The Research Internship Saga
So, after months of struggling, looking for research internships at a decent university abroad, I finally landed an intern at the École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), under a prof of my choice. I wanted to pen down this experience of me applying to the Summer@EPFL program.
Disclaimer: The article is going to be unconventionally long and unorganised because I just wanted to get the thoughts out of my head, without caring much (at all) about the structure at that point.
History
Just like any other CS Sophy, I also wanted to get an intern in the coming summers (who wouldn’t..lol) and what would be better than a research intern abroad in the field of your choice (I know, my opinion is certainly biased at this point). Perks of getting a foreign internship struck upon me, when I saw my facebook feed being filled by all sorts of embarrassing and weird photos of seniors getting the interns. Being a freshman and totally naive at that time, posts like these would be the last ones that should be accepting comments like “Congratulations!” and other wishes, according to me. But, sighh! that’s how things were. So, just like any other curious being, I started researching about these internships and what are the benifits of getting one. That’s when I made up my mind, to try to get one after my sophomore year!
But wait…why research internship and not others? (Going into tangents again..smh) Ahh, I am afraid trying to pull that answer out of my head in this post would be sufficient enough to get the readers away from the blog and would totally lose the point of writing it. So, let’s keep it for some other day :smile (some other post).
Time to act
Looking on the internet, I came to know about various programs that could help you land an internship. So, I researched about these programs back in September (before the online sem was going to start) but since none of the programs was open at that point of time, the only thing was to wait for them to be opened. With never ending cases of the virus and uncertain times as these, my hopes for these programs opening for next summers started fading slowly.
That’s when I got to know about the process of apping. Apparently, this involves sending mails to professors of your choice and expecting them to give you a project based on your skills. The process is called cold-mailing. And yeah, the cold nature that profs attain after recieving your mail justifies every bit of the name (Jk). The number and kind of replies you end up receiving are good enough to bring you back to the ground and diminish your motivation for applying any further (although I sent only 5 mails and got back 3 replies, with prof telling all sorts of reason as to why you aren’t the one :P).
With the start of online sem, which was hectic enough to distract you from most of the worldly affairs, I totally forgot about apping for the time being. But forgetting it wasn’t easy and the hopes of those programs opening, reinstilled when I got the news of three of my friends from IITB getting a research intern at top universities in Europe. This certainly meant that univs are gonna open their programs this year as well and I was again on track looking for opening dates of the programs, so that I don’t miss any of those.
Applying for Summer@EPFL
I came to know about the Summer@EPFL program through a senior at IITB who got qualified for the same. Fortunately, he also got selected in his second year of bachelor’s and therefore, I kept my hopes high for this program. But honestly speaking, there was something bugging me at the back of my mind, a voice that suggested that there can be nothing good coming out of this program for you (by extrapolating my failure at apping). So, I kind of lacked the motivation for applying and as a result procrastinated preparing the documents for the same till the very end of the deadline. Nevertheless, I successfully prepared all the documents and was able to choose my top 3 professors whom I wanted to work with.
With assignments being thrown at you every other day, I almost forgot about my application and went back to normal routine. I also stopped apping completely, and thought to continue once my EndSems would get over.
The Day
The time between 14th-19th of Dec was a break from the endsems, since there was only one exam left. So, I planned to spend the few initial days as a break. It was 15th of Dec. I was on my exercise routine in evening after which, I checked my phone for notifications. Found that there were a few groups with 10+ messages on whatsapp (pretty normal during endsems) and a few notifications about mails. During normal times, the mail part is the least that I care about, as we tend to receive all sorts of useless mails on the common mailing list. But, since this was endsem period, so it becomes necessary to check them regularly. There were around 5 mails left to be read, and as usual most of them seemed dull, except one!
The mail came with the subject Summer@EPFL, which I had least expected to receive specially in such a short duration after applying. I almost forgot, for a moment about those 30+ pending messages on whatsapp and started reading the mail with immense concentration. It came from a postdoc working with one of the profs in my preference list and that they have pre-selected me as a potential candidate and wanted to have an interview with me. But the thrill doesn’t end here, they wanted to hold the interview within the next 3 days. Ok! Now we see a problem. As if just the thought of having an interview for one of the best labs in the world was not enough to worry me, preparing for the endsem of an 11 credit course did just so good to scare the hell out of me. So, I told them to conduct the interview on 18th, so that I get ample amount of time to prepare for the same.
Now, I had to plan the next few days to study about their projects(which mostly had things that I haven’t read about before) and to prepare for the endsem as well. Since, doing both of them would not be possible in such a short duration so I had to set my priorities (For those of you, thinking about those 30+ pending messages. Yes, I did read them eventually xD). I went with preparing for the interview and giving some of the time in between to preparing for the exam. But preparing for the interview, I almost forgot about an endsem waiting in the corner for me. However, I do not regret any moment of doing what I did, since I enjoyed every bit of that. (Gotta admit, this looked like a biggg gamble at that point lol).
Interview
It was 18th of Dec. I was done with what I had to do related to reading about stuff. What was still left..was how to go about presenting myself to them. What all things I will talk about? what all they can ask? At this point, it seemed like I had more questions in my mind than they had for me in the interview. Then I did, what I am good at doing in such situations…I imagined the whole set-up in my mind and started practicing. (Sounds hilarious, doesn’t it?!) So, I had my script ready as to how to start the talk, how to carry it forward and all (I even took various scenarios under my consideration as if mapping some if-else statements in my head). Tomorrow’s ESC201 exam was the least important thing for me at that point of time :P.
So, I was ready with my script and entered the virtual meeting, expecting it to go, just as I thought it to go. (Un)Surprisingly, the things started digressing from the start itself except a few general things which I expected to be asked. Therefore mostly, I was all on my own during the interview. Good thing was that the postdoc taking the interview was very patient and I never felt slightest of discomfort during the interview. I was successfully able to state things that I wanted to state and the interview went well according to me.
Now coming to the things which mattered the least (both for me and for this blog) - The endsem exam. I did not have much time in my hands, so I just visited the lecture slides once and went through the previous year papers in whatever few hours I was left with.
What Happened? The Results
This was not much of a surprise now, since I knew, the interview went well from my side. I received the offer from their side the very same day and BOOM, ACCEPTED!!
Coming back, the things which mattered the least before, mattered the most now. I was not able to get a good sleep due to my lack of preparation for the exam. Fortunately for me, the paper turned out to be easy and I was able to perform decently enough to end up with a good grade.
In the end, all the months of fighting for getting a research internship ended with a deep slumber.