[epaladin]

I only recently learned about the Post-Bac program, and I wish I had known about it when I was just out of school- I went to a university that wasn't research oriented, and such a program would have been fantastic for picking up the research mindset before going to graduate school I ended up in a lab staff instead, and learned about real research in sort of a trial by fire manner that's been much more stressful than the postbac probably would have been. So it's got it's possible advantages- let alone working for the NIH looks pretty good on a CV.

[dnautics]

I would argue that being a lab staff is better, because you know what you're getting into. You were probably paid better, too. "cushy" is not a good thing to "prepare you for grad school", especially not for students who are noncommital (not saying that you are, but a lot of IRTAs are). OTOH, I knew a postbac whose job was to counsel macaques that had pieces of their brains gouged out (and therefore wound up with severe behavioral problems). So her job was pretty stressful.

Upshot: You made the right "choice".