Cambridge Tea Party
Maintaining your productivitea by getting off campus
I might be the only person in the world that looks forward to working on weekends. For most people, weekends are a time to sleep in or to catch up on their favorite TV shows but for me, I use work as an excuse to visit some of my favorite places in Cambridge: coffee shops. […]
The Project Management Triangle
Applying project management fundamentals to graduate school
Graduate school is a wonderful time to indulge in research, fun side projects, and coursework. This is especially true at MIT, where opportunities are plentiful, whether it be startups, teaching, courses, or working with professors. This is both a blessing and curse, especially for someone like me, for whom saying no to exciting opportunities is […]
You Got NSF, Now What?
How NSF can change grad school selection
It’s early April. You wake up and refresh the emails on your phone. There is an email from your professor congratulating you on getting the NSF, a colloquial expression for getting into the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program. You excitingly text your friends and call your family. After a later-than-expected breakfast, you rush […]
Gambling with Degrees
Coming to MIT with a master’s
How many master’s degrees is too many? It’s not a very common problem to have. Yet for some of us that have already completed a couple years of postgraduate education before coming to MIT, the question comes up. I must admit I hadn’t looked much at the course requirements for a PhD before applying. A […]
Bilingualism is a Feature, Not a Bug
Shifting perspective on my non-native English
If you are a non-native English speaker like me, have you ever felt that your English was not good enough? And worse, did you feel that your English would never be as good as a native speaker’s? I did. My native language is Mandarin Chinese, and while I learned English growing up in China […]
