It's the end of the semester, and the end of another academic year, which means I've been spending countless hours preparing year end reviews for UTA and for NSF. As tedious as this process may be, I feel like its given me some good perspective on just what I've done, and failed to do, in the past year. As a whole, I feel like graduate students, myself included, are prone to condemning ourselves for not working hard enough, not publishing enough, not 'keeping up with the Jones's' per say. And sometimes I feel like these year end reviews are the perfect medicine for that ailment. As I sit back and look over the list of achievements I've compiled to supply to my committee for evaluation, I realize what a good source of self-evaluation this process actually is. Everything of significance which I've done in the past year is now written in one place. I have one document I can use to rationally evaluate my work over the year. And while I may feel like I'm a lack-luster graduate student, I am now forced to remind myself that in the past twelve months I've published 2 papers (one is in press, but I'm counting it since I received the proofs today), presented at two conferences, and taken several opportunities to participate in broader outreach events. That, combined with the two manuscripts I'm currently writing gives me some piece of mind that I'm not a complete failure as a graduate student. But this process also allows me to critically look at where I've failed: yes I got a manuscript out, but only after two years of working on it. And several other research goals from last year have barely progressed in the past twelve months. So somehow this annual review process seems to simultaneously give me piece of mind about my progress as a graduate student, and light a fire under my butt where I've been lacking. Whether the accomplishments I've listed will be 'satisfactory' for my committee, I don't know. But I can say I'm proud of my work this past year, while at the same time ready to push myself even hard to be more productive next year. Hopefully my fellow graduate students will agree with this sentiment. Cheers to summer and another year of progress!
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AuthorLauren Fuess is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Connecticut working with Dr. Daniel Bolnick. Formerly she was a PhD student at the University of Texas at Arlington with Dr. Laura Mydlarz. The opinions expressed here are solely her own. Archives
September 2019
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