I love this place.
The morning started with a bus tour of the town. First stop on the map, Michigan Stadium.
I am not a sports fanatic, not in the least bit, but just walking around Ann Arbor and seeing the sports paraphernalia plastered around every corner made me want to feel the team spirit. Football in particular seems to drive people batty and touring the stadium showcased the true extent of this.
We drove up to the stadium to be greeted by a large yellow M on the back of the most massive LED screen I’ve ever seen, with ‘Michigan Stadium’ elegantly written on a gate below. An older man, clothed head-to-toe to blue and yellow directed us out of the bus and into the VIP area of ‘the big house’.
The group of 30 of us piled into elevators and were taken to the exclusive fifth floor. The interior of the stadium smelt of plastic and lysol, and the trophy encased in glass shined bright in the sun. The man led us into a room overlooking the stadium with a kitchen and theater seats arranged into 2 rows of eight. The room next door was of the same layout and separated from us by a piece of glass that I first mistook for a mirror of the room we were in. The older man came in and told us some facts about the stadium:
- Michigan Stadium is the biggest stadium in the US, and it’s record capacity was in 2011 during a football battle against Notre Dame in which 114,804 people attended the game.
- By 2011, a $226 million (yes, really) renovation on the stadium was complete. The original stadium was built in 1927 for a mere $950,000. In the pictures below you can see the separation between the new and old portions of the stadium by the color of the bleachers.
- The room we were standing in is available to rent with a minimum 3 year contract, at $855,000 per year (that price is made slightly better by the fact that renting this room is considered a donation to the stadium and is therefore tax deductible). Here’s the view from the room:
This tour just kept getting cooler. Next, we were led to a place where few people are allowed to set foot: the home team’s locker room, and I have never seen a more beautiful place that is supposed to be so dirty. All locker rooms I’ve ever been in have all been similar, with metal lockers lining the walls, some sort of easy to clean floor, and a stench that can only be attributed to years worth of sweaty humans inhabiting that room, but this one was completely different. The floors were carpeted, it smelt good, and the lockers were wooden and huge. A large yellow M was barricaded on the floor, the man told us that it’s bad luck for the players to step on the yellow M before a game, and continued to tell us that on the central campus a metal M is embedded in cement and it’s tradition for students to not step on that until after their first exams (silly superstitions).
We left the locker room and went down onto the green allowing a few people throw a football around. I imagined what it would be like to have the bleachers filled with roaring people staring at me, it was a terrifying thought. (Also, that is indeed snow on the edges of the field! So cold!)
We said goodbye to the stadium in south campus and took the bus through central campus, and finally up to north campus, where our interviews would be held. Ann Arbor is a college town, literally the college is spread all over the town. It reminds me of Cambridge University in the fact that you can have a class in one building and have the building next door be a corner market with nothing to do with the school, except Ann Arbor is nothing like Cambridge in size. This campus is huge. I thought UCSD was big, but at least the campus there is centralized, UMich is stretched out across town (and expanding!). I cannot imagine living in Ann Arbor without a car, especially in north campus where it seems many of the BME courses would be held, though a bike may make it feasible.
Before my first interview another prospective student and I were taken out to lunch at Panera by 2 grad students in the department. They gave us a few hints on topics to bring up at the interview including: expectation of students, size of lab, papers published by graduation, and average years until graduation. These topics proved invaluable when awkward silences were starting to brew in some of my less successful interviews.
At 12:00, I went in for my first interview. I was really excited for this one as I thought the research this person is doing was exactly what I wanted to do, but I was wrong. The conversation did not flow well and I found myself struggling to find topics to talk about. I left that interview early to avoid further awkwardness. That was luckily the worst interview of the day and made the good interviews feel that much better. Out of 7 total interviews, I had 3 favorites and they all had similar traits: the research involved some sort of biomimetic biosensor or diagnostic system, conversation was fluid and upbeat, and my questions were fully answered and explored. My favorite interview went overtime by 30 minutes, I’d say that’s a good sign.
Interviews ended at 6:00pm and we were then served a variety of cocktail foods, including delicious chocolate covered strawberries. Prospective students, current graduate students, and faculty members all intermingled for the next two hours. I tried to talk to as many people as possible and learn a bit about them. I was pleasantly surprised to strike up a conversation with two other prospective students about David Lynch movies, and even more surprised to find a current graduate student who has written and published fiction and continues to do so through his BME studies (neat!).
The graduate students took us out to Buffalo Wild Wings for drinks and more substantial food at 9:00pm. The waitress serving our large group was adamant that once we chose a table, that we did not move, so less mingling went on at dinner and deeper conversations developed between the few people I was sitting with. Conversation did eventually dry up, so I challenged a few of the men to a game of pool. We played doubles and my partner was skilled with the cue. My team won both rounds, and somehow I ended up with a battle wound on the knuckle of my thumb that is just as bad or worse as wounds I’ve received from the recoil of a hand gun. My thumb was a bloody mess, but the hostess found me a blue bandaid to wear in the spirit of UMich (Go big blue?).
It was shortly past midnight when most of the party went back to the hotel, but a group of about 10 of us headed out to get a better taste of Ann Arbor. The grad students led us to Mash, a facility that used to be a hall for salsa dancing, now turned into a whiskey bar with live music. I was stoked to walk in to a dimly lit, cave of a bar that looked like it’s been around since the prohibition and see a rockabilly band, complete with an upright bass playing songs from eras past. The room was energetic with people dancing in front of the band. I was fine to stand but the writer grad student was able to grab a table for the two of us. We talked for a while before we both decided it was necessary to join the fun on the dance floor. I pushed my way into a group of the most fun dancers and made a fool of myself with them. Apparently, a little confidence goes a long way; my lack of caring about my goofy dance moves somehow convinces people that I know what I’m doing.. I was even complemented on my moves by another girl. I tried to cool off, but a local Michigan boy dressed in a red plaid shirt, just as you would expect a Michigan boy to be dressed, asked me to dance before I could sit for long. Together, we continued to make good fools of ourselves. I met back up with what was left of the group as Mash was closing and we all walked back to the hotel. Sleep was much deserved that night.
BME/BioE Grad Interview Adventures 