Joining the Program

Members of the Stanford community are invited to join MBC as training faculty, affiliates, or trainees.

Training faculty participate in the program in teaching and other educational activities, and can serve as mentors or co-mentors to trainees (other faculty may also serve in these roles by arrangement).

Affiliates are members of the community who are interested in MBC's programs and activities, and are on the Center's mailing list.

Trainees are graduate students in a Ph.D. program at Stanford who pursue the MBC Graduate Training Program. Potential applicants should read the Graduate Training page and review Information for Potential Trainees.

Applying to a Stanford Ph. D. Program?

If you are currently applying for admission to a Stanford Ph. D. program, and are interested in the possibility of joining MBC as an affiliate or as a trainee, follow the normal application procedures for the Ph. D. program of your choice. You may submit a concurrent application for MBC affiliate status. This will alert us to your interest in the MBC program, and allow us to coordinate with the admissions process of your home department.

MBC has established affiliations with the Ph.D. programs in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Neuroscience, and Psychology, but Ph. D. students in other programs are welcome to participate as well. If you are not sure which Ph.D. program suits your interests, please feel free to contact the MBC administrator with a brief description of your background and interests, and we will endeavor to provide guidance.

Joining as an Affiliate

Affiliates are welcome to participate in all MBC events, will receive announcements, and will be listed on the MBC website. Everyone in the Stanford community who wishes to participate in the program is encouraged to become an affiliate. Faculty are welcome to contact Jay McClelland about joining the Training Faculty, or to join the MBC Program as an affiliate, depending on their level of interest.

In order to become an affiliate, all you have to do is provide a small amount of information. Contact the MBC administrator for the electronic form. Please indicate in your request whether you are already a member of the Stanford community or are concurrently applying for admission to Stanford.

Information for Potential Trainees

Trainees are graduate students in a Ph.D. program at Stanford who pursue a specialized program of study and research that aims to enhance their ability to integrate computational/quantitative and experimental approaches to investigate the emergent functions of the brain. Each trainee designs an individualized program of coursework that culminates in a MBC Research Experience, stretching the student's research beyond the ordinary expectations of his or her home program or laboratory.

Trainees receive guidance from the primary mentor, usually the student's home-department research advisor, and a secondary mentor with complementary expertise. Trainees also participate in MBC activities including the weekly seminar series, annual retreat, and outside speaker series. Potential trainees should familiarize themselves with the details of the program, available on the Graduate Training page.

Applications from existing Stanford Ph.D. students for traineeships are considered on a rolling basis and become effective starting at the beginning of the quarter after they are approved. It is best to allow 2 months from the time you start the process of developing a proposal -- (see Steps to Becoming a Trainee).

Students in a Stanford PhD program who are not yet ready to develop a full Traineeship application may apply to become a provisional trainee for one year. Provisional trainees generally join the program during the first year or at the beginning of the second year, after providing a brief statement and a short note of support from the primary mentor (see Steps to Becoming a Provisional Trainee). Provisional trainees must provide a full traineeship proposal to transition to regular Trainee status two months prior to the end of the provisional year.

Trainees and Provisional Trainees who are US Nationals are eligible to be considered for stipend and partial tuition support from the MBC's NSF IGERT Grant. In addition, all trainees are eligible for an annual travel allowance and modest research expense support -- (see Financial Support). Funding decisions will be made in conjunction with the evaluation of traineeship applications.

Traineeship Details

MBC is committed to the use of advanced computational/quantitative tools, in conjunction with experimental research methods and findings, in order to understand the emergent functions of the nervous system. Traineeships should integrate both computational/quantitative and experimental approaches, but the program is flexible about the exact nature of this integration. The most important criterion is that the student intends to stretch in a meaningful way that is recognizable to the Program's steering committee. It is expected that each trainee will consult with steering committee members in developing the training program.

Mentors and Co-Mentors

Each applicant will need to obtain approval of the training plan from both the primary research mentor and from the co-mentor.

Co-mentors need not come from Stanford, and may be international (for NSF funded trainees, foreign travel support is available). It is best if the mentor and co-mentor have a sense of mutual understanding of the student's overall training and research goals, and of the nature and role of the MBC research experience in the student's research and training. An established working relationship between the mentor and co-mentor is beneficial, and will be especially important if the co-mentor works outside of Stanford.

Training Plan and MBC Research Experience

The trainee should develop a training plan including coursework, culminating in the MBC Research Experience. The coursework part of the training plan should stretch the trainee beyond what would ordinarily be expected for graduate students in the trainee's home program and laboratory, and should relate meaningfully to the research experience described below.

The MBC Research Experience should generally enhance the student's training, and also meaningfully mesh with the overall direction of the student's research. As a rough guideline, it should consume 50 percent of the student's research effort for one year. This level of effort is needed to begin to achieve meaningful hands-on mastery of an approach or method that is a genuine stretch for the student.

The MBC Research Experience must draw in a meaningful way on the expertise of the co-mentor, who should be carefully chosen in light of the student's training and research plan. It might involve a period of time in the co-mentor's laboratory to acquire a technique that will be brought back to the home laboratory, or a side project undertaken under the primary supervision of the co-mentor. The co-mentor may specifically recommend preparatory courses that would be included in the coursework part of the training program.

Traineeship Timeline

The training period should extend over approximately two years, although included coursework may begin before the traineeship starts, and the two years may not overlap exactly with the period of NSF support if awarded.

Trainees will be expected to have a three-way meeting with the mentor and co-mentor at the beginning, middle and end of the training period. Trainees will complete complete regular progress reports during and at the end of the training period. Detailed requirements and timing for these reports will be provided.

All trainees will be eligible for modest necessary funds for direct research costs that cannot be covered by the mentor or co-mentor. Funding for travel to training-plan-relevant conferences will also be available where necessary, especially for presentations of results of the trainee's research.

Steps to Becoming a Trainee

Those who wish to be trainees should take the following steps. Note that you will need to begin the process about 2 months before the beginning of the quarter in which you would like to begin your traineeship; you should plan to submit the proposal about a month before the start date.

1. Become an affiliate.

2. Familiarize yourself with the content of the Graduate Training and Join MBC pages on this web site, including the Information for Potential Trainees and all seven Steps to Becoming a Trainee.

3. Notify the program administrator of your interest in becoming a trainee.

Provide your name, department, primary advisor's name, and a brief statement of the intended scope of your training proposal. The administrator will then work with you to set up a time to meet with the Training Program Director or another member of the Steering Committee.

4. Find a mentor and co-mentor.

Meet with both (a joint meeting is strongly recommended) to discuss a research proposal, after considering the requirements for the proposal that are described in the following step.

5. Prepare a narrative statement of the research proposal.

This should be no more than 2000 words in length, and should contain the following sections. Word counts are suggestions rather than strict limits.

An introductory statement. This should describe the applicant's motivation and training goals (300 words).
A background section. This should describe (500 words):
- the domain of the applicant's research interests
- his or her existing expertise, and relevant coursework background
- how the proposed program will contribute to that expertise
- how the MBC will allow the applicant to address issues relevant to the main line of his or her research, in ways that would not be possible without the extended training
Details of the proposed training plan (300 words). This will comprise a list of thoughtfully chosen courses that extend the applicant's research in a meaningful way as discussed above, with a statement of the rationale for choosing each course. Students may also include a plan of independent study; in such cases, the training plan statement should include a paragraph explaining the goal of the independent study, the specific topics to be covered, and the plan for faculty oversight, including the name of the faculty member who will oversee the independent study (possibly the co-mentor).
A description of the proposed bridging research project (1000 words). This section of the proposal should describe the specific issues to be addressed by the research project, the methods to be used, and the practical aspects of conducting it. Questions that this section should also address include:
- Will the project be done in the co-mentor's lab, or will the trainee acquire skills in the co-mentor's lab, and then bring those skills back to the home laboratory for use in the project?
- How will the co-mentor be involved? How will the involvement of the mentor and co-mentor will be coordinated?
- How will the MBC Research Experience combine with the applicant's other research activities?
While some details of the proposed research may remain to be developed, it is important to be specific about the hypotheses/questions you plan to address and the approaches that you propose to use, so that reviewers will be able to evaluate the value of the proposed research, the concrete scientific contribution that the research would make, and the concrete contribution to the applicant's training and research goals. It is important also to make clear how the research will make synergistic use of the expertise of the mentor and co-mentor.
Statements of approval from the mentor and co-mentor. These statements should be 2-3 paragraphs in length. The statement should include a brief summary of the proposed research and training program, an assessment of the value of the proposed training and research projects both for the trainee and for the sake of the science to be pursued, and a summary of the writer's understanding of the practical aspects of how the research will be carried out, what role the writer will play, and how progress will be monitored. The statement should also describe the writer's involvement in the development of the traineeship proposal and indicate cognizance of the requirement to have a three-way meeting of the trainee with the mentor and co-mentor at the beginning, middle and end of the training period.

7. Submit the training proposal.

Send the proposal as a PDF attachment by email to Laura Hope, lehope@stanford.edu.

Steps to Becoming a Provisional Trainee

To become a provisional trainee, please complete steps 1-3 under Steps to Becoming a Trainee above. Under step three, indicate in your note to the program administrator that you are exploring the process of becoming a provisional trainee. As with those preparing full traineeship proposals, the administrator will work with you to set up a time to meet with the Training Program Director or another member of the Steering Committee.

After the meeting mentioned above, you will be asked to provide a brief statement of your overall goals for participation in the program along with the general nature of the extended training and research you would like to engage in. You should identify a primary mentor (or someone who is likely to become your primary mentor), and you should develop your brief statement in consultation with the primary mentor. In the statement, you should also indicate the kind of faculty member or if possible give the name(s) of a specific faculty member or members who might be appropriate to serve as secondary mentor.

You should then ask the primary mentor to provide a brief letter of support addressed to the Program Director, indicating awareness and support of your plan to become a provisional trainee. Transmit both your brief statement and the brief letter of support to the program administrator, Laura Hope, lehope@stanford.edu.

Provisional traineeships are awarded for one year, and can be put in place retroactive to the start of the current quarter if approved within the first month. Provisional trainees should prepare a full proposal two months before the end of the year.

Financial Support

The program is able to provide up to three years of stipend and partial tuition support for Trainees and Provisional Trainees who are US Nationals. The program also provides up to $1500 to support research- and training-related travel each year for up to 3 years, and up to $3,000 to cover other research-related expenses. All Trainees and Provisional Trainees are eligible for these additional support amounts. If you apply to become a trainee, we will ask you to let us know if you are a US National and what other sources of support may have been awarded to you.