How I Studied For My Qualifying Exam: Part 1
One of the most stressful parts of my PhD experience was preparing for my qualifying exam (QE). In the UC Davis Chemistry Department, the QE is a three hour oral exam taken in winter or spring of a student’s second year. The exam is judged by an assigned committee of five professors (four as of 2020) that evaluate the student based on two different “halves” of the exam: the first 90 minutes are dedicated to discussing the student’s completed research and future directions, and the second 90 minutes are general knowledge questions. In the second half, the professors can ask any question that they expect a second year graduate student to know, including all of undergraduate and graduate level chemistry. In essence, the goal of the QE at UCD is for the graduate student to demonstrate that they have made reasonable research progress, can think critically about their research, and have enough general knowledge of their field to complete their dissertation work. The QE committee ultimately decides if a graduate student is able to advance to candidacy, or rather, become a PhD candidate.
At UCD, there are three potential outcomes for a QE
Full Pass: The student can immediately advance to candidacy
Conditional Pass: The student can pass as long as they complete an additional assignment to the standard of the committee (retake a class and get at least a B, retake all or part of the exam, write a paper etc.)
Not Pass: The student can no longer continue as a PhD student in the program
Needless to say, it was a rather anxiety inducing time for me! I had put so much thought and effort into going to graduate school, the fact that it could slip through my fingers if I did not adequately prepare was difficult to grapple with. So in honor of QE season, I wanted to use this opportunity to explain the studying approach I took that led to a full pass on my qualifying exam.
Disclaimer
I believe that the qualifying exam system is broken. I think it’s extremely important for graduate students to remember that humans have inherent biases: faculty have favorite students, they have poor relationships with their colleagues, there can be unspoken competitions between faculty members, a person may be in a bad mood the day of the exam, and there is plenty of internalized racism and sexism throughout academia whether we want to acknowledge it or not. While we can hope that faculty evaluate students exclusively on their science, there is nothing that a graduate student can do about inherent biases. Sometimes you will see students pass who you may not think deserve it, and sometimes the smartest person you know will have to retake their exam. Academia is not fair, and it is important to prepare yourself for these potential outcomes. These biases aren’t unique to qualifying exams either—these biases will exist throughout your entire career.
With that being said, this is how I prepared for my qualifying exam:
Graduate Level Classes
My qualifying exam preparation began the moment that I began graduate school. Some people say that graduate courses don’t matter, but I believe that is objectively false for several reasons. Like I’ve said in a previous blog post, I believe that academics should always strive to know more rather than less. As a result, I sought to excel in my graduate level courses so that I would not only have a good foundation for my research endeavors, but also because I knew that fellowship review committees look at graduate school grades (NSF GRFP, NIH F31 predoctoral fellowship, NIH F32 postdoctoral fellowship etc.). Additionally, I knew that the professors teaching my courses were going to be part of my network for the rest of my career. I wanted to start off on a positive note with the faculty at UCD because I knew I would need mentors throughout my career, and, there was always a chance they might sit on my qualifying exam! The professors that taught my first year graduate courses are still my mentors to this day and they have written me letters of recommendation for fellowships, awards, and jobs for the past six years. One of them was also the chair of my qualifying exam! I took the time to get to know my professors and I believe that ultimately has proven beneficial for my career.
Beyond building my network, the concepts that I learned in my first year courses were critical for passing my QE, and I still use that foundational knowledge to this day. My exam certainly did not go as planned, and I ended up spending at least a third of my first half discussing Kinetic Isotope Effect (which I had learned in my required Physical Organic Chemistry course). I reviewed all of my notes for my three core classes and made sure that I understood each topic that was discussed. If I did not understand a topic, I would look to several textbooks and online resources until I had mastered it. I started passively reviewing my notes in November of 2017 and took my qualifying exam in March 2018. Most importantly, I made sure to study fundamental topics that were directly analogous or relevant to my research because those topics were the most likely to come up in my exam.
Research Progress
I was privileged to join a project in my first year with a research mentor who had already generated preliminary results for the reaction we were developing together. When I joined the project, I was responsible for expanding the substrate scope of the reaction. By the time I took my qualifying exam, we were working on our first draft of our paper and my coworker was working to obtain the last crystal structure we needed for a stereochemical proof of one of our products. I knew that I had enough data to demonstrate my research progress, but I wanted to ensure that I understood the depths of my project. I looked at my reaction, and I simply kept asking myself “why?”
Why are we studying this?
Why are we getting one diastereomer over the other?
Why are we proposing this mechanism for the transformation?
Why do we need X equivalents of base?
Why did we settle on these reaction conditions?
You get the picture. I kept asking myself “why?” until the answer was answered by the nature of protons and electrons, and that was when I felt satisfied with my answer. I continued asking myself “why?” until I didn’t have any more questions about my project. That is to say…. I was consistently thinking about the gaps in my knowledge until the moment I stepped foot in my exam. There was no way for me to prepare for every question they might ask, but I wanted to convince myself that I had done the most that I could to prepare for my exam. If I didn’t pass that day, it wasn’t for lack of studying.
The way that I approached my qualifying exam (and every scientific presentation I’ve given since) was by presenting it as a story. The most interesting papers and talks are structured as complete stories including motivations, roadblocks, resolutions, etc… and I knew that was how I wanted to structure my talk. I organized my research data into a story beginning with the background and motivation for studying the reaction, then I discussed the reaction itself and the problem solving I had demonstrated, and finally, I ended with all of my positive results and my future directions. My exam ended up becoming a conversation about the proposed mechanism for the entire exam, and I actually didn’t end up getting through my entire story. However, the story structure was critical for organizing my thoughts before the exam and demonstrating the thought processes that led me to presenting my research that day.
Ultimately, here is no proper way to study for a qualifying exam. In my opinion, students should be guided by what will make them feel the most confident going into their exam. If a student lacks a strong foundation in general knowledge, they should spend ample time studying the basics. If a student doesn’t have enough research progress, then they should be spending more hours in lab generating data. No two QEs are the same, so the way I studied may not be the way that another student needs to study. I provide my approach because I sought advice from anyone who would talk to me when I was preparing for my exam.
In this post, I mostly talked about what I did to study for the exam. In part two, I plan to discuss what might happen during the qualifying exam, how I approached practice QEs and the general types of questions that students should prepare for. Happy Studying!