Have you ever felt tired of classes, assignments, exams? I’m sure we all have. I’m also sure we all love learning, but also hate all-nighters and the stress from school which might lower your motivation for school. This happened to me during my third year, and I am trying to prevent it to happening to you. During my third year, my genius approach was to take many upper division Physics courses and get A’s in all of them so I could be a very competitive applicant for graduate school. This genius strategy would soon fall apart. Although getting straight A’s was a pretty genius plan, taking more Physics courses I could handle was not. I love challenges and I hate quitting, so when I run across a homework problem I can’t solve, I spend a long time trying to figure it out by myself before I ask for help. Due to this and weekly homework assignments for each course, I started falling behind classes and sometimes had to turn in homework late, which really affected my grades. As a consequence, I realized I had to just give up on my “no quitting policy” and skip some challenging problems or ask for help sooner. This made the learning experience very boring and plain, causing me to lose motivation and excitement towards my classes. Overloading myself really affected me. If you feel like you’re not enjoying your classes, or you can’t take full advantage of them, consider decreasing your course load. A graduating senior once told me “don’t ever take a class if you can’t take full advantage of it,” and I will repeat it for you in bold don’t ever take a class if you can’t take full advantage of it.

If the course load isn’t the problem, and you’re losing motivation for school, then I recommend getting involved in research. It’s very easy to stay motivated when you’re learning about what interests you. Let me tell you a story about a very successful UCSB professor (who I will refer to as Professor Oak) who also went through a lack of motivation period during his undergraduate career. Professor Oak was very tired of taking classes and tests. During the third year of college (yes, third year of college sucks) the last thing Prof. Oak wanted to do is take another test. Therefore, Prof. Oak decided to take a break from school and was able to find a research position at a national lab where Prof. Oak worked for the next 9 months. Prof. Oak loved the research experience, came back motivated again for school, and then got accepted into a TOP graduate program. The moral of this story is not to drop out if you are unmotivated, but to encourage you to pursue your own interests and become involved with research. UCSB offers many research opportunities (many of which include a paid!) for undergraduates, so please take advantage of them.

This summer, I was given the opportunity to be a part of UC LEADS (University of California Leadership Excellence through Advanced DegreeS), a two-year undergraduate research program. UC LEADS offers a variety of benefits such as paid research experience in the summer at UCSB and throughout the academic year, participation in the UC-wide symposium, GRE preparation and so on. The most awesome benefit that UC LEADS offers, in my opinion, is the chance to participate in research at any UC campus of your choice during the second summer. This means you are not limited to work with the faculty mentors at UCSB, but faculty mentors throughout the UC system in STEM. How awesome is that!

My research interests are in the field of bioengineering. I have been looking at a few professors at each of the UC campuses. There are professors who are doing work in tissue engineering, stem cell research, and using liposomes to deliver drugs. All of their research seem so interesting! I would love to work with all of them. However, I have to choose one of them.

The visiting UC LEADS scholars from other UC campuses I met this summer were awesome and very excited to work with the professors at UCSB. I’m sure my experience at the other UC campus will be amazing too. I look forward to be have an awesome summer!

The picture of visiting UC LEADS scholars and UCSB UC LEADS scholars

Before you decide to pursue graduate school, the one question you need to ask yourself is: “Do you enjoy doing research?” This might be a tough one to answer, especially if you’ve never set foot in a research lab before. And no, your General Chemistry Labs do not count (though I wish they did). Many graduate programs, more specifically, PhD programs require about five years of commitment, and a majority of a graduate student’s time is spent on doing research. Participating in undergraduate research is probably one of the best ways to assess if graduate school is really what you want to do.

It’s never too early to start researching. In fact, starting early gives you a big advantage. You’ll have more time to experience different research projects and opportunities to travel to other universities. This will give you a better insight on the type of research you want to do when you start graduate school. UCSB offers undergraduate research programs that will pay you to do research. Why do research for free if you can get paid? All you have to do is apply. Here’s a link to a page with summaries of all of the research programs at UCSB:
https://undergrad.research.ucsb.edu/get-started/programs-and-funding/research-opportunities/

I myself am part of the UC LEADS Program. A cool aspect of being in the UC LEADS Program is that you get to go to another UC during your second summer in the program. I spent my summer doing stem cell research at UC Berkeley. I also got to meet some pretty amazing people (pictured below).

One last thing I want to mention is that research is not for everyone. It’s better to figure that out now rather than later. It’s a lot more frustrating to find that out when you’re already halfway through your PhD program. By doing undergraduate research, you get a small taste of what it’s like to be a graduate student. So, is research something you enjoy to do? Once you figure that out, you’ll have an easier time deciding if graduate school is right for you.

If you need some incentive to do research with one of these lovely programs, here’s one:

TRAVEL

So, as of now I have been fortunate enough to travel and present at two conferences: the 2013 SACNAS National Conference and the 2013 oSTEM National Conference. It would take me blabbering to you, stumbling on multiple sentences, speaking way too fast, and probably waving my hands in the air frequently with excitement to fully immerse you in what this is like but I’ll try to give you the gist with this post:

Off to San Antonio, Texas! And a mighty and beautiful city it was! It had been a while since I had traveled anywhere but I was so happy to go somewhere new, especially with such great people from UCSB!

Look at these gorgeous people!

If you have not already heard about SACNAS’ brilliance, let me enlighten you. SACNAS (The Society for the Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science) is an organization whose mission is to increase diversity in the STEM fields, particularly looking at underrepresented minority groups and low-income students. Let me clarify that they support all ethnic diversity, not just Chicano/a and Native American students and you also do not have to be underrepresented to support the cause, I am a proud Lebanese/European man and I embrace and support the mission and values of SACNAS.

My amazing mentor, Jose Navarrete, and I representing the Moskovits group in Texas

Each year, SACNAS holds a National Conference (this was their 40th) to bring students and professionals together. It’s basically awesome research and speakers, networking opportunities, tons of internship and graduate school information, and simply marvelous and diverse culture packed (and I mean PACKED.) into a 4-5 day event. It was inconceivable (INCONCEIVABLE!) the number of people at this conference; like 4000, but who’s counting? There are seminars, workshops, recruiting booths, free stuff, free food, socials, networking events, poster and oral presentations… the list goes on. A good chunk of this conference’s awesomeness is also attributed to having Jose Navarrete, my research mentor and friend, come with us from UCSB. He was and always is really supportive of everything I do, and I am glad that he enjoyed the conference. I hope that next year he will be one of the graduate student presenters, even bring back an award!

I was honored to be one of the poster presenters this year which was a phenomenal experience! This was only third poster presentation and, although I hated the poster medium initially, it is definitely growing on me. More than that, this was my first time presenting at a conference, my jaw just about hit the floor when professionals and professors approached me to hear about our research or compliment my work. I may as well have been riding rainbows…which leads me to my next conference: oSTEM 2013!

Now if you have not heard of oSTEM, please come talk to me, as this will involve the said gestures above, with probably even more enthusiasm: do be careful. oSTEM (out in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) is a national organization that strives to promote and support LGBTQ (that is, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer) students, professionals, and their allies in their pursuit of STEM fields. Similar to SACNAS, oSTEM aims to increase the diversity within STEM fields while simultaneously conquering issues with discrimination, oSTEM simply focuses on the LGBTQ community, which is not currently recognized or protected as a minority group. Hint hint, it is an important organization.

Mel Kanne and I started a chapter of oSTEM at UCSB last Spring Quarter, and just about flipped (cyclohexane flip status, this is real) when we found funding to go to the 2013 oSTEM National Conference in New York City, NY hosted by…

That’s right, Google. Google Headquarters, NY. oSTEM is cool.

This was oSTEM 3rd National Conference and although smaller than the SACNAS conference, equally extraordinary. As an openly gay student myself, who hopes to someday make a difference in the world with research, many of the goals of oSTEM are really close to my heart. This is essentially why I bubble with enthusiasm at even the slightest mention of oSTEM.

The oSTEM Conference was a lot more personal, which was a great contrast to the SACNAS Conference. Though I met lots of people at the SACNAS Conference, the oSTEM Conference was great because I was able to make more personal connections. I was surrounded by a bunch of queer nerds and I could not have been happier! It was so helpful to connect with other oSTEM chapters across the nation, not to mention such outstanding friends! I connected with some really great graduate students too, even a couple professors (one of whom I might try to work for this upcoming summer).

Two keynote speakers: Google and MAKE! Magazine, a Dinner with Scientists, workshops and seminars, more great food and free stuff, and just so much fun! Again I was fortunate enough to present my research, this time an oral presentation to about 40ish people. And of course, I loved the sightseeing with Mel and Nedda, one of the other officers of our chapter and a great friend of mine. It was truly an amazing conference, I cannot wait to go back to both conferences next year in Los Angeles, CA (for SACNAS) and Atlanta, GA (for oSTEM)!

And I promise that my next blog post will be more about my research, clearly my mind and heart are still in Texas and New York!

The best Co-Founder and Co-President I could ask for, Mel Kanne

I take a step forward, but then quickly retract my step. I look left, then right. My palms are sweaty. It’s 9:55AM. “I’m going to be late,” I think to myself. Panic sets in. “Do I make a run for it, or play it safe and wait it out?” I can feel my heart beating through my chest. “No, I can longer let fear control me,” I tell myself. “I’ve made my decision. It’s go time.” I then quickly dart across the heavily congested bike path. And now I am well on my way to Quantum Mechanics lecture.

Welcome to a day in the life.

While successfully crossing those bike paths around campus during rush hour can be an art, and something that gets my adrenaline running once in a while, there is of course much, much more to my day! My junior year is in full swing, and here are the highlights:

Classes, Classes, and More Classes

Life as a double major in physics and biology makes me one busy bee! This quarter I am taking 5 classes, ranging from quantum mechanics to genetics! I have already learned so much in the last two weeks. Studying both physics and biology is challenging but intriguing and of course, rewarding. One minute I’m learning about Schrödinger’s equation and infinite quantum wells, then literally an hour later I am learning about sickle-cell disease! I know, there really isn’t too much overlap in physics and biology, but both fields are growing in research and are very interesting in their own unique way. Through all the homework sets and reading, I enjoy learning in both fields.

Textbooks Galore: Here are my textbooks for the quarter (from top to bottom): Thermodynamics, Quantum Mechanics, Biochemistry, and Genetics (not pictured: Mechanics). This amounts to a grand total of 20 units!

Let there be Light!

…Or not. My research project entails creating an absorber that absorbs a certain frequency of light. Simply put, it is my job to make a compact, affordable absorber that absorbs scattered light from my lab’s experiments (you can read more about my lab – the Sherwin Group in the UCSB Physics Department – and our experiments, here). Why is my job important? The current absorbers we have cost $2000 a piece, and are too bulky for our set-up! Without absorbers, scattered light interferes with our data. You can see a comparison of the cone absorber (black “witch’s hat”) to my plastic absorber below. I’ve managed to increase the absorption of my absorber 100-fold in the last week; I cannot begin to tell you how excited I am about this! With a little more fine-tuning, maybe I’ll be able to put the guys who make the black cones out of business…

One Big Expensive Witch’s Hat: The plastic absorber I made (left) vs. the commercial cone absorber (right) currently used. With a little more work, my plastic absorber will be ready for use in the lab!

Work Hard, Play Hard

With everything going on academically and on the research front, it seems that there is little time for relaxing or having fun. This is true a lot of the time, but not always! Just this past weekend I took Saturday off and went to the Santa Barbara Harbor Festival. It was a gorgeous, warm day, perfect for relaxing and trying all sorts of seafood. While I didn’t try the really exotic seafood, I munched on fried calamari and sipped on cherry coke, all while overlooking the SB harbor. As I walked back home with my friends, taking in the views of the calm, deep blue waters, palm trees, and grand, majestic mountains, I thought to myself, “this is the life.” (Very cliché, but hey, it’s true!). Yes, things may get busy, hectic, and stressful with everything going on, but life is all about balance!* Balancing school, work, research, you name it. Sometimes I feel like I’m tipping the scale, but then I remember that I’m studying and doing what ultimately makes me happy. And here and there, I can take some time to relax and enjoy myself!

*Life is also about making decisions (like deciding when to cross the bike path)… but that is for another blog post!

California Dreamin’: My view as I walked back from the Santa Barbara Harbor Festival.