First, you must get up early and finish your homework before it gets dark.
Doctoral education in the United States is divided into two stages. The main task of the first stage is learning. Study courses related to your future research direction for about two years, and then take the qualification examination. Students who fail the qualification examination will be eliminated in the first round.
The main task of the second stage is to do research. Under the guidance of tutors, it is the basic operation that doctors must learn to establish topics, conduct cutting-edge research in specific fields, publish academic papers in magazines with high influence in the industry, and report their research results at various academic conferences. Finally, the doctoral thesis is defended, and those who fail are eliminated in turn.
Second, there is not enough discussion in class.
The lectures of American doctoral students in science and technology are not as full of discussion as we thought. Professors will make full use of class time to explain their positions and views on the content, and students will only ask questions in classes that they are particularly good at or like. Because of the difficulty of the course, it is not easy for students to understand it immediately, let alone ask questions and discuss it. But this does not mean that students have no chance to communicate with teachers. In fact, teachers will set up four hours a week to answer questions for students after class, and students usually use this time to discuss homework and curriculum issues with professors.
Third, the qualification examination includes the usual homework.
Because the doctoral program in the United States is much more difficult than the undergraduate program, coupled with a lot of homework, many students are very uncomfortable at first. But it is through a lot of training that I feel that my way of thinking is changing. The purpose of doing homework before was just to solve the problem and finally get the standard answer. Now, homework has become an important tool to help us sort out the context of curriculum knowledge, find problems and try to solve them through reading, searching information on the Internet and programming. This kind of thinking training can make students remember important knowledge points, and more importantly, open up new ideas for future research work.
It is also very hard to go to the United States to study for a doctorate. There is a saying that "no pains, no gains". If you want to gain something academically, you must go all out.