After completing my dissertation in August, 2007, I took up a 3-year postdoctoral fellowship in the Introduction to the Humanities Program at Stanford University.  As a fellowship that values interdisciplinary teaching alongside disciplinary research, the IHUM fellowship is optimal for academics early in their careers who have both developed models for interdisciplinary approaches and attained proficiency in their unique disciplines.  The faculty in Classics at USC not only encouraged these twin goals but modeled them for their students.  As such, USC's approach to the pedagogy/research relationship has proved invaluable for my scholarly and professional development.  Moreover, USC offers its graduate students many opportunities for professional development,e.g. USC Classics provided funds for me to attend an important conference in Delphi, Greece, where I met professors who would later become my colleagues here at Stanford. I recall the great value of practicing conference papers with the faculty and graduate students, and I continue to consult with my dissertation advisors Greg Thalmann and Tom Habinek on many aspects of my professional career, including new research that goes beyond the subjects I pursued in graduate school.  In this sense, my experience in graduate school at USC may be best described as seminal and symbiotic, as I continue to grow with those former teachers who have now become friends.