"Choosing a lab during the first year of your Ph.D. program is tough. When I started doing rotations, I assumed the most important factor to consider during this decision-making process was the research. I looked through labs’ papers asking, “Is this interesting? Can I think about this for a long time?” While that is undoubtedly a key question for grad school, because you will be sitting and thinking about one small slice of the science world for a long time, I learned during the course of my Ph.D. program that there are a lot of other variables that are worth considering seriously. Had I considered them earlier, it might have saved me a lot of time and trouble."

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