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04_Work-Life_Balance.md

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Note: This document is primarily for graduate students who do research (Ph.D. students or master students who write a thesis).

Assumption: The underlying assumption of having "work-life balance" in a research lab is, regardless of how much you get paid, a graduate student is a full-time job.

Mental Health

Lab Attendance Policy

Ph.D. Working hours (Why you should NOT do a Ph.D.)

  • A Ph.D. student is a tough job because you have to do lots of different works. See this video for more detail. http://pgbovine.net/PG-Vlog-128-PhD-student-challenging-job.htm
  • One of the challenges is that you are (typically) getting paid for less than half your working hours.
  • If you are on an assistantship (GTA/GRA), this means that you are getting paid for the work that you do towards a research project or teaching. Typically it is up to 20 hrs a week. Also, note that taking coursework does not count towards your research.
  • Does that mean that your responsibility is done if you work 20 hrs? Totally. Except the fact that you will not be able to graduate and get Ph.D. if you work only 20 hrs a week because you will spend all of your time on doing something that is not going to be your dissertation unless you supervisor is super-rich and your GRA work or GTA work count towards directly your dissertation and you got multiple publications out of it.
  • For example, there are so many disciplines that have no GRA at all. (i.e., social science, education, psychology, etc.). Suppose a Ph.D. student gets funded via GTA only, and they don't work at all outside their teaching. That means that they are not writing their dissertation, and they cannot get a Ph.D.
  • Some people may be extremely lucky for working as a GRA, and the work that they do directly goes to their dissertation. However, this is not common. (Or you can try your best to use your GRA projects for your dissertation). And it is not the faculty advisor's responsibility to find GRA for their dissertation. It works based on mutual agreement and the availability of the advisor's funding. Given there is limited funding, you would understand that faculty members would love to avoid risks, making bets to students who proved themselves even without GRA already rather than those who they met for the first time or had not been great so far. I am not sure if this is right, but the current education system that evaluates faculty members based on external funding and publication outcomes encourages professors to act this way and to realize that they are not running a charity.
  • Other than 20 hrs a week's responsibility, the rest of the time is up to you. If you work zero hours on your research, that's fine, but you won't be able to get a Ph.D. then. Therefore, advisors have to expect you to work more hours than you are getting paid to, not because they want to get free labors, but it is their responsibility and goals to advise their students to successfully get a Ph.D. More importantly, it is because that is what you signed up for. Yes, you signed up for it. I hope nobody asked (or is forcing) you to do a Ph.D. I discourage people not to do a Ph.D. because it is a financially ridiculous thing to do.
  • Let's say that you are taking two courses and one seminar (7 credits = 7 hours per week) and are working as a GTA (20 hours per week), based on the assumption that you will spend 14 hours per week for courses that you take (7 hrs for attending the class, extra 7 hrs for doing homework, preparing exams). If you work 34 hours a week for your coursework and GTA and still work zero hours for your research, you won't be able to graduate. Even before that, you won't be able to pass the qualifier exam because, typically, it is to check if the student is ready for Ph.D. research. So yes, you won't get to the point where you are done with the coursework requirement and finally have time to work on your research. Therefore you would have to work an additional X number of hours (on top of 34 hours) to make some progress in your research with your advisor. If X is 6, it is 40 hrs a week (a typical full-time worker) but that your progress is going to be slow. If X is 16, you work 50 hrs a week and you will make more progress. if X is 0, you work 34 hours a week, but you are almost guaranteed to get no Ph.D. out of this.
  • Let's face it; why would you want to work 34 hours a week and are guaranteed not to get a Ph.D.? Is this something that you want to do? Doing a Ph.D. is not for everyone. It is for something for those who would have other types of rewarding functions along the way.
  • Some may ask me how many hours do I have to work as a Ph.D. student. That is the wrong question. Also, some people ask me how many years does it take to get a Ph.D.? The right question is, do you want to get a Ph.D.? How quickly do you want to get it? And how many publications do you want to have by the time that you graduate? What kinds of career goals do you have? How many papers does the one who already accomplish what you wanted when they graduated? (Hint, they got to be in the same research areas.) If you have answers to those questions, please figure out how many hours you think you have to work to accomplish your goal. If you are not sure, set X with some non-zero number and see if you are satisfied with the progress. I will be happy to discuss this in person.

Time management

  1. This is purely for research hours
    • Not the hours you spend on other activities (etc., GRA, GTA, coursework, services). X hours in the previous section
  2. Know how much you want to work (Desire).
  3. Keep track of your time (Reality).
  4. Reduce the discrepancy.: Match the reality with your desire, or adjust your desire to match your reality. Be honest with yourself.
  5. I don't care.: I don't care about your desire(1) until 2 and 3 are satisfied. If I have to care about your desire(1) because you are not making any meaningful progress even if 2 and 3 are satisfied, it is probably one of these cases:
    • Your time tracking is incorrect.
    • You are lying (to yourself or to me).
    • You are not serious about this job (e.g., you desire to work 5 hours a week).
    • Maybe research is not for you (e.g., if you work 40 hrs a week, but you are not getting anywhere, that means something).
    • (Which one are you?)

Vacation Policy

  • Being a graduate student is tough and, (hopefully) You DESERVE time off without feeling guilty and work stress. This is important to recharge yourself and gain energy for upcoming semesters. (I call this recharge guilty feelings by doing nothing.). The only thing that I ask you is to let me know in advance so that I cancel the meeting and do not feel offended when you completely ignore me.
  • a graduate student that I advise gets 15 working days off per year. One needs to tell me 2 X N working days before the off-days where N is the number of days that you are going to use for vacation. e.g., If you are going to take a day off on Monday, you have to tell me at the latest Thursday (2 working days before Monday).
  • At the beginning of every academic year (September), you will get new 15 working days (sorry, no rollover).
  • However, if not noted, I would assume that you will be working and responsive (online), regardless of where you are. For example, without prior notice, I will be expecting you to work during the Winter break or Spring break (and I don't recommend that. You need a break)
  • Holidays defined by HR at VT are off by default. (You don't use vacation days on these days.) https://www.hr.vt.edu/benefits/leave/holiday-closing-schedule.html
  • Being on a different physical location does not mean that you are forced to use your vacation day; you can be online and work remotely.
  • You do not have to work on weekends or holidays (defined by HR at Virginia Tech), although you can if you would like to distribute your work flexibly. One of the benefits of being an academic is you can choose the times that you work, which means that you can distribute working hours in any way you want. However, I don't expect you to be responsive on weekends or holidays.
  • Request your vacation without a guilty feeling via this form. No questions asked if you follow the policy. https://forms.gle/kwFWymeUjbrp9gVZA