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Do you want to own and use the URL ResearchIntensive.com? Contact me with a reasonable offer:
a.federman [at] warwick.ac.uk
Since I moved to working with the Business School in Warwick, I no longer work with research staff. You may like to look up Julie Gallimore who does my old job. Of course, the resources here may still be relevant to you. See the welcome page for more information or scroll down to view old posts about training, publications, jobs and career planning for researchers.
effort minimalist
image copied with permission from "Piled Higher and Deeper" by Jorge Cham www.phdcomics.com
Staff on fixed term contracts
Vitae has published a report about fixed term research contracts in HE. It is called Researchers, fixed-term contracts and universities: understanding law in context and can be downloaded from the link.
It reports on the ways the 2002 regulations ( 'The Fixed-term Employees (Prevention of Less Favourable Treatment) SI 2002/2034') has been understood and implemented by HE institutions.
I have no intention to summarize the 33 page document which has many legal and policy angles, but to state the obvious - this is a must read (or at least must scan) for anyone who is doing, or wishes to do, post-doc research.
The days of tenure and comfortable security for academics are long gone, but the 2002 legislation and its implantation at least begin to strike a balance between the needs of institutions (flexibility) and the needs of researchers (stability). Whether this 'balance' meets your personal preferences as researchers is, well, a personal matter.
Warwick researchers may be interested to know that the university has updated its guidelines on fixed term contracts. Like elsewhere in the UK, researchers are still far from comfortable employment security, but at least the burden shifts to departments who now need to objectively justify why a researcher should not move onto a permanent contract after 4 years. Read the Warwick document here (password protected): http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/services/humanresources/newpolicies/ftcs
Things I learned at ‘The Future of Universities’
Here is a report of yesterday evening's panel on the future of universities followed by some implications for early career researchers.
The panel at Warwick University suppose to have discussed the future of universities, but the leaving NUS president, with some cooperation of Warwick University's Chancellor and CBI Director-General Richard Lambert and Vice-Chancellor Professor Nigel Thrift, managed to mainly talk about the future of student tuition fees.
What did I learn?
University leaders agree that the next 10 years will see a fall in government spending on HE. This joins a more immediate decrease in research funding from other bodies that work under tighter budgets now. They do not see any real alternative to making students pay more for their education. There are some well known ideas which are not likely to generate enough income (alumni relations) or will take too long to implement (international campuses).
Naturally, NUS president did not agree and suggests an alternative in the form of graduate tax. Not sure I fully understood, but I think it should be based on universities graduates' earning and therefore be fairer than a rise in tuition fees.
All panellists discussed the issue of access and pointed out that there should be simultaneous rise in student support especially for part-timers and those of low-middle income (comparing with low income who are well supported now). Student loans may be reconsidered. Richard Lambert said that having 2 A levels or more is a much better predictor of university accessibility than income, hence the problem is equal opportunities at secondary schools, not financial barriers at university.
Which government is going to do what? NUS managed to sign 1000 local MPs on a petition that says that once in power they will object to raising fees. 800 Lib-Dems signed. 200 Labour and 13 Conservatives. Personally I don't think this means a lot.
What are the implications of the expected cuts? Richard Lambert predicted that some universities may disappear or at least will struggle to survive. This pushes them already to become more independent. Notice this is not about academic freedom as such but about independence from state funding. Let's face it, for universities being dependent on corporate money is much more risky than being dependent on students' money. As a result we may see rise in student support, but at least we will not be told what to teach by a major bank.
What are the implications for early career researchers?
When applying for teaching or research positions, make sure you understand the financial situation of the university. How dependent it is on state funding? How good is it in balancing its sheets? This information is usually in the public domain, on institutional websites. It would advisable to work for a university that will not go bust in 2 years time.
Be involved in student support. Develop an excellent record of teaching or similar activities. It is more likely that those who are good at and enjoy supporting students will keep their jobs.
Make sure you understand the differences between a research intensive university and other universities. The gap may be widened even further as the former are somewhat less dependent on central money.
If you consider a non-academic career - student support in HE can be a stepping stone on your way out. Universities will not be able to afford raising the fees and cutting skills training, careers guidance, and pastoral care at the same time. It is easier for a researcher to move into these areas in HE than to jump into a new sector altogether.
How many PhD students become lecturers?
I tend to use the data from What do researchers do when I want to illustrate to PhD students that not all of them end up as university lecturers. But thinking about it, the data in this document is far from being perfect and poses some interpretation issues.
First, a little whinge. Have a look at how it is presented graphically. I find myself rotating these graphs again and again because the originals do not show clearly the most relevant information: the sectors.
A little exercise for neck can't do any harm
Second, the document presents PhD destinations graphically as a pie chart. Indeed very interesting if you want to know that 3.5% of Arts and Humanities PhD holders ended up as 'business and financial professionals and other associate professionals' whatever that means. (not very useful if you are colour blind, though).
Notice how the most interesting information for PhD students, namely how many ended up as full-time university lecturers, is not presented graphically anywhere! No, the Education Sector doesn't capture this information because it includes all kinds of teaching positions from school teachers to temporary tutors.
I therefore had to revisit the report myself and extract the relevant bits. In the following image you can see how many Art and Humanities PhD holders, according to Vitae, ended up as lecturers, how many work in HE but are not as full time lecturers, and how many are post-doc researchers/fellows. PhD students are interested exactly in this and couldn't care less about how 'other' breaks down.
my graph. isn't it beautiful! the red bit represents research staff. feel free to use with reference or link.
But there is another problem with the numbers themselves. Do they really represent how many PhD holders would end up as lecturers? In science, a typical path takes PhD holders through 2-3 fixed-term research jobs before they become full time lecturers. In the humanities, it may take a few years as well until you publish enough. What we really need is the leavers data for those who finished their PhD courses 5-10 years ago. The data available in this document is from 2003 to 2007 and represent data collected in the first year after graduation.
To illustrate this, the fact that only 1% of physics PhD holders ended up as lecturers means that unknown percentage is still in post-doc positions, and may (or may not) become lecturers in a few years time.
Anyone knows of a longitutde study of this kind?
Event: Medical and Science Writing
MedComms, an initiative of NetworkPharma, advertises a careers event at Imperial College, London, on 5th July 2010. The topic is medical and science writing.
This may particularly interest post-doc researchers in bioscience who want to explore a careers in science and medical writing, but may be also relevant for historian of medicine in relevant subjects.
Full details are at http://www.medcommsnetworking.co.uk/london10.html
Imperial have very generously extended the invite to other Institutions so registration (by email) and attendance is free of charge. There is also a careers guide, From academic to medical writer: A guide to getting started in medical communications, which was updated in March of this year and which is freely available to download from http://www.medcommsnetworking.co.uk/startingout
PhD Careers Outside of Academia
I'm on holiday, but found something I wrote about LinkedIn in the spirit of the previous post: finding work through social networking.
LinkedIn is home to some professors of Religious Studies I know, but to be honest we don't maintain real relationships through this medium. I'm pretty sure that they ticked all the boxes that say "don't let LinkedIn send me any emails about anything". In other words, it is almost useless for academic networking, especially in the Humanities.
But it is good for networking and job hunting in many others areas. With a clear US bias, there are many science, business and technology groups, regional groups, alumni and even a group established solely for people with PhD looking for non academic careers. It is called 'PhD Careers Outside of Academia' and you need to be logged in to join.
Recent jobs opportunities included science editor, medical researcher, managerial and technical opportunities, most if not all in the US.
Event: Careers in Academia
30 March 2010 - Manchester
Following the success of our previous Careers in academia events, Vitae is another one-day Careers in academia event on the 30th March, to explore what a career in the academic environment is really like.
For more information and booking visit: http://www.vitae.ac.uk/policy-practice/916-188921/Careers-in-focus-Careers-in-academia-.html
Information from the previous event, including video of presentations can be accessed via: Careers in academia - www.vitae.ac.uk/policy-practice.
social networks
I came back yesterday (15 March) from the Digital Researcher conference in the British Library and now updating this post.
Hopefully you would have heard of social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook. I have never found them too attractive for either my work or my academic interests, but I didn't know that there were so many alternatives.
Yesterday, Tristram Hooley rushed through a list of such sites. Here they are with some links and thoughts:
Academia.edu is the 'social' network for academics with about 130,000 members. The critial mass of users is important if you want to find colleagues and put yourself out there. Being in a network without relevant members is like being the only one in the world with a telephone. Mebmers of Academia.edu include Richard Dawkins, Paul Krugman, Noam Chomsky & Steven Pinker. I am not sure if this is offputting or attractive...
Graduate Junction is a British venture designed by and for early career reseachers. It has 15,000 users from 70 different nations and as one of the founders told me it is particularly strong with Art and Humanities postgraduates. I will definitely give it a try.
Methodspace - The giant publisher SAGE has made a great marketing move and initiated a social network for researchers. I am told that it is used more by social scientists than any other researchers. Again, worth exploring.
Nature Network is only one of a number of subject-specific networks. Look them up! Other things mentioned were Copernicus & researchgate.net. Not being a scientists I dare not try them myself.
Ning is another social networking platform. You can create your own small network and manage it. Not sure I fully understand their unique offer.
LinkedIn is a business oriented professional network. Most academics find it alienating, unless they work towards a commercial career. You are more likely to find there opportunities and links to non-academic work opportunities and discussions.
Finally, Facebook. I would not use it for professional or academic matters because... well... because no one does. I opened an account, but after a few weeks later nearly closed it down. It was simply a time consuming purposeless procrastination tool for me. I haven't eventually, but I will refuse friendship requests from colleagues!
Asaf Federman is a Senior Careers Consultant at Warwick University UK
Research Intensive was created to publicize training, publications, career planning and views on HE research.
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- Things I learned at ‘The Future of Universities’
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