I find a book titled Good Manners for a Little Princess. I just wanted people to know it was NOT OUR Kelly Chapman who wrote it, although I kind of wish she would have. Maybe if she READ the thing…
Day: April 16, 2013
I used to eat the Carl’s Jr./Hardee’s Low Carb hamburgers (no bun included) because I was on an Atkin’s diet. Now I eat them because I really like them a lot. It causes some problems, though. Kelly told us she learned in her Agribusiness marketing class that ALL Carl’s Jr./Hardee’s marketing is aimed exclusively at men. I got a real-world view of that today when Lorena and I ran down to get me a Low Carb burger. She refused to eat anything from Carl’s Jr./Hardee’s. Instead, we drove through Wendy’s first to get some food more fitting for a female after which we got my Low Carb burger than sat and ate together in the car.
Day 603 of 1000
We have two kids about to finish their Junior years at North Carolina State University. Both of them want to go to graduate school, but they have very different goals. Christian, the Applied Math major, wants to go to a tier one University to get a PhD in Control Systems with the idea that he will work as a researcher in industry when he gets out. Kelly, the Statistics major, wants to get a one or two year Masters degree at a school known for its close association with industry so she can get a good job and start her “real” life. This summer, both kids will travel to a number of universities on the west coast to talk to professors before for they start applying.
It has always seemed that things work better in both business and school when people have a personal connection with each other. I have two good friends from Russian. One, Stepan, has a PhD in Chemistry from Moscow State University and has done post-docs at University of Texas at Austin and University of Houston. The other, Igor, has a PhD in Mathematical Physics from Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology and has worked as a scientist at universities in the US and Europe. They have a very interesting outsiders view of post-graduate education in the United States. They both highly recommended that the number one criteria in selecting a graduate program is to find the right professor to serve as your thesis adviser. The best way to chose a good thesis adviser is to research and go meet as many of them as possible.
That makes a whole lot of sense to me. People are a lot more important than than institutions. So, based on that advise, the kids have started doing research and writing introduction letters to professors at a number of universities they think they might like to attend. The plan is to talk face-to-face with as many professors as possible to increase the chance they will be accepted into a good school and to be able to make an informed decision about which program is best for them. I will write more about the process as we move through it.