lot of work, but why not accent that you know how the publishing game is played” (More on the politics of publishing later).

As for the rest of the resume, make sure to keep an accurate employment history and remember important dates for everything. Since I did not have postdoc experience while applying, I left everything research or academia related in my resume since about the middle of my undergrad. Make sure to have all of your sections concise and not spread out over a page break but do list everything. Aside from research/employment, education, journals, and conferences, list any patents, presentations at conferences, companies, and/or universities, mentoring, key skills for your research, academic service, conference volunteering, professional associations, awards, grants, everything including the kitchen sink. You're supposed to stand out, not blend in.

Another tip I got was to make a website of projects. Your future colleagues probably don’t want to go through all of your papers but if you had a website with some good photos and schematics, that will work wonders. Have a short description, keeping the high-line of the research focusing on “What’s the main purpose” and “Why is this project successful”. No more than a paragraph or two. That can really give reviews a good perspective.

On Monday, I’ll tackle the SoT, SoR, and cover letter. Any other tips/tricks that I didn’t mention are greatly appreciated.

The FuNk

2011-02-03T02:25:00.001-05:00

The six months prior to November of last year was just a whirlwind of activity for me. Aside from the final push for finishing my thesis on time, last minute experiments, and a conference proceedings/presentation, I had tenure track interviews involving international flights and adjusting to a newborn at home. I defended in December, finalized my negotiations for a tenure track (yay!) and took a few weeks off. When school started up after the winter recess, I was in a total motivation funk. My background on my laptop is a “To Do List” with papers that I need to finish and submit to journals, as well as prep work for NSF proposals and basically a bunch of stuff I didn’t want to do.

This lull persisted for about two weeks before I had to train a new PhD student in the group. And I don’t know if it was getting my hands dirty or if it was working on something other than thesis project/writing for the first time in a while, but that was the jolt to get me out of that funk.

As an experimentalist, I like nothing better than building stuff and setting up experiments to prove or disprove ;-) stuff. Working with a new PhD student in an area where they have no experience is certainly good prep for the next step. And aside from things progressing nicely in the lab and teaching a potentially good student, I’ve managed to check off one of those papers that I had to write.

I’ll definitely have to remember this for next time; I’ll probably get “the funk” after a rough semester. But if you find yourself standing in front of a wall and you know you can climb but you really don’t want to, just walk around it and see what you find. On your travels, you might come across a trampoline and might be motivated enough to drag that back to your wall to make things easier.

Group Dynamics

2011-02-02T02:31:00.001-05:00

Lately, I’ve been thinking student and research group managements. Given the dynamics of lab setup, startup money, and teaching responsibilities, I probably will have about 3 grad students for the first few years. Once I start building up resources from external funding sources, I might be fortunate enough to support 5+ students and maybe a postdoc. The question is, is that necessary to run an effective research group?

During my MSc work, I was in a smaller group (~4 grad students) and during my PhD, I was one of 8-12 PhD students and up to 3 Postdocs. With a group that large during my PhD, it was easier (and more productive) to essentially break off research with one of the postdocs and just work on our own stuff together. Basically we had our own “small group” within the large group.

The pros of that situation were obviously good and fruitful (otherwise I wouldn’t have the opportunity that I have now...). We were able to focus our research, crank out papers, attend a lot of conferences, and pool resources. At the same time, our interaction with the rest of the group dropped off and there were so many students, that keeping track of what we were doing was difficult for our advisors.

Twice, I have benefitted from a smaller group and clearly seen the ineffectiveness of a large group (although 1 data point doesn’t make a trend). At the same time, during interviews and discussions with other faculty, the general trend seems to say bigger is better. The break seems to be between 4/5 students and 5+ students. For the latter, a postdoc is necessary to help manage the group. At the same time, the amount of funding per year also jumps. More students/postdocs equals more papers (theoretically) which leads to a perception of a more “successful” research group. That should increase the amount of funding. At the same time, the amount of time in the lab decreases, you are spread thinner for your students, and you become less effective at pushing the research focus where needed.

So what is the ideal group size? How has a smaller(larger) research group benefitted you?

Removing University Faculty Tenure

2011-02-01T03:07:00.002-05:00

There was an interesting article in the NY Times discussing the failings of tenure in K-12 education and several states trying to remove the tenure process [linky]. If you’re reading this blog, then you probably already know the merits of both sides of the argument, so I’m not going to remind anyone of those. However, removing the tenure system at K-12 (which I think will eventually happen) is certainly a step towards removing tenure at the collegiate level.

The dynamics of tenure for K-12 teachers and university faculty are vastly different. University faculty are not only rated on their effectiveness for teaching (albeit a minor part of the overall “score”) and their contribution to academic service, but they also must graduate successful students, perform research, publish, and, most importantly, bring in money.

What if we assume there wasn’t a tenure system? Would a full professor who has presumably brought in a lot of money for a university escape the headsman’s ax if the budget gods decided their salary was not justified (no matter the amount of money they bring in)? Would they rather have the younger (cheaper) asst/assoc prof who doesn’t bring in as much money? I’m not so sure that would be the argument. I suspect the argument would revert back to who is the better teacher. If that’s the case, then my money’s on the asst/assoc prof because they still have jumps left in their career.

Do you think the university tenure system is going to be dismantled at some point (and if so, when)? How much do you think the typical ratios for performance evaluation would change? Some typical numbers I know of are 50% research, 30% teaching, and 20% service.

Open or Blind

2011-01-31T02:23:00.003-05:00

I can imagine that a lot of reviewers (and I’m guilty of it too) relish a poorly written article only so that they can absolutely crush it. I’ve done enough reviews to know they’re annoying and tedious, yet necessary. However, when the work clearly doesn’t warrant publishing, or the authors have gross lapse in literature review, or it’s just poorly written/described/presented, reviewing for the sake of “helping the community” starts to lose its footing as a reason.

With one-sided blind reviews, the author does not know the reviewers but the reviewers know the authors. Eventually, I think most publishers will switch from this current system to either Open-Open, or Double-Blind. The reasons for a Double-Blind review are fairly strong. Helps remove gender bias, location bias, and research bias. The only major problem with this review system is the reviewer (if they’re any good…) should know who else in the world is working on similar research. Plus, with conferences, references, and a good literature study, the reviewer can easily figure out well established groups. Thus, in the end, I think the Double-Blind review process will in effect always be a quasi- one-sided blind.

An Open-Open review, on the other hand, lays everything out on the table. Authors know exactly who is critiquing them and (hopefully) the reviewers will give strong reviews (either for or against), even when their name is attached to it. The main problem with this type of review system is the softening of the review. Reviewers might be less inclined to reject a paper or even give strong criticism. Also, retaliation for a particular review is a problem.

In most of my reviews (which are typically one-sided blind), I have generally added the statement:

“I believe the review process should be open between reviewers and authors”

GEARS

Awesome Engineering U

[Note: I know publishing a blog under a pen name is hypocritical while I readily give my name to the authors for which I am reviewing.]

However, I am curious, how do you think an Open-Open review process would affect young faculty members just starting out? Should they keep their principle or use the cover of peer review to their advantage? Is an Open-Open review process even a good idea?

Figures make the world go ‘round

2011-01-28T02:25:00.003-05:00

One of the fundamental aspects of academic research is publishing. And it is the author’s responsibility to make things “relatively” easy for the reviewer. Aside from a terribly written paper, there’s nothing worse than referring to a figure/setup/design in the text that’s not there.

For example, I recently reviewed a paper where the authors described the design of a system and adjustments to an overall schematic, yet show no figure. Believe me, it definitely needed a figure. After trolling through two references, I managed to find said schematic but correlating the changes to the original was a pain. How hard would it have been to say “the extra widget here allows for more travel and this do-hickey’s placement was adjusted from a previous design [ref]. The updated schematic can be seen in Figure X”. That makes life a lot simpler for the ~~reader~~ reviewer. (Remember, no one’s going to read it if it doesn’t get past review…)

In this particular case, it was even more frustrating because the author (from their Scopus record) has numerous publications in reputable journals. If this was a graduate student working on their first publication, a reviewer like me might be a little bit more lenient. But from a seasoned author who presumably does reviews of their own, that kind of sloppiness is unacceptable.

I guess the one good thing about performing reviews is you get to vent, that is until things become transparent between authors and reviewers, but I’ll save that for tomorrow.

T-minus 5 months and counting

2011-01-27T02:33:00.003-05:00

Five months doesn’t seem like a long time but it is an eternity when you’re waiting to start a new position. At the same time, five months doesn’t seem long enough to prepare for everything that must be done. So why not blog about it?

The GEARS blog is about life as a PhD student transitioning to a young tenure track faculty member in engineering. Since there is time to spare before the big move, this blog will provide a real-time account of the preparation leading up to the start of the position. Afterwards, it’ll be a place to share insights into engineering academia and the hurdles of trying to get tenure.

If you’re a fellow faculty member reading this and you’re pulling your hair out because I did something stupid, please let me know. Any advice is appreciated. If you’re a grad student or postdoc reading this, hopefully it shed some light on what goes on during the trials of a tenure track position.