Graduate Advice Day (GAD)

Graduate Advice Days (GADs) are presentations by faculty, students, and guests that provide current UTCS graduate students with career advice, such as:

• Completing the graduate program
• Performing research
• Finding a job
• Living life as a UTCS graduate

GADs are usually be held on the last Friday of this month, immediately prior to TGIF.

Slides or recordings of GAD presentations are posted on the Research & Career Advice page.

• Topic: How to find an advisor
• Informal session

• Topic: Resume Workshop
• Speaker(s); Melanie Pearce, UT College of Natural Sciences, Career Design Center

• Topic: Planning Your Research
• Speaker(s); Prof. Ray Mooney, UTCS

• Topic: Tips for Teaching
• Speaker(s): Prof. Calvin Lin and Prof. Lorenzo Alvisi, UTCS

• Topic: Preparing for Academia
• Speaker(s): Prof. Kristen Grauman, UTCS

• Topic: Paper writing
• Speaker: William Cook
• Time/Place: 3:00-4:00pm PAI 3.14

• Topic: Acing your RPE
• Speaker: Don Fussell
• Time/Place: 3:00-4:00pm PAI 3.14

• Topic: Fellowships
• Speaker: Panel discussion
• Time/Place: 3:00-4:00pm PAI 3.14

• Topic: Finding and Obtaining Fellowships and Grants
• Speaker(s): Previous Fellowship Recipients?
• Time/Place: 3:00-4:00pm PAI 3.14

• Topic: Research in Industrial Labs vs. Academia
• Speaker(s): TACC? IBM Austin Lab, MSR
• Time/Place: 3:00-4:00pm ACES 2.402

• Topic: Inter-Disciplinary Research with Real-World Applications
• Speaker(s): Tandy Warnow? Risto?
• Time/Place: 3:00-4:00pm

• Topic: Preparing your Resume/CV OR Interviewing Skills (coding)
• Speaker(s):
• Time/Place: 3:00-4:00pm

• 9:00 am - We want you to succeed! J Strother Moore
• 9:15 am - Job and internship interview questions to ask and expect, Kathryn S McKinley
• 9:45 am - Practicum: Practice interviewing with your peers.
• 10:15 am - Break
• 10:30 am - Panel led discussion: What I wish I had done in graduate school and the best thing I did do, Mike Walfish & Brent Waters
• 11:30 am - Networking, Adam Klivans
• 12:00 pm - Lunch & Practicum: Give an elevator talk. Come prepared to describe your research to a student outside your research area.
• 1:00 am - Looking back, peering ahead, Rama Kotla, Microsoft Research (UT PhD 2008)
• 1:30 pm - Practicum: Curriculum vitae swap. Bring your CV. You will exchange with a student outside your research area.
• 2:00 pm - I speak pretty now, Kristen Grauman
• 2:30 pm - Break
• 3:00 pm - Interdisciplinary research, Luay Nakhleh, Assistant Professor, Rice University (UT PhD 2004)
• 3:30 pm - On writing well, William Cook
• 4:00 pm - Practicum: writing swap. Bring a one to two page writing sample, such as the abstract and introduction of a work in progress, your research statement, or a paper critique. You will exchange with a student outside your research area.
• 4:45 pm - Evaluation: Fill out web evaluation form.

UTCS Graduate Advice Day, Feb 23, 2007

• Overview & What we are doing to help you succeed, J Moore, Department Chair
• Communication Skills, Adam Klivans
• Panel: What Will I Do When I Graduate? (Praveen Yalagandula, HP; Dave Moriarty, Apple; Seth Pettie, University of Michigan – all UT PhD grads)
• Managing Your Advisor, Keshav Pingali
• Panel: Tools and Advice for AI, Systems, & Theory Research (Ned Dimitrov, Mike Bond, Shimon Whiteson – all UT PhD students)
• Advice on Applying and Interviewing for Jobs, Steve Keckler
• Panel: Work-Life Balance (Adam Brown, PhD student; Emmett Witchell, assistant prof; Kathryn McKinley, prof)

UTCS Graduate Student Advice Day, May 11, 2006

• Overview & What we are doing to help you succeed, J Moore, Department Chair
• Starting a research career & picking an advisor, Emery Berger, Assistant Prof at UMass (UT graduate)
• What your advisor can do for you & managing your advisor, Doug Burger, Associate Professor
• Communication skills - I speek pretty now, Mike Dahlin, Associate Professor
• Networking, Pete Manolios, Assistant Professor at Georgia Tech (UT graduate)
• What it takes to land academic interviews & how to create it, - Kathryn McKinley, Professor
• Preparing for an academic interview, Karu Sankaralingam, Graduate Student
• What I did right, what I would change, & other general advice, Long Huang, Graduate Student
• What I did right, what I would change, & other general advice, JP Martin, Graduate Student

Here are topics that have been suggested for Graduate Advising Day. Add your thoughts! Simply log in and edit this section.

• Selecting exciting research projects
• Choosing an advisor
• Senior vs. junior
• Prominent or not?
• Checking with students
• Picking a postdoc position
• Giving talks
• Introductions
• Prettiness
• Writing papers
• Titles
• Abstracts
• Prof. Dahlin has been suggested as a good person to give this talk.
• Professional Development Seminar on Writing
• Picking a path: Academia vs. industry, teaching vs. research, lab vs. commercial
• Industry vs. Academia panel talk
• How to get an internship / how to be successful at an internship / Internship Panel
• Networking
• At conferences – faculty / students
• Grant writing
• How to teach and advise
• How to manage your advisor
• Switching advisors
• C.v. / resume / statement writing & review workshop
• Preparing your Ph.D. proposal
• Master's career opportunities
• Interdisciplinary research
• Strategies for finishing