University of Rochester I, a little comedy, a bittersweet farewell

University of Rochester

I was a grad student at the University of Rochester from 1994 to 1999. In retrospect, I would not trade my experiences there for anything. I am deeply grateful to many people there, most importantly my advisor, Emil Wolf,    shown at right at a colloquium lecture at UIUC in 2004.

Pursuing a career in academia is a little like pursuing a career in professional sports, except the pay scales are a little different and the fall back position not quite as far a fall. To ``make it'' one must have a certain combination of talent, accomplishments, personality, pedigree, and contacts. Then one must get really lucky. I am amazed at the number of people I know who would be much better at my job than I am who are still looking for a position.

So, when I write that I would not change a thing, I mean it. It was a delicate, fragile, cascading series of lucky events that gave me the opportunity to land in a tenured faculty job at a top school and graduate study at U of R was a huge part of that diaphanous structure.

A little comedy

I really can't tell my UR story without taking a little air out of the great, over-blown hype ballon that is often encountered in an entering class of grad students. Every year a grad program evaluates how many students they think they can handle, they estimate acceptance rates based on previous years' rates, and they make a number of offers.

In the spring of 1993, UR Physics was looking to bring in 15-20 students for the fall. they made their offers and got 31 acceptances. So they restricted offers in 1994 and brought in my class, a class of eight of the most elite, carefully selected students, the best and brightest class they had ever admitted. We were told this. I'm not sure anyone worried about the message this sent to the class a year ahead of us.

Last I knew, 29 or 30 of the 31 entering students from 1993 finished with a PhD in Physics. The one I am sure didn't finish transfered to a history of science program at another U. Most of those that finished did so in reasonable time, meaning five, six, even seven years. I think there might have been a couple of eight year stragglers. This is a very impressive record for the class of 1993.

After five years, two of my class ( I and Ed Hull ), had finished PhDs. Two more would eventually make it out in seven or eight years. As far as I know, the other four never finished.

My closest friend in grad school was among the four that didn't finish. We studied for and passed the quals together and a semester later Dave explained his decision to quit this way: ``I came to grad school because I believe in pursuing my true love in life. I've come to realize that what I love is money. '' Amen.

I have a lot of respect for Dave because he was able to make a clear-headed choice in a social environment pushing him to ``stick it out,'' as if grad school is just some exercise regimen getting you ready for the day at the beach that will be the rest of your life. If you don't like grad school, you probably won't like the career it prepares you for.

Anyway, our elite little group wasn't so much. I never really believed it anyway, being a subscriber of the Marxist theory of such evaluations. Some people have so much promise they don't have room for anything else. Some people just get busy living.

A bittersweet farewell

We finally get this show on the road tomorrow. We fly out of St Louis at 1:38, spend a few hours in Philadelphia, and take of from there a 9 PM. We land in Schipol at 10:30 AM local time after a seven hour flight. We're all really excited.

So why is the departure bittersweet? 

We'll miss the dog.

We'll also miss being here for the rebirth.