The ‘Fail Forward’ CV: Adventures in Academia

(A not-so-glamorous collection of bumps, bruises, and bruised egos)

2011: Where Dreams Went to Die

• Dreamed of : Tsinghua University, Peking University, Fudan University, Shanghai Jiaotong University.

   Outcome: Rejected from all.

2011-2015: Humble Beginnings

• No National-Level Scholarship

• No Guo Moruo Scholarship

• Toefl (April 27, 2014): 81

• Course Grades:

• Calculus I: 62 (midterm)

• Organic Chemistry: 62

• Instrumental Analysis: 60

• Topics in Isotope Chemistry: 60

• Core GPA: Below an A (less than 90/100).

   -When ‘average’ starts feeling like an accomplishment.

2015: Chinese Academy of Science Graduate School, Institute of Botany, Rejection

2018: A Year of Almosts

• Research:

-  Lattice dynamics of ferropericlase and bridgmanite under Earth’s lower mantle pressures  (Manuscript that was never finished)

• Excellent Graduate Award, missed!

• Graduate School Applications:

Rice, UCLA, Caltech (interviewed), U Chicago (interviewed), UT Austin.

Outcome: Rejected across the board.

• Advanced Photon Source (APS) Beamtime Proposals: Multiple rejections.

2020-2024: Rejection, Rejection, and Oh!

• APS Beamtime Proposals: Multiple rejected. The streak lives on!

• Brillouin Paper Submission to EPSL: Desk rejected.

• Fellowships that I did not get

- Shultz Energy Fellowship

- Carnegie Fellowship (Earth and Planets Lab)

- Arizona State University SESE Fellowship

- Schmidt Science Fellow