As someone who has recently interviewed for science PhD programs (yikes, scary, omg!), I would caution you that interviews aren't all about listening to the faculty recite on their research. In most of my interviews, I have been asked to discuss particulars of my past research projects, what brought me to the school, where I see myself in twenty years, etc. While there have been opportunities to discuss their research, the amount of time dedicated to this has really varied from faculty member to faculty member.
Honestly, some professors don't think that it's a good idea to come into graduate school with a defined set of research interests anyway, since undergraduate research opportunities can be very restrictive (for instance, I attend a primarily agricultural university, so my background here has been with plants, which might lead me to be predisposed to particular plant-centric projects...). In fact, a lot of the faculty that I spoke to at Top Choice Molecular Biology Program cautioned me that graduate school isn't really about choosing a research focus: that's what post-docs are for. Now...I'm not saying that there aren't people I interviewed with who had been on their path since undergrad, just that most of them seemed to think that the best approach to graduate level research was to not feel pressure to pledge yourself to a particular field just yet (especially not before rotations).
If you're still hella resistant to the idea of interviewing people outside of your intended field, I would take the opportunity to ask them about student/faculty relations, the atmosphere between departments (collaborative? secretive? competitive?), and their own reasons for conducting research. General questions can sometimes provide more insight into the nature of both the program and faculty, and if you don't really dig their research, these might be great times to ask.
Hey...good luck! I just got back from an interview on Sunday, and I'm still exhausted...it can be such a long period of time to be on top of things!
Well thank God. Because don't get me wrong, I love neuro as a discipline and it took me a super long time to even think of narrowing down to Field A. Just, through my past internship and whatnot I've met my fair share of people who've sort of turned up their noses when I go "I like Field A, but fields B, C and D are awesome". I'm glad to know not everybody is like that! ;_;
Anyway, thank you for the advice. I wrote down a couple more names and emailed them to the grad coordinator "as extra suggestions for the To Be Decideds". Hopefully I'll get somebody interesting!
You will probably be pleasantly surprised. I'm currently waiting impatiently for some more of these lists to come to me, and I feel like I have to believe that!
Honestly, some professors don't think that it's a good idea to come into graduate school with a defined set of research interests anyway, since undergraduate research opportunities can be very restrictive (for instance, I attend a primarily agricultural university, so my background here has been with plants, which might lead me to be predisposed to particular plant-centric projects...). In fact, a lot of the faculty that I spoke to at Top Choice Molecular Biology Program cautioned me that graduate school isn't really about choosing a research focus: that's what post-docs are for. Now...I'm not saying that there aren't people I interviewed with who had been on their path since undergrad, just that most of them seemed to think that the best approach to graduate level research was to not feel pressure to pledge yourself to a particular field just yet (especially not before rotations).
If you're still hella resistant to the idea of interviewing people outside of your intended field, I would take the opportunity to ask them about student/faculty relations, the atmosphere between departments (collaborative? secretive? competitive?), and their own reasons for conducting research. General questions can sometimes provide more insight into the nature of both the program and faculty, and if you don't really dig their research, these might be great times to ask.
Hey...good luck! I just got back from an interview on Sunday, and I'm still exhausted...it can be such a long period of time to be on top of things!
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Anyway, thank you for the advice. I wrote down a couple more names and emailed them to the grad coordinator "as extra suggestions for the To Be Decideds". Hopefully I'll get somebody interesting!
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