Classes are OVER for the Semester!

Yesterday was my last day of classes for the spring semester! I can't believe it. I still have a final left, which is next Thursday evening, but other than that I'm done until June!

Well, done with classes at least - so I'll have free Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Well, free Tuesdays and Thursdays except for my two weekly therapy clients that I see on Tuesdays, and supervision for those on Thursdays. And of course, not counting the interviews and assessment clients I've already allowed to talk me into coming into work for on those days.

Well.. in theory, it's a break!

Anyway, my Experimental Design professor, Dr. Kirk, stopped teaching us how to design experiments yesterday with about a half hour left in class. He told us he wanted to share with us the three most important pieces of wisdom that he has accumulated throughout his life. (Which, trust me...he's had a while to accumulate said wisdom). It was really pretty neat and felt like a good way to end the year we've spent with him.

His advice? Well, the first thing was really mostly applicable to people in academia. He said to make sure that when you do any research, you need to get at least three things out of it. So he used the examples of a journal article, a poster, a chapter in a book... but he said that you need to make sure you are getting the most out of all the work you do, and to do this, you need at least three publishable things for every project.

Advice #2: Network, network, network. Not only with people immediately surrounding you - really, Dr. Kirk advised against that - he said he spends all his time networking with other quantitative psychologists across the country. He spends hours each week specifically focused on networking with other people in his field! Wow.

And finally, advice #3: Hire the best accountant you can find. It's not how much money you make, it's how much money you keep. And you'll be able to keep the most of your money by working with someone who really knows the ins and outs of the laws. He got more in detail with this, talking about his own business, renting rooms to himself, and municipal bonds...but let's be honest, that's not so much my territory so I'm not going to try to repeat it and risk messing it up. The take home message here was that an accountant is a good thing.

I have no idea what my three pieces of wisdom would be...but it's something fun to think about. Discuss amongst yourselves...