Prospective Graduate Students
I am newly established at University of Montana, and so, naturally, my lab is small at the moment. However, I intend to continue running a small laboratory, perhaps growing to medium size eventually. I encourage my students to pick their own projects and to show independence and initiative. My own interests are diverse, scattered even, and I draw energy and ideas from many different areas in biology. So I am open to students working on a wide variety of projects. I view my role as facilitator, not guide, dictator, or parent.
My views on how to be a graduate student have, of course, been influenced by my own graduate experience in the early 1990s at the University of Washington. Ray Huey was on my committee and had an office nearby. At some point he passed out copies of the following two complementary articles, which are based on presentations he and Steve Stearns gave at a grad student meeting at Berkeley in the mid 1970s. The advice still resonates:
Steve Stearns—Some Modest Advice to Graduate Students
Ray Huey—Reply to Stearns: Some Acynical Advice for Graduate Students