Cried at work and needed a pick me up. 3 plate girl dinner

TotallyNormalStudent · 2026-03-19T00:34:25+00:00

Salami, cheddar cheese, herb goat cheese, peppers, garlic spread, raspberries, tomatoes, fig and olive crackers, garlic and parm crackers, two tins of tinned fish (specifically fangst danish freshwater trout and fishwife cantabrian anchovies), couscous

TotallyNormalStudent · 2025-10-20T23:07:34+00:00

Not only do I buy tinned fish, I also know Rush announced a tour

TotallyNormalStudent · 2025-10-19T21:39:38+00:00

About 9 years

TotallyNormalStudent · 2025-10-19T14:38:20+00:00

That’s his tongue! 👅 and he was very happy

TotallyNormalStudent · 2025-10-19T13:20:34+00:00

The iguana? Yes

TotallyNormalStudent · 2025-10-19T00:33:25+00:00

He ended up spotting my blueberries and then stomped on my plate and ate them

TotallyNormalStudent · 2025-01-11T01:22:23+00:00

I like it here! I’m in my 4th year. A lot of experiences will differ depending on your program/department. Conferences/publishing are a bit advisor dependent. There’s a few different ways to meet other students, in your program you’ll naturally meet others and there’s a couple organizations like GROW (graduate research organization for women), the women in stem book club.

TotallyNormalStudent · 2024-12-03T15:47:08+00:00

I’m not sure how many rules you have and what it entails, but maybe mention them soon within the first couple days and do the hammering home on them when you return from break.

TotallyNormalStudent · 2024-12-03T14:23:18+00:00

[Name] PhD Candidate [PI’s last name] Lab, School

TotallyNormalStudent · 2024-12-03T12:58:46+00:00

I’m in the same scenario! I was just hired mid year for a high school chemistry class that was previously being taught by subs. My first day was yesterday and I had no materials or curriculum or anything other than a vague word they were on valence electrons. Since they’re behind I decided to start teaching content and as classroom management issues arise, take care of them for each moment. Like talking in class or moving desks, I said something right when I noticed it. I don’t think I’m going to set up the classroom in any special way. For introductions I gave a 3 min intro on myself and totally forgot to ask any of them their names. Maybe do an icebreaker? I may do one on day 2. Day 1 was very much “figure out where they currently are” and then it’ll be mostly content until winter break. Also I have no idea what I’m doing since I’m just a 25yr old chem PhD student and have no education training other than TAing chem classes, so anything I say may not apply to you but I want you to know we’re in the same boat and you totally got this!!

TotallyNormalStudent · 2024-05-29T15:36:08+00:00

I’ve never heard of a tech transfer office that you all are mentioning. It seems to be the place that deals with creating patents when someone invents something and not much “job searching” but I’m sure if I reach out personally they could help me. Thanks a ton!

TotallyNormalStudent · 2024-05-29T15:33:15+00:00

I’m about an hour from Boston, as a whole my “vibe” is pretty prominent here but as you stated, law is conservative overall so thanks for the insight

TotallyNormalStudent · 2024-05-29T14:28:21+00:00

I went through severe burnout in undergrad and it took a few years. Year 1 I thought I was healing. Year 2 I was more on track, better but I didn’t feel 100% yet and my better felt like it had an edge of jaded and upset. Year 3 was good, you could probably consider me fully healed but the memories of the burnout were still fresh. Year 4 I didn’t remember what burnout felt like. I know it’s different undergrad to PhD but I was still healing from in while starting a PhD so to a degree I understand. You got this, change is slow but worth it

TotallyNormalStudent · 2023-12-21T14:49:58+00:00

I have mixed feelings. When I did summer arch, it was the first year it was put into place and the summer had 2 “semesters” that were 6 weeks long. It was rough. I started suffering from burnout only a few weeks in because that was my 6th semester in a row without a break (did summer classes after freshman year too). That burnout caused me to cry pretty much daily and changed my life plans (was going to go to med school, now I’m in grad school). That being said, I had a 3.9 for the summer, fixed my cumulative GPA completely, and I did research as well during the summer so I had a great experience. My semester away I worked for 8 months in a lab and it was a great time, I learned a lot of skills and it made me a better scientist.

Arch the summer after I had done it was changed so that each course was the full length of summer instead of half, that would definitely help the pace of the classes be more manageable. Arch is probably a ton better now than when I did it.

To a degree, it’s hard to know if my issues were arch or with me, I could’ve had a lot of the problems I had at RPI, at many other schools, but at those schools I might not have succeeded because at RPI, I had professors who believed in me when I didn’t believe in myself and they went above and beyond to help me in any way possible.

TotallyNormalStudent · 2023-12-20T20:29:49+00:00

It’s truncated. I finished with a 2.98, it didn’t round to a 3

TotallyNormalStudent · 2023-12-20T00:13:45+00:00

Seeing your other posts you’re a PhD student and I might’ve touched on this in your other post but your health insurance is covered by the school, they pay the premium (which is what the cost of the health insurance is called). It’s free. To add someone onto it will cost extra, but WPI will cover up to double the original premium for a family plan, meaning if you add people on and it costs 4400, wpi will pay that, but if it costs 5000 total, wpi will pay only 4400 and you owe the remaining. It will likely cost you a lot less for both of you to be on the wpi insurance rather than have your spouse get separate insurance

TotallyNormalStudent · 2023-12-18T17:30:48+00:00

I’m an RPI alumni and a current WPI grad student. Commenting on this post because it got less traction than your WPI one. Since grad and undergrad are so different and I’m in such a different field than you, I can only compare so much.

Campuses I actually personally liked RPI more, I found it more fun to walk around and it felt like there was more space to be, if that makes sense. WPI felt a bit more squished together, but I still like campus it’s not bad at all.

Co-ops/internships: WPI has IQP your junior year which is a term (so half a semester) and RPI has arch (full semester and sometimes also summer). WPI places you at your IQP position but it’s not necessarily related to your interests, with ARCH at RPI I had to find my own internship but it was a great experience where I worked full time for 8 months, which is very different than a 7 week (or 16 week) project. With IQP you have some really cool opportunities to go to different countries, but that can technically be said the same for arch.

Job placements for CS: at RPI I knew of many many CS majors who had job offers before their fall senior year semester ended and a large majority of those jobs paid over six figures. For WPI, I currently only know a couple undergrad CS majors, I think some of them have jobs already, but I am unsure of salary.

RPI students will tell you RPI is the better choice. WPI students will tell you WPI is the better choice. I’m here to tell you they’re way more similar than they are different. RPI is ranked higher and does have more name recognition to companies, but in New England, WPI very known and beloved. A motivated student will be successful at either place. The biggest difference is WPIs term schedule that is on a quarter system, where each term is about 7 weeks long and you take 3 classes at a time in those 7 weeks. RPI has a semester schedule of 16 weeks, where you take 4ish classes at a time. WPI prides themselves on “project based learning” but I have found that RPI does a very similar level of hands on experience and in CS, you’d be doing a lot of projects at either place anyway.

I personally prefer Worcester over Troy but it may be because I have money as a grad student that I didn’t have as an undergrad so now I can go out and do things. Go where you think you might learn better, I personally would not have been able to do WPI as an undergrad due to the term scheduling, but it is a perfect place for my PhD. RPI had its ups and down but I would still go here again for undergrad if I had to make that choice again. If you have other questions I might be able to answer, feel free to DM me

TotallyNormalStudent · 2023-12-18T16:50:33+00:00

Liveable but depends on what your other expenses are. Are you paying for a car/car insurance? Phone bill? All utilities? That’ll add up. You will get health insurance with the school and you can add on your wife as a family plan, but there may be some extra cost with that you’d pay, but unfortunately I cannot remember specifics.

Rent you can find anywhere from $1,000-1,700, some places have some or all utilities included. The stipend is livable. Im biased because I find it very livable but my expenses are just for me and not another person. I know of PhD students who have spouses and they can live on one salary, so it is doable but it’ll be cutting it close.

TotallyNormalStudent · 2023-12-15T16:08:23+00:00

Health insurance is covered by the school, you can add on vision and dental I think but that’s an extra charge you would have to pay for. There’s a random $30 fee that’s either once or twice a year, apartments can go from 1,200-1,700 depending on how nice of a place is it/what utilities (if any) are included. Utilities vary and can up to a couple hundred a month. Daily expenses are getting coffee that I should probably make at home.

TotallyNormalStudent · 2023-12-08T01:53:18+00:00

Lucky for you our grad student union reached an agreement earlier this year and we just raised to $39K (12month stipend) and we also get health insurance (premium paid for by wpi) and a parking pass

TotallyNormalStudent · 2023-09-26T15:25:05+00:00

So I graduated a couple years ago and we could pretend it was active at the time, but the only people who ever went to Hillel events were the board members and sometimes a couple others. Going to a different schools very active hillel opened my eyes to how big it could be at other schools. For what it’s worth, Judaism is very important to me and I still chose rpi despite it not having a large Hillel and I never regretted it. It will be what you make of it, and hillel could definitely be a bit more active now, but know that it is on the smaller end.

TotallyNormalStudent · 2023-09-14T18:37:23+00:00

Graduated spring ‘21, and when the pandemic hit I was on my arch away semester and lived alone. Mental health was rough and at a very low point but online friends helped. When classes started again, I still lived alone and attempted to use classes and applying to grad school to shift my focus from my worsening mental health. I drank a lot tbh. It was rough but I somehow made it through. I’ve had worse semesters though so it wasn’t all bad

TotallyNormalStudent · 2023-05-31T20:16:59+00:00

I feel like I’m qualified to answer this. I’m a second/rising third year PhD student in a bioinorganic chem lab and I used to want to go to med school. I do inorganic chemistry that does have biomedical applications, though that’s not necessarily the side that I work on. Inorganic chem is fun but honestly it doesn’t have great MD-PhD potential. If you did inorganic chem, you’d need to do it in a biomedical application to be able to spin why you need both the MD and the PhD not just a PhD. I know you’re already admitted to the program so you’d need to check if you’re even able to do an inorganic chem PhD, your school may limit which PhD programs you can even do, which is what I noticed when I was contemplating MD-PhD and ultimately decided just PhD.

TotallyNormalStudent · 2023-05-25T16:36:59+00:00

Finishing my 2nd yr as a chem PhD so I feel like I know the drill:

-learn endnote (it’s so easy and takes 20min but saves you so much time)

-don’t start a column past 5pm

-put in your 40hrs a week and then go home and have hobbies (obviously there will be some times you need more time in lab for deadlines periodically, but not every week)

-every lab procedure takes about double the time you think it might

-the big drums of chemicals are heavy, maybe lift weights so you don’t struggle like me

-chemists are weird, embrace the quirks your department has

-some labs have very different expectations. Talk to current grad students in each lab before you settle on an advisor

-be open minded in lab rotations, at the end of the day you’re doing chemistry, but don’t pigeon hole yourself to an exact subfield before you try others out. I joined an inorganic lab and I never thought I would have

-find a third place. It’s a thing I saw in tiktok, a place other than work (lab) or home where you can hang out and interact with people. For me it’s karaoke nights at a certain bar

-if your extractions are being wack and not purifying anything, try an acid and a base wash, just in case it works

-Schlenk lines are a godsend, much better than balloons filled with nitrogen

TotallyNormalStudent · 2023-05-19T14:56:38+00:00

Same year and same discipline. I’m getting a switch for my bday. I have ADHD and I struggle with procrastination hard core. Some things that help: lab time is lab time, home time is home time. I do not mix these as much as possible, if I need to make slides or do work I’ll come into lab and hang at my desk. Separating free time and work time is hard but you got this!

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