{"id":3263,"date":"2008-12-31T10:24:22","date_gmt":"2008-12-31T10:24:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/scienceblogs.com\/principles\/2008\/12\/31\/its-a-great-job-if-you-can-get\/"},"modified":"2008-12-31T10:24:22","modified_gmt":"2008-12-31T10:24:22","slug":"its-a-great-job-if-you-can-get","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/2008\/12\/31\/its-a-great-job-if-you-can-get\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s a Great Job, If You Can Get It"},"content":{"rendered":"

Over at Unqualified Offerings, Thoreau calls out unnamed ScienceBloggers for cognitive dissonance<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

I think scientific training is of great intellectual and practical benefit to students with the interest and ability to pursue it. I would like to see more people choose to study science (whether at the undergraduate level or beyond). However, I am amused that otherwise intelligent and highly analytical people can simultaneously discuss the following ideas without displaying any awareness of the tensions: The competition for science faculty jobs is too intense, it’s bad when people leave the competition and pick a different path, this is the best job in science, too many people are competing for it, and we need to get more kids interested in doing this.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

I’ve tried to be consistent in calling for an expansion of the definition of success in science, to go along with my calls for improved science outreach and education. I think that the “Tenure-Track at a Research I or Bust” attitude is one of the most harmful of the many dumb ideas to take hold of academia, and it’s particularly stupid in the sciences, where people actually have other good options.<\/p>\n

At the same time, though, it’s hard not to fall into the trap of evangelizing about the difficult-to-obtain academic lifestyle. As Thoreau notes, it’s great work if you can get it– near-total freedom to explore whatever you like, plus job security. It’s tough to beat.<\/p>\n

So, when I run across a student who I think would be good in an academic role, it’s hard not to push them that way, because it really is an incredibly rewarding life. The tricky job we face as academics is to strike the right balance between giving students a realistic assessment of the difficulty involved in pursuing an academic job and explaining the rewards of success.<\/p>\n

It’s a tough spot to hit in the classroom, let alone in a blog post. The last time I tried in a class setting, I managed to scare the hell out of the students who stood the best shot of making it in grad school, while pumping up those least likely to succeed. So I think I can forgive a little blog-based cognitive dissonance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Over at Unqualified Offerings, Thoreau calls out unnamed ScienceBloggers for cognitive dissonance: I think scientific training is of great intellectual and practical benefit to students with the interest and ability to pursue it. I would like to see more people choose to study science (whether at the undergraduate level or beyond). However, I am amused… Continue reading It’s a Great Job, If You Can Get It<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3263","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-academia","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3263","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3263"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3263\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}