A number of graduate students who took the qual Feb 1 2013 agreed to share their experience and tips for preparing for the exams.
A high-level summary:
- Plan ahead. e.g., make a schedule, and keep track of your progress.
- Know thyself! Identify your strength and weakness, and develop a strategy (e.g., comprehensiveness vs. efficiency, see Lulu's response).
- Balance group study time with individual study time.
- Make summary sheets as you study, so that you have a condensed version of the most important concepts to go through for the last week or so!
- Take practise exams seriously (see John's and Mareena's responses).
- Take advantage of the senior grad students (esp. the ones in your group!) and ask plenty of questions.
The following is a list of questions and responses that will hopefully give you an idea of what to expect in the next couple of months. I do want to note that people studied very differently, and this is by no means a representation of everyone!
1. How long did you study for? e.g., how early did you start, and how intense was the studying. Would you recommend more or less studying?
Pun
0-1 month before quals around 8-12 hours a day; 1-6 month before quals around 10 hours a week average
Becky
Started in the summer to try not to lose what was learned from 211 and 106. Meet about once a week to go over 106 and 101 during the summer for a couple hours. We started a little late as a group doing review for 211 and 312 and ran out of weeks before exams in the fall semester to get through the last couple topics. For those two each person was the lead for a topic and brought study guides. It worked well for some things and not so well for others but doing practice problems was always good. It was good to review early, get your mind refreshed, get organized. That way in January every thing feels more like a review because hopefully anything you needed to relearn or learn in the first place was done before xmas break. I think I studied about the right amount because I feel like I reached saturation and couldn't absorb/learn/memorize any more at the end.
John
I basically studied intensely for the month of January, but I had started reviewing in the months leading up to the test.
Mareena
I started studying for the qual about 8 months before, in July. During the summer, my studying consisted of rereading notes and looking over problems. I found it difficult to keep focused while I was away on internship and reviewing by myself so I consider my summer the time I got myself into the right mindset.
The real studying started that fall before the qual. Literally day one, my office mates and fellow study group partners came up with a weekly study schedule that we stuck very close to. Having the schedule helped keep our momentum up and keep us accountable for the material. We would review the lecture notes, in depth! The main goal of studying is to plug the holes in our understanding and make sure we see the larger picture each course is trying to tell us.
During that fall, our studying was pretty intense but we were still taking classes so we had to divide our time. Once IAP started, all we did was review for quals. Literally starting for 8AM to 10-11PM, we reviewed old homeworks, old exams and all the old quals multiple times. I think seeing all the possible ways someone can ask the same question really helped drill the point home. Even with all this studying, they still found a new way to ask it.
Some of my study partners made note cards for each class. I made post-it notes that I stuck them all over my office and also made QuickRead guides for each class that summarized the main points.
In terms of more or less studying, it's person dependent. The important thing is that you are honest with what you do and do not know, swallow your pride and fill the holes. Everyone taking the qual is a potential resource, whether for material or a different type of explanation of a concept. Working as a team toward learning the material helped me stay focused and acquire a comprehensive review packet.
Lulu
Very light study over the summer; listen to classes + cleanup notes + read books (recommend Reuss, Hebert, and Stacy) + weekly group meetings in the fall; full-time study in January.
2. Did you study with people? Would you recommend studying alone, small group, large group etc?
Pun
I studied alone mostly and join study group weekly. I would recommend studying alone then sharing answers and asking questions in group.
Becky
Practice problems with others is great. If the group is large make sure you volunteer to go to the board. Otherwise stick with a smaller group so you can't just slide by nodding your head.
John
I typically study alone, and that is what has worked for me up to this point. For the quals though I really did find that studying with a group was helpful. This is particularly true during the early stages, before January, when it is hard to get motivated to do it on your own, and having a group to be responsible to helps you get started. I also found it to be really useful for the late stages when you are spending so many hours at a desk studying that you start to miss just being around other people. Having group study sessions that remind you that you aren't alone studying for this thing is very helpful. It sounds bad but knowing others are suffering too makes it better for sure, even if you spend half the group study session just complaining about things.
Aside from the group stuff I spent most of my time just sitting at my desk in my room studying.
Mareena
I did study with people and I know it was one of the main reasons I passed. Personally, I like smaller groups (at most 4) where the people have a mutual respect and are equally committed to the goal of passing. It takes these things to not go off on each other while in this high stress situation. Also, every one in the group needs to bring their A game. Its not productive if everyone waits until the day of the study session to review and identify holes. Everyone needs to come to the study session with their questions already identified and an outline of the session needs to be nailed down. There's a lot of temptation to stop early or clown around, but no one really has time for that. An outline helps everyone stick to the script and come prepared.
Lulu
Fall: a big group meets every week to go through concepts. A schedule was made to cover all the major topics, and each person took one topic to prepare notes and lead the discussion on that day. We didn't have much in-depth discussion happening in the fall as everyone was busy, though it was a good refresher on the material.
IAP weekday mornings: a small group to go over concepts and answer each other's questions on practise problems (again we had an agenda for what we cover each day).
IAP weekend mornings: a big group study where we checked answers for past quals & exams.
IAP afternoons and nights: going through notes & practising myself.
3. Any good strategy you want to share?
Pun
Probably heard this too many times, but prepare well and eat well and sleep well before quals. Write up notes of stuff that are hard to remember, and spend your last two days on it.
Becky
Doing all the 312 problems I could find was very very helpful. Doing all of Kord's exams and making sure I knew how to do them was a must especially for the very short answer to make sure I had memorized what was needed. I was ready to derive tons for 106 but never had to on the test.
I recommend making sure you are all organized before January. I then went through each class ~5 days per class and condense the information as much as possible. This was more of a review and memorize time. I also review pset and exam problems for each class to make sure I could apply things.
John
The two big changes I made between the first time and second time I took the test were 1) use flashcards for equations and basic concepts and 2) take practice tests much more seriously.
Point one actually was pretty useful for me, I have never been a flashcard guy, but I started very early on with my studying making flash cards of basic equations, important numbers (cross sections for important nuclides, PWR inlet/outlet temperatures, etc), and just reviewing them any time I got too tired of the really tough stuff but still wanted to do something productive. These are especially nice to review in the final days before the test because you will have built up a huge stack of them and you can feel confident that you aren't leaving anything out, which will decrease any pre-test worries or frantic last-minute searching for odds and ends you might have forgotten.
The second point was far and away the most important change that I made. After the first test it was the advice given to me by Ju Li. You should absolutely take every practice test you can, and not only that but I recommend taking them in as close to real test conditions as possible. I bought some envelopes, printed out the tests, packed them just like they would be for the real thing, and in the final 2 weeks or so of studying (once I had gone over all the topics at least once) I would wake up early, have breakfast, go through my entire morning routine, and go to another room (not the actual test room, though I would recommend that) and take a test starting at 9:00 AM and following the real timing of the test. This way you start to learn what its like to pace yourself on these things, and you start to learn what to do when you DONT know the answer, or when you don't have time to finish a test. You should ALWAYS be writing something. Briefly explain the concept. Explain something related and how this is different. Make a simplifying assumption that may not be what they were looking for but demonstrates that you know the context of the problem and understand what the challenges are, and solve it as best you can.
Taking practice tests should help you with these sorts of things, and will be much more helpful than opening up the test on your computer, getting stuck, an then pulling out a textbook and working through the problem. It is less about learning the material than it is learning how to take the test. You are also practicing your morning routine (not to mention calibrating your sleep schedule for the test), and doing a lot more than you might think to make the real thing less stressful.
As a corollary to this, do make sure that you take advantage of all the folks in the department who are willing to help you prepare for the oral exam as well. Schedule a few practice exams with folks like Jake DeWitte, Bryan Herman, and Josh Richard. They all helped me this year and it was really great to just help me get in the mindset of how to approach the oral exam, particularly since I hadn't taken 22.39 as recently so it had been a while since I had an oral exam. I am sure there are others that would be willing to help as well!
If any quals-takers would like some envelopes to put tests in, or would like to borrow/take my note cards, first ones to come ask me for them have dibs. With the notecards I'd recommend making your own, because just making them is a good learning process, but if you want to see what I did or would rather just study mine I'd be happy to help.
Mareena
BE ORGANIZED AND MAKE A SCHEDULE! This is not something you just jump into. There is a lot of material to learn and a lot of room to be stressed. You can prevent a lot of unnecessary stress if you are organized and prepared. Sounds cheezy but color coding things helps with organization.
Also, DO EVERY PRACTICE PROBLEM YOU CAN GET YOUR HANDS ON! If only for peace of mind, doing the problems multiple times helps drill the points home and also shows you where you need more work. The worst feeling is being on the qual and seeing a problem you chose not to review. You want to bite your tongue off in that moment! So don't let that happen and do all the problems.
Also, these professors love derivations on the quals (at least that's the impression I got). Make sure you know all the milestone derivations, backwards and forwards. A lot of this is understanding but you can get a long way with simply remembering a derivation and reasoning through the meaning after.
Another thing I don't think I expected was how emotionally draining studying for the qual is. Know yourself and make sure you work in a scheduled time to recharge. It has to be worked into the schedule or else it wont happen. Whether its working out, going on a date with your hunny, or reading a chapter in a book for leisure, you've got to recharge. This is a marathon of studying, not a sprint (okay, maybe for some people it was a sprint, but definitely not for me. I worked my butt off studying!) Do the things you need to do to keep your endurance up and your mind at peace. It can be done.
Lulu
Strategy: depend on what your goal is, your strategy can be dramatically different! For instance, if your goal is comprehensiveness (i.e., learning as much as you can in a given amount of time), then you should probably allocate a good amount of time, and start from reviewing books and notes, and follow the flow of the theories etc. However there is always a point of diminishing return, and it is perfectly understandable that you have more important things to do in your life (say research), so if your goal is efficiency or effectiveness (say, pass qual with minimum time spent), then you might want to skip the book-reading and start from the most important topics.
Theories vs. practise problems: for 101 and neutronics (106, 211) going through the theories (definitions, derivations, equations, concepts etc) worths your time, as you will soon find out that the available problems (quals, past midterms and finals) are very similar, and if you don't have your theories all figured out, rushing into practise problems is just a waste of time and a waste of resources (I highly recommend saving the problems to when you are ready to take them seriously without the help of notes or books so you get a somewhat realistic assessment of where you are). On the other hand I felt like for 22.312 practising problems are a lot more helpful than spending too much time on going through the theories.
Summaries: I enjoyed summarizing/condensing material as I go through my notes. It was easy to do with Latex notes as I just start a new section at the end of a chapter and start copying and pasting. It felt great every time I did a round of editing of my notes or added in more material! More importantly, you realize as it gets closer to the qual dates, it is much more efficient to go through your condensed summaries a couple of times, than wasting a ton of time flipping through your entire notes!
Realistic practise: John and Mareena have already stressed the importance of practise exams. I practised going 4-6 hours straight using 312 past exams (there were a ton of 312 past problems), so on the exam day going 3 hours in the morning and 3 hours in the afternoon were not physically or mentally exhausting.
Be positive: make qual prep into a positive experience by staying organized and having a support group. Use whatever tricks you need to make yourself happy! I tried printing out a schedule with check boxes, and checking items off with a giant red marker, and it seemed to help me stay motivated. Also don't forget that the reason you are doing this in the first place is to learn stuff!
4. Things that did not work for you?
Becky
wish I started a few days or a week earlier to leave more room for down time, especially because my oral was early and I would have like to be able to rest my brain a bit more, so about 5 weeks before really get going
John
I think the main thing was not taking advantage of the practice tests.
In terms of taking the test, the thing that doesn't work is to panic. You will miss some questions. You will probably see something on 101 that you have never heard of before in your life. Don't worry about it. Like I said earlier, if you can write a bit about the concept. Maybe make a simplifying assumption. If you can't even do those things (101) just cut your losses and move on. 211 is going to be a LONG test, use the extra time you have saved to really knock that one out of the park, etc. "Don't panic" is a pretty cliche piece of advice, but it is surprising how easy it is to panic if you don't take advantage of the practice tests.
Mareena
Working in large groups. I found those setting were less focused and tended to break into smaller subgroups anyway. Four max was my limit.
Lulu
Oral exam: I spent way too much time during the fall semester preparing for the oral portion. I definitely enjoyed all the material I learnt and the meaningful discussions I had, though I feel like most of them did not directly contribute to my oral exam performance. Check out old oral exams to see for yourself.
312: I spent a good amount of time going through theories and struggled with the-seemingly-countless-number-of-equations. As soon as I started going through practise problems, it turned out there were really a couple types of problems, and for each type you use a very small subset of the equations learnt in class.
5. Any other feedback?
I saved Dave’s response to this section -- enjoy! -- Lulu
I started studying after finals in December. The first thing I did was try the 2008 exams--and I concluded that I was in big trouble. The other years' exams had a similar effect.
So for about two weeks I cancelled the rest of my life. No hanging out with friends, no alcohol, waking up/going to sleep early and started working through course material. Going through derivations, looking at old psets trying to approach the whole experience in a disciplined and professional manner. I reminded myself that I do care about knowing the subject material.
I made a critical decision to soak in the experience I was having and see quals as an opportunity to show the breadth and depth of my knowledge.
During this two weeks in late Dec I was working alone. This was key not asking for help from anyone until I had done my due dilligence. Then the four weekends of morning quals review started. I was still very far from where I wanted to be, however I had reviewed the concepts and was getting better with the previous years quals.
Then one weekend I took a break friends, lots of alcohol, and I let myself enjoy it without worrying that I should be doing something else. My mind drifted, and I didn't try to force it to come back. After about three days I started studying again. I think periods of intense study can be counter-productive beyond a certain point but that may just be how my mind works. (If you're into it and excited by your work then this may not apply in the same way.)
I also ate takeout and delivery morning noon and night. No expense was spared ... sushi 5 times a week whatever, I knew I was only doing this once (regardless of the outcome). Again, knowing my own psychology and how to keep my imagination vivid and optimistic is critically important to performing under stress. Other day-to-day lifestyle decisions were optimized for this process as well.
After the first weekend group meeting I started to study with others a lot more. Presenting my reasoning and answers definitely reinforced what I already knew and taught me a lot more it made a lot of things very solid that I may have had a more tenuous grasp on before.
As the written exam approached I decided that I wasn't going to worry about 101 so much, and would put my greatest efforts into 312, 211, and 106. I still covered everything I thought I should for 101, but 312, 211, and 106 seemed to exist in a more well-defined space. Given enough review I thought those three would be manageable and that even doing poorly on 101 would not depress my overall performance that much.
Also in the final weeks I reinforced my positive view of the exam as an opportunity to showcase my hard work. I had to be careful about complaining to myself in my own mind and continue to apply myself fully without judging the process. I reached the state where I thought if I didn't make it after that much work{}then maybe it's not for me. I did not have a second chance because I knew I am leaving in the summer no matter what and that coming back three years later and having to take quals would likely not be something I'd be willing to do.
So that was it. I had one chance. I decided to accept the experience without regard to the outcome, and did everything I could.
In the last two weeks I was starting to get saturated ... and knowing that that was happening was unnerving. I started to do things that I normally do not, like drink beer while studying. The weekend before I had my oral exam I went out to a houseparty and let loose (I think pictures of that party are on Facebook).
I can condense any advice I have to give into four basic ideas:
1. View this in a positive light, as a chance to reveal your brilliance.
2. Start your work alone and push yourself as far as you can before working with others. A couple serious, dedicated weeks can accomplish this.
3. Then embrace working with others and debate anything that is not fully understood.
4. Finish your major effort before the last week. The last week before the written is a time to review your study so far . . . not necessarily to be digging deep into new things.
Also, for the oral exam, no matter what they ask you, and no matter what you think about how you are doing remain confident. Imagine you are giving a talk at a conference. You wouldn't be there if you hadn't earned your place. Prepare, give it your honest best, and don't worry about it.
Credit:
Becky Romatoski
Mareena Robinson
David Allan Bloore
John Hanson
Pun Dumnernchanvanit Ittinop