... an architecture grad student

You know they're there. They must be. There are supposed to be 2,000 of them. But where, exactly, are all the graduate students on campus?

Chances are that outside of precepts, you haven't interacted much with grad students. That's because, according to Ryan Neiheiser GS, a second-year masters student in the School of Architecture, graduate school is "a completely different mentality."

To uncover the great campus mystery of what exactly grad students do with their lives, I spent last Friday shadowing Neiheiser. I found that, contrary to popular belief, most graduate students don't live in holes, drinking black coffee alone and contemplating problems without answers. In fact, most grad students have actual lives, and though they may work hard, their work can be intriguing.

As you can see, graduate students don't divide up their time the same way we do; instead of bustling to and fro between classes and meetings and rehearsals, grad students usually spend large chunks of time working on specific projects relevant to their field of study.

Of course, a typical "day in the life" of a graduate student varies widely based on the student's department and on the nature of his or her research. Their lifestyles vary widely as well, in part because of their different ages. Neiheiser, for instance, spent four years between his undergrad work at Swarthmore and grad school here to work as an engineer and architect.

Based just on Neiheiser's life, though, grad school is suddenly not looking so bad. Well, maybe except for the whole "staying up until 5 in the morning" part... but then again, admit it, you do that too. Just at the end of the day, you don't have an entire building to show for it.

4:30 a.m.: Time to go home. Neiheiser leaves his desk in the studio space of the School of Architecture, where he has been working all night. He walks to his house a few blocks off campus, where he lives with two roommates, who are both grad students as well.

10:30 a.m.: Time to get up. Neiheiser wakes up and walks to the School of Architecture. He stops along the way at the satellite Small World Coffee to get some caffeine. Then he works at the studio until lunchtime.

12:35 p.m.: Lunch. Neiheiser takes advantage of free pizza, which the School of Architecture provides every Friday for both its graduate and undergraduate students. On typical weekdays, Neiheiser either eats at Nassau Street or at Frist, but either way, he usually gets lunch to go.

1:15 p.m.: Formal studio time begins. Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, Neiheiser spends about three hours of "class time" in the afternoon working on studio projects at his desk. Today, he is designing a theoretical skyscraper to go next to the U.N. building in New York. His assignment is to create a series of building designs based on different notions of architectural beauty. At the moment, he is working on floor plans for a building influenced by "material-based" beauty.

Neiheiser says that studio projects like this one take up about 75 percent of his work time. The rest is dedicated to his three other classes, which are all graded on a high-pass/pass/fail basis. This semester, Neiheiser is taking a theory class on the history of architecture and a technology class focused on the use of the 3-D mill, a specific type of machine for making building models. His other class is more informal; he and a group of students are putting together a display for the Rotterdam Biennale, an architecture convention in the Netherlands.

3:20 p.m.: Library. Neiheiser goes to the architecture library to look through books for inspiration and scan interesting images.

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4:00 p.m.: Back to desk. Neiheiser returns to his desk, where he continues working and chats with the other grad students who are working near him.

4:35 p.m.: Desk critique. The studio class' teaching assistant comes by to critique Neiheiser's work. The two talk about Neiheiser's designs in relation to the work of famous architects and to various notions of spatial organization.

5:10 p.m.: Time to go home. Neiheiser writes down ideas from his "desk crit" and gets ready to go back to his house.

6:00 p.m.: Run. Neiheiser goes for a run to take advantage of the nice weather.

9:00 p.m.: Dinner. Neiheiser meets up with friends for dinner and drinks at The Alchemist and Barrister.

11:00 p.m.: Architecture School party. Usually, Neiheiser spends Friday nights at "small house parties that grad students throw for small groups of 10-20 grad students off-campus." On this particular Friday, however, the School of Architecture throws a "prom" for undergrads, grad students and even some faculty.