Receiving a PhD offer is exciting! But before you accept, you want to determine if the program, the lab, and your advisor are actually the right fit for you. This post gives you some tips on how to carefully evaluate whether this offer is one you should accept. We'll talk about questions you should ask, who you should talk to, and things to watch out for. If you haven't read the previous post in this series on how to research a PhD program before you apply, it's worth startin

In the previous post in this series, I made the case that research fit matters more than simply getting accepted to a PhD program. If you haven’t read that post yet, I’d encourage you to start there. This post assumes you’re convinced and ready to start evaluating fit. So let’s get talk about what to do before you ever submit an application. Before you dive into evaluating a lab’s research, however, you should understand how graduate school admissions in the US work. I’ve wri

One of the most common mistakes PhD applicants make is prioritizing acceptance over fit. Getting into a program feels like the goal, but it's really just the beginning, and what you're getting into matters as much as getting in. I once knew someone who started their PhD because they didn't get into medical school. In a panic because the new school year was about to start, this person decided to do a PhD in the first lab they could find. On the surface, a PhD in a biomedical f

I recently reconnected with one of my former PhD students. We reminisced about his time at the university as well as how his time away provided some perspective into the whole graduate school process, student-advisor interactions, and factors that help students be successful. This conversation and conversations with my current PhD students underline the concept that the skills that make someone successful as an undergraduate do not necessarily translate into PhD success. Basi

I was recently invited to serve as a First Editor for the British Journal of Nutrition, which means I might be one of the first people to read your manuscript — before it ever reaches a peer reviewer. The cover letter for your academic paper is an important part of your submission. It’s your first opportunity to make a case for why your paper belongs in this journal. What Exactly Is a Cover Letter for a Journal Submission? When you submit a manuscript to an academic journal,

If English isn’t your first language, writing a grad school personal statement can be tricky. I have another post about writing personal statements in general. You can find it here. After you follow that advice, look at your draft again and see if you’re making these grad school personal statement mistakes: 1) Overly complex sentences Many international applicants write very long, complex sentences because they associate complexity with academic sophistication. In a per

Many strong research papers are rejected because of academic English mistakes, not science. In fact, as an editorial board member and someone who has reviewed many manuscripts as a peer reviewer, if the abstract is written poorly, I’m not going to accept the review request. I don’t have time to fight to understand what the authors are trying to communicate. This post will help you avoid having your paper stuck under review because reviewers can’t be found. You’ll learn five c

I have sat on graduate admissions committees and dietetic internship admissions committees. I have read hundreds of graduate school personal statements. I only remember a handful because the majority of applicants failed to tell a story. For international applicants writing in English as an additional language, this problem is even more common, because so much energy goes into getting the language right that your story doesn’t come through. This post is not about grammar. I

Somewhere in almost every faculty interview, a committee member will ask some version of this question: “What is it about this opportunity that excites you?” Or: “Why did you apply to our department?” Or simply: “Why us?” It sounds like an invitation to be enthusiastic. It's actually something more specific than that. The committee is asking whether you did your homework — and whether what you found there genuinely connects to where your work is going. What the Question Is Re

I don’t enjoy giving academic talks. Weird choice to be a professor, right? Public speaking makes me nervous. Actually, it’s not the speaking part. It’s the question and answer part. I’m always afraid I might not know the answer, or “that guy” who wants to be the smartest person in the room will walk up to the microphone. What I have learned over the past decade is: hostile or aggressive questions are not a sign that your skills are in question. In many fields, they are a sig

Below is a sample email I asked AI to create. While the details are different, it looks almost identical to the dozens of emails I get from prospective students each week. I don’t bother to respond to these emails if they are obvious products of AI and they are not tailored to me, personally. Read each paragraph and note the mistakes to avoid, so that you increase your chances of getting a response to your PhD application inquiry. Dear Dr. [Last Name], I hope this message fin

Interviewing for an academic position in English when it is not your first language is challenging. You are expected to present complex research, discuss teaching techniques, and demonstrate your “fit” within the department all while processing questions in real time. The good news: search committees are not evaluating you as a native speaker during your faculty interview. They are evaluating your ideas, clarity, and professional communication. The first part of this mult

The second part of this multi-part guide provides concrete strategies used in professional Academic English coaching to help international scholars perform with confidence. Interviewing for an academic position in English when it is not your first language is challenging. You are expected to present complex research, discuss teaching techniques, and demonstrate your “fit” within the department all while processing questions in real time. The good news: search committees a

The third part of this multi-part guide provides concrete strategies used in professional Academic English coaching to help international scholars perform with confidence. Interviewing for an academic position in English when it is not your first language is challenging. You are expected to present complex research, discuss teaching techniques, and demonstrate your “fit” within the department all while processing questions in real time. The good news: search committees ar

Don’t know what a logical connector is? I didn’t either until I started to notice students using them incorrectly. Logical connectors are the linking words or phrases we use to connect our thoughts together in complex sentences - words like “however,” “yet,” and “additionally.” You need to match the connector to the actual relationship between your thoughts; that is, are you contrasting or adding to your ideas? These small words can make your writing sound illogical even when

How is academic writing different from writing an essay or even a term paper? The biggest difference, in my opinion, is the need for citations. Citations are the "receipts" that prove your arguments. Here are some examples: “The link between obesity and carbohydrate intake has been studied at length in other research with inconsistent results.” Citations, please! By citing who did this work, you prove it has been done. “These differences could be due to the fact that wo

When I review manuscripts, I often have to ask the authors what they mean due to a lack of precision in their writing. Let’s look at some examples: 1. There was a significant difference between the two groups. Help! How were the two groups different? Did the intervention increase or decrease the outcome of interest compared to the other group? If it’s significant, you don’t have to say “significant”, but you do need to provide evidence. A p-value or some other measure is

Presenting your research is an important part of the scientific process. In most cases, you will need to submit a research abstract to the conference for acceptance. Not all abstracts are accepted, so use the following tips to maximize your likelihood of success. DON’T DO THIS: In many cases, conferences will not accept incomplete research. If you are writing your results section using the future tense, (“We will use logistic regression to determine the outcomes.” “We expect

The saying, “Comparison is the thief of joy” is attributed to American president Teddy Roosevelt. Not to be overly dramatic, but when I heard this statement, it changed my life. For me, it means that I should not be judging myself against the accomplishments of others. I will always be able to find someone else who is more successful than I am in some way. They might have more publications, more grant funding, more citations, more awards. If I compare myself to these people,

The final project for our master’s degree students is a systematic review. The hardest part of this project is developing the research question. The second hardest part is describing the results. The biggest problem: students summarize individual studies rather than synthesizing the information. But what does it mean to synthesize? Before we answer the question about what it means to synthesize, let’s start with a discussion of summarizing because it will help to explain th