ADSA is where students and dairy professionals alike find the research, relationships, and professional home that moves their career forward. From the ADSA Annual Meeting to our journal community, membership is an investment in what comes next for graduate students.

At the ADSA 2026 Annual Meeting in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the ADSA Graduate Student Division (GSD)—including the GSD early-career mentor Claira Seely and GSD Secretary Frederico Pereira spoke with eight early-career professionals to bring the best of the hallway conversations directly to you.

Read their distilled advice below and watch their full interviews to get their best tips from their experience in graduate school, to understand what surprised them most about post-grad life, and what they would tell their younger selves.

Clara Rial

Dairy Technical Specialist at Granja San José S. A.
Connect with Clara on LinkedIn

  • Prepare early for international job searching.
  • Leverage scientific events: Use conferences like ADSA to meet professionals in your target country.
  • Network with your job in mind: Focus conversations on the specific needs and community where you want to land a job

Quinn Kolar

Senior Lecturer at Cornell University
Connect with Quinn on LinkedIn

  • Have an outlet outside of graduate school: Find a way to decompress and have a healthy outlet (hers is gardening, which she documents on Instagram!).
  • Don’t believe the myth that things get easier after graduate school: Even after graduating, you’ll be busy, so take advantage of your time now and publish papers and build your CV instead of waiting for a “calmer” time.
  • Prepare for emails: Answering emails will be a big part of your day no matter what job you take after graduation.

Francisco  Somaré

Consultant with Progressive Dairy Solutions
Connect with Francisco on LinkedIn

  • Say yes to hands-on learning while you are still in grad school: Those chances narrow once you leave.
  • Plan on spending real time earning your clients’ trust: Even with all the knowledge you have after graduating, it takes time to build the relationships that come before implementing your recommendations.

Hugo Montero

Assistant Professor at Cornell University
Connect with Hugo on LinkedIn

  • Think outside of the “just the research” box: Participate in professional associations like GSD to get outside of your comfort zone, build relationships, and prepare yourself for a career.
  • Don’t be afraid to ask for help: Your community wants to help, and only by reaching out can you get to know people and make connections.

Rebecca Culbertson

Technical Support Manager with Feedworks USA
Connect with Rebecca on LinkedIn

  • Get involved with other departments and other disciplines: Working with other departments and disciplines puts you in front of new people and new ways of thinking.
  • Practice explaining your research to both general and highly technical audiences: The questions you get back often point somewhere you hadn’t looked.
  • Hold on to your grad school connections: Dairy is a small industry, and those are the people you will call to troubleshoot and collaborate with for years.

Geneva Graef

Postdoctoral Associate at Cornell University
Connect with Geneva on LinkedIn

Lift your head out of your specialty: Graduate school pulls you deep into your topic, but it’s beneficial to talk to people outside of your focus. It can teach you a different perspective and shine a new light on your own work.

Pay attention to which parts of graduate work you like and which you don’t: That is the information that you can use to carve out your own path based on what appeals to you every day.

Eileen Yeh

Application Scientist with Daisy Brand
Connect with Eileen on LinkedIn

  • Consider a future in industry: Graduate school is a great path to industry, not just academia! My work in MaryAnne Drake’s lab at North Carolina State University on sensory and product testing directly helped me in my transition to working at Daisy.
  • Leaving academia doesn’t mean leaving research behind: You may find you have more resources than you did before.

Daniela González

Dairy Welfare Lead with Fairlife, LLC
Connect with Daniela on LinkedIn

  • Take classes in other parts of animal science: Explore other areas of dairy, including foods and production, management, and economics, and across other departments.
  • If you go into extension work, be prepared to have patience: Building relationships and earning client trust takes time.