Last week I gave you a brief introduction and talked a little bit about why I chose graduate school and what I’m studying now. I’ll go into that a little more this week.
I picked aerospace engineering because I love space—its mystique, its boundlessness, and its color (look at Hubble photographs if you don’t believe me!). I alluded to this last week, but during my years at KU, we didn’t talk about space as much as I wanted; there were other fundamentals that we needed to learn to ensure we would be successful in our program. I don’t regret taking those classes at all because they ensured I had the knowledge for the “aero” part of my degree. But I wanted more for the“space” aspect of my degree. So here I am.
Since I am still a first year graduate student, my work is a combination of classes and research. Classes do two things—prepare you for the doctoral qualifying exams and give you tools to conduct research. Every graduate program is different, so some students may arrive knowing exactly who their advisor is and the project they will be working on, while others may come with one or the other or neither. That can influence your daily life substantially. I was fortunate to know my advisor before arriving at UT, but my particular research topic/project is still being formulated. Additionally, my advisor emphasizes succeeding in classes. That being said, I probably spend more time on my classes than other graduate students, which is familiar for someone coming directly from undergrad. That doesn’t mean, however, that I don’t perform research!
Currently, I’m working with my advisor on a proposal to turn an existing astronomical observatory into a geodetic observatory. Geodesy deals with measurements and representations of the Earth, particularly its gravitational field. UT currently owns and operates the McDonald Observatory in west Texas and uses it for astronomy research. My advisor is part of a team that wants to also use this observatory as a geodetic observatory such that it can be part of a next generation sea level and storm surge coastal hazard observation network for the Gulf of Mexico area. A big component of this type of research is having precise, detailed knowledge of Earth’s gravitational field such that scientists can know when water levels are rising in a particular area, how much is due to water levels actually rising and how much is due to land sinking.
Right now, I’m wrapping up a weather analysis for the site to ensure that the new antennas and receivers the team wants to add will be able to perform at full capacity. Not super glamorous (and not what I’ll be doing for my thesis!), but it’s been a good introduction to graduate school research. The biggest challenge is determining how to best get your point across. For this project, my advisor told me he wanted a weather analysis for this observatory and wanted to know about sky conditions, precipitation, and wind speed. He gave me a starting point for obtaining data, and then I was off. It was my responsibility to find the information, analyze it, determine what was important, and how to best present the data to accurately portray what I felt was important for my advisor to know. Of course there were refinements along the way—my advisor would change what he wanted, or tweak how he wanted me to present something—but it was a good learning experience.
An important aspect of research is to take initiative and personal responsibility for your work. I have meetings with my advisor, but it is up to me to ensure that I take the time to get the information I need to ensure that what I present to my advisor is an accurate reflection of my effort and what I want to convey. People always tell college freshmen that there is this transition between high school and college, and the same is true for graduate school. You are on your own to an even greater extent, and it is your job to ensure your success. Your advisor is there to help guide you and give you resources, but you have to ask the questions, and you have to make the first steps. It isn’t immediately clear what those questions should be or what those steps lead toward, but you have to be willing to start somewhere and make mistakes along the way.
Now for the obligatory Lawrence recommendation—ice cream. Sylas and Maddie’s is the best ice cream in Lawrence. Hands down. If anybody tells you differently, they’re wrong.
Have a great weekend!
Sarah Elizabeth