One of my classes this semester is Science & Technology Policy. The first few weeks will entail a lot of history. I’m taking a quick break from reading Science The Endless Frontier A Report to the President by Vannevar Bush from July 1945. It’s the report that essentially set up the National Science Foundation.

The main themes or justifications Bush uses to urge Congress to finally set up a system for the government to support basic science research after World War II. It’s amazing to read a government document that is so supportive of science given the state of anti-science rhetoric from the GOP. 

For one of my lit reviews from last semester, I read a quite ranty paper on the evolution of how we evaluate science in the USA from how many quality scientists are produced from faculty members to how much ROI scientists get from their grants. That flip happened at this same moment that the government decided to finally go all in on supporting scientific research.

For me, it’s quite a fun thing to juxtapose the progress that we have made scientifically in the USA versus how scientists are now judged to be successful (dollars in grants, papers written, etc) and how both sides are very much tied to the federal government getting into the business of science.

OK, off to finish reading the report that got this all started.

Thus it begins again. Another semester.

This is going to be another challenging semester. I’m taking a class with a professor whom I need to be in my corner, but he’s already questioning my worth as a student. I have to take his classes, but I would love to work on a project with him too. We’ll see. All I can do is do my best. If it’s not good enough for him, what can I do?

Onward!

Two Bs!

The first B was a joy to have earned. The second one is ok and I can handle it. I know what I did wrong. Basically I focused so much time and energy on my HR final paper and I neglected my research design paper. The crappy part? Both papers were on the same topic! But I did have to adjust to the research design aspect and well, I guess I just fell short.

A hermana on Twitter sent me a copy of Brene Brown’s The Gifts of Imperfection. I started reading it just before the fall semester and it immediately struck a chord. I was still dealing with a poor first year review, but this book coupled with a visit with a mentor who does not live in my home department helped so much.

There seems to be two opinions (at least so far) of what grades mean in a PhD program. There are those who believe it’s A or fail. Then there are those who reserve As for spectacular work and Bs are fine. We do not speak of Cs. The A people are feeding my learned sense of perfectionism. A sense that I have wrestled with for a long time and one I work hard not to feed to my own daughter.

It’s so hard to point out her errors in her graded work without sounding like I’m looking for perfection. SOOOOO HARD!

So for me, Brown’s book came at the perfect time. I earned two Bs. Not spectacular and surely will keep me from winning any fellowships I had hoped to apply for next year. But I’ll try anyway, perhaps my “moving story” of a working mother *dramatic hand to forehead* will win some over. No matter what others think (unless it’s the person in charge of kicking students out of the program!) I have to be satisfied with my performance. I know my weaknesses, mostly time and energy, but I also know that if I can push my way through this, rarely does one ask for a transcript after you get those three magic letters after one’s name.

Next up for spring 2012?

Science Policy and Research Design II. Science Policy is another reading intensive course. Off to look for cheap books now!

Thanks for all the support after the last post. Each like, comment and message sent to me is appreciated. This is a lonely road, but I know I have friends on the sidelines cheering me on.

I’m starting to think this PhD tumblr is a major fail since I haven’t written here forever. But it’s also evidence of how much time this PhD is taking from any extracurricular activities.

The semester is mercifully over. My HR course was super fun as it made me think in a totally different way. But it’s also the course I am praying that my professor has mercy on me, loves my final paper so much and has enough heart to give me a B. I’m fairly certain I earned a B, but he’s a tough grader. My other class, research design, is a toss up between an A and a B. I had to put more time into my HR final paper than my research design final paper, so if I get a B, I totally understand.

It’s really weird. I feel like I’m finally finding a bit of a groove with this program and I have this overwhelming fear that I’m still not proving myself enough to make it through to the end. But I think that’s how most PhD students feel. Add on top of that the fact that I’m a part-time student and well, I may never feel like I belong until the very end. Heck, I might be 80 years old and fearing someone will take it all back.

Next semester is part two of research design and my first science policy course. That last one I am going to put so much energy into. I have to prove myself to that professor in a mega-uber-way.

Well, back to recovering from the semester by writing holiday cards.

I runs through my head more times than I dare count every single day.

I spend every chance I can reading. When I’m not reading for class, I feel guilty. Even when I take time to snuggle with the kid. When I let her have a break to watch TV, she likes me to cuddle up with her. I think, “Gawd, I need to read!” But I snuggle. AND I LOVE IT!

I hate that being a PhD student makes me resent the time I want to spend with friends & family. Or hesitate when the kid wants to spend time with me.

I hate that I have a stack of books mocking me. I feel like I can hear them saying, “We’re way more exciting that dumb journal article!” And sometimes they are correct. Sometimes, not so much.

I had to get that out of my head, so I have room for the other stuff.

Back to our regularly scheduled Saturday afternoon.

It’s the fourth week of the semester and I’m hanging on pretty darn well.But it’s late, so my updates will be quick here.

• Met with my sociology professor from the spring who was her usual constructive yet critical self. She gave me a lot to chew on. Again, less details the better, but she did say she’d do whatever she could to help me get through the program. That gave me the lift I needed to hit the semester running.
• While at first the idea of having a whole class on HR theory was a total bore, it is so not. I think it helps that my professor has a huge passion for HR theory, but is not 100% settled on where he actually stands on a few issues. So he is willing to assign readings that contradict each other and allow good discussion in class. In other words, I’ve been my usual feminista self and haven’t gotten the eye roll yet. I did ask about pay equity and he responded with a brain teaser about what is “equity.” To be continued!
• My research methods course is going well. I came in ahead of the curve since the first month is about questioning how science is done. That is the basic foundation of feminist science studies, so while we are not reading feminist science studies per say, the themes in what we are reading are all about objectivity, bias, who gets to ask the questions, on and on.
• I’m still reading “The Gifts of Imperfection” and loving it. I wish this book existed when I was in high school. But as I said elsewhere, I doubt I would have read it. Maybe if a few certain teachers had given it to me. Hell, it would had helped anytime between ages 14-24. But then I wouldn’t be here in this moment, would I? The Goddess gifted this to me now for a reason. 
• Work is always hard the first month due to getting things rolling. Being short staffed has made it difficult, but I also turned down the expectations in bit too. See, I’m being imperfect! But so far, so great at work. Now if only I could find a big grant to land!
• The kid is in her second week back at school. In some ways I am happy our calendars are not in sync. While I’ve been fearful of how intense third grade would be for her and us, it’s been pretty good so far. I don’t feel like we were thrown into hot grease with a nice beer batter on us like last year. Or maybe I’m just in a better place. Who knows, who cares, we’re doing good.
• Oh! Did I mention that my husband & I are coaching the kid’s soccer team this year? Yup. I scraped off a tiny space on my plate to be assistant coach or else there might not had been any soccer. We had our first game on Sunday. We lost, but not for a lack of passion and eight super aggressive girls. Don’t believe the hype that girls can’t play aggressively at this age. ROWR! 
• And since things are going pretty good now, I’ll be on the look out for any and all wheels to fall off this ride.

That’s it for now. Thanks for reading!

Today is the first day of the fall semester.

A quick and purposely vague update on my last post: The meeting with my advisor went really well and I felt a million times better about where I am in my program. She did go over my final paper for her class, which should had gone better for me, but I also agreed with her criticism. Live and learn.

I am reading Brene Brown’s The Gifts of Imperfection right now and it is helping so much with this PhD stuff. I do consider myself a perfectionist, but have really been working on it on my own the last few years. I’ll write more on the book once I am done. It is going slowly because I can’t input more than a few pages from her at once. There is just so much to think about and digest.

Well I should get to bed. I just wanted to write this quick update for myself. I have classes on Mondays and Thursdays, so today is class! Time for sleep.

Or maybe it is over since I already spent $300 on books for the upcoming semester.

To get the most out of my money, I used 4 different websites to obtain the best prices. The books where there were no deals at all to be had, I bought from my local feminist indie bookstore. I also bought the one book I know I already have homework in…so the quicker the better on that one.

My program reviews all the students every summer. I received my review a few weeks ago and had been letting it stew in my inbox. It was not good at all.

Remember how I was content with my two Bs? Well, not everyone shared that contentment. So I spent a few days last week scheduling appointments with those two professors in order to find out how I earned those Bs and if I should be as concerned as my review tells me I should be.

After I was able to gather my thoughts on the review and a conversation I had with a professor, I think, I hope, it’s a difference of opinion on what a B means. I’ve already spoken to one professor who seemed to think I kicked ass. But I’ll have to wait to sit down with her for a few more days.

But another PhD friend of mine, whom I ran into on Friday night, said she had a similar “bad review” and it spurred her to make some tough decisions on her focus. I have been delaying putting a interests in focus. I figured I had some time before I had to do that since I’m part-time and have only taken 3 classes, which is what a full-time student takes in one semester. But I was wrong.

Part of my difficulty is also not quite knowing what is out there, how to verbalize exactly what my ideas are and how to defend them. So that ends now. I need to dig into the literature and find a few papers, hopefully recent ones, that will help me crystallize what I want to do with this whole PhD thing. What do I want to spend years studying? And how do I do it without continuing to pigeonholing myself YET stand on years of experience?

We shall see. So until then, if you see me IRL or on the interwebs, I could use a hug or a thumbs up. Thanks.