One of the big choices when leaving UMM last year was whether to pursue graduate school or get a job right away. Seeing as the job pool was relatively shallow at the time, that kind of nudged me towards graduate school. I can honestly say, it is WAAAAAY better to be paid to attend school than to pay to attend school. Granted, I have lots of responsibilities with my research on top of the school portion, but getting paid 760 dollars every 2 weeks for a degree I would have had to pay for in any other discipline (Ph.D. in the non-sciences, Med School, Pharm School) is pretty awesome. This, plus free health insurance and all the benefits of still being a student (Hell yeah) are definitely perks. Verdict: Just as awesome as I had envisioned.
Another of the factors in deciding to come down here were the opportunities for Bailey. While she has yet to find the right job for her, at least Tucson has a job market, unlike other cities. In addition to that, she has numerous internship opportunities (most of which start in January) that she can apply for. Plus, if she decides to go back to school, whether it be a masters or some other degree, she has a lot of choices. The U of A has a great anthropology department (one hopefully with teachers that DON'T cause Bailey to completely rethink what degree she wants) with an archaeology subfield, something Bailey has expressed interest in before. In addition, the Art department has an Art History masters or a Museum Studies certificate. Regardless of what she decides to do, at least the opportunities are there, less than I can say for some of the other places I applied (*cough* UAB *cough*) Verdict: Should be helpful in the long run for Bailey.
One reason U of A stood out to me was its outstanding facilities. They had some newly built buildings in the health sciences area of campus, and some of the other buildings were pretty recent. Palm trees are ever present on campus and benches and tables are all over the place outside. Not only is my part of the campus centralized, but walking to class puts me in a good mood, as the sun is always shining and the temp is above 70. While I'm sure other campuses have as good of facilities, none can compete with the weather and atmosphere of the U of A health sciences area of campus. Sidenote- for those who don't know, the College of Pharmacy is in the northern part of the U of A campus, separated from the other parts of campus by Speedway, one of the main roads in Tucson. The College of Pharmacy is near the College of Medicine, the College of Public Health, the College of Nursing, the Medical Research building, the Arizona Cancer Center, University Medical Center, and the Bio5 institute. Despite their state of the art facilities, most of the Pharmacy research is done in the COP building, which is among the older buildings in the health sciences area. While this is unfortunate, as the labs in the Bio5 building are much newer and nicer, it is just a minor complaint. Verdict: Not horrible, but some of the labs could be better.
The current research going on was obviously another factor into my decision. The program I am in is Pharmacology AND toxicology, despite the fact that I am interested mainly in the pharmacology field. Because of this, there are a number of faculty members focused solely on toxicity, and because of the amount of arsenic in the drinking water down here, their research is focused on arsenic toxicity. I had already ruled out rotating with those labs because the research didn't strike my fancy, and I've been lucky enough to rotate through (or be scheduled to rotate through) two labs that I am extremely interested in so far. The first lab was Dr. Catharine Smith's lab, where she studies histone deacetylation and its affect on transcription. This can either silence or turn on genes, changing the normal expressed genome of a cell. The second lab I am rotating in is Dr. Serrine Lau's lab. The particular project I will be focusing on is part of an ongoing clinical study of patient blood and urine samples on diabetes. Without going into too much detail, it should be extremely interesting, and will use some of my chemistry background. Verdict- Great so far, but I haven't figured out my third rotation
Now onto some of the minor things that factored into my decision-
University of Arizona is a D-I school in the Pac-10. Morris was a D-III school in the UMAC. It's no contest. I would much rather watch Nic Grigsby run all over Stanford than watch Ernest Tucker run all over Crown. I'd much rather watch Nic Wise flinging passes to Derrick Williams than watch Big Phil Allen lumber around the paint. Bailey and I have been to two football games so far and plan to go to a third, and I already have tickets for the Red vs Blue scrimmage, the Augustana exhibition game, and the UNLV game on Dec. 2nd for basketball. To me, this can't be reiterated enough: college sports down here, while they were a perk in terms of my decision, have become pretty damn important to me. I love the fact that I can root for my home school in football, attend the games, defend the fact that they are 22 in the BCS standings.
In addition to the college sports, just up the highway Phoenix has every major sport. We went to one baseball game, and while the roof was closed because of the extreme heat, the experience of Chase Field definitely beat the Dome (minus the fact that we were watching the Diamondbacks). Unfortunately, this is the Rockies last spring in Tucson for spring training, so if we want to go to some spring training games in 2011, it will be a little bit of a drive. Nevertheless, great college football, great college bball, and nearly year round baseball (Dbacks, Arizona Fall league, Spring training) makes the sports here pretty damn fun to follow and attend. Verdict- Better than I expected
Another perk to attending here was the weather. Not much needs to be said here...the weather is great. While snow was falling in October in MN, we were enjoying 80's and 90's. This also has the added effect of keeping me in a better mood and better frame of mind, especially in terms of school. Walking outside to class in the midst of palm trees beats trudging through the snow from November to April. Verdict: Basically what I knew was going to be the case.
Then, there were some unexpected good and bad things.-
Extreme heat causing you to want to eat healthy Good
Photo-enforced speeding zones Really really stupid
Copious amounts of restaurants Good for eating, bad for the wallet
No Top the Tater. While this may sound really stupid, it is definitely something I am noticing missing. While most other things that I had in Minnesota are down here, this is the one noticeable item that is not carried in grocery stores. And its not just the brand Top the Tater...they don't carry sour cream, chive and onion dip anywhere. I guess I didn't realize how much I purchased it or used it until I didn't have it. I literally don't buy pretzals anymore because i don't have anything to eat it with. Luckily, I just found this site and may be using it relatively soon. Extremely disappointing
The other item I have noticed missing in stores? Both rainbow and raspberry sherbet. They have rainbow, but it is a different mix of flavors as the kind in MN, so thats a no-go. And they don't even carry raspberry. Just a minor thing, but still noticeable. Eh.
Alcohol is carried in every grocery store and gas station, and its not 3.2 beer. Not like I buy alcohol a whole ton, but making it so that I don't have to go to another store is pretty convenient. It is a small plus.
Obviously the biggest downside to being down here is the lack of family and old friends. That has been pretty hard to deal with, but coming out of Morris, we were already (at least) 3 hours away from family and high school friends our four years there. Obviously the physical difference has increased, but I feel like I am talking with my parents more as a result of the move, keeping the updated on college or just life in general. We have set up Skype and have had some webchats to keep in touch as well. I've been keeping in touch with some of the guys from back home, but it hasn't been a lot or very often. I'll have to make an effort to do that more. Hopefully everyone will plan some visits down here, as it should be gorgeous compared to the bleak snow of Minnesota in the winter. We already have planned visits from my brother (and Pagel), my parents, Bailey's parents, and Courtland, but would love to see others make it down here.
We are planning on making it back over winter break, and will try to catch as many people as possible. Anyways, there is my small update on how things are going so far.
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