Undergraduate Research

All my plans were disrupted by my year abroad in China. I had taken the Junior Honors Seminar in spring 07, with a plan to write my thesis during the 07-08 school year. I had an adviser lined up who was interested in and knowledgeable about my project. But then China came and no thesis got written during the 07-08 school year. This wasn’t a problem, since I planned to write my thesis in summer 08, defend it in the fall, and then graduate in December 08/January 09. A snag: my adviser wouldn’t be at W&M the summer or fall of 08.

So those are the circumstances. I talked with the lovely people at the Charles Center, who suggested I find another adviser—they didn’t want a “rogue thesis” on their hands. After dragging my feet for some time in the hope that the situation would magically resolve itself, I eventually e-mailed another professor in the English department and asked if she would be willing to advise me. I’m waiting to hear back, so I’ll update the blog when I find out.

           Lessons to be learned:

1) Switching advisers is not the end of the world.

2) Your thesis will not magically finish itself; nor will it magically find a new adviser.

So…
Starting things can be difficult. I know I usually have trouble knowing just where to begin. That goes for this blog as well.
We’re supposed to track the research process as we go along, unfortunately I’m already rather far in. So, I’m going to have to make some stuff up, because I don’t quite remember just what I did, or how I got certain ideas.

My mom hassled me a bit after freshman year; she told me I wasn’t doing enough at school besides classes and that I’d better find something else to spend time on than hanging out with friends. She was right , as I told her repeatedly in order to get her off the phone, and I’d had the idea to see if there were any internships available in anthropology, since I already knew that’s what I wanted to major in. I also knew that I wanted to be an archaeologist, and that made things easy. There are four archaeologists in the anthropology department, not counting those who work for CW and teach some classes. I went to the one who’d taught my Intro to Archaeology class and asked 1. would he be my adviser 2. did he have any idea where I could do an internship that semester.

Luckily, the answer to both was ‘yes.’

It’s a good idea when looking for an adviser not just to make sure the professor works with what you’re interested in but also that s/he is someone you get along with. If you get along with your advisor you can pop in to ask questions on everything from what classes to take, to finding internships or grad schools. Thankfully mine has the patience to put up with all three subjects and more. Your advisor is also normally the source of research, whether they have  their own projects going or know someone working on something you’d be interested in. Of course people also seek our research separately if they have other interests, but that can be a lot more work.