This weekend was Ph.D. Recruitment weekend at UCONN where I hope to go to school next year. Overall the weekend seemed to go well. It consisted of 3 interviews with different professors, a tour of the campus, then 2 breakout group sessions with the different areas of concentration. My interviews weren’t the greatest. The first one was with some bone guy, who was about as excited about his research as he seemed to be to have me there, and let me say I’ve seen people more excited about a new flavor of jello, than this guy was to tell me about what he was working on.
The second interview went better. I like the Prof very much and we seemed to have a good rapport. His work was very interesting and if I get accepted I’d probably do a rotation in his lab.
The third interview was just horrid. The lady I was supposed to meet with decided she needed to have some sort of family emergency so I got stuck talking to the Dean. The guy was humorless what a personality that would have made ice shiver. Its never good when the first thing some one says is “Well your grades are below what we usually accept and if it wasn’t for your recommendations we wouldn’t have even considered you, how do you explain them?” The rest of the interview he asked me questions about how much money people make in industry and what kinds of benefits we offer.
The tour was crap, I saw the bookstore, the library, and a bunch of immunology labs, full of box like machinery. If you know anything about scientific equipment you will realize that for the most part all of the good equipment looks about the same, an off white box with a fancy name on it “cell sorter” or “Refractinator”. It was just a big waste of time.
The break out sessions went well. I got to talk to the chair of the molecular department and think I made a good impression on her. Her research was very cool and I’d probably do a rotation in her lab too if I got the chance.
The second session I went to genetics, which had a big presentation instead of letting us talk to the people. It was interesting but I would have preferred to have had more time to speak with the profs.
Then there was a dinner and an after party, both we fun and I had some more good talks with people in different departments.
The hotel that put us in, the Marriot” screwed up my room reservation and put me and my roomie into a single with a big king sized bed. We got a cot for me to sleep on since I got there second. It came as a big thing standing upright, strapped in with a bungee cord. My roommate convinced me I should call down to the front desk to have someone set it up. The call went some thing like this.
“Hi I’m in room 331 and we got a cot up here, I was wondering if some one could set it up for me.”
“Ok…(pause)…Are you with the special Olympics?”
“No.”
“Because the bed pretty much just tips over.”
Always nice to make a fool of your self. I just hope the Special Olympics were actually at the hotel and it wasn’t just a shot at me.
All and al cot very uncomfortable, not much sleep gotten. Fortunately Day 2 was just breakfast and some student went over his research. Lots of slides of DNA code and proteins in Amino acid form. In my state they al looked about the same. So I hope I get in.
Word for the day is caffeine, as I desperately need some.
The second interview went better. I like the Prof very much and we seemed to have a good rapport. His work was very interesting and if I get accepted I’d probably do a rotation in his lab.
The third interview was just horrid. The lady I was supposed to meet with decided she needed to have some sort of family emergency so I got stuck talking to the Dean. The guy was humorless what a personality that would have made ice shiver. Its never good when the first thing some one says is “Well your grades are below what we usually accept and if it wasn’t for your recommendations we wouldn’t have even considered you, how do you explain them?” The rest of the interview he asked me questions about how much money people make in industry and what kinds of benefits we offer.
The tour was crap, I saw the bookstore, the library, and a bunch of immunology labs, full of box like machinery. If you know anything about scientific equipment you will realize that for the most part all of the good equipment looks about the same, an off white box with a fancy name on it “cell sorter” or “Refractinator”. It was just a big waste of time.
The break out sessions went well. I got to talk to the chair of the molecular department and think I made a good impression on her. Her research was very cool and I’d probably do a rotation in her lab too if I got the chance.
The second session I went to genetics, which had a big presentation instead of letting us talk to the people. It was interesting but I would have preferred to have had more time to speak with the profs.
Then there was a dinner and an after party, both we fun and I had some more good talks with people in different departments.
The hotel that put us in, the Marriot” screwed up my room reservation and put me and my roomie into a single with a big king sized bed. We got a cot for me to sleep on since I got there second. It came as a big thing standing upright, strapped in with a bungee cord. My roommate convinced me I should call down to the front desk to have someone set it up. The call went some thing like this.
“Hi I’m in room 331 and we got a cot up here, I was wondering if some one could set it up for me.”
“Ok…(pause)…Are you with the special Olympics?”
“No.”
“Because the bed pretty much just tips over.”
Always nice to make a fool of your self. I just hope the Special Olympics were actually at the hotel and it wasn’t just a shot at me.
All and al cot very uncomfortable, not much sleep gotten. Fortunately Day 2 was just breakfast and some student went over his research. Lots of slides of DNA code and proteins in Amino acid form. In my state they al looked about the same. So I hope I get in.
Word for the day is caffeine, as I desperately need some.
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