Coursework vs Research: Battle or Balance ?

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Coursework vs Research Battle or Balance ?
ECEN 6001 PhD Seminar Series

• Daqing (Daching) Piao, PhD
• School of Electrical and Computer Engineering
• Oklahoma State University

Professor probes prostate problems
www.oil.okstate.edu
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Not good at all in time-management!

• 19841990
• 6-year playing in college to find a way out of
  the BOX
• 19901999
• 9-year running in industry to sneak back to the
  BOX
• 19992003
• 4-year struggling in graduate school to earn the
  PhD cap
• 20032005
• 2-year hanging around in New England to land a job

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There is no life BEFORE you get your
PhD !
Everyone wish to drop out from the PhD program
after this lecture !
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What is the difference between degrees ?

• Bachelors are-------- Smart Students
• Masters are ------ Stubborn Survivors
• Doctors are ------ Stupid Scholars

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What is PhD
Why PhD ?
http//acronyms.thefreedictionary.com/
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• Papas Hat got Dust
• Personal HemoDialysis system (Aksys, Ltd.)
• Player Hater Degree
• Port Hueneme Division (Naval Surface Warfare
  Center)
• Port Huron Detroit railroad
• Portable Handheld Device
• Portable Hard Drive
• Post Hole Digger (construction)
• Post Homicidal Depression (serial killers)

7

• Pot--Hole Dodger (driver on poorly maintained
  roads)
• Pre-Hearing Detention
• Presbyterian Hospital of Dallas
• Probability Hypothesis Density
• Process Historian Database
• Push Here Dummy (point shoot cameras)
• Professional Help Desk
• Professor and Head of Department

8

• Piled Higher  Deeper
• Particularly Hard to Deal with
• Permanent Head Damage
• a Persons Highest Degree
• Poor, Hard, and Difficult
• Persistence, Hard-work, and Dedication

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The life of an ECE PhD student
Too little time Too much load Too heavy
stress Too bossy boss like Dr. Piao
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Coursework vs Research

• Battle
• Time confliction
• Course too much theory to understand ?
• Too many projects to do ?
• Research too tough, too complicated, spend too
  much time?
• Battle in time-domain,
• balance in k-space, knowledge-domain

Fourier Laplace
Foolish Transform
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Research

• TA ? Have to have research to get PhD
• Theoretical
• Theoretical theory
• Applicational theory (medical image processing)
• Experimental theory
• Instrumentational
• Developmental instrumentation
• Experimental instrumentation
• Team-work, help others
• Do your own part

Prove
Guide
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Research work
Method
Problem
Pre-existing knowledge
A
B
N
M
C
D
E
F
P
Q
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Research work

• A different problem for a known application
• An innovative application of a mature method
• A novel method in an established area
• A new area within an existing discipline
• An unprecedented discipline for a ground-breaking
  application or problem-solving

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Coursework vs Research

• Similarity
• Lead to your degree
• Suck your time, drain your brain
• Problem solving
• Career training
• Competition
• Presentation (class, conference, seminar)

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Coursework vs Research

• Difference
• Pay for coursework (someone pays)
• Paid for research
• Competition in the (inter)national
  level---research
• Courseworkgood or bad affect yourself
• Research-----alive or dead affect the entire group

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Coursework vs Research

• Difference (roughly)
• To use known details to derive known results

Known details
Known results
Coursework
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• To use known details to administer known
  expectations

Known expectations
Known details
New product development
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• To use known methodology to address unknown
  details

Known methodology
Unknown details
Applied research
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• To use unknown methodology to approach unknown
  expectations

Unknown methodology
Unknown expectations
Basic research
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Evaluation criteria

• Productivity
• of courses
• ------------------------------------------
• of years to finish PhD
• of publications
• Quality
• 4000/5000/6000, A or B
• ------------------------------------------
• of 1st author (contribution
  level weighting)
• of Letters paper (impact factor
  weighting)
• of talks (face credit weighting)

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Coursework vs research

• Which is more important?
• Job in industry (general PhD level) r
• Job in industry (RD centers) r
• Job in teaching college cr
• Job in research university r
• Recommendation letter for job from Boss r

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Coursework vs research

• Fellowship/scholarship cr
• Award rc
• Internship rc
• Getting degree rc
• Recommendation letter from instructors
• 
  c

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Coursework vs research

• Which is more important?
• To make myself safe, 50 c, 50 r
• To make you safe 50 c, 100 r

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Coursework vs Research

• Time-management
• Work hard----------ultimate management
• No game, less sleeping (200 am ? 500 am ?)
• Persistent, die-Hard, and Determinant, (typically
  35yrs for a PhD in EE)
• Not everyone can finish a PhD, treasure this
  privilege
• Stay oriented, focused (dont be distracted when
  economy booms, nowhere to go when economy plunges)

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Coursework vs Research

• Time-management
• You came for PhD, if quit or sleep in the middle,
  your uni-directional head damage wont get
  recovered.
• No life, PhDs no life is interesting
  rewarding
• Keep accumulating small amount everyday, do not
  attempt to rush up a big chunk in a short time,
  it does not work out that way..

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• Time-management (my experience, may not apply to
  your case)
• Schedule the week
• Days for research
• Nights for course
• Weekends for back-up, or, catch-up (for both)
• Observe the schedule for both course-work and
  research, though you do have deadlines to meet

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• Deadlines
• For student
• Course work---homework, project, presentation,
  exam
• Research----conference paper, features journal
  paper, data when boss needs badly, student
  research proposal
• For Boss
• Proposal, getting in, ends, requires
  students to deliver results on-schedule
• Advise students papers/abstracts,
• Lecture notes, hw grading, other academic
  duties/services
• Win-Win, not lose-lose
• Keep research moving, slowly moving traffic is
  better than complete jam

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• Why put day for research?
• You are paid for,
• Good interaction with advisor, supervised
• Good discussion with group, connected,
• Concentrated and guarantee the time proceed

Common time window
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• Time-management
• Why spend so much time on research being an RA
  because you are paid for just 10/20 hrs/week ?
• RA position is not a regular job
• Dont waste your own time thinking about how much
  work I should do to match up the assistantship ?
  (not because I am one boss)
• The RA leads to your dissertation
• Working in restaurant---working for the boss to
  get money for living
• Working as RA----working for my dissertation
  while get paid

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• Time-management
• We are talking about your degree! And you are
  working on new, unknown stuff.
• Overpaid during learning curve (1 years)
• Even-paid after know how and where to drive (2
  years)
• Underpaid when close to graduate (1- years)
• Every effort you put into research will be paid
  off when you look for job-----------it does make
  difference !--------It is you who will look for
  the job, not the boss
• Want to stay in business in your research
  community ? Want to land a dream job ?

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Coursework Type

• Not related to research at all
• Somewhat connected to research
• Significantly associated with research

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Coursework Level
4000

• Linking up
• Advanced
• Independent study (?)

5000
6000
Specific topic
Particular purpose
Buffer
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• Research topic into coursework
• Term project or paper
• Electromagnetic Wave--------light transportation
  in tissue
• Estimation theory-------------- missile tracking
• Microwave Array ----------------- probe design
• Independent study (?)

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• Coursework into research (great !)
• Develop term project/paper for a course to be
  included in your dissertation (one section, or
  one chapter)
• It will save your time when you write your
  dissertation, and make your dissertation more
  coherent. Though, no one will read your
  dissertation except you and perhaps your advisor
  (Dr. Alan Cheville)

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• Superluminescent diode, semiconductor optical
  devices final paper
• a complete chapter among 11

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Coursework vs Research

• Done with course ?
• Do more and better research,
• Keep doing research when you write dissertation
  (post-doc ?) (dissertation, 102, three month)
• Done ?
• Proved that Hard-work Deserves the name of PhD
• Promoted as the Head of your Division

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There is no life AFTER you get your PhD
!
Now you enjoy no life as you have addicted to it
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http//www.cs.mdx.ac.uk/staffpages/richardb/notMad
.gif
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http//www.jescomeao.org/images/profess.gif
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• Scared ?
• The road-ahead becomes wider, brighter, more
  predicted after getting PhD
• PhD is the second largest achievement for me,
  just next to my two boys!

Picture taken in 2005
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In 4 years, you will belong to the fish of
scholars Questions ?