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It’s Time for the KNC!

Tomorrow I will be traveling to the KEEN National Conference (KNC)! The KNC is a gathering of individuals interested in developing the entrepreneurial mindset (EM) in engineering students. During my time at OSU, I have been involved with KEEN (the network around EM) in a variety of capacities. I’ve been involved with grants, classroom implementation/curriculum development, and coaching after a summer workshop. While KEEN is very focused on undergraduate education, I have been able to apply what I’ve learned about EM to many aspects of my work including my research and work with graduate students.

My favorite part about working with this group is the people. I’ve met so many amazing faculty at institutions across the United States through KEEN. It has been extremely rewarding to get to know them and learn more about their programs, many of which are very different than our programs at OSU in terms of focus and size. It’s been wonderful to learn so much from them and develop collaborations and connections around and beyond EM. I’m looking forward to seeing so many familiar faces at the KNC and getting to meet new people as well.

One of the things I’m most looking forward to at the KNC is just being in person! I love the energy around an in-person conference and really missed that over the last few years. Hallway conversations can be some of the most important at conferences and those are very difficult to recreate in a virtual world. While being in-person for conferences is really exhausting in the moment, it is also really energizing as you come back to campus and think about all the new things you can try based on what you’ve learned. I’m looking forward to being tired after this event!

Toy Adaptation with Hilliard Schools

Dr. Kajfez recently met with a group of 4th graders at a local elementary school. Check out the story here: https://www.hilliardschools.org/4th-graders-create-toy-to-make-a-difference/

Tips for Writing Multiple Papers Simultaneously

My semester has consisted of writing, writing, and more writing! Because of this writing workload, I had to be extremely organized with my hours and writing time. Below are some tips and tools that I found helpful along the way to keep me on track, hold myself accountable, and achieve my writing goals that I hope will be useful to others writing multiple papers simultaneously.

#1: Make and continually assess a long-term strategic plan

Each semester I make a week-by-week plan with all my papers/projects so that I can see all my goals and tasks in one table. This helps me to ensure I meet deadlines for all my assignments (see tip #3) but also to manage my workload (see tip #2) on a weekly basis. As I’m creating my plan, I consider deadlines for each paper, mine and my team’s schedules, and other responsibilities outside of writing so that I may balance my workload each week to meet deadlines without burning out. I continually revisit this strategic plan every week or two to ensure that I am progressing, including assessing whether the plan needs to be adjusted. I also build in a buffer for each paper to account for any final reviews or edits that are needed prior to submitting – or in case I fall behind schedule. By creating and continually reassessing my plan, I am able to see what’s coming, so that deadlines don’t sneak up!

#2: Set short-term goals to manage workload

At the start of each week, I set my weekly writing goals and how I am going to allocate my time between my tasks. Weekly goals help me to break down my long-term goals into actionable, achievable items. Each week, my goal is to make incremental progress on each of my papers, which may range from small tasks (e.g., starting an outline) to larger tasks (e.g., writing a whole section of a paper). As I set my weekly goals, I utilize the long-term plan created in #1 to ensure that the heavy writing items for my papers do not all fall within the same week. By setting short-term goals, I stay on track while feeling a sense accomplishment each week that I am progressing on each of my papers.

#3: Create personal accountability structures

In order to keep myself accountable for my writing tasks, I consider both external and internal deadlines. I make sure that external journal and conference deadlines are clearly indicated in my strategic plan (in #1), with a reasonable workload each week to reach those deadlines. If there are no external deadlines, I will work with my team to set internal deadlines to keep our writing on track and hold each other accountable. I may also create a personal accountability structure by asking a teammate or colleague in advance if they are willing to review my writing. By setting deadlines, I am more likely to keep on task and work toward my writing goals!

 

All that being said, my long-term strategic plan helps me to see the bigger picture and balance my workload. Weekly goals allow me to make continual progress by completing manageable tasks. And an accountability structure provides motivation to achieve both my short-term and long-term goals. At the end of the day (or week or semester), I reflect on my accomplishments, whether a small writing task or a larger writing goal. I remind myself that any progress is good progress and that it will all get done in the end.

Dissertation Research Decision Making

Throughout the dissertation research process there are many decisions you must make. What is your topic of choice? Which methods will you use to answer your research questions? How much data do you need? But how do we make these decisions? I try to follow the three-step method below for making research-related decisions.

  1. Consult the relevant literature. Find examples of what other researchers have done within your field around your topic of choice. Often you can easily find helpful information on your topic within the literature that can inform your decision making. Sometimes you cannot and that is okay.
  2. Discuss potential options with trusted mentors and peers. Take advantage of the wealth of knowledge your advisor, dissertation committee, and even your peers have within your field. Your mentors have completed the dissertation process themselves in addition to the research they are currently performing. Their experience and expertise can help guide you toward an informed decision.
  3. Trust your gut. At the end of the day this is your research, and you will need to make final decisions. Sometimes, whether you think you are ready or not, you will need to make research decisions to keep making progress toward graduation. Use all the help from literature and trusted mentors or peers and make the decision that feels right to you. Just don’t forget to document the ‘why’ behind your decision.

Give this research decision making method a try!

The Beginning of a Journey: My First Month as a PhD Student in the EED

This semester, I began working on my PhD in Engineering Education here with RIME. I finished my M.S. in Mechanical Engineering this past spring, and couldn’t wait to get away from the calculus and technical work of my last two years of school. It was interesting and made me think critically, but I was eager to take on more of a human-centered approach to engineering.

When this new semester began, I was determined to dive deeply into this new world, learn more about the research being conducted, and begin searching for a research topic that I am passionate about. Even though this is something I am excited to do, it can be a little daunting when you think about how much literature in this field exists and how many facets engineering education touches on. Luckily, the courses I’m taking this semester are encouraging me to reflect on my engineering experiences in and out of the classroom, teaching me about myself and my values, and helping me develop some fundamental skills needed to be successful in this field.

All three of my courses (Foundations of Engineering Education, Learning Pedagogy & Assessment, and Qualitative Research), are full of reading, reflecting, writing, and discussions which juxtapose the typical education setting of technical engineering fields. It’s been a nice change of pace from all the technical work that went into my Masters. Because there is so much reading and writing in this field, I’ve found myself having lots of thoughts and ideas. To keep track of all these thoughts, it’s been handy to have a notebook with me at all times to jot them down so I can free up that headspace again for more thoughts. From things related to possible dissertation topics, to journal articles that have encouraged me to think differently, this notebook has quickly become a valuable tool for me in this first month of my PhD. My goal is to have a large whiteboard and write all these ideas on there too so I can take a step back, see my thoughts, make connections and use them to weave a larger narrative of what’s going on in my mind.

Like I said earlier, there’s been plenty of reading to do in this past month. Another PhD student of my cohort tallied up the total number of readings we’ve done in our Foundations and Learning Pedagogy class over this past month and we’re already at 30 articles! I didn’t realize how much ground we’ve already covered, but it’s been a good reminder for me to keep writing thoughtful summaries of each article and to keep my Literature Trace up to date so I can recall and refer back to all of these readings with ease when it’s time to study for my Qualifying Exam next summer.

With all the reading, writing, reflecting, and discussions I’ve had in this first month of my PhD, I’ve been able to refine the lens I want to conduct my work through and even added aspects to it that I hadn’t thought of before. It’s certainly a work in progress right now, but I’m confident I’ll be able to tailor it to suit my needs and desires and I’m excited to see what I discover in this field over the course of this year!

Reflections on the Qualifying Exam Experience: Advice for Future EED Students

Qualifying exams, sometimes referred to as preliminary exams, are a common milestone in most Ph.D. programs. Although varied in structure and design, these exams seek to measure a student’s ability to apply the skills and knowledge acquired during their graduate courses. In the EED, qualifiers are comprised of two components: (1) an oral portion modeled after an NSF review panel and (2) a written portion that requires students to craft essay-style responses to three-question prompts. The written portion of the exam is designed so that each of the three prompts pertains to the content covered in one of the core EED courses. The exam is regarded as the first major milestone in the Ph.D. process and is typically taken after the first year of study when students have completed the required courses (I.e., Foundations of Engineering Education, Learning Theory, Pedagogy, and Assessment, and Research Design.)

As someone who took the EED qualifier this past July, I have spent much of the last few weeks reflecting on my exam experience and thinking about what I could have done to be better prepared. In reflecting on this experience, I have identified 3 key pieces of advice for future EED graduate students to consider as they begin preparations to take their own qualifying exams.

  • Start preparing for your qualifier on the first day of classes.
    While the qualifying exam is probably the last thing on your mind during your first few weeks as a Ph.D. student, developing a long-term study plan and getting organized early in your Ph.D. experience can help set you up for success. This does not mean that you need to be drafting practice responses during your first week. In fact, you will likely be somewhat limited in how much “studying” and practice you can do until after you complete at least one of the required EED courses for the exam. Rather, I encourage you to begin by coming up with a broad plan for how you will organize your knowledge and course resources (I.e., course readings & notes). The written portion of the exam requires you to support your assertions with appropriate evidence. Organizing the readings/notes in a way that is meaningful to you and is easy to navigate can save you time during the written portion of the exam. In addition to setting up your organization system, you can begin to develop a plan or schedule for studying during the latter parts of the first semester and the entirety of the second (spring) semester. How long will it take you to review the course readings and your notes? Do you plan to practice writing a response for the exam? How do you plan to prepare for the oral panel? If you are struggling with where to start with regard to developing a study plan and getting organized, I encourage you to chat with your advisor(s) as they can serve as an important resource and guide.
  • Utilize the resources available to you.
    In addition to beginning preparations early, I also encourage you to take advantage of the resources that are available to help you prepare for the exam. For me, one of the most useful resources for preparing for the exam was reviewing examples of previous qualifier questions and their associated rubrics. Accessing and reviewing these materials provided insight into the types of questions that could potentially be asked during the exam and provided guidance with regard to the different components that were expected to be present to receive a “passing” score. In addition to reviewing the previous exams and rubrics provided by the department, I also advise future EED students to engage with other grad students in the department who have already gone through the exam process. Students who have taken the qualifiers can provide important insights into the exam process and share advice on how to be successful. I encourage you to ask these students about their experiences with the exam, what helped them be successful, and what they wish they would have done differently. While they are not obligated to share them with you, you can also ask these students to see their written responses, which may give you further insight into what a “passing” response or “failing” response looks like.
  • Practice, practice again, and then practice some more.
    The last piece of advice I have for future students is to practice drafting responses for the written portion of the exam. Although the questions vary each year, you can use questions from previous qualifiers and the associated rubrics as a guide for crafting practice responses. I highly recommend drafting at least one response to each of the questions to get a feel for the amount of work and time each prompts requires. This practice can help you plan and develop a realistic schedule to follow during the exam itself. Additionally, engaging in a practice round of writing can also illuminate areas of improvement with regard to how you have organized your course readings/notes, providing you with an opportunity to correct or reorganize these resources before the exam. In addition to drafting a practice response for each of the questions, I also encourage students to seek feedback on their work. Your advisor(s) and fellow Ph.D. students in the department can serve as great reviewers and provide you with suggestions on how to improve your writing for the actual exam.

I am hopeful that these 3 pieces of advice will help future EED students in preparing for the qualifier exam!

A toolkit for sustainable progress

As we approach the beginning of the autumn semester, I’m already missing the open calendar and minimal meetings of the summer months. Despite the greater flexibility the summer offers for my work schedule, it is often accompanied by dips in motivation where I feel a lot of resistance to furthering professional projects. In these last few weeks of the summer, I have noticed myself frequently reaching to tools in my kit of “things that I try when motivation is low.” Many of these “tools” are mindset-based and some are literal (e.g., Cuckoo Timer). I’ve decided to share some of those tools here, with the acknowledgement that these are things that work for me and might not work for everyone. This list has evolved over the last 10 years through trial-and-error and self-reflection and is also influenced by myriad works of others: books, conversations, podcasts, and social media content (some are listed below but I cannot possibly list them all!). I hope that in those times when work feels hard or just less-than-ideal, some of these approaches may help you reframe “work” to decrease resistance.

  • The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey
  • Full Catastrophe Living by Jon Kabat-Zin
  • Playing Big by Tara Mohr
  • Deep Work by Cal Newport
  • Chelsea Tanner’s content
  • Adam Grant’s social media pages and on the Rich Roll podcast
  • Brad Stulberg on the Rich Roll podcast
    • shoutout to Dr. Julie Martin who encouraged EED postdocs to read Deep Work and Playing Big
    • in reviewing the authors I added to this list, I noticed the lack of diversity in the authorship, and wanted to call this out because in drafting this post, I’m encouraged to make an active point to seek out work from BIPOC, AAPI, and LGBTQ+ communities

Manage your energy versus your time.

I am a firm believer in tuning into your energy levels and then adjusting expectations and tasks accordingly. For example, I have gone through periods where I do a 5 or 10-minute meditation in the morning and observe what’s going on in my mind and body: Am I feeling fatigued or refreshed? Are my thoughts racing or quiet? What is my mood? If my mind and body give me the green light, I will jump right into a high energy task; red light, low energy task; somewhere in between, medium energy task. For this to be most successful, it’s best to designate energy levels for your tasks and have those written down wherever you track your tasks. For me, some examples include high: drafting a discussion section for a manuscript; medium: making edits to existing curriculum or manuscript text; low: grading and data management. Of course, energy and time are very intertwined, and it is impossible to divorce the concept of time from our work lives. So, I find this approach works best on days when you have several meeting/teaching-free hours devoted to solo tasks. Importantly, a morning check-in can reveal unexpected things that are going on in your mind and body and are always important to listen to!

Pick just ONE high energy task per day.

Following on my approach to managing energy, it’s important to aim to tackle just one high energy task per day. For every working day during which I have 2+ hours devoted to solo work time (“deep work” as Cal Newport says), I pick just one high energy task that I promise myself I will devote energy to. I usually choose something that takes a good amount of activation energy to begin (again, like writing). You’ll know which tasks these are because they’re likely the ones on your list that are “very important, not urgent” and keep getting pushed to tomorrow. I think it’s important to pick just ONE because the moment you have two things, you may prioritize the one that takes less mental energy. In practice, this works 3 out of every 5 times I set a high energy task intention. It’s not perfect, but it usually gets me to start to tackle some daunting tasks and lowers the activation energy substantially when I turn to it again on another day.

Change up your task list and scheduling approach if it’s not working for you.

There are an incredible number of strategies and tools for to-do lists, task lists, scheduling, bullet journaling, the list goes on. I have used very detailed to very “big picture” approaches including Miro board, written lists, iPad lists, lists in personal journals, lists on single fluorescent pieces of paper, notes on a Phone app, Evernote, my Outlook calendar … you get the idea. The takeaway is not that one is better than the rest but that different tools might serve you better at different times. Every few months I find that I end up changing my approach to scheduling, to-do lists, and goal setting. Regardless of the approach, what I have found the most helpful is doing a big-picture brain dump of everything I’d like to do during a set time, from one-week to one-semester, and grouping those tasks by category (e.g., research, teaching, professional development, service, personal, exercise). I start by planning my high energy tasks to be distributed across the time period and then do more detailed scheduling from there.

Align your to-do list with your values.

Sometimes certain tasks bring up a lot of resistance for a variety of reasons. It could be because it’s something you “have to do” for someone else, something that you associate with failure, something you simply find tedious and unenjoyable. Aligning your tasks with your values is a good approach for helping with this. How can you approach your to-do list in a way that reframes tasks so they’re FOR you? Not in a way that will result in you beating yourself up if you don’t complete everything or in a way that seems like it’s for other people? (<< This language comes from Chelsea Tanner!). An aside, I highly suggest taking some time to write your values down and treat this process as constantly evolving. Many others have written about this including several of the sources I cite above.

Practice a “soft” focus.

I used to approach work with the perspective that focus needed to be intense. We always hear about individuals having laser focus to accomplish great things. I found, however, that approaching a task that was especially mentally taxing gave me incredible anxiety. I often felt like I need to “gear up” to start the task and that ultimately resulted in procrastination. I need to make this cup of coffee before I start. I need to clean out my inbox so I can focus. I need to do smaller, shallower tasks to “work up to it”. The Headspace meditation app has a course on Focus where I originally heard the idea of approaching focus with a gentle or soft attitude. The premise of the course is that focus is a calm and serene state, not a tense state where your fight-or-flight nervous system is on high alert – the latter is not sustainable. This approach is especially helpful to me during heavy writing phases.

Taken together, the common theme across these ideas is to approach your work with a balance of self-discipline and self-compassion. The mindset approaches I’ve included here help to uncover whether work resistance is because of a very real physiological or mental cause (e.g., illness or depression) – always listen to these things! – or due to something less serious that you can approach with curiosity. Remember, Stress + rest = growth; stress + stress does not = growth. There is the axiom that “mood follows action” and sometimes with work resistance a nudge using one of these tools can really help get out of a rut and make work progress sustainable.

Lessons Learned from my First Year as a Faculty Member

I’ve made it through my first year as a full-time faculty member, and I’m back working with RIME this summer! I spent last year as a visiting faculty member in the Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering department at Miami University. I taught Introduction to Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering and Engineering Thermodynamics, along with mentoring a capstone team, trying to get my dissertation research published, and many other pieces of being a faculty member, not to mention my personal life! I’ve spent some time reflecting on my lessons learned this year, and wanted to share them:

  1. Make a plan (for the semester, the week, and the day) but be flexible: For me, if I go into a day (or week, or semester) without a plan for what I’m going to accomplish, I’m doomed to failure. I quickly realized that if I didn’t spend a few minutes planning my days and weeks, it was easy to let everything-from grading to writing-run away from me. Everyone is different, but I like to use an online calendar for my “hard and fast” events (such as classes and other meetings), but a paper hour-by-hour calendar to plan out things that were more flexible, like when I would grade an exam, or work on paper revisions. I would spend about 20 minutes right before I left for the day planning the next day, about an hour on Friday afternoon planning the next week, and a day or so laying out the semester in broad strokes. However, I quickly realized that I could not be too committed to my semester, weekly, or even daily plans, as things I hadn’t anticipated-from snow days to unexpected meetings. However, I found that I recovered better from these disruptions with a plan in place.
  2. Keep your commitments to yourself and your work: Like many jobs, I found that as a faculty member, there was always more work to be done. I found this to be particularly true in the aspects of my job related to teaching: there is always more lecture prep, or grading, or refining that assignment to be done. Because my role was primarily teaching related, I found my personal research goals often taking second (or third) place, and I could go days, if not weeks, without touching the manuscripts I’m working on. A colleague recommended setting a 30-minute meeting every day where I worked on my own research. I included this meeting in my “hard and fast” meetings on my online calendar, and keeping those meetings with myself made a tremendous difference in what I was able to accomplish over the course of the second half of the year.
  3. Learn when (and how) to say no: As someone who is more inclined to say yes than no to new opportunities, this was a hard lesson to learn. I like to say yes to new opportunities-often, they help meet new people, gain new skills, or learn something. However, there are only so many hours in the day, so you can’t say yes to everything!  One of the tactics that has helped me say no is by taking time to think about what I’ve been asked to do. Even when I’m asked in person to take part in something, I will often say something like “thank you for thinking of me! I may be interested but need to check my calendar. Can you send me an email with the information?” Having a ready response has helped me take a moment to pause and reflect if I actually have the time, skills, and interest in participating in new opportunities.
  4. Figure out and set your boundaries: This is where I struggled the most over the last year, and an area I am actively working on. During the past year, I sought to set boundaries around the end of my work day and my work week. However, especially during the busy parts of the semester, I often longer days than I planned. While this may be occasionally unavoidable, I do better work and am able to be more present in my personal life when I take time to relax and do things for myself. For me, removing my email from my personal phone was key to these boundaries. With no notification on my phone, I was more able to separate my personal and professional lives and take that time for myself. I am continually searching for ways to balance my professional and personal life and encourage you to do so as well.

I will be starting a new job as an Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Ohio Northern University, my alma mater, in the fall, and I will be taking these lessons learned into my new role. I can’t wait to see where I go from here and what other lessons I can learn as I go forward!

Dissertations: Group Projects Masquerading as Individual Achievements?

This is it – My final post on the RIME blog as a graduate student. In late February I successfully defended my dissertation, made revisions through the month of March, submitted the final document in April, and graduated in May. I wondered for many weeks what I wanted the topic of my last graduate student blog post to be and came to the conclusion that no graduate student can really go wrong with some reflective advice. What do I wish I would have known a few years ago? What would I tell a graduate student who wanted insights and secrets into the world of what it is like to do an engineering education PhD?

I would tell them that their dissertation really isn’t done completely on their own. It truly is a unique version of a group project.

I will fully recognize the statement I just made is a ‘hot take’ – a potentially controversial claim. In academia dissertations are commonly framed as what is used to determine if a person and their research measures up to the standards necessary to be awarded the PhD. They are considered tests that must be ‘taken’ – in written or oral fashion – alone (as most assessments are in academia). But when reflecting upon my 4-year PhD experience, specifically the 3 that were spent working most on my own dissertation research, the credit for my dissertation belongs to many others beyond myself for various reasons. To demonstrate this, below is the checklist of basic items you will likely need for a dissertation.

Ideas and Questions – Before you can start a dissertation, you need a dissertation topic. This might sound like a simple first step, but this also might have been where I spent the most calendar days working on. Trying to find a topic that inspires and interests you enough for it to be the focus of your work for the next three years is challenging. The conversations with my advisor, other faculty, and peers ahead of me in the program were important in helping me scope and better define my interests as I worked toward a dissertation topic. These simple conversations and short notes jotted down add up over time and can inform some awesome ideas.

Data – Getting data to study is not a walk in the park. Whether you are sending out surveys, interviewing people, or gaining access to pre-exiting data sets, it is HARD to do this alone! I certainly didn’t. Whether I needed to know how long my survey took to complete, or if my interview questions were eliciting the data I needed to answer my research questions, I leveraged colleagues both inside and outside my research group. I would say a total of 10 different people helped me test either my survey or interview questions! And this doesn’t count the three people who spent a total of 17 hours in interviews with me taking detailed notes as I focused on engaging and connecting with my participants! Getting the data I did for my dissertation would not have been possible without the help of other graduate students.

Funding – Research often needs money to fund it for one reason or another. Whether that be for conference travel to present your research, incentives to encourage participants to fill out your surveys or talk to you in interviews, or data analysis services or software, research is expensive. While I tried (and tried, again) to apply for fellowships to fund my research, I did so with no such luck. For these applications I needed letters of recommendation from others who I had worked with! I couldn’t apply completely on my own. Through these experiences I gained a new perspective in rejection (see my May 2021 blog post), but did not gain money for research. Thanks to the generosity of another research team member who had funding leftover from their research and donated it to the research group as general funds, I was able to fund my own work. For this reason, when I was the recipient of professional development funding this Fall, I donated that money back to the research group to help someone else fund their dissertation research!

Quality Checks – Once you get all of your data you will have a whole lot of analysis to do. Despite all of the YouTube videos that exist on JMP software, I had to call on a graduate student and post doc more experienced than I am to help me work through some quantitative analysis roadblocks. And quantitative analysis was the smaller portion of my analysis! While doing my qualitative analysis I was consistently (like once a month) checking in with multiple members of my research group to check the quality of my work to 1) minimize the influence of my positionality and implicit biases in my data analysis and 2) ensure I was documenting my methods in a repeatable and consistent way. I would also do similar regular check-ins with my advisor and my committee members. Leveraging the expertise of others who are strong where you may not have the knowledge or expertise needed at that time is a sign of good and responsible research practices and important to improve the quality of your work.

Editing. A lot of Editing. – And finally comes the writing… that I mostly saved for the end – don’t do that. But for when you inevitably procrastinate this part of the dissertation process and you spend 4 straight months writing, you will need editors. There comes a point when you know something too well and you’ve spent too much time with the data. Your writing will make sense and be clear to you, but probably not anyone else. This is where the perspective of others is helpful. Ask as many people as you can to read it across a spectrum of expertise levels and disciplines. You will want people to read for if it even makes sense, if sections are in an order that flows well, if spelling/grammar/tense are all correct, if your figures and tables are organized clearly, etc. I must have had 15 different people read and give me feedback on anything from individual paragraphs to the whole 200-page document, and while this process was iterative and exhausting, I am a much better writer for it.

While my experience is only my own and is likely different than the experiences of others in different disciplines and at other universities, I still think the belief that dissertation research is meant to be the work of a single person and that person alone is an outdated definition of the experience and not reflective of the world of research. I kept hearing encouragement to the tune of “this is the last time you’ll have to do research alone” as I was trudging through my final year, but I didn’t do my research alone. I had the mentorship of my advisor and committee, and the support of my research group colleagues and peers in the program. What I believe is the truly individual aspect of completing a dissertation is learning to identify your group project members – the mentorship and support needed – and taking the initiative to pursue and leverage those group members to elevate the quality of your research and the quality of the experience you have.

Reflections on a Postdoc, Parenthood, a Pandemic, and More!

As my postdoc ends, I wanted to spend some time reflecting on this unique experience. It was not my plan A to pursue a postdoc, and at the same time I will forever be grateful for this experience for many reasons. As with many folks, the COVID-19 pandemic had a stark impact for me. The plan was to graduate in May of 2020 with my PhD and pursue a job outside of academia, possibly in higher education or with an education-focused non-profit. However, in March of 2020 this was all thrown out the window as I quickly realized the reality of working from home and caring for a 10-month old baby would not be conducive to finishing my dissertation in this timeframe or conducting a job search. Plans changed, and I adjusted my graduation date to August of 2020 and soon realized that a job would be very challenging to find given the hiring freezes many employers had put in place with the pandemic. The incredible PI’s of the project that I was a GRA on arranged for me to stay on as a postdoc and continue research on the project, which I was able to start in August of 2020. Around this same time I found out that I was expecting my second child and we were in the process of moving to a new house. It was a busy and hectic time, to say the least. I am proud to say that from August of 2020 until May of 2021, I was able to continue the data collection for the project, analyze data, and begin writing my first (and most challenging) journal manuscript for the project.

From May until August of 2021, I was fortunate to be able to take parental leave and spend time with my new baby. Which again, I am grateful for a job that afforded me this as it was not an easy time with life throwing some unexpected curveballs and the ever-looming stress of the COVID-19 pandemic clouding what should have mainly been a joyful time.

When I returned from leave in August of 2021, I was offered the opportunity to teach part-time as a lecturer in the first-year engineering program along with my postdoc. I was excited for this new opportunity, but also nervous as I was living the exhausted, sleep-deprived life of a new parent returning to work, in a pandemic, with two children under the age of 3. I knew it would be challenging, and I also knew that becoming a full-time lecturer was the next step I was interested in my career. I said yes to this opportunity, not knowing what the 2021-22 academic year would bring but optimistic that COVID would be less disruptive in our lives as we were returning to teaching in-person. In reality, the year was a muddling through of hybrid teaching, navigating quarantines for students, daycare closures due to COVID exposures, illness for myself and my kids, and so much more. During all of this, I still continued to make progress with my postdoc responsibilities, digging deeper into data analysis, leading one manuscript, and co-authoring other manuscripts.

The biggest lesson learned the past two years has been that I can do hard things in circumstances that I would have never imagined. After all of this, I am so grateful for my time as a postdoc to have employment during these tumultuous times, to grow as a scholar, and to have the opportunity to prepare for the next step of my career. I am excited to be staying in the Engineering Education Department as a full-time lecturer in the first-year engineering program! A huge thank you to Dr. Kajfez and RIME for the support during my time as a graduate student and postdoc in this research group!