Meetings

As a general note – my outlook calendar will always be up to date and available for you to access.

1-1 Meetings

• Frequency -  I will have time regularly scheduled in my calendar for each trainee in the lab. For first-year students, these meetings will be scheduled weekly. For all others, meetings will be scheduled every other week. This time will always be yours in my calendar – if you need more than this please find an additional time that works for both of us and send me a calendar invite with a brief note on what you are hoping to discuss.

• Purpose - These meetings are for YOU – use this time as you see fit for your current goals both in the lab and in your career development. My suggestion would be that you generally come prepared for these meetings with an update on recent research progress/general status of projects you are working on, an outline of your next steps, and any key aspects you’d like my thoughts/help on. As you navigate the various stages of your PhD, other topics to consider for these meetings include figure stories, paper outlines, fellowship applications, conferences, career questions, interview preparation, etc.

• An important note: These meetings are not meant to be stressful!! I don’t need to see all the data you’ve ever collected to prove you’ve been productive, nor will this be helpful for you to drive a discussion in which I can truly support you. This is time for us to work together, brainstorm, troubleshoot, or just have a conversation, and my hope is that you come to me excited to share new data or determined to work through your current frustrations together. I may ask for particular content to be included in your updates from time to time, but I will be sure to give you sufficient heads-up and indication of why I’m asking for this.

Group Meetings

• Frequency – Group meetings will be held weekly for 1 hour. Attendance by all group members is expected, and if you will miss a meeting you should communicate this to me ahead of time. The particular day/time of these meetings will change based on course schedules of group members in a given semester.

• Purpose – These meetings are meant to be a time for practicing presentation skills, critically analyzing science, communicating, collaborating, brainstorming, and both giving and receiving feedback in a constructive manner. It is also generally a time for the group to check in with each other and collectively keep up to date on each other’s work and recent literature.

• Structure 

  • Part 1 – Lab updates (~5 min unless a critical issue needs to be resolved in the group setting) – This is open-ended time to discuss any matters that pertain to the majority of the group (events, lab issues/updates, etc).

  • Part 2 – In alternating weeks:

    • • Literature discussion – One group member will select a recent journal article on a topic relevant to our research. Ideally, the article should have been published no more than 3 years ago in a reputable journal (no mdpi!!). The article of choice should be sent out to the group no less than 3 working days before the meeting (although more time is better!), and all group members are expected to familiarize themselves with its content ahead of time. During the meeting, the group member who selected the article will present slides detailing the main/most important points of the paper, any major criticism, and how it is relevant to our group or other key literature. This is meant to be a brief presentation that sparks engaging discussion among the group as a whole.

      • Research update – One group member will prepare a presentation on their work. This could take a couple of forms, depending on what your current goals are:

        • • • Informal update/discussion: prepare enough prior work/background to remind us what you are working on or why, and then spend most of your time on recent results to share exciting progress, solicit feedback, or troubleshoot/brainstorm as a group. We don’t need to see everything, just what is most useful/impactful for you to share with the group! This could also take the form of presenting the figures and telling the story for a paper you’re preparing. While technically informal, you should use this as an opportunity to gather your data and make figures that look nice, etc. The more often you do this and iterate on them, the better your content will be and it will be easier to pull together for formal talks/papers later!

            • Practice exam: as you prepare for your qualifying exam, preliminary exam, and defense, you will be expected to practice your talk with the group at least once. My advice would be to prepare these talks early (>2 months before the exam), practice and solicit feedback, and then schedule a second practice 1-2 weeks before your exam