A short list of why I love [working in] museums

When I visit BNHM for a change of working scene about once a week, good things nearly always come of it. I'm going to sum up these good things with a list of bullets of why I love working in museums.

•  Meeting other scientists. They're always coming to see the collections. Last week I met a former grad student from my department who now teaches at a small liberal arts college (aka SLAC). I'd heard about her from Herb and Leo since that is my aspiration as well, and it was great to finally meet her. Bonus: she also studies critters so we talked about that too.
• Weird shit. Even relatively normal natural history museums have all kinds of weird things in their collections. Sometimes I get to see them.
  
• Books. Boy do they have a lot of books- old literature especially. Very useful stuff. Sometimes amusing. Today I stumbled across this funny* little excerpt from a note entitled Don Rosevear- polymath in the journal Nigerian Field, 1978, vol. 43(2): 49.  

 "...At the British Museum, Rosevear introduced a new technique, which deserves to carry his name for all time, to mammalian taxonomy that involved the use of soap, sponge, and water. By the judicious application of this technique many species and subspecies of the hedgehogs of West Africa were reduced to synonymy by the removal of coloured soils in which they had habitually burrowed."

• Seriously, though. It's been incredibly useful for me to have access to the library to find older literature that just isn't online. It's essential for this note I'm writing with Sam.
  
• I feel smarter just from sitting in an office surrounded by so many natural historians, collections, and books. Yep, that's right, I went and did what I normally do in my office at UBC, but today I did it in a windowless cavern at Big Natural History Museum. But I was next to a whale skull.
  

 *Maybe I'm the only person that thinks this is funny, but I hope not.

Just showing up

Janus Professor wrote a post about the importance of just showing up. That's my strategy for this year at BNHM- I'm just showing up. I'm coming every Friday, even if it's just for a little while, so that I can make my presence known to the museum-types.

Good things seem to come from just showing up. Nearly every time I come I meet some interesting visitor who has insight or wisdom to offer. Today I met another researcher who worked at Nyota and was just passing through Big City. It spawned an interesting discussion about some different types of data that could be useful for my analysis.

Today I also had a long talk with another scientist who works in Ukenzagapia about my research. He's worked with critters, so I was hoping to get some ideas from him about a more feasible project. We talked about my "ideal project" and why I don't think it's going to work, or at least why it's not worth the risk (in terms of time, money, and data). Unfortunately, we mostly talked about the possibilities with other critters instead because he agrees with my assessment of the time/effort/expense issues with critters.

I feel like I'm at a point in my Ph.D. where I need to reassess not only what I can realistically do, but also think long and hard about what I want to do. There is no shortage of possibilies for projects in Nyota, but I've got to do something and I'd prefer if I enjoyed it. I have to think about what I want short-term (during my Ph.D.) and long-term (my career) because it may change some of the decisions I make in terms of what I choose to focus on. For example, I don't think I actually want to travel as much now as I did when I decided to apply to grad school. I'm not sure I'll want to continue doing a lot of field work abroad after my Ph.D.

At another level, I need to think about what I enjoy doing in the field (costs aside, for a moment). To use my scuba diving analogy, I don't want to commit to a project that requires scuba diving every day if I much prefer snorkeling. Or do I actually like sitting on a boat and counting whales? Or recording their songs? Or sampling the krill that they eat? I think I could be happy doing any of those things, as long as I felt like I was actually doing something that would result in useful data in a reasonable timeframe.

Inspiration

Yesterday morning I had a meeting with Herb. We talked for almost two hours, and I think I did an ok job of articulating my insecurities. I told Herb that I know he's a hands-off advisor but that I think I'm going to need more advice this year than in years past. The most helpful thing he said was that I need to find something I'm interested in doing and forget about what anyone else thinks I should be doing. Overall, the conversation was somewhat unfulfilling but I'm glad I talked to him.

Then I went to an event at Big Natural History Museum. It was one of those events with free food and alcohol where they try to woo donors for specific museum initiatives. Anyways, I'm really glad that I went because it reminded me of some of the reasons that I wanted to do research in Africa in the first place. Sometimes I need to feel all warm and fuzzy about my 'mission.'

Next month I'm going to an interdisciplinary conference and I expect to be energized by all of the ideas I'll encounter there. I hope I'll be able to channel that excitement into figuring out what I'm most motivated to do in Ukenzagapia.

so much exhausting fun

This morning I took my niece back to the airport. My aunt, uncle, and cousin left yesterday. We spent Friday, Saturday, and Sunday at cultural institutions. It was great fun but also exhausting.

I showed them behind the scenes at BNHM and they were all impressed. After seeing someone stuffing a bird for a study skin my aunt said, "I never imagined that this was even a job that someone did!" She said what happens at the museum makes her job (retail) seem incredibly dull and unimportant. I'm glad that a few more people in my extended family have a greater understanding and appreciation for what I do.

The girls, both 8 years old and in second grade, had a blast. I can't believe how much they giggled and laughed, especially before 8 am! Their laughing made me laugh too. I should laugh more.

Also, our niece is so much fun. She asks fantastic questions. She reads books like hungry grad students eat free food. In two days she read 1/2 of The Complete Calvin and Hobbes. I'm sure she could have finished it except that we took her to a museum (where she went to their library and read more books). Her favorite t-shirt is this one from xkcd that we gave her for Christmas.
Perhaps I would be more excited about everything that I have to catch up on this week if I made such a grand announcement before sitting down at my desk to work.

great undergrads

This semester I'm mentoring two great undergrads, both of whom have been mentioned more than once on my blog (here and links within).

One is a UBC student from my first semester of teaching. I've been writing her letters of recommendation for summer research internships and advising her on the application process. Today she came to pick up the last two letters and told me that she is being interviewed for one of the most awesome and competitive programs she applied for (and it's also the most ecology-related).

The other student is one of Sam's students from Another University (AU). Let's call her Marcie. Sam envisioned this multi-layer mentoring scheme for Marcie involving me, Sam, and a scientist from BNHM. I'll field most of the questions she has, but Sam and the other scientist will also be invovled as needed. Marcie will be working on a project using the collections at the museum. I'm excited to work with her on this because it means I'll actually get to work a bit with the collections, too. My research is overwhelmingly field-based, but this is giving me a few ideas for small projects that I could do. You know, if everything else fails or something. Or in my extra time.

The idea is that Marcie and I will write a small natural history type paper for a regional journal based on the data she collects. I'll help her through the writing and submission process. I think Sam will probably be an author on that too. Then we'll probably start on a bigger project that will test some hypotheses about critter ecology. Exciting stuff.

take ugly pictures

Last week I spent a day working at the museum for a change of scene. While I was there, Leo introduced me to a visiting scientist who has similar research interests. He also used to be in charge of one of the organizations that funded me last year*. We chatted for a while about my research and possible funding sources. He said that taking photos was important for broadly publicizing my research and writing articles for general audiences. His parting words of advice were, "Take ugly pictures. Illegal fires, bushmeat, whatever you see. Make sure you document the bad stuff, too."

*He said funding rates are going to be much lower this year from that organization because it was all funded from endowment income, and their endowment tanked (not surprisingly). Ouch.

interests and advisors

I originally applied to UBC to work with Leo at Big Natural History Museum. In order to do that, I had to have someone else at UBC willing to co-advise me (Herb). My intention was to bridge their research interests and work closely with both of them. As my project ideas have developed, however, my research becomes more and more like Herb's and less and less like Leo's. When I met with Leo to discuss my prelim proposal, he pretty much said, "Well, you're conceptually out of my realm of expertise, so I'll contribute what I can to the big picture and taxonomic advice."

This revelation is a little bit sad for me because I really like Leo and I think he's a great advisor. I wonder how my project ideas might have developed differently if I had spent most of my time last year at the museum instead of Herb's lab.

Then, there's Sam. I don't think I've written enough about what a tremendous influence and resource Sam has been. Last year I want searching for a field site to do what I wanted to do, and I was introduced to Sam. After an hour of talking with him I was completely sold on working at his site. Not only does he have tremendous knowledge of the area's natural history (stuff you just can't find in books about East Africa), he has similar research interests, is a native Ukenzagapian, and has tons of contacts. He could just tell me things that I spent weeks trying to read about a different African field site. Working with him is the difference between scrounging for natural history crumbs in 50 year old articles and having the answer (or at least an educated guess) just an email or phone call away.

Sam also happens to be one of Herb's students (have I explained this before? I can't remember), so his research ideas are well within Herb's realm. The fact that I am working at Sam's field site, not Herb's, means that Sam's advice is extrordinarily important. He is effectively a third advisor, though technically he is an outside committee member since he's at another university. But the extent to which Sam is involved in my research endeavours begs the question of who should be the PI (Principal Investigator) on the DDIG or DDIG-like grant that I submit after my prelims. Normally it would be Herb. It could also be Leo, but that doesn't make sense for my project. Can Sam and Herb be PIs with me as a co-PI? I need to talk about this with Herb.

Photos from Washington, DC! Part 3

Photos, finally! Did I mention that I'm really busy? Here are the photos from the Natural History Museum in Washington, DC. After Obama's inauguration we worked our way through the crowd and into the museum to warm up our frozen feet.

This is the main hall of the museum with the entrance from the Mall off on the right. Everyone had to come through metal detectors and have their bags searched. I tried to capture how many people were in the museum- it was so crowded!

The people on the right were all lined up to get food from the cafe. The cafe isn't even close to being in this photo. Cool dinos, huh?

There were people sleeping all over the museum. Seriously. Everywhere. Maybe these were some of the people who got there at 4 am or maybe they didn't sleep at all.

Some primates in front of the other primates.

These adorable twin boys were learning about spiders in the insect zoo. Perhaps they should consider renaming it the arthropod zoo considering how many non-insects where there? Or the insects & allies zoo?


It just so happens that Tuesdays are free admission days for the butterfly house at the museum, so we really warmed up in the hot, humid butterfly haven. That's a closeup of a butterfly wing (above).

At this time of year, nearly all of the butterflies in Northern hemisphere butterfly houses are from the tropics. Butterfly farming can be a significant source of income for subsistence farmers in developing countries. They raise the caterpillars, then the chrysalides (pupae) are shipped to butterfly houses all over the world.
This butterfly landed on my backpack.

Rocks & minerals are so awesome. I think I could've easily been a geologist if just a few things in my life happened differently.This tiger is intimidatingly mounted to pounce on you. This is just one example of the phenomenal taxidermy in the mammal hall.

We stayed at the museum for a couple of hours to wait for the crowd to disperse but the parade was still going on so the area downtown was still busy. All of these unfortunate people were waiting to get on the metro. The line wasn't moving at all. We kept walking and just two blocks down we got in without any wait at all. Our motto of the day was "don't be sheep." It worked out well.

Finally, if you haven't see this amazing photo, you really must go check it out. Click around. Zoom in. Unfortunately, we're behind that camera on the right. Thanks to Kent from Uncommon Ground for the tip.

good meeting

Today I had a meeting with Sam about my prelims and a database project he and I are collaborating on. The database actually involves several people from a few different countries, and the long-term plan is that I will get many papers from the database, several of which I can be first author on if I run with it. Sam said he and the others really see me as a collaborator on this and that I should not be afraid to speak up with my ideas. Exciting stuff, but also a little bit intimidating as this project could easily be with me for the next decade and I have a bit of commitment anxiety.

But, there have been some major frustrations with this project so far and I've tried really hard not to rip my hair out. Long story short- someone on the project either doesn't know what they're doing, did crappy work in order to get paid for more hours of work, or their task truly is 1000 times more difficult than I thought it would be. AAAAH!

The upside: Sam said these things are the other person's problem and I should just work on different parts of it while the mess is sorted out. Phew.

We also talked about possible chapters for my thesis and what exactly I should write my prelim proposal about. For my thesis: My review will be the introduction, then I can have a chapter about observational stuff I'll do this summer, a critter-based chapter, an interdisciplinary chapter, and a database chapter. Oh yeah, I almost forgot, I need an EXPERIMENT. My prelim proposal will focus on a truly experimental study that I can submit to NSF for a Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant (DDIG). Before the end of January I've got to figure out exactly what that experiment will be (I've got plenty of ideas).

Oh, more exciting news. Sam wants me to mentor one of his undergrads! In fact, it's the one I mentioned here who asked great questions. We'll be working on a project at the museum that is tangentially related to my thesis and the database, and it will broaden knowledge of the natural history of some Ukenzagapian animals. I'll be helping the student analyze and write up the data she collects. I'm looking forward to this since the UBC mentoring program never gave me a mentee.

my very busy and exciting weekend

This weekend was mad busy with non-academic work and I've got tons to do before we leave on Wednesday, but here's rundown of my non-stop weekend.

Friday
7:45 pm- Arrive home from school after a long day of meetings.
8:00 pm- Friends arrive to play Settlers of Catan.
~midnight- Friends leave and we get ready for bed.

Saturday
9:15 am- Wake up, check email, start laundry, etc.
10:30 am- Other friends pick us up to go to a museum for several hours.
4:00 pm- Friends bring us home.
4-6:00 pm- I make yogurt, start making banana bread, and start a loaf in the bread machine.
6-8 pm- Run errands with Jon and a friend to pick up crafty items for a crafty workshop on Sunday.
~8:00 pm- Park car that belongs to our friends (who are out of town this week) a block away from our apartment.
~8:30 pm- Different friends come over to play Settlers of Catan.
Midnight- Three people (a friend plus two others) stop to spend the night. They are driving A Very Long Trip over two days in the most ghetto-tastic 1995 Geo.
12:30 am- Settlers of Catan finally ends with Jon's victory.
~2 am- Different friends leave.
3 am- We finally go to sleep after chatting with the road-tripping guests.

Sunday
8 am- Awakened by the departure of our 3 midnight guests for their second day of driving.
9:20 am- Get out of bed to get ready for day of crafty workshops, shower.
~10 am- Get in aforementioned car that isn't ours to pick up a friend to run final crafty errands. Car starts but doesn't move. I give up and friend walks to our apartment and we forgo final errands. I tell Jon and we decide to deal with the problem later.
10:30-noon- Bake cookies, prep apartment, prep crafty stuff.
noon-2 pm- First crafty workshop.
2 pm- 4pm- Second crafty workshop (two people from school completely forget to come)-:
4 pm- 6pm- Final crafty workshop with friends from SFC who bring their bfs to hang out with Jon.
6-7 pm- Cleanup crafty stuff, chat and be exhausted.
~7 -8 pm- Eat semi-potluck dinner with our 5 friends.
8-9 pm- Play Chinese checkers with some friends while others play with the Wii.
9 pm- Our friends leave. We play on the Wii until about 10 pm.
10 pm- I get ready for bed and remind Jon about the car. I plan to spend the rest of the evening blogging about my weekend and thinking about what I need to do this week except this happens. It deserves its own post, so I made one. This is both the most exciting and unfortunate part of the weekend.

Tomorrow I have 3.5 hours of meetings and a 20 minute presentation to prepare for Tuesday about a section of a paper I haven't written yet. Before we leave on Wednesday we have to deal with this! Monday and Tuesday are going to be very busy.

communicating what I do

I recently attended a communication workshop to learn how to more effectively explain what I do. I went with relatively low expectations, but it turned out to be incredibly useful. I learned about some exciting new venues for science news and information, and got to practice distilling my research into easy-to-understand pieces.

Before the workshop I had an unanticipated lesson in communication at BNHM. I was there for another one of those donor-schmoozing events. They always include a presentation of some sort, but this one also had a behind-the-scenes tour for the donors/guests. I got to watch several museum scientists, including Leo, talk about their research in a whole new way. Instead of hearing them talk about their research for other scientists, they were talking to intelligent adults who were interested in science and research, but didn't necessarily know anything about their field or what they actually do as scientists. They noticeably changed their language, eliminated jargon, and spoke concisely. Leo and another scientist were particularly good at it, and you could tell. The other scientist also happened to be a great story teller, and people were riveted to him. He's an excellent example of an effective science communicator. He made it exciting and easy to understand. I explained my research too, but I could tell immediately one-on-one when I lost them somewhere.

[At the end of the event Leo said to me, "I'm so glad you came over for this event. It's good to attend these things, especially since you're interested in education and outreach." I was thinking, Oh good! He doesn't notice I'm here for the free food and alcohol! Well, that's not the only reason I go (I do like trying to explain to people what I do), but I'm self-conscious of the fact that I'm almost only at the museum when they're giving me free food or I'm taking some friend or family member behind the scenes.]

But really, I love talking about science. I love trying to explain what I do in a way that makes it real to people. Podcasts, blogs, and well-planned in-person presentations are some fantastic ways to communicate science. I can't wait to actually collect some data so I can talk about it! The next challenge I've got to tackle, though, is communicating my research to people in Ukenzagapia.

friends and mentors

On Monday I got to visit with my friend Cora who recently finished her Ph.D. at a big-name university with well-known ecologists. She finished in less than 5 years and is a role model for me as someone who can use her time effectively at work and still have a life outside of school. She was married for her whole Ph.D. and she's now expecting her first baby. When I see grad students who seem to be at school every day of the week until late in the evening, I remind myself that Cora was able to finish sooner than everyone else in her cohort by working intelligently. She even went on several long vacations! As someone slightly older and certainly more experienced than me, I think of her as a mentor and appreciate her perspective on getting through grad school. How would my grad school experience be different if I hadn't known Cora?

Cora was originally going to come over for dinner, but we changed plans and met for lunch at BNHM. It was a good excuse for me to work at the museum. I finally rode my bike from home to the museum after thinking about doing it for months. It was great! I should do that more often. Even with a 2 hour lunch to chat with Cora and show her around, I got a lot accomplished today. I'm feeling really good about the condition of my GRF personal statement and previous research statement. Family members and close friends will be getting drafts soon! I was holed up in a very quiet corner of the museum and I restricted my internet access. Sometimes a change of scenery is definitely a good thing for writing.

We've had a very social few days, hence the lack of posting. We had a party on Saturday night that didn't end until 4 am and two people spent the night. Great fun! On Monday evening a friend from SFC stopped to visit as she drove through Big City so we went out to dinner with her. Oh my gosh, I just realized this is going to be a very short week for me. I'd better get a lot done!

being influential

I didn't blog about it at the time, but last spring I offered to take my students behind the scenes at Big Natural History Museum. About 6 or 7 of them took me up on the offer so I showed them around one afternoon and introduced them to a few other grad students who told them about the research they're doing.

On Wednesday I got an email from two of my students from last spring. They wanted to know if they could list me as a reference because they're interested in volunteering at BNHM! I'm so excited that they're thinking about museum work! I doubt they would've considered or pursued this possibility before the tour. I know that the first time I went behind the scenes at a big museum I was totally blown away and it definitely made me want to work in a place like that. I'm glad I was able to share of some of that excitement with my students.

schmoozing at the museum

This evening I went to an event at Big Natural History Museum where they invited major donors and a staff scientist talked about their research so the donors have some idea what their money is supporting. Since I got some financial support for my research from BNHM, I feel obligated to attend these functions when I can. Plus, they usually include dinner or at least good cheese.

Usually Leo is at these functions to introduce me to people, but he couldn't go tonight so I ended up talking to two new post docs and not talking to donors. Oops. Functions like that can be socially awkward if you don't know many people. Unfortunately, I'm rarely at the museum so I knew even fewer people. Next time I'll try to introduce myself to someone totally new without waiting for someone else to do it for me. I think it will be good for me.

I really love museums, and my goal this semester is to be at BNHM once a week, even if there's no particular reason I need to be doing my work there because I want to be more recognizable to the museum scientists and students. It will also make me feel more comfortable bringing everyone I know behind the scenes, and I'll actually get to know people in more areas of the building and be able to give my friends and family better tours. Museums are such amazing places, but few people ever get the opportunity to go behind the scenes at a museum. There are so many specimens that will never, ever be on display, and so much research that happens. Exhibits are only the tip of the iceberg.

Good kind of day

Lots of good things happened today. First I presented a poster of my proposed research in our required class. I hadn't actually prepared what I wanted to say, so I stumbled over my words a bit more than I would've liked, but I think my classmates were generally interested in the topic and they asked good questions. Some hard questions that I didn't have the answers to (What's your control? Why don't you exclude all of the critters and see what happens then?). It was good to receive feedback from people who don't spend all their time thinking about critters and/or their impacts. Their questions and suggestions will be useful for writing my proposal which is due next week.

I got my paper back from Herb's class (this one). I wasn't thrilled with it when I turned it in, but I got an excellent grade and he wants to post it as an example! This made me happy.

This evening I went to the museum to schmooze with some rich museum supporters, and received the excellent news that my proposal for Grant E will be funded! Yay! Leo told me my proposal was ranked highly for scientific merit so it was likely to be funded, but it's great to know now for sure.

My plans to blog keep getting thwarted!

I meant to post every day this week and my plans just got foiled again and again. At least I was having fun. We have been playing a lot ofSettlers of Catan (with the expansion packs) thanks to my parents who got it for us for Christmas.

My second week of teaching went well. I'm so much less nervous this semester and I'm developing a good relationship with my students. I have two students from last semester (one in each section). I sent my new students an email with summer internship opportunities like I did last semester and the lab instructor was really impressed when I told him. The email was also an excuse to make sure I typed all of their email addresses correctly.

Yesterday I spent the afternoon at Big Natural History Museum getting to know my critters as study skins. It is really cool to work with the collections but I don't like coming home smelling like naphthalene (moth balls). I stayed for happy hour at the museum and had some useful conversations with other researchers about ideas for African Field Site. I am so proud of how much more comfortable I am in talking about my research with other people. I can confidently say what I know what I don't know and I don't feel awkward about it.

Greatest non-academic discovery of the week: You can bulk-buy from Whole Foods! You get a 5% discount for buying by the case. I ordered cases of our most-used items that we'll pick up next week when we have visitors coming with a car :-)

Today when I woke up our apartment smelled like paint thinner and the smell hasn't gone away. In fact, it has gotten worse and it's giving me a headache. It's really disgusting. I think someone below us must using paint thinner. I can't imagine why they'd decide to do that in winter when they can't open the doors and windows for ventilation.

Getting lost in Big Natural History Museum

That's what I did today. Again (did I write about that the first time? I can't remember). But that's not why I went there. I went to look up obscure reference materials in their library and talk to Leo about my project. I still didn't make much headway but I've done a heck of a lot of reading. I was there for 5 hours but I still didn't get to read everything I wanted to. They have lots of great books and literature that UBC lacks.

I had to get back to school for a meeting so I was leaving the museum in a bit of a hurry. I tried to pay attention to which stairwell I used when I went in today and I thought I used the same one going out until I found myself in the wrong exhibit. Normally it's kind of cool to get lost in a museum because you can discover new places but I was in a hurry. I ended up in the African mammals section, which is where I am conceptually but not where I wanted to be physically at that moment when I had to be leaving quickly. Thankfully I guessed correctly and made it out without any wrong turns.

Advising

I haven't yet introduced my advisors to my faithful blog readers. I think now is a good time.

First of all, I am jointly advised. One of my advisors is from U of Big City and the other is from Big Natural History Museum. I like them both and my interests are a good marriage of theirs. They are both older and well-established in their fields.

Herb is from U of Big City. He's interested in factors that effect community composition. My office on campus is right next to him and I'm a member of his lab. He has four new graduate students this fall so it's quite a cohort for him. Herb's research is based in Central America.

Leo is a -ologist from Big Natural History Museum. He works with all kinds of critters all over the world but I'm interested in working with him because he's very well connected where I want to do my research in Africa.

Herb is my primary advisor. The extent to which I work with Leo will depend on how my interests develop and possibly how I am funded in future years (i.e. grants or TAship).

However, the coolest thing about having Leo as my co-advisor is that I get to work in Big Natural History Museum. For those of you who have never been behind-the-scenes at a natural history museum, I highly recommend it. The objects on display are just the tip of the iceberg of their collections. I'm excited to be working with Leo simply because of the WOW factor involved in going to visit him at the museum.

On Friday I went to see Leo at Big Natural History Museum so that I could get my student pass and talk about stuff. This pass is super exciting because not only does it get me behind the scenes at the natural history museum, it gets me and my family into all of the other museums in Big City.

While I was talking to Leo about my plans for the semester, I said I'd like to try to be at the museum at least once a week even if it were just for part of the day. I imagined myself going there as often as I could just because I feel like there's information practically oozing from the walls from all the volumes and specimens in the building. So Leo caught me off guard when he said, "And what would you do here?"

I actually wanted to say, "Because this place is just so cool! Who wouldn't want to work here?" But I decided that I should articulate a better reason than that so I said something like, "Well, I think it would be good for me to check in with you frequently as I develop idea for my research and keep you informed- not that I want to take up all of your time or anything since I know you're a busy person- and I also thought it would be good for me to use the library here for access to the rare literature that the university won't have." I suppose this was an acceptable answer because he didn't press it. Whew!

As illustrated in the exchange above, one of my greatest fears at this point is embarrassing myself in front of advisors and other professors. For this reason I'm really nervous about talking to people about my research interests. I'm afraid of them asking lots of questions I can't answer and just generally appearing clueless. I know that I just need to speak with confidence and everything else will fall into place but talking about my research ideas is currently my greatest fear.