HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: mds@iastate.edu (Mark D. Smucker)
Subject: Underproduction of scientists and engineers
Organization: Iowa State University of Censorship and Repression
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1992 22:16:34 GMT


In the Iowa State Daily

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Tonight at ISU, Camilla P. Benbow will be giving a lecture titled,
"The Math/Science Pipeline: Can it Meet Tomorrow's Technological
Needs?''

Dr. Bendow will dsicuss the underproduction of well-trained scientists
and engineers which is predicted to lead to a crisis at the beginning
of the next century.  Dr. Bendow will address these problems and
suggest presciptive strategies based on the findings of a 50-year
longitudinal study of mathematically precocious youth started in 1971.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Ok, from all I hear on this group, THERE IS NOT OVERPRODUCTION OF
SCIENTISTS!

Perhaps I shall go listen to her, but I am tired of hearing that all
the faculty will retire by the year 2000 to offer lots of positions
for _all_ of today's students.

Mark D. Smucker  ----   mds@iastate.edu
From: yamauchi@ces.cwru.edu (Brian Yamauchi)
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Re: US academic job market improving?
Date: 3 Oct 92 17:23:39 GMT
	<1992Oct2.142458.3492@news.columbia.edu>
	<1992Oct2.192248.4287@cs.sfu.ca>
Organization: Case Western Reserve University
NNTP-Posting-Host: caisr1.caisr.cwru.edu
In-reply-to: mcdonald@cs.sfu.ca's message of Fri, 2 Oct 1992 19:22:48 GMT

In article <1992Oct2.192248.4287@cs.sfu.ca> mcdonald@cs.sfu.ca (Ken Mcdonald) writes:

>The problem in the sciences is
>on the supply side; all those people who believed that science held
>a bright future, and so went into the scientific career track, and
>are now flooding the market.  The humanties have attracted fewer
>people, ergo less oversupply, at least in academia.

Is this really true?  Does anyone have the statistics for the numbers
of Ph.D. students in the humanities and social sciences versus the
number in science and engineering?  How about the number of domestic
(U.S.) students in each area (since many foreign students return
overseas after completing their doctorates)?
--
_______________________________________________________________________________

Brian Yamauchi			Case Western Reserve University
yamauchi@alpha.ces.cwru.edu	Department of Computer Engineering and Science
_______________________________________________________________________________
From: rchun@banting.bio.uci.edu (Rene Chun)
Subject: NIH today
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Reply-To: rchun@banting.bio.uci.edu (Rene Chun)
Organization: University of California, Irvine
Date: 5 Oct 92 15:06:10 GMT

There was some articles in a recent NATURE that described working
at the NIH today.  It seemed to be pretty favorable.

Are there people on the net who currently work there or have recently
worked there who can comment?  

How does the tenure-track system work there?  How are the pay and benefits?
How did you feel about working there?  Would you  recommend the experience
to others?

Thanks in advance for any opinions!

sincerely,
rene
From: sjc@cs.purdue.EDU (Steve Chapin)
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Re: Stipend taxation bill (update)
Date: 5 Oct 92 21:24:13 GMT
	<KRULWICH.92Oct5131344@zowie.ils.nwu.edu> <19868@ector.cs.purdue.edu>
	<1992Oct5.210706.11033@cs.cornell.edu>
Organization: Department of Computer Science, Purdue University


First, I wasn't trying to pick on David; I don't think he took it that
way, either.  But he brought out the central point:

}} Not necessarily.  The government currently IS giving me a break because
}} I decided to have children.  I am assuming there is a valid policy
}} reason behind that; it's been the rule for very many years.
}} 
}} >Why should it matter if David decides to support a family of four, and
}} >Joe Blow is single?  It was David's choice to get married, David and
}} >his wife's choice to have kids.  Why should Joe Blow subsidize David's
}} >choice?
}} 
}} For that matter, it is Joe's choice to attend graduate school.  Why
}} should Tim, who works as a janitor in Joe's school, subsidize Joe's
}} education?  Isn't this what the above argument boils down to, when
}} applied to tax breaks for students?

Exactly.  Why should people get tax breaks for choices they freely
make?  Once we open the Pandora's box, everyone wants a tax break for
their personal choice.  I'd rather get rid of all the deductions,
exemptions, and everything else and go for a flat tax rate.  Otherwise
we have to decide if Joe's education is more important than David's
kids, or Tim's senior-citizen mother's medical expenses.  I don't have
a problem with letting the first $10,000 or so be tax free for
everybody, but above that, flatten the tax rate and get rid of the
loopholes/inconsistencies.

sjc@cs.purdue.edu               Steve Chapin           Today's Grammar Lesson:
       "If you loose your arrow, you're likely to lose it in the weeds,"
                       was often heard in days of yore.

             If I don't want it in my back yard, I don't want it.
Xref: sparky sci.research.careers:1239 sci.psychology:3975
Organization: Queen's University at Kingston
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1992 13:23:30 EDT
From: <FORSDYKE@QUCDN.QueensU.CA>
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers,sci.psychology
Subject: Re: Montreal news of Fabrikant - 5
 <92271.111256FORSDYKE@QUCDN.QueensU.CA> <1992Sep29.184053.8200@sfu.ca>

>>>I think that Fabrikant obviously was over the edge to actually kill people -
><... deleted...>
>>>has tended to report him simply as a maniac, rather than examine the issues
>>>he was upset about.
>>>                   Scott
>>
>>    As a Faculty member at a Canadian University, I would like to reply to
>>Scott's point.
>>    Yes, the press has reported him simply as a maniac, which he undoubtedly
>>was with the respect to the killings. If one wants to draw attention to
>issues
>>which one is upset about, there are a number of relatively "rational" ways of
><...deleted...>
>>considerable lapse of time, makes this impossible in our profession. I think
>>I can understand how someone, who, rightly or wrongly, believes himself to bea
>>scientific equivalent  of a Menhuin,     gets driven to such a state by the
>>system that his behaviour becomes maniacal.
>                                            Forsdyke

>thanks for the comments, most of which i have deleted for the sake of brevity.
>i did want to ask, however, what your opinion about the seriousness of the
>problem that seems to have driven fabrikant over the edge. do you think that
>it has reached the point of being a serious impediment to some within the
>academic system?
>scott

   Scott, just look at the Notes and News and Letters sections of Nature for
the past few years.
                  Sincerely, D.Forsdyke
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
From: tlai@cs.toronto.edu (Tony Wen Hsun Lai)
Subject: Re: Underproduction of scientists and engineers
Organization: Department of Computer Science, University of Toronto
Date: 2 Oct 92 00:35:20 GMT

In article <1992Oct1.221634.12032@news.iastate.edu> mds@iastate.edu (Mark D. Smucker) writes:
>In the Iowa State Daily
>-------------------------------------------------------------------
>Tonight at ISU, Camilla P. Benbow will be giving a lecture titled,
>"The Math/Science Pipeline: Can it Meet Tomorrow's Technological
>Needs?''
[stuff deleted]
>-------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>Ok, from all I hear on this group, THERE IS NOT OVERPRODUCTION OF
>SCIENTISTS!
>
>Perhaps I shall go listen to her, but I am tired of hearing that all
>the faculty will retire by the year 2000 to offer lots of positions
>for _all_ of today's students.

It may be worthwhile listening to the talk to see the types of arguments
used to justify such claims.  For example, a lot of predictions of
shortages are based on very simplistic models of supply, while ignoring
demand.  The 1987 NSF study predicting shortages is a good example; the
study has since been discredited by experts both inside and outside the
NSF.  Moreover, I have yet to see a serious study on retirement among
scientists and engineers, and the effect on the job market.  In addition,
shortage claims entirely disregard such things as defense budget cuts and
government deficits, and their effects on funding.  Finally, shortage
claims often implicitly assume that practically all retired faculty will
be replaced, which is very questionable.
--
Tony Lai (member of the Young Scientists' Network)
tlai@neat.cs.utoronto.ca
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
From: jovanovic-nick@CS.YALE.EDU (Nick Jovanovic)
Subject: Re: Underproduction of scientists and engineers
Organization: Yale University Computer Science Dept., New Haven, CT 06520-2158
Date: Sat, 3 Oct 1992 18:35:24 GMT

In article <1992Oct2.142829.20511@unocal.com> stgprao@st.unocal.COM (Richard Ottolini) writes:
>For an interesting contrast, read this week's Science (9/18) and Scientific
>American (10/92).  This is Science's career issue and it talks about
>the perpetual post-doc syndrome and multi-hundred applicants per faculty
>job.  On the other hand, Scientific American talks about the science gap
>in describing a special science teaching course run at UC Irvine last
>summer.  Both sides may be right in a sense.  They may be too many highly
>trained science professionals for our economy to support.  On the other
>hand the average scientific literacy may be so low that average American
>can't function well in a technological world.
>
>P.S. There were dozens of job ads in Science- mostly biomedical.

Math, science, and engineering programs should become more broadly connected
with our society.  Specifically, more people with these kinds of educations
should be going on to run for political office, become teachers (yes, even
elementary school teachers), become attorneys or physicians, start small
businesses, etc.  Our fields look inward far too much.  Students majoring
in these fields should be encouraged to explore all of these possibilities,
not just to continue in some math/science/engineering pipeline or work in 
industry.

Doing these things would help expand (or at least keep level) the demand for
math/science/engineering degrees, thereby helping the graduate school pipeline
as well.  At the same time, it would help our society become more scientificallyliterate in two ways: (1) a greater cross section of the population would
encounter math/sci/eng-trained people, and (2) more of the power structure
which makes decisions about technological issues would be scientifically
literate, and therefore, would speak more intelligently about these issues
in public instead of evading them.

I think that math/sci/eng programs and professional societies should work
with each other, with local, state, and federal government, with other graduate
and professional programs, and with the media to start making some of these
things happen.  As individuals, we should be discussing these ideas with the
people in our community and in our workplaces.  

-Nick Jovanovic

 


Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
From: karr@cs.cornell.edu (David Karr)
Subject: Re: Stipend taxation bill (update)
Organization: Cornell Univ. CS Dept, Ithaca NY 14853
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 1992 21:07:06 GMT

In article <19868@ector.cs.purdue.edu> sjc@cs.purdue.EDU (Steve Chapin) writes:
>
>What I find strange about David's reasoning is that he feels the
>government somehow owes him a break because he decided to have
>children.

Not necessarily.  The government currently IS giving me a break because
I decided to have children.  I am assuming there is a valid policy
reason behind that; it's been the rule for very many years.

>Why should it matter if David decides to support a family of four, and
>Joe Blow is single?  It was David's choice to get married, David and
>his wife's choice to have kids.  Why should Joe Blow subsidize David's
>choice?

For that matter, it is Joe's choice to attend graduate school.  Why
should Tim, who works as a janitor in Joe's school, subsidize Joe's
education?  Isn't this what the above argument boils down to, when
applied to tax breaks for students?

-- David Karr (karr@cs.cornell.edu)
From: sjc@cs.purdue.EDU (Steve Chapin)
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Re: Other attacks on research (Was: Re: The Cold War: a Golden Age...)
Date: 28 Sep 92 03:04:36 GMT
	<92Sep25.132320edt.48040@neat.cs.toronto.edu>
	<lc6r07INN7ki@utkcs2.cs.utk.edu> <1992Sep26.181723.5903@cs.sfu.ca>
Organization: Department of Computer Science, Purdue University


I must enter a dissenting opinion.  Tenure ensures that professors
have at least some freedom of action.  Politics (at least in the CS
departments I've seen and heard about) is vicious, and the only thing
that protects the jobs of the political minority is tenure.  It's bad
enough that many professors kowtow to the political majority in order
to curry favor (in the form of equipment, lab space, etc.); if they
had to bootlick just to keep their jobs, they'd not be able to work on
unpopular yet significant research.

For example, if the head of your department is a strong proponent of
systems work, and you are a theorist, you might be forced to stop work
on your chosen area, if you didn't have a tenure system to protect
your job.  Ack.

Never underestimate the vindictiveness of the petty and underqualified.

sjc@cs.purdue.edu               Steve Chapin           Today's Grammar Lesson:
                    ect. is meaningless; etc. == et cetera

        "...the probability of a puttering nutcase slaving alone in his
         workshop actually developing fundamentally new technology is
                     practically nil..."  -- John DeArmond
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
From: krulwich@zowie.ils.nwu.edu (Bruce Krulwich)
Subject: Re: Stipend taxation bill (update)
Organization: The Institute for the Learning Sciences, Evanston, IL
	<1992Oct1.154111.27864@netnews.noc.drexel.edu>
	<1992Oct2.132504.13329@cs.cornell.edu>
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 1992 19:13:44 GMT


karr@cs.cornell.edu (David Karr) writes:

> >>>form of a scholarship or fellowship was tax-free.  This was an important
> >>>exclusion, since it encouraged individuals like myself to continue my
> >>>education. Graduate scholarships and fellowships are not large--every
> 
> I finally have gotten irritated enough myself that I need to respond to
> this.
> 
> If you think it is hard to live on a graduate stipend, you should try
> supporting a family of four on it.  It's impossible.  Someone with small
> children who wants to get a PhD, like myself, may have to draw tens of
> thousands of dollars from savings, or incur a similar-sized debt.  Talk
> about disincentives!

Well, I'm supporting a family of three, one of which is a new-born.  I also
had to pay a chunk of the bills for the birth of my baby, due to having
screwball university-related insurance.  I also have been cut off from support
altogether recently due to my advisor's grant running out.

Maybe I'm qualified to comment on David Karr's thoughts here.


> What you are proposing to do, by tinkering with the tax code (which is
> already complicated enough), is to remove from it (in this case anyway) the
> recognition that it's harder to get by on a small income when one has
> children.  This is progressive?

As I understand it, David thinks that the incentive to grad students (proposed
as a tax exemption of stipends) should scale with a bigger family.  I suppose
that this means to scale based on the number of exemptions you can claim on
your tax form, or something like that.

What this leads to, instead of a simple rule that a new class of income (grad
student stipends) is exempt, is a brand new system of tax credit for grad
students based on family, exemptions, etc.  While it could be argued that this
would be better (as David argues, and I'm not arguing with), the question to
ask (IMHO) is whether it would _really_ happen.

When I see info about the bill being considered, I have a simple choice.  If
the bill passes, I would get an extra $80-$110 per month (if I were still
getting a stipend, that is), along with (more importantly) a refund of 5 years
worth of taxes.  If David's position wins and the bill does not go through,
then I get nothing until another bill is worked out, proposed, discussed,
passed, and implemented.  If it ever does.  Right.

I suppose I should be selfless, and sacrifice my own well-being for the sake
of ultimate good.  Seriously, maybe I should.  I just don't see ultimate good
ever comming to fruition.  Should I sacrifice for a theoretical ultimate good
that I don't see happening?


Bruce Krulwich
krulwich@ils.nwu.edu
From: PNCSPPC@ccvax1.cc.ncsu.edu
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Creativity in the sciences
Date: 27 Sep 1992 14:34:21 -0500
Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu

What types of jobs in the scientific and technical fields require the
extensive use of creativity?  I just finished my master's (food science
major/microbiology minor) and I am pondering whether or not to continue for
a Ph.D. (in a different area). Unfortunately, it seems as though much of
the research being done in the life sciences involves a lot of routine work
but only a little creativity.
 
I would like to hear from people who are innovators or inventive
problem-solvers and who have found satisfying careers.  What type of work
do you do?  If you're still in school but pretty certain you've found your
niche I'd like to hear from you too.  Since my Usenet newsgroup access is
variable I'd appreciate replies by e-mail.  Thanks.
 
Phil Calvert
 
<Bitnet: pncsppc@ncsuvax / Internet: pncsppc@ccvax1.cc.ncsu.edu>
From: sjc@cs.purdue.EDU (Steve Chapin)
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Re: Stipend taxation bill (update)
Date: 5 Oct 92 19:19:57 GMT
	<1992Oct1.154111.27864@netnews.noc.drexel.edu>
	<1992Oct2.132504.13329@cs.cornell.edu>
	<KRULWICH.92Oct5131344@zowie.ils.nwu.edu>
Organization: Department of Computer Science, Purdue University


What I find strange about David's reasoning is that he feels the
government somehow owes him a break because he decided to have
children.

Why should it matter if David decides to support a family of four, and
Joe Blow is single?  It was David's choice to get married, David and
his wife's choice to have kids.  Why should Joe Blow subsidize David's
choice?

sjc@cs.purdue.edu               Steve Chapin           Today's Grammar Lesson:
       "If you loose your arrow, you're likely to lose it in the weeds,"
                       was often heard in days of yore.

             If I don't want it in my back yard, I don't want it.
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers,sci.psychology
From: probst@selkirk.sfu.ca (Scott Probst)
Subject: Re: Montreal news of Fabrikant - 5
Organization: Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
Date: Fri, 2 Oct 1992 02:03:30 GMT

In article <92275.132330FORSDYKE@QUCDN.QueensU.CA> <FORSDYKE@QUCDN.QueensU.CA> writes:
>>>>I think that Fabrikant obviously was over the edge to actually kill people -
>><... deleted...>
>>>>has tended to report him simply as a maniac, rather than examine the issues
>>>>he was upset about.
>>>>                   Scott
>>>
>>>    As a Faculty member at a Canadian University, I would like to reply to
>>>Scott's point.
>>>scientific equivalent  of a Menhuin,     gets driven to such a state by the
>>>system that his behaviour becomes maniacal.
>>                                            Forsdyke
>
>>i did want to ask, however, what your opinion about the seriousness of the
>>problem that seems to have driven fabrikant over the edge. do you think that
>>it has reached the point of being a serious impediment to some within the
>>academic system?
>>scott
>
>   Scott, just look at the Notes and News and Letters sections of Nature for
>the past few years.

thanks - i might do that. but also, i was wondering what your opinion was.

scott
From: yamauchi@ces.cwru.edu (Brian Yamauchi)
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Re: Taulbee Survey on CS Ph.D.'s
Date: 7 Oct 92 00:27:47 GMT
	<1992Oct6.065455.12533@m.cs.uiuc.edu>
Organization: Case Western Reserve University
NNTP-Posting-Host: sartre.caisr.cwru.edu
In-reply-to: gillies@m.cs.uiuc.edu's message of Tue, 6 Oct 1992 06:54:55 GMT

For those who are interested, I ftp'ed a copy of the 90-91 report from
ftp.cs.cornell.edu (taulbee.ps or taulbee.dvi).  (Thanks to Peter
Wayner for the pointer.)

Selected statistics for 1990-91 in Computer Science:

Surveys returned from all 137 Ph.D. granting CS departments in the US
and Canada.

862 Ph.D.'s awarded (and increase of 17% over the previous year).

Of those for whom job status is known:

	312 stayed in academia
	290 went to industry
	 95 went overseas
	 22 went into government
	 14 are self-employed
	 10 are unemployed

CS departments hired 133 new Ph.D.'s as faculty, so I would assume the
academic number above includes post-docs, as well as faculty hired in
non-CS departments.

CS departments expect to increase their faculty size by 19% through
1996-97.
--
_______________________________________________________________________________

Brian Yamauchi			Case Western Reserve University
yamauchi@alpha.ces.cwru.edu	Department of Computer Engineering and Science
_______________________________________________________________________________
From: loki@castle.ed.ac.uk (A Kashko)
Newsgroups: sci.research.careers
Subject: Re: Underproduction of scientists and engineers
Date: 2 Oct 92 14:29:22 GMT
Organization: Edinburgh University

In article <92Oct1.203508edt.48029@neat.cs.toronto.edu> tlai@cs.toronto.edu (Tony Wen Hsun Lai) writes:
>In article <1992Oct1.221634.12032@news.iastate.edu> mds@iastate.edu (Mark D. Smucker) writes:
>>In the Iowa State Daily
>>-------------------------------------------------------------------
>>Tonight at ISU, Camilla P. Benbow will be giving a lecture titled,
>>"The Math/Science Pipeline: Can it Meet Tomorrow's Technological
>>Needs?''
>[stuff deleted]
>>-------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>Ok, from all I hear on this group, THERE IS NOT OVERPRODUCTION OF
>>SCIENTISTS!

	I agree. Funnily enough the groups that are saying we need
more scientists are composed of people who know nothing about science
or the scientific job market.


	There is a surplus of scientists. This explains the relatively
low pay of scientists, engineers, etc.

	Would it be too cynical to suggest that politiciians, who seem
mainly to be lawyers, want more scientists in order to divert intelligent
potential competition away from their own beat, and simultaneously ensure
they have more people to push around (politicians) or fleece (90% of all
lawyers since the profession started).

	Would it also be too cynical to note that the powers that be percieve
scientists as basically rightwing, and conservative, and therefore to be
encouraged, let alone the fact that scientific research can burn up all
the energy that might otherwise be used for political activity?

	More realistically, a shortage of scientists at time t can only
be remedied at time t+10, say, so the number of scientists needed must
be estimated ten years in advance. This involves planning, and a ten year
timescale is hostage to a lot of fortunes. It is easier just to have a surplus
and let the unwanted ones suffer.

	The surplus of scientists is just one facet of the surplus
of graduates. Soon there will be no market value in a degree, or even a
PhD, and so fewer people will take one, and thus degrees will accquire a value,
more people will take them, reducing their market value, etc,.....