You&#x27;re missing the single best part of it: add on top of that mentorship from someone who&#x27;s a world-class expert. My PhD advisor was probably the single best <i>programmer</i> I knew.<p>He taught me things about the Linux kernel that I&#x27;m not sure I could have learned anywhere else. I&#x27;m sure plenty of programmers are kernel experts, but none of them have the time to sit down and do an all-nighter hackathon with me the way my advisor did.