I write this from my home state of North Carolina. I am now roughly halfway through the PhD program. 2024 was a very chaotic (*) year full of stress, overload, and breakdown, however, it has also been full of opportunities, moments of joy, and achievements.

(*) For the purposes of this blog post, I’m speaking about my personal experiences as a math graduate student, but I would be remiss to not mention the political turmoil overseas, especially in Ukraine, Israel/Palestine, Syria, and also domestically with our recent headache of an election. This has truly been a chaotic year that has tested the limits of our diplomacy and democracy, and we seem on track to stretch its limits and test its resiliency in the coming years. I admit I do not know much about how to go about this, but to put it simply, we’ll need to fight for each other.

I’ll start back in August 2023, because I consider the past three semesters to all have built up to the state I am currently facing. By this point, I had completed 5 classes, started to attend conferences in the area, and spent a summer visiting my family in Korea and interning at Los Alamos National Lab. So what did I do next? Well, I honestly have to break it up into multiple timelines.

Academically

  • Third attempt on comps. Passed algebra, failed topology.
  • Took differential topology and knot theory. Learned enough to pass the topology exam following semester, but decided it wasn’t for me. Oh yeah, I passed comps!
  • Began meeting with my now-advisor Josephine Yu about problems in Ehrhart Theory. Declared advisor in May. Continued working with my advisor and another student throughout 2024 to conduct primary research.
  • Got overwhelmed in Spring 2024, barely pass one class in Tropical Geometry.
  • Finished my remaining course requirements in Fall 2024 by passing Numerical Linear Algebra and Enumerative Combinatorics. I am now done with classes, in both senses of the word ``done”.

Research

  • Wrapped up my first internship project at Los Alamos.
  • Joined a second internship project at Los Alamos for the summer of 2024, resulting in a paper approved for publication!
  • Began PhD research with my advisor on Ehrhart Theory. We make some good observations and a list of future directions. However, I am stretched thin and unable to complete as much as I want/should.

Volunteering and School of Math activities

  • Spent 3 months as an event organizer for GT6000, Georgia Tech’s introduction to grad student life. A rewarding experience but also exhausting.
  • Spent 7 months as a primary coordinator for High School Math Day. As rewarding as that was, it was also exhausting and I have since entrusted HSMD to a capable team.
  • Elected as Graduate Student Representative and begin attending weekly commitee meetings. Also hosted a bunch of events as part of Grad Council in Fall 2024. This is the area in which I perhaps stretched myself the furthest in terms of my time. My terms continues until May of next year.
  • Mentored two undergrad students as part of DRP! Thanks Graham and Richard for a great semester - I’m impressed by your curiosity and openness and hope you continue learning more in the future!
  • At the peak of my busy schedule, I gave two different student lectures on the same day. Never doing that again.

Travelling

  • Gave a poster at CLSAC 2023 in Annapolis, Maryland, as part of Los Alamos duties. Also attended AMS Southeastern Sectional Fall 2023 in Mobile, Alabama!
  • Attended the AMS Eastern Sectional Spring 2024 in Washington, DC and GTA Philadelphia at Temple University!
  • Attended ECCO 2024 in Popayan, Colombia! I wrote a whole blog post about it!
  • …and I hope to travel even more in 2025…

And other fun things…

  • Attended all the conventions in Atlanta (DragonCon, MomoCon, Anime Weekend Atlanta)!
  • Went on hikes to Stone Mountain, Sweetwater Creek, and Arabia Mountain in Georgia! Also went to Lake Tahoe with friends!
  • Hung out with friends. Highlights include GT Football Games, gatherings at Emmy Squared, seeing Hamilton in February, music jams, and hosting my first ever party.
  • Began improv comedy in Fall 2024 - I am now a member of Let’s Try This and I look forward to Monday evenings doing improv :D. I also finally got around to doing a few open mics in 2024.

  • My niece was born this year

    and she brings so much joy to our now larger family.

In Summary, Burnout

As grateful as I am to have traveled the places I’ve gone, met the people I have, getting to do the things I’ve gotten to do, and helping those I helped, my schedule this year has led to a gradual and painful burnout that really kicked in around November. I’ve just been moving from place to place, task to task, project to project, and yeah, it was crushing. I’ve helped out a LOT of people in the School of Mathematics, finished my coursework and comp exams, started research, and even contributed to an accepted paper, but I’ve had too much on my plate for quite some time, as my close friends and family could (and would) point out obviously in retrospect. Do I regret having taken the speedrun route to finish out my remaining non-thesis requirements? Or do I regret having done the volunteer positions I’ve done? No. Were both of these things taxing? Absolutely. I’m grateful and proud to have done what I’ve done, but it has forced me to reconsider my work-life balance and to shift my priorities going into 2025. So what do I do?

Plans for 2025

Well, now that I’m done with classes, I’m trying to set a stricter work-life balance, and for me that roughly means:

  • Morning: focus on Math research and nothing else. For Spring 2025 I’m going to attend a virtual class on computational commutative algebra and algebraic geometry, but that’s it for me personally other than my few other commitments (grad council, grad committee, teaching, algebra seminar) - I’m trying to keep them to a reasonable minimum.
  • Afternoon: focus on self-care/writing. Try to exercise more (I got a bit lazy this semester) and fall in love with cooking again (it got taxing this year to take care of myself, but honestly that’s kinda what I need to do).
  • Evening: focus on comedy. Go to open mics. Do more improv. Go to events with friends. Atlanta is a good city for this sort of stuff (music/theatre events). (EDIT: But also feel free to stay in if you need to…)

I’m essentially making a bet on myself that instead of overloading my schedule with a bunch of different parallel topics, that if I just focus on one, even if it’s for half the normal time I would work, then I can make good progress. Especially since I’m in two creative fields (math and comedy) that both require time. I have been trying to rush myself for the past few years and now I’m a space where I don’t have to… so… I shouldn’t.

And of course, more time with my family and niece is always appreciated. I am also trying to spend more time with friends and build up some friendships I might have lost.

Finally, I am working on a travel/internship schedule for this year and I hope I’ll get to visit some cool places in the process.

Here’s to 2025.

We’re halfway there…