Basics and Policies
Research and conduct policies. What we can expect from one another.
What the University Expects of a Professor
Universities are strange institutions. The public views them as places to get degrees, but this is only a small part of how universities view themselves. Research is a very large part of how a university acquires and spends funds. The research aspect of the university is usually less visible to the public than the educational aspect, so I find it helpful to give new students a detailed explanation of what the university expects of me, how you will help me meet their expectations, and what you will gain from the experience.
As a “tenure track” professor, I am an employee like at any company: If my group performs poorly, I will be terminated; if my group performs well, I get promoted. At a university, that promotion is called “tenure”. In order to receive tenure, I need to meet the university’s productivity requirements. The university expects the following things from me:
Help the department teach the courses they offer.
Win grants. Grant proposals for federal programs are often 90+ page documents detailing the work we’re proposing, work that has already been done in the field, and a budget for paying graduate students and buying materials. The success rate for funding is between 10% and 20%, so I will need to submit several per year.
Publish manuscripts. Because I will be busy with 1. and 2. above, you and your colleagues will be primarily responsible for this, but I will assist you. The ways in which I will assist are detailed below.
Mentor students to graduation.
This is a lot to get done, but if we work together, we all get something out of it. You get a chance to apply your classroom skills to real problems; you get to do work that no human has ever done; and you get to travel the world to present the results of that research. I get a chance to pursue my research program and learn new things alongside you.
What I Expect from You
Make progress on your research and publish it.
Sometimes research is exploratory, but the majority of your time should be spent working toward a specific paper that we want to publish. This is the primary skill you will acquire while working in the laboratory. In short, you will:
Read what work has been done in the field. I cannot overstate how important this is. All too often, students start a project without knowing if their work contributes to the field or not. If your work does not add something new or test a controversial question, it may not be easily publishable.
Place your research within the larger narrative of the field, identify a relevant question to address, and verbalize a testable hypothesis that your paper will support or refute.
Perform controlled experiments to test your hypothesis.
Produce clear and aesthetic figures explaining your results.
Place your results within the larger narrative of the field.
Whether you start a career in academia, the private sector, or the public sector, this skill of how to communicate technical information will be critical. You can view Paper Rules of Thumb for more details about writing and presenting papers.
For your PhD to be successful, you must publish peer-reviewed technical papers. Technical papers are the currency of all PhD-level work. They are how the success of your PhD will be judged, whether you enter the private sector, the public sector, or academia. Furthermore, you have a requirement to publish in order to graduate, which works in your favor: Your dissertation will mostly be a stack of the papers you wrote, with an introduction and discussion to frame them as chapters in one, long story. This makes writing your thesis much easier than what you might be imagining (e.g. locked away in your room for months, writing nonstop). Therefore, it is very important that you take this part of your job seriously.
Because productivity is measured in papers, you should have a goal for how many papers to publish. I suggest aiming to publish "n-1" papers every year, where "n" is the number of years you have been a PhD student. I don’t expect anybody to publish a paper during their first year, because they will primarily be completing coursework. However, in your second year, you will begin research in earnest, and could ideally publish one paper (sometimes this will be a literature review paper, based on the literature you read before starting your research). As you progress in your research, you will be able to publish more often, for several reasons: You will become better at your research, and will complete it more quickly; your progress will lead to new ideas and capabilities, meaning you will have more topics to publish about; and you will get better at the process of writing a paper, meaning it takes less time to plan and assemble it. If you finish your paper requirement after three years and wish to graduate, then you should. But you may wish to stay for another year or two to publish exponentially more papers, which may help you get your next job.
Regular schedule of research effort.
You don’t need to be in the laboratory from 9:00 to 17:00, but you should see lab research, reading the literature, and writing manuscripts as your “full-time” responsibility, especially once your coursework is complete. You may be an early riser and prefer to work 7:00-15:00, or you may be a night owl and prefer 11:00-19:00, or your energy and focus might ebb and flow throughout the day, such that you work 8:00-12:00 and then from 17:00 to 21:00. You can work whenever or however you want, but you must accomplish two things:
Schedule your work time to include several, long blocks (e.g. 2 hours or more) of uninterrupted, undistracted work time.
Fulfill your obligation to make research progress and publish your results.
I see research as a hierarchy of tasks to work on, with priority at the top of the list:
Write or edit manuscripts, posters, or presentations.
Perform experiments in the lab (in order to collect data for manuscripts, etc).
Design and simulate hardware (in order to perform experiments in the lab).
Brainstorm and plan a manuscript or presentation (to guide design or simulation work).
Read the literature (to help plan what manuscript you want to write next).
Depending on where you are in your program, you might spend most of your time on a particular level of this hierarchy. You can always step one level down to find something to work on.
When deadlines are approaching, you need to spend whatever time is necessary to hit the deadline. Deadlines are often in the form of submission deadlines for conference proceedings papers. Unlike a journal, a conference is a physical meeting on a particular date, so papers associated with the conferences must be submitted by a deadline. You need to send me a draft of your paper seven days ahead of time. To make that happen, you might need to spend a few weekends in the lab or stay late every night for a couple weeks.
Be a teaching assistant.
Your stipend may require you to be a teaching assistant. This is a great opportunity for you to master the course material and build your teaching skill set. Typical responsibilities include:
Grading exams and homework.
Holding office hours.
Teaching lecture if the professor is traveling.
Assist with outreach events.
State and federal funding often requires that we perform outreach, that is, show the public the research we do, and actively assist young or marginalized students to work in our field. This could include:
Giving tours of our laboratory to visitors.
Traveling to public events or schools with robots to talk about our research.
Running workshops or tutorials for visitors in our laboratory.
Be respectful of your fellow students.
Academia and engineering have historically been very exclusive. This lab is open to absolutely anybody with the proper academic background. Exclusionary or threatening speech or behavior based on sex, gender identification, race, sexual orientation, ability status, or other identities will not be tolerated. This includes but is not limited to using slang that disparages groups of people or lifestyles. If you feel excluded or threatened by someone else’s language or behavior, you should:
Tell the offending party that their behavior is offensive and try to come to a resolution.
If you cannot come to a resolution, consult me, either in person or anonymously (e.g. send me an email from a throwaway account).
If the three of us (you, me, and the aggressor) cannot reach a resolution, then we will consult the university justice department.
People who repeatedly make other students uncomfortable will be expelled from the laboratory.
Monitor your mental health.
I have seen many graduate students struggle with their mental health. I struggled with mine. Graduate school is sometimes a stressful and demanding experience. In addition, many people experience new mental issues in their mid-20s, simply because of changing body chemistry. Unfortunately, there can be stigma surrounding mental health and getting help, but let me be clear: you should always seek treatment if you don’t feel like yourself. Treatment may include talk therapy, medication, or lifestyle changes such as increased exercise. There is no one-size-fits-all solution to help everybody stay calm, focused, and motivated. But at the very least, we can keep an eye on your mental health, and then seek professional assistance if necessary. Questions to keep in mind are:
Are you having trouble focusing?
Are you having trouble sleeping?
Are you sleeping more than usual, or having trouble getting out of bed?
Are you bored with everything, or no longer enjoying things you have always enjoyed?
Are you irritable, or do you have a shorter temper than usual?
If you’re having trouble, I strongly encourage you to schedule a talk therapy appointment at the Carruth Center (https://carruth.wvu.edu/) or see your general practitioner or a psychiatrist to discuss medication options.
What You Can Expect from Me
Technical direction and funding for your research.
To build on work I have already done, and to fulfill whatever grants I may be awarded, I will need specific projects accomplished. I will provide:
Funds to purchase materials for research and send you to conferences. If you have a GRA position, this includes funds for your stipend as well.
Details of prior work from this research group, including models, code, and robots, as well as preliminary models or code for your particular project.
A starting point for literature review.
My accumulated knowledge through software I’ve used or written, topical primers and reviews that I’ve found or written, course notes and lectures I’ve assembled, and conversation.
There is almost always flexibility to pursue different paths as research progresses. However, your continued funding is contingent on making progress on the original research question (This is the funding agency’s rule, not mine). I expect you to make your project your own, within the constraints of our funding.
Time for at least a 30-minute meeting every week.
I encourage you to share specific results you have and ask specific questions. But we can also discuss research direction, careers, life and mental health, lab conditions, etc. As you near milestones such as your qualifying exam or thesis defense, we can meet more frequently and/or for longer durations.
Assistance with theoretical problems, as well as high-level technical problems.
As an example: If you want advice on which algorithm to use, you can ask me. If you want to know which software library to use to implement that algorithm, you can ask, but I cannot guarantee I know the answer. If you want to know which chip to run your code on, I likely cannot help you. But you can ask your lab mates, technical staff at the university, and the Internet.
If you are unhappy with my performance, we should talk about it.
If you feel I am too involved in your research, uninvolved in your research, or inaccessible, please tell me so we can make adjustments. If we fail to come to an agreement, you can talk with my supervisor, the department chair. At the time of writing, this is Prof. Jason Gross.
We All Succeed Together
The purpose of this document is to disclose the policies and expectations of this lab and help you meet them. I understand that this is a lot of information upfront. My main motivation for assembling this document is to give you a reference for your future in this laboratory. By explaining what being a graduate student in this laboratory is like, I hope to help you prepare yourself and see the larger context in which we work. If we continue to be transparent, then we can work, learn, and grow while making some awesome robots!
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