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Many Junior Scientists Need To Take a Hard Look at Their Job Prospects (nature.com)
In its careers section this week, science journal Nature surveyed more than 5,700 early-career scientists worldwide who are working on PhDs. Three-quarters of them, they told the journal, think it's likely that they will pursue an academic career when they graduate. How many of them will succeed? The editorial board of the journal wrote in a column published on Wednesday. Most PhD students will have to look beyond academia for a career, the editorial board added. From the article: Statistics say these young researchers will have a better chance of pursuing their chosen job than the young footballers. But not by much. Global figures are hard to come by, but only three or four in every hundred PhD students in the United Kingdom will land a permanent staff position at a university. It's only a little better in the United States. Simply put, most PhD students need to make plans for a life outside academic science. And more universities and PhD supervisors must make this clear. That might sound like an alarmist and negative attitude for the International Weekly Journal of Science. But it has been evident for years that international science is training many more PhD students than the academic system can support. Most of the keen and talented young scientists who responded to our survey will probably never get a foot in the door. Of those who do, a sizeable number are likely to drift from short-term contract to short-term contract until they become disillusioned and look elsewhere.
But in my experience it was a blessing. Academia is so political now - not just to get in, but to stay in (tenure). Also they expect you to work yourself to death until you get tenure. Otherwise, your just a permanent postdoc wondering why you spent so long and so much to get the pay you're getting.
In debates about Christianity, there are two groups: those looking for answers, and those looking to just ask questions.
the drugs that kept a family member of mine alive were made in Europe at public Universities. Most drugs are (and then they're packaged up my big Pharma into profits). The computer I'm typing on wouldn't exist without massive public spending.
We're cutting all this back so we can give more and more money to the elites. Let's stop that. I get it, everybody's afraid of tax raises because even at $250k/yr a lot of us are paycheck to paycheck (60-80% depending on how you run the numbers). But here's a crazy idea: We can raise taxes on the wealthy elite without raising taxes on the workers? I know, crazy right? All it takes is to stop voting for your friendly neighborhood right winger. Oh, and make sure you show up at your Primaries so they don't sneak an economic right winger in because they're socially left wing.
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Having gone through all this myself, my advice would be: "assume you will be average". Will this particular career let you have a decent life if you end up being about average in your field? If not, consider something else.
I don't think that Nye is trying to get kids to grow up to get Doctorates. Nye himself does not have a Doctorate. Nye seems to be advocating for science education because it will allow students to better understand the natural world around them and to make decisions with that understanding. A byproduct of a good science education is the development of critical thinking skills, which further helps students to make good decisions.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
I always say that being a scientist is like being an artist: it is a privilege just to be able to pursue my passion, even if it isn't a great career choice. I didn't get a PhD because it made financial sense, I did it because I have this insatiable curiosity and academic research gives me access to resources that I wouldn't have any other way.
I went through grad school in a similar illusion of going into a strictly academic position. Then I went through a postdoc position and hit a wall. There are lots and lots of PhDs running around out there who tried the same and failed the same.
Thankfully a lot of advisers now are more receptive to their students announcing early that they want to follow a non-academic track (many before used to reject prospective students who wanted that). However not many are great at steering their grad students towards it. If the faculty advisers were even honest about the time commitments expected of junior faculty in the hard sciences (generally starting around 80 hours a week) that would steer many students down another path.
That said, I have a non-academic position and I am very happy. I'm making more than junior faculty at the school where I did my undergrad or PhD and I only work 40 hours a week.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
The problem with STEM here in the US is that the government and businesses make a mistake that even the most brain-dead farmer would never do. If you expect to have a harvest, you plant a crop. You have to fund R&D, fund colleges and universities, and give Joe Sixpack Jr. a reason to go into engineering or science, and not law or finance. Because there isn't any interest in plowing a field, there are very few returns, and it is no wonder why other countries (like Germany or China) who offer university education for a reasonable cost are reaping rewards, while here in the US, many people consider having roads and a power grid "socialism"... and then wonder why prosperity has left this country.
It's been this way since the 90's, possibly earlier.
love is just extroverted narcissism
How about a college system like a lot of European countries? When I was in school, my German friend had his tuition paid for by the Fatherland. The Russian student? By the Motherland. The Chinese engineer? By his country. The guy from Chile? Paid for by his government. Compare that to Americans which have to mortgage their future and have to earn significantly more to maintain the same lifestyle, and it is no wonder why there are economic issues in the US.
Seems to me that the majority of PhDs should be going into the private sector.
I agree. My university has a much higher proportion of graduates entering faculty positions, yet it also helps students enter suitable industry positions, fosters industry contact, and provides several ways for students to pursue their own entrepreneurship. There's certainly demand for highly trained individuals from all STEM fields across multiple industries.
I'd also add that in my experience, which includes a Master's program at a lower-tier school and a PhD program at an elite one, students are actually pretty realistic about their prospects, and most do not really intend to enter academic careers. They are often willing to give it a shot, or know they'll seek an academic postdoc before entering industry, but the number who have principal investigator as their only desired career outcome is pretty similar to the average proportion of graduates who do attain that status.
My feeling (reinforced through peer communication at conferences, etc.) is that most students know they'll go to industry, but they may not feel safe in openly declaring this to advisers or program directors. No doubt this is a strong confounder for surveys like the one in TFA.
.: Semper Absurda
I was sent this awhile back by a friend doing her PhD: http://phdcomics.com/comics.ph...
The science job system is broken. The main problem is the federal subsidy of Graduate Student Stipends and Postdoctoral Fellowship salaries from grants. This has led to the situation of an oversupply of bright people in what amount to full time jobs with no benefits with little chance to achieve a rare faculty post. The fix is to stop the subsidy. Institutions need to take on fewer graduate students, pay them more and train them fully. Bolster the Master's degree for the less committed. The Postdoc should be eliminated and replaced with the term Contract Researcher which should be treated like a job. These people should be paid market rates so they can move to whomever is smart enough to get a grant.
For the kids out there, the current system is a sort of feudal concoction built to maximize imperious egos and is fundamentally exploitive.
Advise: go into science if you have the desire. Go to a good undergraduate school but if you do not get into one of the best institutions for grad school DO NOT GO.
It's that bad out there and it's winner take all.
Science is a rewarding profession but the hardest thing to understand is that even if you do everything right your career can still fail so you have to be brave. You also have to have GENERAL/VERSATILE knowledge to adapt with the times.
The parent article is predicated on the assumption that Science equates with dollars for science. Once basic science in an area is well formed it becomes technology and society has no compelling reason to keep paying for it. Tenured faculty who continue to burn out grad students working on subjects "understood" decades ago are part of the problem here.
Finally: biology is a vast frontier but the NIH wants cures. You don't have to fully understand cancer to kill it.
It was particularly bad for me. Friends and family and random strangers pumped up my ego since leaving high school, using terms like, "creme-de-la-creme" "got through JEE? life is made man!". Then ended up in a PhD program in hypersonic flow when that baldie with a blotchy birthmark pulled perestroika and glasnost out of a hat and dissolved USSR. Having defeated the enemy USA cashed in its peace dividend, which essentially meant all those PhDs in hypersonic rocket science are totally surplus. People with 10 and 20 year experience in hypersonic CFD were coming around begging for temp positions. People whose papers I used to read with great reverence and admiration were standing in line ahead of me fighting for a 12 month post doc position.
Visa running out, with a baby, all those non creme-de-la-creme were all on great jobs and career path ... never felt more depressed.
Then, finally, the waves of economic growth finally lapped up on that isolated island I was marooned in. Feb 1994. Worst month in life. March 1994. Had three job offers, three count them, one, two, three! Purely lucked into taking up an offer from a startup just on the verge of take off and IPO.
But, it was luck. Not perseverance, not hard work, not impossibly high IQ, not my careful career choices. Bad luck followed by good luck. That is all it was. L.U.C.K.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
I had to dig this up:
http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2013/12/11/how-academia-resembles-a-drug-gang/