Interview Essay

Ian Weiner

This assignment was given to us to expand our knowledge of The Ohio State University personnel and how to use all the resources available to us as students through interviewing an upperclassman, a TA, and a professor. These resources include library tools such as Scopus and Web of Science, which are both useful tools to find scholarly journals and the professors that did the research with relative ease. Another resource we learned through the interviews was networking/professor relations.

I interviewed Emerson Collin, a third-year STEM EE Scholar who is majoring in actuarial science. I interviewed Saeed Shaker Akhtekhane, a graduate student TA in my economics class, and Dr. Andreas Chavez, a professor in the biology, ecology, and evolution areas for my TA and professor interviews respectively.

            To find an upperclassman to interview I used the directory for third-year STEM EE Scholars, provided to us by Jorge Eduardo Mendoza. After I saw that Emerson had the same major (actuarial science) I sent him an email asking to talk to him about how to prepare for actuarial exams and how to succeed in college. He said he would be willing to talk to me and from there we set a time and place to meet. I only have two classes that have TA’s and Saeed seemed to be much more receptive to questions than the other so I sent him an email asking if I could talk to him about undergraduate research and professor relations. To find the professor I wanted to interview I went to the staff directories for each department, and quickly found that there are no professors doing research in my particular area of study. This was not too surprising because frankly there is no research needed to be done in actuarial science. After I realized my major was not an option I looked for areas that have always interested me and I landed on evolution, and from there I found Dr. Andreas Chavez. I then looked up Dr. Chavez’s research, emailed him requesting to talk about it, and then we set up a time to meet.

            As I said previously I interviewed Emerson Collin as my upperclassman. I chose to interview Emerson because he is in the same major as I am and has completed two actuarial exams, and has had an internship already, so I wanted to hear how he accomplished all of that before his third year. I learned how to succeed on the actuarial exams through Emerson. He told me about study tools that can be very helpful for studying the exams and which of them he personally uses. He said that studying for each exam takes anywhere from 4-6 months and I was not expecting that, so it was good that I spoke with him so I can start studying for my first exam this coming spring. He also told me that I will inevitable be disappointed/let down sometime in my college career, be it with bad grades, a denied internship, etc., but to never let it keep you down for long. He talked about how he was denied internships before, how he failed an exam once, and how he always rebounded from those disappointments and continued working towards his goals. He said to always have an outlet to get away from school for a bit by talking to someone on the phone, playing video games, playing sports, just anything other than school. Emerson was a great person to talk to, and I have little doubt I will reach out to him again in the coming years.

Saeed Shaker Akhtekhane is the TA I interviewed and he is a grad student who is originally from Iran. Saeed reinforced the fact that if I want to get into a graduate school that professor recommendations are crucial to admittance. He talked about how he created the relationship with his professor by going to their office hours whenever he had questions, being involved in class, showing interest in their research, and eventually becoming their assistant. This all just cemented the fact that I have always believed to be true and that is in college you must always be proactive if you want to succeed. Nothing will be given to you, you must go get it yourself, and through my interview with Saeed I am now 100% confident in this belief.

To find scholarly articles I first found my professor like I said previously and then I went to Scopus and Web of Science to find any articles he has been a part of. After I found the articles I followed the links as we were taught and downloaded the article to read. Scholarly articles are very difficult to read for people such as myself and other freshmen because generally, we do not have enough advanced knowledge on the topic we are reading about, so it can be difficult sometimes to understand what the author is saying. The use of acronyms and other shorthand techniques can also lead to confusion for an uneducated reader. With my field being actuarial science scholarly articles are few and far between and do not have any big impact, if at all, on the processes used. Other than that there are no advantages or disadvantages to this type of media because we simply do not use it.

            Dr. Andreas Chavez is an Assistant Professor in the fields of evolution, ecology, and biology here at Ohio State. Dr. Chavez and I have a common interest in finding out why some animals have evolved the way they have, and how some animals got to where they are today geographically. These two points are what led me to choose to interview Dr. Chavez. After asking him about how to get into undergraduate research if I so choose he told me that I should just put myself out there. Talk to my professors whenever I can, see if they have any internship programs that might not be widely publicized, stay up on literature, and overall just build relationships with the professors I would like to work with however possible. I learned that the best possible way for any undergraduate who is conducting research to network in is national conferences. National conferences are usually once a year and draw all the biggest names and experts in their respective fields to these conferences to discuss research and next steps for the field as a whole. He said that these conferences can lead to internships, jobs, and much more if you talk to as many people as you can and, again, just put yourself out there. Dr. Chavez was a good person to talk to and has given me plenty of insight into undergraduate research, as well as how to succeed in school now and farther down the road.

            This assignment was very helpful for me as it allowed me to create a great contact and resource in Emerson Collin. Also, I now know how to better use certain library tools to find research articles if I ever need to do so. The main point I heard from each of my interviewees is that you always have to be proactive, chase goals, and accept the failures and denials when they come, or regret never being able to achieve your goals. This was somewhat of a wake-up-call for me even though I believe I am a pretty proactive person I now know I have to do everything possible to set myself up for success later in life, and not just what everyone else does, I have to do more in order to achieve my goals. Although this assignment was a little time consuming it was not overwhelming and having done these interviews, I feel as if I am better prepared for the coming years I have left at The Ohio State University.

Research Articles Read

Chavez AS, Saltzberg CJ, Kenagy GJ (2011) Genetic and phenotypic variation across a hybrid zone between ecologically divergent tree squirrels (Tamiasciurus). Molecular Ecology           20:3350-3366

Chavez AS, Kenagy GJ (in press) Clinal color variation within a panmictic population of tree squirrels, Tamiasciurus douglasii (Rodentia: Sciuridae) across an ecological gradient.          Biological Journal of the Linnean Society