My grandma’s been reading my blog and supposedly she
commented recently “It sounds like Katie’s having a great time but when is she
going to get working on her PhD stuff?”.
And the answer is that I have been, kind of…
Yesterday, I gave a talk on SCALE-UP at NUS. It was a pretty good turn-out
considering it wasn’t advertised very well- just a couple last minute e-mails
from my host. Probably three dozen
students showed up and a handful of faculty members. One of the professors was incredibly interested in what I
had to say since her efforts at incorporate active learning didn’t go as well
as she hoped. One graduate student
told me he was interested in getting a degree in physics education, which he
knew he couldn’t do here but North Carolina State University was on his list of
possible places to apply.
Unfortunately, before I finished talking to him, we were surrounded by a
swarm of Reddy’s students for a group picture so I lost him before I got his
e-mail but hopefully I’ll be able to figure it out and find him again.
After my talk, Reddy gave an overview of his research to
give students a sample of the avenues that they can pursue with their
individual projects. He manages
30-40 high school and junior college students with an annual budget of ~S10,000
and manages to get 3-4 papers published per year. He certainly has a gift for finding projects appropriately
matched to his lab facilities, time scales that are realistic for his students
and engaging their intrinsic motivation.
It’s especially amazing when you think about how his work compares with
“real” labs with graduate students and budgets 10-100 times that. His work (co-authored by these
students) is actually getting published in legitimate places! And he agreed to take on a random
person like me, even though he knows our research isn’t remotely related (but I'm not entirely random- he researched me extensively before accepting me and repeatedly says how impressed he is at all the things I've accomplished).
I’ve also been
back to SUTD for multiple observations- once for a lecture (incredibly
traditional and boring) and back for a cohort session (much more fun). Monday night, I was able to meet up
with the girl I tried to meet up with at Hard Rock and actually was surprised
by finding my co-worker from India in the store before I found Lauren. I knew she had been in Malaysia but
apparently she’s not a fan of Kuala Lampur, which she found to be dirty, not
easy to get around and she felt generally uncomfortable. Her favorite part was the luxury bus
ride back (for $15) when she had her own cozy lounge and personal TV. She said crossing back into Singapore
from the border was like entering Oz, when the world turned to Technicolor. Hopefully my Malaysia experience this
upcoming weekend will be better (we purposefully stayed away from Kuala
Lampur)! Lauren is also
super-cool. She’s from Texas
originally, spent a couple years living in Tokyo and now she’s doing a mix of
things, including writing a column about finding organic foods in Singapore. We're going to have a pickling party and she's going to show me how to cook Japanese food on friday.
Dr. Reddy and I and the gang... |
Sentosa at night |
The three of us took the tram to Sentosa, which is Singapore’s “pleasure island” which Universal Studios, a casino, an aquarium, some beaches… a place even more precisely manicured that the rest of the city, which was hard for me to believe. We ate at a Chili’s restaurant and Western food really hit the spot. Lauren was going crazy eating black beans, which she hasn’t had in two years because it’s expensive and hard to get here. I hate how oatmeal, black beans and sweet potato are all nearly impossible to find but those are my main staples back home.
Dinner with Lauren (on left) and Samantha at Chili's! |
This afternoon I went swimming and it was hilarous. The three male lifeguards were listening to Shania Twain "This Kiss". They also had an intense game of kayak-water polo going on where they hit the ball with their kayak paddles. Even on the other side of the mammoth pool, I felt like I was swimming in the rocky ocean seas because they were moving the water around so much. So at least people are still exercising outdoors despite the dangerous smog that is shrouding the city in white and the American government keeps e-mail me warnings about. Everyone's starting to bust out their face masks. They've been burning fires in Indonesia which has raised the air pollution to dangerous levels but I think Malyasia suffers from a similar problem so unfortunately, I probably won't be able to escape it this weekend. At least, in my Dad's words, "it's better than China!"
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