Learning from What Isn’t

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With May finally here, we’ve reached the home stretch of the 2014-15 school year. Make no mistake: This is an achievement. You deserve to celebrate. Grab an extra fro-yo cone next time you’re in the dining hall, and enjoy knowing the machine has more handles than there are weeks remaining in the semester.

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Here’s hoping your fro-yo cone turns out better than mine.

After that *debauchery*, ease back into the research world with a reflexive book – like Verlyn Klinkenborg’s Several Short Sentences About Writing, which was recommended in my African American Studies class last semester. As the title makes clear, it’s a series of short sentences about how to approach the writing process. Klinkenborg replaces oft-repeated mechanical suggestions with much more useful ideological ones. My favorite appears on page 29: “Every sentence could have been otherwise but isn’t.”

Following Klinkenborg’s words, every sentence in your research papers is a deliberate choice. Every argument could have reached a different conclusion, but did not. As you question, test, and analyze facts in your independent work, a crucial step is to recognize why you chose a particular arrangement of information. This goes beyond mere adherence to a thesis. Why did you pursue one research lead, and not another?   Continue reading Learning from What Isn’t

Moving Forward by Looking Back: Revisiting Old Posters, Papers, and Texts

Posted on by Stacey Huang

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A couple of the posters that hang outside the lab.

Deep in the darkest depths of the E-quad, there is a lab I go to—a lab where I run all my optics experiments, run tests with the breath analyzer instrument I work with, and that I have come to know and love during the past year. The entrance to the lab actually includes a space for presentation posters, which show off the work of graduate students and past interns. Usually I’m in a rush to get in or out and don’t spare these posters a second glance. But last week, for some reason or another (perhaps because I was feeling less stressed than usual), I decided to take some time to  look at them.

When I did, I was surprised. What had seemed to me before like a mass of incomprehensible jargon and tangle of convoluted science was now something more tangible—here were key words I had encountered over and over again throughout the past year, concepts I had heard about many times in group meetings. Even within a mix of phrases that were still not so familiar to me, I could at least grasp what the projects were about and start to see what was so relevant and interesting about these projects. I even found the work that described the novel technology behind the breath analyzer instrument I currently work on, and I felt good being able to understand that poster in its entirety.

It’s kind of strange. Even though I had looked at these posters before, that was back when I had first joined the lab, more than a year ago. Continue reading Moving Forward by Looking Back: Revisiting Old Posters, Papers, and Texts

To those still in Thesis Life…

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Those tanks can be flipped soon... (Photo by Yuem Park)
Those tanks can be flipped soon…

Congratulations to all seniors who have finally attained the legendary PTL! After four challenging (but hopefully rewarding) years, you deserve the relaxation that post-thesis life affords you.

But there are still many seniors who can only dream of such relaxation. And, as “#PTL” floods social media and the black tanks rapidly turn orange, it’s hard to not feel a twinge of jealously for our carefree friends.

Don’t let these friends distract you from the final push! These last few day are crucial for your thesis. As with all deadlines, the final approach is almost always the most work-intensive (even if you’ve been working diligently throughout the year).

In an attempt to keep you all motivated, here are a few words of advice: Continue reading To those still in Thesis Life…

Some Quick Tips on Making Figures

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Part of a figure I am working on.
Part of a figure I am working on.

For my fellow seniors – the end is in sight.

At least in theory, we’re at that stage when we’re polishing up our theses, making sure that our words make sense and our figures are intelligible.

But, it is also important to make sure that our theses look nice – nothing shouts amateur more than a pixelated figure hastily scribbled freehand in MS Paint.

Don’t know where to begin? You’ve come to the right place. Below I’ve briefly outlined a few quick tips to making your thesis look like the work of a seasoned professional… even if it’s not. Some examples are tailored more toward those with quantitative data, but hopefully there is enough below to be useful to anyone, whether you’re making bar graphs, diagrams, or anything in between!  Continue reading Some Quick Tips on Making Figures

April is Coming

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The snow is melting!

The saying goes that “March comes in like a lion…” and March certainly is one of the most difficult months at Princeton. Here are some of the things that get me down in March when it comes in like a lion…

  • brutal temperatures
  • unexpected snowstorms
  • midterm week
  • independent work crunch-time
  • springtime seems out of reach

…BUT the saying also goes, “…it also goes out like a lamb.” Which means we can look forward to:

  • warmer weather, sunshine, and melting snow
  • independent work deadlines (consequently, submissions!)
  • no midterm week
  • bound theses, and more academic freedom

Continue reading April is Coming

Things I Don’t Thesis Without

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This week’s post is a photographical account of the three main things I never really write my thesis without – the things getting me through the next month and a half, the things that are the only reasons I have any words on a page at all, etc.

A snack, and maybe a coffee: I’m not a huge caffeine person, but a small coffee and a banana usually does the trick when I need a small boost of energy after a long work period. Continue reading Things I Don’t Thesis Without

The Power of Fresh Perspectives

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It often becomes clearer when you change your perspective…

As winter break rolled in, I finally had the opportunity to focus on my thesis and make substantial progress. However, as always, it wasn’t going to be easy.

Generally speaking, the problem sets assigned in class have a solution.  You know that if you focus and spend time on them, it is (at least in theory) possible to come to the correct answer and complete the problem set. The challenge with research, however, is the very real possibility that the ultimate solution is unattainable with the methods/data that you have available to you.

It was precisely this problem that I encountered over the winter. Continue reading The Power of Fresh Perspectives

Page Limits: Balancing Quantity and Quality

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A different kind of page limit, but still relevant: the number of pages you write determines the number of sheets you print. (Photo by Melissa Parnagian)
A different kind of page limit, but still relevant: the number of pages you write determines the number of sheets you print.

At times, the phrase “between x and y pages” seems tedious or even unnecessary, but there’s something inherently different about 5-7 pages of research versus 12-15.  And if we recognize that difference, it means page limits serve a purpose.  Think about how you react at either extreme of a page range: when your paper hasn’t met the minimum requirements, it’s easy to tell that you need more research; conversely, passing the maximum is an indication to scale back.

But not every issue is so easy to resolve.  What about finishing just below the maximum?  On a recent policy paper, I found myself barely squeaking below the maximum page limit… or, more accurately, using shorter synonyms to avoid hitting page z on an x-to-y assignment.

That remedy didn’t last long.

Continue reading Page Limits: Balancing Quantity and Quality

Student Profile: Alexandria Herr, 2017!

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So far, PCUR bloggers have focused on what we’ve learned from our own research journeys. This week, I thought I would share an interview I conducted with another student last fall about what he/she is working. Princeton students are always involved in something interesting, and Alex Herr is no exception.

I met Alex in our freshman seminar, Earth’s Environments and Ancient Civilizations, in which we travelled to Cyprus and analyzed topics of climate, minerals, and topography using geophyics and other scientific methods. A proud Forbesian and member of the class of 2017, Alex is a tentative Ecology and Evolutionary Biology major and plans on getting certificates in Computer Science and Latin American Studies. Last semester, she was enrolled in JRN 440: Unconventional Foreign Correspondence, a creative writing poetry class, GEO 365, and SPA 103.

What are your favorite pieces of research from past classes at Princeton?

Last year, in Ancient Egyptian Archaeology, we went to the archives of the art museum and were assigned a certain number of Egyptian scarabs, or beetle-shaped amulets. Scarab beetles were used as seals mounted on rings or simply as amulets placed over the heart of a mummy. Our final project was to identify where the scarabs in the art museum were from and whether they were real.

Scarabs are the ancient world’s equivalent of an “I Love NY” shirt. As individual records, they are not that special, but as conglomerates, they tell researchers a lot about a time period. One of my scarabs had been listed as a fake, but I was able to make an argument for its authenticity. Continue reading Student Profile: Alexandria Herr, 2017!

Keep Calm and Write Outlines

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The last time you heard from me, it was 2014.  Holiday lights were on and deadlines were far off. Now that reading period is upon us, it’s time to start your research assignments if you haven’t already.  To find materials, organize, and finally write can be a time-consuming process – but a strong outline can both save time and prevent stress.  Outlines undoubtedly vary by discipline, but I use the same general strategy for all my classes: keep things concise.  As you can see, the strategy itself is concise.  And concision is effective.

It’s temping to write a stream of thoughts about your subject, but not always useful; so start by limiting yourself to a single sheet of a small piece of paper.  I use a lovely little clipboard that my sister gave me when I graduated from high school:

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Thanks, Jennifer!

Continue reading Keep Calm and Write Outlines