Category Archives: education

Separating the l33t from the graph

Posted on October 18, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

Were you ever explicitly taught which graphs to use to represent different types of scientific data? I remember some very basic lessons on this subject in high school maths (and possibly biology), but once I reached university it was never … Continue reading →

Posted in career, communication, education, English language, science | 25 Comments

The Teacher Feature

Posted on October 6, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

Writing my last (proper) post reminded me that way back in 2009 I started a series on my most influential teachers, and that I’d intended to include my PhD supervisor in the list. However, given that it’s World Teachers’ Day … Continue reading →

Posted in career, communication, education, music, personal, science | 6 Comments

Dr. Strangehabits, or: how I learned to stop procrastinating and write my thesis

Posted on September 28, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

Athene’s recent post about how students write their PhD theses (plus frequent keyword search hits to my blog on the same subject) served as a long-overdue reminder that I’d promised to share my own thesis writing experiences. Some of the … Continue reading →

Posted in career, education, personal, science | 30 Comments

Feeding the Science Tamagotchi

Posted on September 12, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

It started during my undergrad research project. “I have to go into the lab tomorrow morning to feed all my cells, so I can’t stay out too late tonight or have a hangover tomorrow”, I’d say. After comments along the … Continue reading →

Posted in career, drunkenness, education, grant wrangling, personal, rants, science, travel, whining | 31 Comments

In limbo

Posted on August 8, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

Well, the post I’d planned to write next was going to be about how much I’ve learned from blogs written by cancer patients, and how that knowledge has impacted my work in a basic and translational cancer research department. But … Continue reading →

Posted in career, education, family, medicine, personal | 43 Comments

Random sampling and ambush mentoring

Posted on March 5, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

The teacher I had when I was seven or eight had a great approach to teaching us our multiplication tables. Sure, we did some rote learning and some whole-class recitals of the tables, but her favourite method was to surprise … Continue reading →

Posted in education, science | 19 Comments

More on dating

Posted on February 15, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

Places where I used to write the date: On cheques At the top of letters Lesson / lecture notes Lab books Travel journals Places where I now write type the date: Computer file names Percentage of times I try to … Continue reading →

Posted in education, science, silliness, technology | 28 Comments

Why a three-year PhD is not necessarily shite

Posted on February 8, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

A couple of weeks ago I was chatting to a student in my department who’s just starting to write her thesis, and I mentioned that I wrote mine in three months, from start to finish. Several heads in the vicinity … Continue reading →

Posted in Canada, career, education, personal, science, UK | 44 Comments

In teh Grauniad

Posted on January 26, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

When I was about 15, our local paper ran a special schools edition. They approached English teachers around the city, asking them to contribute pieces written by local students, and my teacher picked an essay I’d written. The essay was … Continue reading →

Posted in blog buddies, education, family, original research, personal, publishing, science, the media, UK | 13 Comments

It Gets Better

Posted on January 13, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

(ETA: DAMNIT! I still can’t figure out how to embed videos. I’ll try to fix this later, but for now I’ll just put the links in) (E again TA: Richard fixed the embedding! Yay! Thanks again, Richard!) (3rd edit: adding … Continue reading →

Posted in Canada, education, embarrassing fan girl, music, personal, videos | 17 Comments