For our final interview this semester in the How and Where I Write Series (don’t worry, we’ll bring this back in the future!), we sat down with Jasmine Stovall, a fourth-year PhD student in the Biology department. She also completed her MS at Baylor as well. Jasmine studies water quality, specifically how human activity affects drinking water sources. Jasmine is also one of the wonderful consultants on staff at the Graduate Writing Center (GWC), so if you are in the STEM fields and need help with your writing, she is your new best friend. Thank you for giving us this glimpse into your writing habits, Jasmine!
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So tell me a little about where you like to do your writing? Is it an office, the lab, coffee shop?
Jasmine Stovall
To be honest, I haven’t experimented too much, because I find what works for me is just in my living room on my couch. I live alone, so I can control (for better or for worse) the distractions, and I wrote 80% of my Master’s thesis just in the wee hours of the morning, chilling on my couch with TV playing in the background. Coffee shops I like if it’s group writing, but other than that, I’m an introvert so it’s not near as much as I can get done late at night, sitting on the couch.
BT
That leads perfectly into the next question! What are the best times for you to write?
JS
I am a night owl, through and through. I have never been the type of person who operates during normal work hours. I’ve tried, but my most productive hours are between 11pm and 4am.
BT
When do you sleep?!?!
JS
From like 4am to 2pm. I’m telling you, I have tried to change my sleep schedule, and I still get the proper amount of sleep, it’s just not during [normal hours]. I’ll come home at 5 or 6pm, take a nap, wake up at 10, eat, and then…
BT
Wow. I feel like that could really backfire depending on when you’re scheduled to run labs.
JS
Totally. But definitely middle of the night/early morning, but not because I’m an early bird, but because I was already awake is the best writing times for me for sure.
BT
Slight pivot here to talking about the research process. At this point in your career, are you still acquiring a lot of books/sources, or has the pace slowed? And I know this looks different in STEM than in the humanities!
JS
I know, I’m like, books?! Haha. I think now that I’m past proposing [my dissertation], it has slowed down. When you’re really honing in on your chapters and your project and trying to background knowledge, that for me was when the sources picked up, and that bleeds into when you are starting to write your proposal. And that is probably the peak, when it’s been the most that I’ve read. Since defending my proposal, I’ve now switched gears back into really heavy lab work, like data collection, which naturally just doesn’t require as much acquiring resources and reading. When it goes back to interpreting that data, I’ll pick up the books again.
BT
That makes sense. This is fascinating. In ways it sort of like humanities, just like when you’re studying for exams, that’s peak intensity concentration! You’re never as intelligent as you are right after you finish your comps. And then it’s all downhill from there!
JS
Exactly. I’ve become a lab rat.
BT
So as you’re engaging with these sources, how do you capture your research?
JS
Good question. So I typically organize them within my dissertation chapters, but then when I go to read, I am a paper and pen person. Love the environment, I study water quality, but I have to print them! So I organize them digitally on my computer so I can remember why I was reading it, and make a note in the title like “discussion” or “results,” but other than that, I’ll print them, and I’m a highlighter. I like visual organization and reading on the computer just doesn’t – I can’t comprehend it. I annotate, write in the margins, and then at the end of the paper on the backside, I’ll do a quick brain dump. It’s so I can get it out of my head and two years from now when I come back to it, I don’t necessarily have to read the whole thing again.
BT
Now do you immediately start taking down your research or do you begin with sketching out ideas before moving to a more formal document? How does that process start for you?
JS
I am an outline girl. I don’t do well with a document to just word-vomit on it; that doesn’t work for me! The brainstorming happens in my head, and then I’ll open up a Word document and know I have these ideas, so I’ll just start typing key words and then those become the headings of my outline. I’ll have my stack of papers with all my highlights, and then my computer files that say “discussion” or whatever, so then I can start transferring the ideas and the outline kind of fills itself in. It’s a combination of digital, paper, and in my head, but the final product is an outline. Then I’ll just start writing from the outline. It’s not the most organized way now that I sit here and explain it to you…
BT
That’s WAY more organized than how I start, so I’m very impressed! Because you’ve done all that prep work in means that when you’re ready to write you’re really ready to write!
JS
Exactly. I’m definitely a front-loaded writer.
BT
But it’s all writing! So many people think that writing is just forming paragraphs, but all of that, from your summaries on the back of documents to the highlights, that’s writing.
JS
Yes! So once you get to the blank Word document, it’s not as daunting to me because I have all of this stuff. Then it’s just like making it into complete sentences.
BT
I have a professor who requires that; she has on the syllabus: “Fat Outline Due.” It doesn’t need to be pretty, it doesn’t need to be organized, it just needs to a super bumped-out, like “give me everything you have.” Because she’s like, once you’ve done that, even if you change stuff along the way, you’re at least ready to write the paper, because you’ve had to articulate enough of your ideas that you’re ready to start.
So what is some good advice you have received on writing?
JS
Hmmm. That’s a good question. Two things. The first I actually learned about in a Writing Workshop between the GWC and GSA, that was the protect your writing time. That is something that is one of the downsides of being an alone-at-home writer, because it’s so easy to be like, “Well, let me just fold this laundry first….”
BT
That’s why I can’t work at home! I will refold every garment in home to avoid… oh and Netflix!
JS
Yes! Or scrub dishes! So that was something where I was like, “Okay, drag me,” when they said protect your writing time because I think that’s something I don’t do. Because writing time is technically flexible; it’s not like a doctor’s appointment or teaching. You don’t not show up for stuff like that. But I’m learning to treat it like a doctor’s appointment, like a class.
The second piece of advice my PI actually gave to me, and he knows I’m apprehensive [about the dissertation] because I’m a perfectionist. So he told me, “Do something even if it’s wrong.” And I was like… *laughs*
BT
I feel personally attacked.
JS
Yes! I’m rarely speechless, but I just sat there across from him. So I wrote that down in super big, bold letters in my little notepad that I take to our weekly meetings, because I think that could apply to so many things in life, but as grad students, because there’s so much pressure on us to be perfect, hearing him say “Just write it! Even if it’s trash, we have trash to work from! You can’t edit something that doesn’t exist.” So that one hit me really hard because I’m like if it can’t be perfect the first time, I’m not even going to start. It’s such a bad mentality to have when it comes to writing, so “do something even if it’s wrong” would be the second piece of advice.
BT
I try to tell my students that, but they never believe me, so I literally titled the assignment in Canvas “Six Pages of Flaming Hot Garbage” just to remind them “I expect, in fact I am demanding that you give me trash, because at least it’s something that exists in the world instead of the nonexistent perfection that’s stuck in your brain, which is also not real.
JS
Yes! It’s so much easier said than done, because our culture, our society is all about right, right, right. I would argue that in no profession today is it acceptable to be wrong. That’s why we’re so afraid of being wrong! We’re conditioned to be scared to be wrong. But being in a PhD program and doing things that I’ve never done before has taught me there’s so much to learn through your failures, we just don’t give ourselves time to fail or the opportunity. But nine times out of ten, your “hot flaming garbage” is way better than you think it is.
BT
Always, because we are way harder on ourselves than we need to be. Okay, so what do you think is your best piece of written work, or the work you’re most proud of?
JS
I think the paper I’m most proud of is this one whitepaper that I wrote for my limnology class. Limnology is the study of inland waters, so think like lakes, rivers, reservoirs. Back when I was here for my Master’s, I enrolled in my current advisor’s class, a class on limnology. One of our final projects for his class was to write a whitepaper, which is kind of like an extended literature review, but on one specific topic. I picked phytoplankton, because that’s what got me into limnology in the first place. It was my favorite, not just because of the quality, but because of the experience and the spark that was reignited as I was writing it. I legit enjoyed it. It was fun to write because I had forgotten that I was as interested in limnology as I was. I had no idea there was so much out there on phytoplankton; I just thought they were cool to look at under the microscope!
So that paper I’m most proud out, not even necessarily from the mechanics and the writing and the grade I got, but just the experience and the emotions I went through producing it. Even if I hadn’t gotten a good grade, I still would have been proud of it. That paper is literally why I’m here today, because he handed it back to me – it was a rough draft, we were supposed to hand in our first draft before Thanksgiving – and when we got back he basically told me I didn’t need to turn in another one. And I was like, what?!? He wrote on the paper, “Wow, this is the best whitepaper I’ve ever read in my fifteen years of teaching limnology. You’re currently pursuing a Master’s, right? Any interest in a limnology PhD?” And I was like, “What is happening?!”
So that paper holds a special place in my heart. I still have it hanging on my wall, because when I’m having bad days or questioning why I’m here, looking at that helps me to remember my “why.”
BT
That’s awesome. Okay, tell me the names of a couple favorite scholars from your field of study.
JS
So the first one that comes to mind is Patricia Glibert. She is a super seasoned limnologist. She also does water quality work in marine as well as freshwater, which makes her papers really interesting to read. I cite her so much. If you look at my dissertation proposal bibliography, she’s just a whole page!
BT
Okay, last question: what is a book you should have read by now but haven’t? And this can be within your field or in general.
JS
Ugh, so many. Within my field, definitely Stoichiometry.
BT
What is that????
JS
Okay, so stoichiometry is a relatively new concept in aquatic ecology that has to with, well, biological organisms can only grow as fast as their limiting nutrient. So if you think of a barrel, it has planks, right? Imagine all of those planks are different heights, and you’re trying to fill said barrel. The barrel can only be filled as high as the shortest plank.
Similarly to that, all organisms – humans included – but specifically looking at aquatic organisms, can only grow as fast the nutrient that they need, the one that’s limited. So stoichiometry is basically a bunch of ratios of the different nutrients like carbon and nitrogen and how those ratios fluctuate, and how that effects grow and reproduction of organisms.
BT
Wow.
JS
So I’ve read a couple of chapters to help me prepare for my exams, and I cite it a decent amount in my proposal. But it’s a book that, as a limnologist, I feel like I should have read by now from cover to cover at least once. But it’s dense!
And a regular book, oh there’s so many. All of them. Catcher in the Rye, Little Women, I’ve never read that.
BT
That’s just a fun, chapter before bed situation. It’s a delight.
JS
Maybe that’s a morning coffee book.
BT
That’s a total morning coffee book. Not so much Stoichiometry!