Graduate Student Essentials - braingamecenternu/bgcwiki GitHub Wiki

Accessing Google Workspace

As a graduate student, please note that your northeastern.edu email address does not grant access to Google services such as Drive, Docs, and Slides. Instead, you should use your husky.neu.edu email address for these services. Your password remains the same as for your northeastern.edu email.

Here is an example of the email addresses:

Free Printing

For general information about campus printing, please refer to this link. As a graduate student, you are allocated $120 of free printing credit each semester. To print documents, upload them through the designated site. You can then collect your print job at any PaperCut print station across campus. You can also print directly via email or check out other printing options listed here.

Discovery/Explorer: How to Access Lab Storage

What is it? Explorer (formerly Discoverly) is a High Performance Computing (HPC) Cluster to which we have access as Northeastern Gradutate students. Main use cases are:

  • Running heavier processes (e.g., fMRI analyses)
  • Project and data archive

The Open OnDemand website provides graphical interface to many applications (shell, Jupyterlab, R, MATLAB, etc).

Here is the quick start guide to Explorer. Northeastern Research Computing folks have pretty good documentation.

For our lab, we have 2 storage spaces (“PI-owned partitions”) on the cluster:

  • /projects/BGC – to be used for ongoing projects
    • Put projects in /projects/BGC/projects/
    • Additional /projects/BGC/ directories available for reusable process helpers (e.g., /projects/BGC/container_images/)
  • /projects/SoundMindCollaboratory – to be used to as an archive and long-term storage for inactive projects
    • Before storage, project directories should:
      • Have a README.txt file that explain the contents of the directory
      • Be compressed/zipped for data storage
      • Zip file should be named such as project_name_fullProjectDirectorySize.zip
  • For Cluster assistance:
  • For cluster access, ask RC-help (above) – they will likely ask the that the PI grant access via the following instructions:
    • “To add members to your project, you must be on a node in the short partition. You can start an interactive session there with: srun -p short --constraint=ib --pty bash The command to add members is: project <project_name> add members <username1,username2,...> For detailed instructions on how to add users to the group, please refer to our documentation at: https://rc-docs.northeastern.edu/en/explorer-main/managingprojects/index.html”
      • Your username is the same as your email (without @...)
    • After RC-help or PI has granted access to the cluster, it may take 3ish hours to activate.
      • If it is not working, try restarting the web server via: OOD → Sign-in (if not already signed in) → Help (Question mark)→ Restart Web Server

HippocampOS

HippocampOS is the Mac Studio 3 Ultra we acquired in Spring 2025. It is currently next to Quentin’s desk in the ISEC 6th floor Bullpen.

Here is a link to the general documentation.

Poster Printing

  1. Psychology Department – Nightingale Hall: head to NI 125 and an administrator can direct you to the printer (and provide a USB if you do not bring your own; Cloie also has a key and a USB if going after hours). Bring an adapter if your computer does not have a USB port – you can rent them from Snell library if needed (no cost with Husky ID). This is by far the best option for graduate students and staff but is not available for use by RAs (hence, all other options listed are backups).
  1. Makerspace – EXP Building: head to the Makerspace and the volunteers there can direct you to the printer. You must complete the EXP makerspace orientation training ahead of time. They can provide a USB for you to upload your poster to the printer (or you can bring your own/borrow Cloie’s). Bring an adapter if your computer does not have a USB port – you can rent them from Snell library if needed (no cost with Husky ID).
  • Cost: Free
  • Paper quality: Good (normal printer paper quality)
  • Size limit: 2ft for either height or width (solution: print in two halves & tape together)
  1. CAMD – Ryder Hall: head to the Media Center in Ryder Hall – this option is exclusively for CAMD students. If you are not a CAMD student but would like to print here, you will need to ask a CAMD student to come with you to give you access to the printer. Upon arrival, please specify that you would like to use the plotter printer (otherwise it will be a much more expensive print job).
  • Cost: Under $10
  • Paper quality: Good (normal printer paper quality)
  • Size limit: None
  1. NU reprographics – Ell Hall: Visit this website for instructions: https://collegiatepress.com/northeastern/. Poster pickup is in the basement of Ell Hall – this option is very costly, so we recommend prioritizing one of the other options if/whenever possible unless you have ample funding and can be reimbursed. Please note: this option also takes 3 business days, so plan ahead if going this route.
  • Cost: Over $70 for a 3x5ft poster
  • Paper quality: Best (glossy)
  • Size limit: None
  1. Other options – Online: If ordered in advance, multiple websites have good poster printing. Spoonflower makes cloth posters for $30. Paper poster printing services can range from $60-$100. PhD Posters has pickup locations in Boston.

Funding Sources

PsyLink

Graduate student often us PsyLink to find participants for studies. PsyLink serves as a centralized platform for managing student participant recruitment and scheduling within Northeastern’s Psychology Department. It streamlines the process for researchers to post studies, manage participant sign-ups, and track compensation. The PsyLink Manual can be found here.

Travel Reimbursement

As of July 2025, graduate students can submit receipts/materials for travel reimbursement directly on Concur. Here is Northeastern’s User Guide and list of user resources. There is also a Concur User Guide for Reimbursements in the NEU Psych Grad Student Resources Drive (requires grad student access). Look on the Psychology Graduate Program and Students Teams channel for the most up-to-date information regarding this process, or email [email protected].

Study Support Template

While filling out the Internal Research Support Form (see item #2 in the Lab Manual -> Lab Resources -> Request Forms), keep in mind that the study support template below represents the information that will be organized by the management team. Providing information about the following (beyond what is already in the form itself) will ensure that requests can be moved through the pipeline efficiently: Study Info_Template

Northeastern Psychologists for Inclusion and Equity (PIE)

Graduate students should all consider joining or subscribing to updates from PIE. The website also has a great list of resources ranging from academia and research to mental health: https://www.psychdeineu.com/resources

Northeastern Psych department listservs

  • Lab members can self-subscribe to the department-general list by sending an email to [email protected] with the word "subscribe" as the first line of the message body.
  • PhD students can self-subscribe to the PhD student-specific list by sending an email to to [email protected] with the word “subscribe” as the first line of the message body.

SMC/BGC Guest Speaker Planning Guide

SMC/BGC Guest Speaker Planning Guide – a living document to help grad students assist with administrative or logistical details related to lab visitors, particularly those who are traveling and/or presenting as part of their visit to our lab (or to Northeastern).

Data Visualization Resources

University Resources for Writing

University Resources for Health & Wellbeing

Joining CBH the listserv(s)

  • cbh-all is for all members of CBH.
  • cbh-trainees is for graduate students and postdocs.
  • cbh-staff is for other staff, including administrative staff, research coordinators, etc.

The email lists are managed by traditional listserv software that accepts commands by email:

  • Commands should be sent to [email protected].
  • To subscribe, in the body of the email type: subscribe
  • For example: subscribe cbh-all
  • You will get an automated reply asking you to confirm your request. Click the link (if you see one), or alternately you can reply with: OK
  • You will get an acknowledgement email when you have been subscribed.

You can also issue multiple commands in a single email:

  • subscribe cbh-all
  • subscribe cbh-trainees
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