[ See my 29 slide 3/10/2011 presentation: PPT version and PDF version ]
I was invited by Professors Katherine Faber and Prem Kumar to join them and ~35 undergraduate Murphy Scholars for dinner on March 10th, 2011, at the McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL.
The faculty of McCormick select about a dozen incoming freshmen each year for this honor, attempting to identify students who they believe may pursue graduate studies and eventually become researchers and faculty members.
To prepare for my ~40 minute talk, I asked to chat with a handful of these Murphy Scholars. Each of them was thinking about their professional future, and wanted to hear from me about the choices I faced and the decisions I made. So that is what I covered in some depth in my talk.
Outline of my talk:
- Family context
- Undergraduate experience
- Summer jobs
- Full-time jobs
- “Retirement”
- Advice
- A few books
- Q&A
While more than 8 years have passed since this dinner, I’m still quite happy with the advice I gave to these undergraduate students. 🙂
Ben Slivka 