Introduction
Iāve officially begun my second semester of grad school. Life seems to be moving in both fast and slow spurts. In an attempt to be able to look back on my journey after getting my PhD (hopefully!), I plan to reflect on each semester. Hopefully Iāll continue to implement things that are going well and learn from my mistakes.
Research
Research is the main reason I decided to pursue a PhD, so itās only fitting that I reflect on this first. I think the one word to describe grad school in general (research and classes) is uncertainty and the one word to describe how I feel about my research up to this point is proud. Although I did a good amount research during undergrad, this past semester was the first time I felt like I was doing true research. During undergrad, everything was structured for me:
- what experiments to run and how to run them
- how to collect data using various profilers
- what infrastructure to use and how to use it
- how to analyze the data and what extra data do we need
This semester, nothing was structured. My advisor and I decided on a problem that we felt had merit to it. But after that, I had to figureo out most things. What applications to run, what metrics to collect, what infrastructure to use, how to set up the infrastcture, all this was left for me to figure out. While this might not seem to difficult, coming to grad school straight out of undergrad with little experience in dealing with uncertainty made me doubt myself a lot.
On top of all this, my advisor pushed me to try and submit this workĀ to a top-tier conference in January (literally 3 weeks ago)! Honestly, a first year student submitting a paper in 5 months is unheard of. At first, this put a lot of pressure on me and stressed me out a lot! I was worried that I would disappoint my advisor if I did not meet this deadline. The best thing I did for myself though is communicate this to her. I was very vulnerable with how I felt and she was extremely receptive to my worries. Turns out, she was using the deadline as a little bit of pressure to motiviate me to structure my research and get stuff done. She made it clear that if Iām working hard and we still donāt meet the deadline, she will have no problem. That totally eased my nerves and after that I really started to enjoy the uncertainty that came with my research. To my surprise, I figured things out quickly and we actually submited to the conference! Even though we are not sure if the work will get published, submitting that quickly was a big win for me mentally and gave me confidence that I can deal with the uncertainty.
School
Iāll be honest, Iām absolutely tired of classes. I worked so hard during my undergrad to do well in my classes. Grad school is a whole different ball game, especially at UT! I took two courses last semester: Advanced Operating Systems (AOS) and Data Science & Machine Learning (DSML). Looking back, both of these courses were amazing for my growth and I learned a ton from them, but they were insanely difficult and time consuming.
AOS was f**king hard! Each lecture was discussing 2-3 paper we had to read and exams were literally on those paper! These papers were dense and complex, often leaving me confused and doubting whether I can keep up with the rest of the grad students in understanding these concepts. In fact, I found out nearly a month into grad school that AOS is known to be one of the (if not the) hardest CS grad course offered at UT. Many of the students were second year grad students as well, so I really felt out of place in that course. The labs were also extremely difficult and vague, leaving a lot for students to comprehend/figure out on their own.
Ultimately, I worked my face off to do well in this course. Up until the first exam, I would read papers several times and I begin labs the day they were released to ensure I had enough time to finish (and even then I sometimes came down to the last minute to turn them in). Thankfully, I did really well on the first exam and that gave me all the confidence I needed to believe in myself. I ended up doing really well in the class, but more importantly proved to myself that I can teach myself anything and thrive in the uncertainty.
DSML was not as difficult intellectually, but this course always required time. Every week we had a lab due and these labs were long! I think without AOS this course would have been a walk in the park, but spending more time on research and AOS made this course difficult as well. Thankfully I did well in this course as well and I learned how to priortize and balance my time to do well in research and course work.
Rest of Life
I did great in research, and I did great in course work during my first semester at UT. Unfortunately, I donāt think I did a good job with the rest of my life.
I wasnāt eating enough food, I didnāt cook for myself, I didnāt exercise consistently, and I really didnāt have a positive outlook on life. I think this all came from my move in experience. The apartment I moved into was infested with ants and didnāt have AC for 1.5 months (should be illegal when itās mid-August in Texas)! Throughout the entire semester we continued to have issues with our apartment which I wonāt get into here. But my terrible experience with my apartment made me not want to take care of any other aspects of my life other than those that I āhadā to: research and school.
I also did not realize how lonely grad school can be. Grad students are very independent and working on their own thing. It didnāt seem like grad students hang out a lot outside of hours. I found it difficult to meet people and make friends, and this is the first time Iāve really tried to make friends in the real world (outside of a campus). Let it be known people, making friends in the real world is nowhere near as easy as when youāre in school. I had to go out of my way to try to meet people I enjoyed being around. And while I felt like I tried hard to meet people, I have yet to fully find a friend group here in Austin, they way I had in Madison and back in in Minnesota.
Next Steps
This is a new semester! Although the last one was really difficult, Iāve been focusing on having a positive mindset this semester. So far, Iāve been working out more, saying āyesā to opportunities to meet/hang out with people, and cooking for myself consistently. Last semester gave me confidence in research and school, so Iām really focusing on taking care of myself and meeting people this semester. Basically, Iām trying to enjoy doing the adult things that I really wasnāt prepared for last year. Hopefully in a few months when I reflect on this semester, I will be able to proudly say that I did these things!