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[ { "content": "How to tell a struggling PhD student who wants to stay in academia that it's time to look for other jobs? I have a PhD student who is finishing this year who ended this job round with no postdoc offers. It's not completely surprising, unfortunately. The student, let's call them P, has had 4 years to improve on things like writing, communication, technical skills, and programming but has fallen short on all of them for where they need to be to be competitive for postdocs. That being said, P is a hard worker, super enthusiastic about research, and has been a good member of my group. P has gotten some interviews, but often gives extremely technical talks with no introduction (despite many rounds of feedback on this from me and others) and has tripped up when asked about the deep details of their work. Unfortunately, I see almost no way of them making it through the whole tenure track (postdoc, postdoc, faculty, building a group) without a quantum leap in their skills, even if there was an offer this year. P is understandably very upset about not getting any offers but continues to say that all they want is a career as a researcher and to stay in academia. This doesn't seem realistic and I want to start gently steering them towards the idea of looking for opportunities in industry or policy, especially since their PhD funding runs out later this year. But I'm not at all sure how to have this conversation without dashing their dreams. They're really eager and dead-set on this line of work, but I just don't see a path. Any advice for how to steer this conversation and offer constructive suggestions? I feel terrible that I have to deliver this news, and I've never done it before.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "This is exactly what I'm worried about. I apologize for not answering your question but I'm hoping you may consider my dilemma. I'm a physics masters student interested in advanced theoretical physics. Though I'm doing masters right now, I don't think I'm competent enough do any kind of research in the field I'm interested in. I haven't solved any problems from books or assignments. I have ok grades. I don't think I'm a dumbass and consider myself to be reasonably good at things which I've studied properly which is not much. But I doubt I can do research in string theory if I didn't even read Sakurai/Goldstein properly. I admit all my problems are due to procrastination. I'm in a serious dilemma. Should I just try to do some small lame master's thesis and apply for grad school or should I leave masters and start masters all over again in a different uni to properly study? I may procrastinate once again but I'm really worried I would not be able to do any good research if I don't know the basics and regret later in life. Some information: I get paid while doing masters in my country so money is not an issue. I sincerely can't imagine myself not learning physics or science in general to understand the world. I don't know what else is there other than understanding the world and I think physics is the one I love the most because I believe in reductionism and believe that everything should be understood from the absolute fundamental ideas. My school has nothing to do with it. It's me and my fucking procrastination. I'm hoping that the result would be different this time. I might be wrong and waste another couple of years, but is there any other option I have? Appreciate any response. Thanks.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "How to tell a struggling PhD student who wants to stay in academia that it's time to look for other jobs? I have a PhD student who is finishing this year who ended this job round with no postdoc offers. It's not completely surprising, unfortunately. The student, let's call them P, has had 4 years to improve on things like writing, communication, technical skills, and programming but has fallen short on all of them for where they need to be to be competitive for postdocs. That being said, P is a hard worker, super enthusiastic about research, and has been a good member of my group. P has gotten some interviews, but often gives extremely technical talks with no introduction (despite many rounds of feedback on this from me and others) and has tripped up when asked about the deep details of their work. Unfortunately, I see almost no way of them making it through the whole tenure track (postdoc, postdoc, faculty, building a group) without a quantum leap in their skills, even if there was an offer this year. P is understandably very upset about not getting any offers but continues to say that all they want is a career as a researcher and to stay in academia. This doesn't seem realistic and I want to start gently steering them towards the idea of looking for opportunities in industry or policy, especially since their PhD funding runs out later this year. But I'm not at all sure how to have this conversation without dashing their dreams. They're really eager and dead-set on this line of work, but I just don't see a path. Any advice for how to steer this conversation and offer constructive suggestions? I feel terrible that I have to deliver this news, and I've never done it before.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "ITT: Anxious grad students looking through OP's post history to see if it's them.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Bad news Hey everyone I went to the Dr a few days ago and she found a mass on my humerus. She was reluctant to officially diagnose but it seems that it is osteosarcoma. I was wondering if this is something I should tell my grad advisor. I’m hesitant because I’m afraid she might tell me to quit to be with my family. In all honesty I want to keep going until it gets bad enough I can’t leave my bed. The reason I’m inclined to telling here is because I might be spotty quite a Few days because of imaging testing and who knows ,maybe even bone autopsies.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "i think it would be helpful create an open dialogue now as this may become something you’ll be dealing with for a while. you may need some allowances in the future for doctors appointments or recovering from treatment so if your advisor is aware of this, they can help you. im really sorry youre going through this and i think continuing your work could help a lot throughout your treatment. be kind to yourself though, your limits and energy levels may change and you may need to rest more often, so just listen to your mind and body.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Bad news Hey everyone I went to the Dr a few days ago and she found a mass on my humerus. She was reluctant to officially diagnose but it seems that it is osteosarcoma. I was wondering if this is something I should tell my grad advisor. I’m hesitant because I’m afraid she might tell me to quit to be with my family. In all honesty I want to keep going until it gets bad enough I can’t leave my bed. The reason I’m inclined to telling here is because I might be spotty quite a Few days because of imaging testing and who knows ,maybe even bone autopsies.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I would wait until the diagnosis is confirmed, and then tell her something. You have a right to privacy, but as an advisor I find it much easier to be understanding of someone’s absences, lack of progress, etc. when I know what is going on. Even just saying, “I am dealing with a serious medical issue,” is better than nothing.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Bad news Hey everyone I went to the Dr a few days ago and she found a mass on my humerus. She was reluctant to officially diagnose but it seems that it is osteosarcoma. I was wondering if this is something I should tell my grad advisor. I’m hesitant because I’m afraid she might tell me to quit to be with my family. In all honesty I want to keep going until it gets bad enough I can’t leave my bed. The reason I’m inclined to telling here is because I might be spotty quite a Few days because of imaging testing and who knows ,maybe even bone autopsies.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Don't wait until you're too sick to get out of bed. I've been getting sicker for months (still trying to figure out why), and I've now hit that point. Trying to deal with logistics of medical leave/administration is a nightmare when you barely have the energy to move.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Bad news Hey everyone I went to the Dr a few days ago and she found a mass on my humerus. She was reluctant to officially diagnose but it seems that it is osteosarcoma. I was wondering if this is something I should tell my grad advisor. I’m hesitant because I’m afraid she might tell me to quit to be with my family. In all honesty I want to keep going until it gets bad enough I can’t leave my bed. The reason I’m inclined to telling here is because I might be spotty quite a Few days because of imaging testing and who knows ,maybe even bone autopsies.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "1. Get it properly diagnosed 2. Tell your advisor 3. Screw Grad school, do all available treatments. Are you insane? Your life is more important than finishing some research", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Bad news Hey everyone I went to the Dr a few days ago and she found a mass on my humerus. She was reluctant to officially diagnose but it seems that it is osteosarcoma. I was wondering if this is something I should tell my grad advisor. I’m hesitant because I’m afraid she might tell me to quit to be with my family. In all honesty I want to keep going until it gets bad enough I can’t leave my bed. The reason I’m inclined to telling here is because I might be spotty quite a Few days because of imaging testing and who knows ,maybe even bone autopsies.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I'm so sorry, I can't imagine how stressful it must be for you right now. Hope it turns out to be something benign. If your advisor is a decent human being, I'm sure she'll be supportive of you no matter what you do and decide in this difficult situation. Sending lots of good thoughts.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Bad news Hey everyone I went to the Dr a few days ago and she found a mass on my humerus. She was reluctant to officially diagnose but it seems that it is osteosarcoma. I was wondering if this is something I should tell my grad advisor. I’m hesitant because I’m afraid she might tell me to quit to be with my family. In all honesty I want to keep going until it gets bad enough I can’t leave my bed. The reason I’m inclined to telling here is because I might be spotty quite a Few days because of imaging testing and who knows ,maybe even bone autopsies.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "1. Get it properly diagnosed 2. Tell your advisor 3. Screw Grad school, do all available treatments. Are you insane? Your life is more important than finishing some research", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Bad news Hey everyone I went to the Dr a few days ago and she found a mass on my humerus. She was reluctant to officially diagnose but it seems that it is osteosarcoma. I was wondering if this is something I should tell my grad advisor. I’m hesitant because I’m afraid she might tell me to quit to be with my family. In all honesty I want to keep going until it gets bad enough I can’t leave my bed. The reason I’m inclined to telling here is because I might be spotty quite a Few days because of imaging testing and who knows ,maybe even bone autopsies.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I would encourage you to look into your institutions resources for students with disabilities. Best wishes!", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Bad news Hey everyone I went to the Dr a few days ago and she found a mass on my humerus. She was reluctant to officially diagnose but it seems that it is osteosarcoma. I was wondering if this is something I should tell my grad advisor. I’m hesitant because I’m afraid she might tell me to quit to be with my family. In all honesty I want to keep going until it gets bad enough I can’t leave my bed. The reason I’m inclined to telling here is because I might be spotty quite a Few days because of imaging testing and who knows ,maybe even bone autopsies.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "1. Get it properly diagnosed 2. Tell your advisor 3. Screw Grad school, do all available treatments. Are you insane? Your life is more important than finishing some research", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Bad news Hey everyone I went to the Dr a few days ago and she found a mass on my humerus. She was reluctant to officially diagnose but it seems that it is osteosarcoma. I was wondering if this is something I should tell my grad advisor. I’m hesitant because I’m afraid she might tell me to quit to be with my family. In all honesty I want to keep going until it gets bad enough I can’t leave my bed. The reason I’m inclined to telling here is because I might be spotty quite a Few days because of imaging testing and who knows ,maybe even bone autopsies.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I had a lymphoma scare recently and my postdoc advisor was very supportive. Hopefully yours will be the same. Check out support groups too. I was surprised that many lymphoma patients continued to work/stay in school during treatment with only a few weeks off during the worst parts.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Bad news Hey everyone I went to the Dr a few days ago and she found a mass on my humerus. She was reluctant to officially diagnose but it seems that it is osteosarcoma. I was wondering if this is something I should tell my grad advisor. I’m hesitant because I’m afraid she might tell me to quit to be with my family. In all honesty I want to keep going until it gets bad enough I can’t leave my bed. The reason I’m inclined to telling here is because I might be spotty quite a Few days because of imaging testing and who knows ,maybe even bone autopsies.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "1. Get it properly diagnosed 2. Tell your advisor 3. Screw Grad school, do all available treatments. Are you insane? Your life is more important than finishing some research", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What obscure skill have you picked up as a grad student/academic? I'm doing a biology PhD, and know exactly how to empty a mortar of powdered plant material suspended in liquid nitrogen into a tiny vial without it exploding (easier said than done), an obscure \"skill\" I've picked up doing hundreds of DNA extractions. Purely our of curiousity, what's your obscure skill?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Not really relating to my MA degree, but been a TA for a couple of years and doing lots of copy-editing work, I can tell if someone's margins (in WORD) are not standard just by looking (even if it's a really small change). Useful in my line of work (checking students papers and tests), completely unnecessary in any other way.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What obscure skill have you picked up as a grad student/academic? I'm doing a biology PhD, and know exactly how to empty a mortar of powdered plant material suspended in liquid nitrogen into a tiny vial without it exploding (easier said than done), an obscure \"skill\" I've picked up doing hundreds of DNA extractions. Purely our of curiousity, what's your obscure skill?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I study bird song diversity across different habitats and now have the curse of knowing when bird songs in movies and games are ecologically inaccurate...", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What obscure skill have you picked up as a grad student/academic? I'm doing a biology PhD, and know exactly how to empty a mortar of powdered plant material suspended in liquid nitrogen into a tiny vial without it exploding (easier said than done), an obscure \"skill\" I've picked up doing hundreds of DNA extractions. Purely our of curiousity, what's your obscure skill?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Coding in Fortran. (Not that Fortran is obscure *per se* by any means, but the most common reaction I get from people both in and outside of my field is, \"Why is anyone still coding in that?!\")", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What obscure skill have you picked up as a grad student/academic? I'm doing a biology PhD, and know exactly how to empty a mortar of powdered plant material suspended in liquid nitrogen into a tiny vial without it exploding (easier said than done), an obscure \"skill\" I've picked up doing hundreds of DNA extractions. Purely our of curiousity, what's your obscure skill?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I study bird song diversity across different habitats and now have the curse of knowing when bird songs in movies and games are ecologically inaccurate...", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What obscure skill have you picked up as a grad student/academic? I'm doing a biology PhD, and know exactly how to empty a mortar of powdered plant material suspended in liquid nitrogen into a tiny vial without it exploding (easier said than done), an obscure \"skill\" I've picked up doing hundreds of DNA extractions. Purely our of curiousity, what's your obscure skill?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I mean, I can draw blood from and dissect an entire mouse in about 3 mins... making sure the organs are undamaged and harvested whole. (For later analysis. I obviously don’t do this for fun.) I’m also quite good at estimating volumes of liquids by eye, opening doors without my hands, and have an unusual tolerance for handling very hot and/or cold items.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What obscure skill have you picked up as a grad student/academic? I'm doing a biology PhD, and know exactly how to empty a mortar of powdered plant material suspended in liquid nitrogen into a tiny vial without it exploding (easier said than done), an obscure \"skill\" I've picked up doing hundreds of DNA extractions. Purely our of curiousity, what's your obscure skill?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I study bird song diversity across different habitats and now have the curse of knowing when bird songs in movies and games are ecologically inaccurate...", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What obscure skill have you picked up as a grad student/academic? I'm doing a biology PhD, and know exactly how to empty a mortar of powdered plant material suspended in liquid nitrogen into a tiny vial without it exploding (easier said than done), an obscure \"skill\" I've picked up doing hundreds of DNA extractions. Purely our of curiousity, what's your obscure skill?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "> how to empty a mortar of powdered plant material suspended in liquid nitrogen into a tiny vial without it exploding (easier said than done) Can confirm, had one of these bitches explode in a course. Not only half of the vial was gone but our sample as well. Mine is probably reading monkey body language and face gestures. I am so used to communicate with them that I once started to lip smack at a (human) baby because it's a soothing gesture. Thankfully nobody saw that (besides the baby, who was unimpressed).", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What obscure skill have you picked up as a grad student/academic? I'm doing a biology PhD, and know exactly how to empty a mortar of powdered plant material suspended in liquid nitrogen into a tiny vial without it exploding (easier said than done), an obscure \"skill\" I've picked up doing hundreds of DNA extractions. Purely our of curiousity, what's your obscure skill?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I study bird song diversity across different habitats and now have the curse of knowing when bird songs in movies and games are ecologically inaccurate...", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What obscure skill have you picked up as a grad student/academic? I'm doing a biology PhD, and know exactly how to empty a mortar of powdered plant material suspended in liquid nitrogen into a tiny vial without it exploding (easier said than done), an obscure \"skill\" I've picked up doing hundreds of DNA extractions. Purely our of curiousity, what's your obscure skill?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I can give fish tattoos with insulin syringes. I needed to track individuals in a tank to calculate growth rates and they were too small to tag with other methods.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What obscure skill have you picked up as a grad student/academic? I'm doing a biology PhD, and know exactly how to empty a mortar of powdered plant material suspended in liquid nitrogen into a tiny vial without it exploding (easier said than done), an obscure \"skill\" I've picked up doing hundreds of DNA extractions. Purely our of curiousity, what's your obscure skill?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I study bird song diversity across different habitats and now have the curse of knowing when bird songs in movies and games are ecologically inaccurate...", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you think research results in STEM should be published regardless of negative or positive conclusions? Researchers in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Exeter believe that publishing scientific articles is not an end unto itself. In a recent opinion piece, they state that researchers should not be disappointed or frustrated by negative results but strive to reach unbiased conclusions driven solely by the data. Thoughts?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I think the results should be published, and I also think they shouldn't be paywalled, particularly if the research were publicly-funded.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you think research results in STEM should be published regardless of negative or positive conclusions? Researchers in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Exeter believe that publishing scientific articles is not an end unto itself. In a recent opinion piece, they state that researchers should not be disappointed or frustrated by negative results but strive to reach unbiased conclusions driven solely by the data. Thoughts?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I think they probably should, but they don't warrant the full effort of an academic paper. One solution might be if journals had a \"negative notes\" section that left people publish very short briefs about the findings. This prevents having to read and write full length papers with zero impact, but also puts it in the scientific record to advise future studies.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you think research results in STEM should be published regardless of negative or positive conclusions? Researchers in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Exeter believe that publishing scientific articles is not an end unto itself. In a recent opinion piece, they state that researchers should not be disappointed or frustrated by negative results but strive to reach unbiased conclusions driven solely by the data. Thoughts?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I'm actually writing an editorial for my journal as we speak about the peer review process. Part of it will be to not allow our personal biases taint our view of the contrarian results and conclusions of a paper. That is followed by a tip to the authors to acknowledge the other perspective and emphasize that the contrarian results do not invalidate prior research but simply indicate a discrepancy that deserves further investigation for potential boundary conditions.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you think research results in STEM should be published regardless of negative or positive conclusions? Researchers in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Exeter believe that publishing scientific articles is not an end unto itself. In a recent opinion piece, they state that researchers should not be disappointed or frustrated by negative results but strive to reach unbiased conclusions driven solely by the data. Thoughts?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Really weird for the article to use the term \"negative finding.\" The commonly used term is \"null finding,\" i.e., \"our research design did not produce credible and informative results.\" Null findings should be publishable. So should replications. There are also what are called \"informative null findings,\" which means your model credibly demonstrated that there is no effect.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you think research results in STEM should be published regardless of negative or positive conclusions? Researchers in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Exeter believe that publishing scientific articles is not an end unto itself. In a recent opinion piece, they state that researchers should not be disappointed or frustrated by negative results but strive to reach unbiased conclusions driven solely by the data. Thoughts?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I think the results should be published, and I also think they shouldn't be paywalled, particularly if the research were publicly-funded.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you think research results in STEM should be published regardless of negative or positive conclusions? Researchers in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Exeter believe that publishing scientific articles is not an end unto itself. In a recent opinion piece, they state that researchers should not be disappointed or frustrated by negative results but strive to reach unbiased conclusions driven solely by the data. Thoughts?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Really weird for the article to use the term \"negative finding.\" The commonly used term is \"null finding,\" i.e., \"our research design did not produce credible and informative results.\" Null findings should be publishable. So should replications. There are also what are called \"informative null findings,\" which means your model credibly demonstrated that there is no effect.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you think research results in STEM should be published regardless of negative or positive conclusions? Researchers in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Exeter believe that publishing scientific articles is not an end unto itself. In a recent opinion piece, they state that researchers should not be disappointed or frustrated by negative results but strive to reach unbiased conclusions driven solely by the data. Thoughts?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I don't think this only applies to STEM. In linguistics it's extremely hard to publish negative results, and often to do so you need to introduce either a new method or a new dataset.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you think research results in STEM should be published regardless of negative or positive conclusions? Researchers in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Exeter believe that publishing scientific articles is not an end unto itself. In a recent opinion piece, they state that researchers should not be disappointed or frustrated by negative results but strive to reach unbiased conclusions driven solely by the data. Thoughts?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Really weird for the article to use the term \"negative finding.\" The commonly used term is \"null finding,\" i.e., \"our research design did not produce credible and informative results.\" Null findings should be publishable. So should replications. There are also what are called \"informative null findings,\" which means your model credibly demonstrated that there is no effect.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you think research results in STEM should be published regardless of negative or positive conclusions? Researchers in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Exeter believe that publishing scientific articles is not an end unto itself. In a recent opinion piece, they state that researchers should not be disappointed or frustrated by negative results but strive to reach unbiased conclusions driven solely by the data. Thoughts?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I think the results should be published, and I also think they shouldn't be paywalled, particularly if the research were publicly-funded.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you think research results in STEM should be published regardless of negative or positive conclusions? Researchers in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Exeter believe that publishing scientific articles is not an end unto itself. In a recent opinion piece, they state that researchers should not be disappointed or frustrated by negative results but strive to reach unbiased conclusions driven solely by the data. Thoughts?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Honestly, I feel that null results are just as important as significant results because 1) it's important to rule alternatives out, rather than only looking for evidence in favor of your hypothesis, and 2) if something doesn't work, please publish it so future researchers don't attempt the same thing and also fail. I do think the emergence of Bayesian statistics has been helping with that lately (at least in my field) because it's providing evidence *for* the null, rather than simply failing to reject it. It's making it easier to publish null results.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "I think I've just failed my PhD This is kind of my open letter to academia... My PhD was tough. It started really well, full UK scholarship, amazing project, and enthusiasm to do amazing research and follow the dream career. Then something happened. Can't pinpoint where or when, but my mental health deteriorated rapidly. I started to be afraid of going to the lab, and everything crumbled from there. Two intermissions to try to sort my health, a referral at the first Viva and major corrections on my second and I have just submitted corrections.. I tried so hard to juggle the corrections with work, and I really doubt it was enough. I'm away from academia now, and even though I'm starting again I'm doing well in my new career. Still disappointed in myself though. On the other hand, I've now done the final mic-drop on the (very personal) hell that became academia. To those who managed to survive, you are in a wonderful industry where you get to be creative and use your unique view on the world to enhance the knowledge of the human population. I wish you all the best of success and all of the grants and papers your hearts desire. I'm not bitter of any of you, just a bit disappointed in myself. But hey that's life. Thanks academia, I've learned lots not only about my subject matter, but also about myself.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Congrats on finding your footing on a path that appears to work for you. Having worked in industry and academia, I know first-hand that neither one is \"better,\" they are just different career paths, with different advantages and disadvantages. I know brilliant, successful people that never tried to earn a Ph.D., that tried and chose not to finish, that finished and chose to go into industry, and that finished and stayed in academia. Leaving academia and going into something that works for you is absolutely not a failure, it is a success. I'm not disappointed in you--nor in any of my students who chose a different path than I did (in fact, I have counseled some of them not to follow my path)--and you absolutely need not be disappointed in yourself. If you are happy with where you are now, that's all that matters.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "I think I've just failed my PhD This is kind of my open letter to academia... My PhD was tough. It started really well, full UK scholarship, amazing project, and enthusiasm to do amazing research and follow the dream career. Then something happened. Can't pinpoint where or when, but my mental health deteriorated rapidly. I started to be afraid of going to the lab, and everything crumbled from there. Two intermissions to try to sort my health, a referral at the first Viva and major corrections on my second and I have just submitted corrections.. I tried so hard to juggle the corrections with work, and I really doubt it was enough. I'm away from academia now, and even though I'm starting again I'm doing well in my new career. Still disappointed in myself though. On the other hand, I've now done the final mic-drop on the (very personal) hell that became academia. To those who managed to survive, you are in a wonderful industry where you get to be creative and use your unique view on the world to enhance the knowledge of the human population. I wish you all the best of success and all of the grants and papers your hearts desire. I'm not bitter of any of you, just a bit disappointed in myself. But hey that's life. Thanks academia, I've learned lots not only about my subject matter, but also about myself.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "There is so much I want to say to you. But I'm gonna start with the most important. You did NOT fail. You took control of your mental health, and frankly, that's so much more important than a degree. I need you to understand how utterly brave and strong that choice was. There are many of us didn't make that choice. I remember having a nervous breakdown 6 months before I defended, like on the brink of committing myself to a psych ward. If it hadn't been for a bit of luck and a kind committee member, I wouldn't have finished either. The other thing I need you to understand is that Academia isn't the great answer. You can save the world without ever taking another foot on a campus. I wish you the best of all the world in your new career. And I don't know you at all, but I'm very proud of you.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Have you ever seen anyone fail a PhD Defense? Per the title. I defend my dissertation in a few days, and I feel like my defense is shaping up to be very... Unimpressive for a variety of reasons. My committee gave me the green light to look for jobs and write a dissertation. I turned in the document a few days ago, and I have a job lined up, but I'm growing nervous about my defense because, well, it feels like it's garbage. I'm largely asking because I want to know just how bad I need to do in order to actually fail.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "No. If they don't want to give you the degree they won't let you schedule it. It would be as much an embarrassment for your advisor as for you. People are usually screened out at candidacy, or sometimes asked to leave after. In practice this just doesn't happen (at least in the US/Canada).", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Have you ever seen anyone fail a PhD Defense? Per the title. I defend my dissertation in a few days, and I feel like my defense is shaping up to be very... Unimpressive for a variety of reasons. My committee gave me the green light to look for jobs and write a dissertation. I turned in the document a few days ago, and I have a job lined up, but I'm growing nervous about my defense because, well, it feels like it's garbage. I'm largely asking because I want to know just how bad I need to do in order to actually fail.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I have failed a student once, but the reasons were not related to the results. The reasons were (a) the manuscript was very badly written and (b) the work was blatantly unfinished. The reason why the supervisor let this student defend were related to the rules of the university (you had to defend after N years) rather than being an official \"green light\". The student failed that time, but we gave them a second chance after one year of extra work, which ended up in a successful attempt and graduation. None of this applies to you. You'll pass!", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Have you ever seen anyone fail a PhD Defense? Per the title. I defend my dissertation in a few days, and I feel like my defense is shaping up to be very... Unimpressive for a variety of reasons. My committee gave me the green light to look for jobs and write a dissertation. I turned in the document a few days ago, and I have a job lined up, but I'm growing nervous about my defense because, well, it feels like it's garbage. I'm largely asking because I want to know just how bad I need to do in order to actually fail.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "In every program I know of, it's the responsibility of the chair/adviser to have a private sit-down talk with the candidate if they're not ready. Most committees have read most (or all) of the dissertation prior to the defense, and they pretty much know if it's going to pass. Candidates get varying levels of revisions, but the pass/fail is decided before you enter the room.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Have you ever seen anyone fail a PhD Defense? Per the title. I defend my dissertation in a few days, and I feel like my defense is shaping up to be very... Unimpressive for a variety of reasons. My committee gave me the green light to look for jobs and write a dissertation. I turned in the document a few days ago, and I have a job lined up, but I'm growing nervous about my defense because, well, it feels like it's garbage. I'm largely asking because I want to know just how bad I need to do in order to actually fail.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I have failed a student once, but the reasons were not related to the results. The reasons were (a) the manuscript was very badly written and (b) the work was blatantly unfinished. The reason why the supervisor let this student defend were related to the rules of the university (you had to defend after N years) rather than being an official \"green light\". The student failed that time, but we gave them a second chance after one year of extra work, which ended up in a successful attempt and graduation. None of this applies to you. You'll pass!", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Have you ever seen anyone fail a PhD Defense? Per the title. I defend my dissertation in a few days, and I feel like my defense is shaping up to be very... Unimpressive for a variety of reasons. My committee gave me the green light to look for jobs and write a dissertation. I turned in the document a few days ago, and I have a job lined up, but I'm growing nervous about my defense because, well, it feels like it's garbage. I'm largely asking because I want to know just how bad I need to do in order to actually fail.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "You're stressed— it's natural, but it's going to be fine. Are you going in person or are you doing it via Zoom? If going in person, focus more on where you want to get lunch/dinner after (if safe to do so) and not the event itself. The day after, you'll be asking yourself what you were so stressed about, I promise :)", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Have you ever seen anyone fail a PhD Defense? Per the title. I defend my dissertation in a few days, and I feel like my defense is shaping up to be very... Unimpressive for a variety of reasons. My committee gave me the green light to look for jobs and write a dissertation. I turned in the document a few days ago, and I have a job lined up, but I'm growing nervous about my defense because, well, it feels like it's garbage. I'm largely asking because I want to know just how bad I need to do in order to actually fail.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I have failed a student once, but the reasons were not related to the results. The reasons were (a) the manuscript was very badly written and (b) the work was blatantly unfinished. The reason why the supervisor let this student defend were related to the rules of the university (you had to defend after N years) rather than being an official \"green light\". The student failed that time, but we gave them a second chance after one year of extra work, which ended up in a successful attempt and graduation. None of this applies to you. You'll pass!", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Have you ever seen anyone fail a PhD Defense? Per the title. I defend my dissertation in a few days, and I feel like my defense is shaping up to be very... Unimpressive for a variety of reasons. My committee gave me the green light to look for jobs and write a dissertation. I turned in the document a few days ago, and I have a job lined up, but I'm growing nervous about my defense because, well, it feels like it's garbage. I'm largely asking because I want to know just how bad I need to do in order to actually fail.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "In every program I know of, it's the responsibility of the chair/adviser to have a private sit-down talk with the candidate if they're not ready. Most committees have read most (or all) of the dissertation prior to the defense, and they pretty much know if it's going to pass. Candidates get varying levels of revisions, but the pass/fail is decided before you enter the room.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Have you ever seen anyone fail a PhD Defense? Per the title. I defend my dissertation in a few days, and I feel like my defense is shaping up to be very... Unimpressive for a variety of reasons. My committee gave me the green light to look for jobs and write a dissertation. I turned in the document a few days ago, and I have a job lined up, but I'm growing nervous about my defense because, well, it feels like it's garbage. I'm largely asking because I want to know just how bad I need to do in order to actually fail.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "At my school you have to collect the 5 signatures like a quest in an RPG. They wouldnt let you do that part if you wernt ready. The quals is where they beat you senseless. The defense is more of a formality. If you did your work, if your adviser thinks it's sufficient, it is. Think of it more like your first time being a colleague and not a student. You did some research. It's original. They've never seen it before. They arnt quizzing you on info they know and you might. They're questioning you about a topic they dont know and you do. You are the instructor and they are your very very curious and demanding students. You are the worlds leading expert on whatever. Bring them up to speed.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Have you ever seen anyone fail a PhD Defense? Per the title. I defend my dissertation in a few days, and I feel like my defense is shaping up to be very... Unimpressive for a variety of reasons. My committee gave me the green light to look for jobs and write a dissertation. I turned in the document a few days ago, and I have a job lined up, but I'm growing nervous about my defense because, well, it feels like it's garbage. I'm largely asking because I want to know just how bad I need to do in order to actually fail.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "You're stressed— it's natural, but it's going to be fine. Are you going in person or are you doing it via Zoom? If going in person, focus more on where you want to get lunch/dinner after (if safe to do so) and not the event itself. The day after, you'll be asking yourself what you were so stressed about, I promise :)", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Have you ever seen anyone fail a PhD Defense? Per the title. I defend my dissertation in a few days, and I feel like my defense is shaping up to be very... Unimpressive for a variety of reasons. My committee gave me the green light to look for jobs and write a dissertation. I turned in the document a few days ago, and I have a job lined up, but I'm growing nervous about my defense because, well, it feels like it's garbage. I'm largely asking because I want to know just how bad I need to do in order to actually fail.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "At my school you have to collect the 5 signatures like a quest in an RPG. They wouldnt let you do that part if you wernt ready. The quals is where they beat you senseless. The defense is more of a formality. If you did your work, if your adviser thinks it's sufficient, it is. Think of it more like your first time being a colleague and not a student. You did some research. It's original. They've never seen it before. They arnt quizzing you on info they know and you might. They're questioning you about a topic they dont know and you do. You are the instructor and they are your very very curious and demanding students. You are the worlds leading expert on whatever. Bring them up to speed.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "If you could start your PhD life from scratch, what one thing would you do differently? Hindsight hour!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I would have a clearer focus - the PhD is the time to learn one subject well and not get too distracted by shiny side-track ideas.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "If you could start your PhD life from scratch, what one thing would you do differently? Hindsight hour!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "1. Start therapy. Mental health is the most important thing and imo the best determinant of success in grad school and in life. Also student insurance is sweet. 2. Network network network. Don't assume you will stay in academia. And don't look at the PhD as an end in itself. Think about what you want once you are done and prepare for it. You might change your views along the way but better start the process early than in the last 1 year. 3. Stick to a 9-5 routine if possible and actually socialize on days off. Don't let anyone push your boundaries. People will try to make you feel bad for not slaving away. Recognize it for the dysfunctional way of life it is. Work smart and work consistent. This is your degree, don't follow anyone blindly if you don't agree.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "If you could start your PhD life from scratch, what one thing would you do differently? Hindsight hour!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "When I thought about forming my dissertation committee, I thought exclusively about whose scholarship matches up with my topic and methods. I did not think enough about my personal relationship with these scholars and importantly their relationships with each other. Faculty in departments can have personal feuds and epistemological differences that may play out during the defense hearing. Expertise is important, but so is the social dynamic of the committee. If at all possible, you want faculty on your committee who care about your success and get along with each other.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "If you could start your PhD life from scratch, what one thing would you do differently? Hindsight hour!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "1. Start therapy. Mental health is the most important thing and imo the best determinant of success in grad school and in life. Also student insurance is sweet. 2. Network network network. Don't assume you will stay in academia. And don't look at the PhD as an end in itself. Think about what you want once you are done and prepare for it. You might change your views along the way but better start the process early than in the last 1 year. 3. Stick to a 9-5 routine if possible and actually socialize on days off. Don't let anyone push your boundaries. People will try to make you feel bad for not slaving away. Recognize it for the dysfunctional way of life it is. Work smart and work consistent. This is your degree, don't follow anyone blindly if you don't agree.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "If you could start your PhD life from scratch, what one thing would you do differently? Hindsight hour!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Hire a personal trainer before I started and learned how to work out and build muscle. Then add the gym to a daily habit alongside my studies. I started to develop back problems from sitting reading all day and it really put me out. Also, I’d force myself to socialise more without using my phd as an excuse not to. I really kept to myself and got lonely toward the end. Two easy things!", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "If you could start your PhD life from scratch, what one thing would you do differently? Hindsight hour!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "1. Start therapy. Mental health is the most important thing and imo the best determinant of success in grad school and in life. Also student insurance is sweet. 2. Network network network. Don't assume you will stay in academia. And don't look at the PhD as an end in itself. Think about what you want once you are done and prepare for it. You might change your views along the way but better start the process early than in the last 1 year. 3. Stick to a 9-5 routine if possible and actually socialize on days off. Don't let anyone push your boundaries. People will try to make you feel bad for not slaving away. Recognize it for the dysfunctional way of life it is. Work smart and work consistent. This is your degree, don't follow anyone blindly if you don't agree.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "If you could start your PhD life from scratch, what one thing would you do differently? Hindsight hour!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Not choose research topics based on perceived difficulty as a personal challenge. Is there a dissertation proposal version of 'post-nut clarity'? Because I have that.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "If you could start your PhD life from scratch, what one thing would you do differently? Hindsight hour!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "1. Start therapy. Mental health is the most important thing and imo the best determinant of success in grad school and in life. Also student insurance is sweet. 2. Network network network. Don't assume you will stay in academia. And don't look at the PhD as an end in itself. Think about what you want once you are done and prepare for it. You might change your views along the way but better start the process early than in the last 1 year. 3. Stick to a 9-5 routine if possible and actually socialize on days off. Don't let anyone push your boundaries. People will try to make you feel bad for not slaving away. Recognize it for the dysfunctional way of life it is. Work smart and work consistent. This is your degree, don't follow anyone blindly if you don't agree.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "If you could start your PhD life from scratch, what one thing would you do differently? Hindsight hour!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Probably try harder for grants, maybe look for less competitive ones and work to focus the impact of my research. I took loans to cover research costs and it’s biting me in the ass now. Also I’d work harder to network. It’s something I’m still terrible at and connections can make a big difference on the job market.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "If you could start your PhD life from scratch, what one thing would you do differently? Hindsight hour!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "1. Start therapy. Mental health is the most important thing and imo the best determinant of success in grad school and in life. Also student insurance is sweet. 2. Network network network. Don't assume you will stay in academia. And don't look at the PhD as an end in itself. Think about what you want once you are done and prepare for it. You might change your views along the way but better start the process early than in the last 1 year. 3. Stick to a 9-5 routine if possible and actually socialize on days off. Don't let anyone push your boundaries. People will try to make you feel bad for not slaving away. Recognize it for the dysfunctional way of life it is. Work smart and work consistent. This is your degree, don't follow anyone blindly if you don't agree.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "People who hire faculty and postdocs, out of the “200 applicants for 1 position” how many were never serious contenders to begin with? And the ones who aren’t serious contenders, what tends to disqualify them? Wrong subfield? Wrong field entirely? Not enough pubs? Low rank university?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "100-150. We scan the list based on university, CVs, references, and bear in mind candidates who come particularly highly recommended. So, you can be considered from a low ranked institution if someone is willing to make calls for you to say you're the best thing since sliced bread, and we also won't really consider people from the top universities either unless they have something special going for them (a comment from faculty or great references/pubs). Field matters for some searches, but not all.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "People who hire faculty and postdocs, out of the “200 applicants for 1 position” how many were never serious contenders to begin with? And the ones who aren’t serious contenders, what tends to disqualify them? Wrong subfield? Wrong field entirely? Not enough pubs? Low rank university?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "In my experience, it's usually 1/3. We usually have some random people submitting apps, like medical doctors that think they should now be a professor in a completely unrelated field. The next 1/3 is usually missing something big, like pubs or teaching experience. The last 1/3 are where most of the attention is focused, and the difference between those applicants is usually quite nuanced.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "People who hire faculty and postdocs, out of the “200 applicants for 1 position” how many were never serious contenders to begin with? And the ones who aren’t serious contenders, what tends to disqualify them? Wrong subfield? Wrong field entirely? Not enough pubs? Low rank university?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I recently hired another assistant professor. Pool of ~30 applied. ~15 were actually qualified. ~6 were good fits for short list. 3 made final short list.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "People who hire faculty and postdocs, out of the “200 applicants for 1 position” how many were never serious contenders to begin with? And the ones who aren’t serious contenders, what tends to disqualify them? Wrong subfield? Wrong field entirely? Not enough pubs? Low rank university?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "In my experience, it's usually 1/3. We usually have some random people submitting apps, like medical doctors that think they should now be a professor in a completely unrelated field. The next 1/3 is usually missing something big, like pubs or teaching experience. The last 1/3 are where most of the attention is focused, and the difference between those applicants is usually quite nuanced.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "People who hire faculty and postdocs, out of the “200 applicants for 1 position” how many were never serious contenders to begin with? And the ones who aren’t serious contenders, what tends to disqualify them? Wrong subfield? Wrong field entirely? Not enough pubs? Low rank university?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I served on a search committee as an advanced student and we had about 40 applicants. 6 made it to phone interviews and 3 to on-campus lectures. Our search was a joint appointment between two schools so we had to find the best fit for the joint placement, an increasingly difficult task. We had candidates from multiple subfields within psychology. Two of the finalists had next to no teaching experience and the winner has next to none. They had quite a few publications though. Some of the phone interview finalists did not have many publications/came from lower ranking universities. It all depends on the search and search committee on disqualifications. One of the biggest ones was incomplete applications or applications that seemed like a one-size-fits-all (reused for many positions and not much thought into tailoring it to the specific search). Our university is a public state university with ~15k students.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "People who hire faculty and postdocs, out of the “200 applicants for 1 position” how many were never serious contenders to begin with? And the ones who aren’t serious contenders, what tends to disqualify them? Wrong subfield? Wrong field entirely? Not enough pubs? Low rank university?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "In my experience, it's usually 1/3. We usually have some random people submitting apps, like medical doctors that think they should now be a professor in a completely unrelated field. The next 1/3 is usually missing something big, like pubs or teaching experience. The last 1/3 are where most of the attention is focused, and the difference between those applicants is usually quite nuanced.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "People who hire faculty and postdocs, out of the “200 applicants for 1 position” how many were never serious contenders to begin with? And the ones who aren’t serious contenders, what tends to disqualify them? Wrong subfield? Wrong field entirely? Not enough pubs? Low rank university?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I served on a search committee as an advanced student and we had about 40 applicants. 6 made it to phone interviews and 3 to on-campus lectures. Our search was a joint appointment between two schools so we had to find the best fit for the joint placement, an increasingly difficult task. We had candidates from multiple subfields within psychology. Two of the finalists had next to no teaching experience and the winner has next to none. They had quite a few publications though. Some of the phone interview finalists did not have many publications/came from lower ranking universities. It all depends on the search and search committee on disqualifications. One of the biggest ones was incomplete applications or applications that seemed like a one-size-fits-all (reused for many positions and not much thought into tailoring it to the specific search). Our university is a public state university with ~15k students.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "People who hire faculty and postdocs, out of the “200 applicants for 1 position” how many were never serious contenders to begin with? And the ones who aren’t serious contenders, what tends to disqualify them? Wrong subfield? Wrong field entirely? Not enough pubs? Low rank university?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I’ve been on med school faculty search committees for a few years. We get 200-400 applications for open calls, with the vast majority applying for their first faculty job. There’s usually around 75-100 “reasonable” applications - a complete application, post-doc experience, reasonable evidence of research productivity (med school so teaching is less important). These are usually easy to narrow down to 10-15 with really good past research (number and quality of papers) and reference letters, with maybe half of those having a truly competitive research statement. We interview 5-10, and offer second visits to 1-3 depending on the year. Most get through the scripted talk on their past research just fine, but fail at the chalk talk where they have to give a reasonable account of what they want to work on, why they think it’s important, and some outline of what they think they should tackle first. These are usually candidates whose research statements weren’t particularly strong, but who we thought worth looking at more carefully. It’s the damnedest thing, but in a pile of several hundred applications from a lot of smart and driven people, you can usually find a handful whose ideas stand head and shoulders above the rest. TL;DR it’s usually the research statement. Very few people can give a coherent account of an interesting problem, explain why they think this is a deep issue, and propose some reasonable approaches.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "People who hire faculty and postdocs, out of the “200 applicants for 1 position” how many were never serious contenders to begin with? And the ones who aren’t serious contenders, what tends to disqualify them? Wrong subfield? Wrong field entirely? Not enough pubs? Low rank university?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I did two postdocs, the first one had 5 applicants, the second was 3 lmao. (Also, both insitutes are great, the 3 applicant one is number 4 in the world for my field... It's just so niche within the field that no one really does it. It's good that whenever I apply it'll probably be less than 10 people, but bad because I only see a handful of jobs per year.)", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "People who hire faculty and postdocs, out of the “200 applicants for 1 position” how many were never serious contenders to begin with? And the ones who aren’t serious contenders, what tends to disqualify them? Wrong subfield? Wrong field entirely? Not enough pubs? Low rank university?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I’ve been on med school faculty search committees for a few years. We get 200-400 applications for open calls, with the vast majority applying for their first faculty job. There’s usually around 75-100 “reasonable” applications - a complete application, post-doc experience, reasonable evidence of research productivity (med school so teaching is less important). These are usually easy to narrow down to 10-15 with really good past research (number and quality of papers) and reference letters, with maybe half of those having a truly competitive research statement. We interview 5-10, and offer second visits to 1-3 depending on the year. Most get through the scripted talk on their past research just fine, but fail at the chalk talk where they have to give a reasonable account of what they want to work on, why they think it’s important, and some outline of what they think they should tackle first. These are usually candidates whose research statements weren’t particularly strong, but who we thought worth looking at more carefully. It’s the damnedest thing, but in a pile of several hundred applications from a lot of smart and driven people, you can usually find a handful whose ideas stand head and shoulders above the rest. TL;DR it’s usually the research statement. Very few people can give a coherent account of an interesting problem, explain why they think this is a deep issue, and propose some reasonable approaches.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What secret unspoken reasons did your hiring committee choose one candidate over another? Grant writing potential? Color of skin? Length of responses? Interview just a formality so the nepotism isn't as obvious? We all know it exists, but perhaps not specifically. Any details you'd like to share about yours?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Ohhhhh.... I like this one. I'm here for the stories, but let me grab a glass of wine or something.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What secret unspoken reasons did your hiring committee choose one candidate over another? Grant writing potential? Color of skin? Length of responses? Interview just a formality so the nepotism isn't as obvious? We all know it exists, but perhaps not specifically. Any details you'd like to share about yours?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "They had a grant that paid for most of their starting salary for two years.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What secret unspoken reasons did your hiring committee choose one candidate over another? Grant writing potential? Color of skin? Length of responses? Interview just a formality so the nepotism isn't as obvious? We all know it exists, but perhaps not specifically. Any details you'd like to share about yours?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Administrative pressure, sigh", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What secret unspoken reasons did your hiring committee choose one candidate over another? Grant writing potential? Color of skin? Length of responses? Interview just a formality so the nepotism isn't as obvious? We all know it exists, but perhaps not specifically. Any details you'd like to share about yours?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "They had a grant that paid for most of their starting salary for two years.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What secret unspoken reasons did your hiring committee choose one candidate over another? Grant writing potential? Color of skin? Length of responses? Interview just a formality so the nepotism isn't as obvious? We all know it exists, but perhaps not specifically. Any details you'd like to share about yours?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "We interviewed and hired people in spite of them being waaay down the ranked list of initial candidates because they were local; their spouse worked in a much better job in our city and would definitely accept the offer because they had no other options. To be fair we made offers to other, higher ranked candidates first but they didn't accept because we don't pay them the going market rate in our field. We are desperate for faculty to teach classes as we've run out of capacity but their research potentials are very much in doubt.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What secret unspoken reasons did your hiring committee choose one candidate over another? Grant writing potential? Color of skin? Length of responses? Interview just a formality so the nepotism isn't as obvious? We all know it exists, but perhaps not specifically. Any details you'd like to share about yours?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Wasn't on the committee but when I was a candidate for a TT position at one of the schools where I adjunct, I was told by two separate people who were on the committee (although I can't imagine they were allowed to tell me this but they did) that the committee was divided over whether or not to hire me or someone else because I am a single Mom and several committee members didn't think a single Mom could handle a full time TT position. One of the people who voted against me was my Department Chair at the time (also a Mom). She asked me to stop by her office so she could be the one to tell me I wasn't chosen and why because she thought it would make me feel better to know that it wasn't *me* they didn't like. Narrator: It did not. ​ edited: typo", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What secret unspoken reasons did your hiring committee choose one candidate over another? Grant writing potential? Color of skin? Length of responses? Interview just a formality so the nepotism isn't as obvious? We all know it exists, but perhaps not specifically. Any details you'd like to share about yours?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Diversity. It’s both spoken and very much unspoken.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What secret unspoken reasons did your hiring committee choose one candidate over another? Grant writing potential? Color of skin? Length of responses? Interview just a formality so the nepotism isn't as obvious? We all know it exists, but perhaps not specifically. Any details you'd like to share about yours?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Wasn't on the committee but when I was a candidate for a TT position at one of the schools where I adjunct, I was told by two separate people who were on the committee (although I can't imagine they were allowed to tell me this but they did) that the committee was divided over whether or not to hire me or someone else because I am a single Mom and several committee members didn't think a single Mom could handle a full time TT position. One of the people who voted against me was my Department Chair at the time (also a Mom). She asked me to stop by her office so she could be the one to tell me I wasn't chosen and why because she thought it would make me feel better to know that it wasn't *me* they didn't like. Narrator: It did not. ​ edited: typo", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What secret unspoken reasons did your hiring committee choose one candidate over another? Grant writing potential? Color of skin? Length of responses? Interview just a formality so the nepotism isn't as obvious? We all know it exists, but perhaps not specifically. Any details you'd like to share about yours?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Availability. Having worked on a VERY related project. Being the “safe” and known choice. Straight number of pubs. The discussion is always enlightening.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "What secret unspoken reasons did your hiring committee choose one candidate over another? Grant writing potential? Color of skin? Length of responses? Interview just a formality so the nepotism isn't as obvious? We all know it exists, but perhaps not specifically. Any details you'd like to share about yours?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Wasn't on the committee but when I was a candidate for a TT position at one of the schools where I adjunct, I was told by two separate people who were on the committee (although I can't imagine they were allowed to tell me this but they did) that the committee was divided over whether or not to hire me or someone else because I am a single Mom and several committee members didn't think a single Mom could handle a full time TT position. One of the people who voted against me was my Department Chair at the time (also a Mom). She asked me to stop by her office so she could be the one to tell me I wasn't chosen and why because she thought it would make me feel better to know that it wasn't *me* they didn't like. Narrator: It did not. ​ edited: typo", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Is it normal to become more convinced your discipline is detached from practical reality the more you study it? I know this might read as a trollish post, but I *promise* I'm serious. So, I'm currently halfway through my Adv. MSc. International Relations & Diplomacy, and while my undergrad was a Liberal Arts BA, that was also heavily IR-focused. Honestly? I love it, but only in the context of academic bickering about pointless minutae that do not matter outside the walls of the faculty - the more I've studied IR theories, the less my remarks of \"we're a humanities field trying to masquerade as a hard science\" and \"if you open the dictionary to 'Ivory Tower Academia' you'll find a picture of our faculty\" have become jokes. I know there's always going to be a difference between academic theory and practices in reality - you clearly *need* to perform abstractions when creating a theory, but several of the main theories in my field just feel like they fall apart at the first dose of being exposed to the outside. I've always had this feeling to some extent, but it's grown rather than diminished, and I'm now actually worried whether or not I'll be able to put any conviction whatsoever in my master's thesis next year. Is this just a natural side effect of learning more about your field's theoretical frameworks and therefore being exposed to case studies where they *don't* work more, or am I just seriously disillusioned/too cynical? TL;DR starting to feel like my entire field desperately needs to go touch grass and talk to people, is that normal?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I came from history now I'm doing a PhD in IR and I'm not a fan of the discipline, so I get your point! But if you want to go for it you gotta reframe some things for yourself. While most education programmes still assign the \"Great Debates\" from the 1990s, that's not at all representative of the type of stuff that gets published these days. Thank God we're not in the 1990s anymore.most people in practice work on mid range theory on a specific subject. Then it becomes a lot more concrete.But beyond the Great Douchebags they're also a ton of of amazing scholars - but I don't know what area you work on so I can't recommend much Have you read beyond the classic theoretical debates and looked into other approaches? Postcolonial IR, queer IR, critical IR, Foucault, poststructuralism, grams I, bourdieau, Latour, etc etc? Try to read broad and wildly and especially read stuff you're unfamiliar with and that's outside your comfort zone I get the sense that you're frustrated that people dress up their opinion as an IR theory? It drives mental too, but remind yourself that all science is ideological, as the sociology of scientific knowledge has shown us. Have you looked into qualitative methodologies too? Europeans are much more into qual while Americans love quant, if you're frustrated with the US empirical slant", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Is it normal to become more convinced your discipline is detached from practical reality the more you study it? I know this might read as a trollish post, but I *promise* I'm serious. So, I'm currently halfway through my Adv. MSc. International Relations & Diplomacy, and while my undergrad was a Liberal Arts BA, that was also heavily IR-focused. Honestly? I love it, but only in the context of academic bickering about pointless minutae that do not matter outside the walls of the faculty - the more I've studied IR theories, the less my remarks of \"we're a humanities field trying to masquerade as a hard science\" and \"if you open the dictionary to 'Ivory Tower Academia' you'll find a picture of our faculty\" have become jokes. I know there's always going to be a difference between academic theory and practices in reality - you clearly *need* to perform abstractions when creating a theory, but several of the main theories in my field just feel like they fall apart at the first dose of being exposed to the outside. I've always had this feeling to some extent, but it's grown rather than diminished, and I'm now actually worried whether or not I'll be able to put any conviction whatsoever in my master's thesis next year. Is this just a natural side effect of learning more about your field's theoretical frameworks and therefore being exposed to case studies where they *don't* work more, or am I just seriously disillusioned/too cynical? TL;DR starting to feel like my entire field desperately needs to go touch grass and talk to people, is that normal?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I've always viewed this kind of academia vs real world as being like haute couture vs high street fashion. You're not supposed to wear haute couture it's an exercise in skill and creativity to the extreme. And although haute couture isn't meant to be worn it does influence what the next high street fashions will be. Academia is kind of the same, it's an exercise in itself but it does influence and trickle down to the real world in real and important, albeit in unpredictable, ways.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Is it normal to become more convinced your discipline is detached from practical reality the more you study it? I know this might read as a trollish post, but I *promise* I'm serious. So, I'm currently halfway through my Adv. MSc. International Relations & Diplomacy, and while my undergrad was a Liberal Arts BA, that was also heavily IR-focused. Honestly? I love it, but only in the context of academic bickering about pointless minutae that do not matter outside the walls of the faculty - the more I've studied IR theories, the less my remarks of \"we're a humanities field trying to masquerade as a hard science\" and \"if you open the dictionary to 'Ivory Tower Academia' you'll find a picture of our faculty\" have become jokes. I know there's always going to be a difference between academic theory and practices in reality - you clearly *need* to perform abstractions when creating a theory, but several of the main theories in my field just feel like they fall apart at the first dose of being exposed to the outside. I've always had this feeling to some extent, but it's grown rather than diminished, and I'm now actually worried whether or not I'll be able to put any conviction whatsoever in my master's thesis next year. Is this just a natural side effect of learning more about your field's theoretical frameworks and therefore being exposed to case studies where they *don't* work more, or am I just seriously disillusioned/too cynical? TL;DR starting to feel like my entire field desperately needs to go touch grass and talk to people, is that normal?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I'm not in IR, I'm an American and a historian trying to wrap up my dissertation, and while the theories and methodology we use make sense to me, I'm working on something rather obscure to Americans and I can't help but feel like it *doesn't mean anything* when I compare my work to Americanists whose subjects deal with the most politically charged debates of the day. I can't help but admire those who work on the American West, American South, and the Civil Rights Movement. That isn't to say that I don't love my topic--I work on French colonialism in North Africa--nor that it lacks continuing relevance in the Mediterranean, but it just *feels* unimportant from my vantage point, and that's ok. Knowing that I feel this way, my aim is to get a job outside of research when I finish it, whether in teaching or some other, non-academic field. I know that it's normal to feel this about our research and work, but it's not something that I can digest as easily as many other academics can.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Is it normal to become more convinced your discipline is detached from practical reality the more you study it? I know this might read as a trollish post, but I *promise* I'm serious. So, I'm currently halfway through my Adv. MSc. International Relations & Diplomacy, and while my undergrad was a Liberal Arts BA, that was also heavily IR-focused. Honestly? I love it, but only in the context of academic bickering about pointless minutae that do not matter outside the walls of the faculty - the more I've studied IR theories, the less my remarks of \"we're a humanities field trying to masquerade as a hard science\" and \"if you open the dictionary to 'Ivory Tower Academia' you'll find a picture of our faculty\" have become jokes. I know there's always going to be a difference between academic theory and practices in reality - you clearly *need* to perform abstractions when creating a theory, but several of the main theories in my field just feel like they fall apart at the first dose of being exposed to the outside. I've always had this feeling to some extent, but it's grown rather than diminished, and I'm now actually worried whether or not I'll be able to put any conviction whatsoever in my master's thesis next year. Is this just a natural side effect of learning more about your field's theoretical frameworks and therefore being exposed to case studies where they *don't* work more, or am I just seriously disillusioned/too cynical? TL;DR starting to feel like my entire field desperately needs to go touch grass and talk to people, is that normal?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I've always viewed this kind of academia vs real world as being like haute couture vs high street fashion. You're not supposed to wear haute couture it's an exercise in skill and creativity to the extreme. And although haute couture isn't meant to be worn it does influence what the next high street fashions will be. Academia is kind of the same, it's an exercise in itself but it does influence and trickle down to the real world in real and important, albeit in unpredictable, ways.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Is it normal to become more convinced your discipline is detached from practical reality the more you study it? I know this might read as a trollish post, but I *promise* I'm serious. So, I'm currently halfway through my Adv. MSc. International Relations & Diplomacy, and while my undergrad was a Liberal Arts BA, that was also heavily IR-focused. Honestly? I love it, but only in the context of academic bickering about pointless minutae that do not matter outside the walls of the faculty - the more I've studied IR theories, the less my remarks of \"we're a humanities field trying to masquerade as a hard science\" and \"if you open the dictionary to 'Ivory Tower Academia' you'll find a picture of our faculty\" have become jokes. I know there's always going to be a difference between academic theory and practices in reality - you clearly *need* to perform abstractions when creating a theory, but several of the main theories in my field just feel like they fall apart at the first dose of being exposed to the outside. I've always had this feeling to some extent, but it's grown rather than diminished, and I'm now actually worried whether or not I'll be able to put any conviction whatsoever in my master's thesis next year. Is this just a natural side effect of learning more about your field's theoretical frameworks and therefore being exposed to case studies where they *don't* work more, or am I just seriously disillusioned/too cynical? TL;DR starting to feel like my entire field desperately needs to go touch grass and talk to people, is that normal?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I think most in the field are probably aware and working towards creating better theories, or more predictable ones. Based on a theory, we can expect something to happen, but even a cancer doctor has to make the treatment based on the type of cancer, the body of the person, and cancer response to treatment. It is a human making decisions, not a theory.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Is it normal to become more convinced your discipline is detached from practical reality the more you study it? I know this might read as a trollish post, but I *promise* I'm serious. So, I'm currently halfway through my Adv. MSc. International Relations & Diplomacy, and while my undergrad was a Liberal Arts BA, that was also heavily IR-focused. Honestly? I love it, but only in the context of academic bickering about pointless minutae that do not matter outside the walls of the faculty - the more I've studied IR theories, the less my remarks of \"we're a humanities field trying to masquerade as a hard science\" and \"if you open the dictionary to 'Ivory Tower Academia' you'll find a picture of our faculty\" have become jokes. I know there's always going to be a difference between academic theory and practices in reality - you clearly *need* to perform abstractions when creating a theory, but several of the main theories in my field just feel like they fall apart at the first dose of being exposed to the outside. I've always had this feeling to some extent, but it's grown rather than diminished, and I'm now actually worried whether or not I'll be able to put any conviction whatsoever in my master's thesis next year. Is this just a natural side effect of learning more about your field's theoretical frameworks and therefore being exposed to case studies where they *don't* work more, or am I just seriously disillusioned/too cynical? TL;DR starting to feel like my entire field desperately needs to go touch grass and talk to people, is that normal?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I've always viewed this kind of academia vs real world as being like haute couture vs high street fashion. You're not supposed to wear haute couture it's an exercise in skill and creativity to the extreme. And although haute couture isn't meant to be worn it does influence what the next high street fashions will be. Academia is kind of the same, it's an exercise in itself but it does influence and trickle down to the real world in real and important, albeit in unpredictable, ways.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Is it normal to become more convinced your discipline is detached from practical reality the more you study it? I know this might read as a trollish post, but I *promise* I'm serious. So, I'm currently halfway through my Adv. MSc. International Relations & Diplomacy, and while my undergrad was a Liberal Arts BA, that was also heavily IR-focused. Honestly? I love it, but only in the context of academic bickering about pointless minutae that do not matter outside the walls of the faculty - the more I've studied IR theories, the less my remarks of \"we're a humanities field trying to masquerade as a hard science\" and \"if you open the dictionary to 'Ivory Tower Academia' you'll find a picture of our faculty\" have become jokes. I know there's always going to be a difference between academic theory and practices in reality - you clearly *need* to perform abstractions when creating a theory, but several of the main theories in my field just feel like they fall apart at the first dose of being exposed to the outside. I've always had this feeling to some extent, but it's grown rather than diminished, and I'm now actually worried whether or not I'll be able to put any conviction whatsoever in my master's thesis next year. Is this just a natural side effect of learning more about your field's theoretical frameworks and therefore being exposed to case studies where they *don't* work more, or am I just seriously disillusioned/too cynical? TL;DR starting to feel like my entire field desperately needs to go touch grass and talk to people, is that normal?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I'm not in IR, I'm an American and a historian trying to wrap up my dissertation, and while the theories and methodology we use make sense to me, I'm working on something rather obscure to Americans and I can't help but feel like it *doesn't mean anything* when I compare my work to Americanists whose subjects deal with the most politically charged debates of the day. I can't help but admire those who work on the American West, American South, and the Civil Rights Movement. That isn't to say that I don't love my topic--I work on French colonialism in North Africa--nor that it lacks continuing relevance in the Mediterranean, but it just *feels* unimportant from my vantage point, and that's ok. Knowing that I feel this way, my aim is to get a job outside of research when I finish it, whether in teaching or some other, non-academic field. I know that it's normal to feel this about our research and work, but it's not something that I can digest as easily as many other academics can.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Is it normal to become more convinced your discipline is detached from practical reality the more you study it? I know this might read as a trollish post, but I *promise* I'm serious. So, I'm currently halfway through my Adv. MSc. International Relations & Diplomacy, and while my undergrad was a Liberal Arts BA, that was also heavily IR-focused. Honestly? I love it, but only in the context of academic bickering about pointless minutae that do not matter outside the walls of the faculty - the more I've studied IR theories, the less my remarks of \"we're a humanities field trying to masquerade as a hard science\" and \"if you open the dictionary to 'Ivory Tower Academia' you'll find a picture of our faculty\" have become jokes. I know there's always going to be a difference between academic theory and practices in reality - you clearly *need* to perform abstractions when creating a theory, but several of the main theories in my field just feel like they fall apart at the first dose of being exposed to the outside. I've always had this feeling to some extent, but it's grown rather than diminished, and I'm now actually worried whether or not I'll be able to put any conviction whatsoever in my master's thesis next year. Is this just a natural side effect of learning more about your field's theoretical frameworks and therefore being exposed to case studies where they *don't* work more, or am I just seriously disillusioned/too cynical? TL;DR starting to feel like my entire field desperately needs to go touch grass and talk to people, is that normal?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Well the main problem is IR, which is not only detached but also theoretically, methodologically, and normatively bankrupt lollll", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Is it normal to become more convinced your discipline is detached from practical reality the more you study it? I know this might read as a trollish post, but I *promise* I'm serious. So, I'm currently halfway through my Adv. MSc. International Relations & Diplomacy, and while my undergrad was a Liberal Arts BA, that was also heavily IR-focused. Honestly? I love it, but only in the context of academic bickering about pointless minutae that do not matter outside the walls of the faculty - the more I've studied IR theories, the less my remarks of \"we're a humanities field trying to masquerade as a hard science\" and \"if you open the dictionary to 'Ivory Tower Academia' you'll find a picture of our faculty\" have become jokes. I know there's always going to be a difference between academic theory and practices in reality - you clearly *need* to perform abstractions when creating a theory, but several of the main theories in my field just feel like they fall apart at the first dose of being exposed to the outside. I've always had this feeling to some extent, but it's grown rather than diminished, and I'm now actually worried whether or not I'll be able to put any conviction whatsoever in my master's thesis next year. Is this just a natural side effect of learning more about your field's theoretical frameworks and therefore being exposed to case studies where they *don't* work more, or am I just seriously disillusioned/too cynical? TL;DR starting to feel like my entire field desperately needs to go touch grass and talk to people, is that normal?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I think most in the field are probably aware and working towards creating better theories, or more predictable ones. Based on a theory, we can expect something to happen, but even a cancer doctor has to make the treatment based on the type of cancer, the body of the person, and cancer response to treatment. It is a human making decisions, not a theory.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Is it normal to become more convinced your discipline is detached from practical reality the more you study it? I know this might read as a trollish post, but I *promise* I'm serious. So, I'm currently halfway through my Adv. MSc. International Relations & Diplomacy, and while my undergrad was a Liberal Arts BA, that was also heavily IR-focused. Honestly? I love it, but only in the context of academic bickering about pointless minutae that do not matter outside the walls of the faculty - the more I've studied IR theories, the less my remarks of \"we're a humanities field trying to masquerade as a hard science\" and \"if you open the dictionary to 'Ivory Tower Academia' you'll find a picture of our faculty\" have become jokes. I know there's always going to be a difference between academic theory and practices in reality - you clearly *need* to perform abstractions when creating a theory, but several of the main theories in my field just feel like they fall apart at the first dose of being exposed to the outside. I've always had this feeling to some extent, but it's grown rather than diminished, and I'm now actually worried whether or not I'll be able to put any conviction whatsoever in my master's thesis next year. Is this just a natural side effect of learning more about your field's theoretical frameworks and therefore being exposed to case studies where they *don't* work more, or am I just seriously disillusioned/too cynical? TL;DR starting to feel like my entire field desperately needs to go touch grass and talk to people, is that normal?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Well the main problem is IR, which is not only detached but also theoretically, methodologically, and normatively bankrupt lollll", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Just saw that the research paper I have been working on for a year is published by someone else. Whats should I do? I have been told to post on this subreddit. Looking for advice on what should be the best course of action and if any one ever faced this issue I would like to learn from their experience. I have been working on a project and hoping to publish a paper for more then a year. I have been often asking about advice regarding it on a fee subreddits because my uni professors did not had expertise in this field. As a result I made mistake of asking stranger in internet if they could go over my paper and review it since I could not get it reviewed from my uni. I shared the paper with 2 people via email but they are the not the one to publish. Today I saw someone has it published on Hindawi.com I am shocked and heartbroken. The paper contains images of my home. It mentions a custom dataset that I never made public and only reside with me. I have pushed this paper to a private github repo before it was submitted here. I also own the overleaf doc on which it was written and it contains history of it. I have also have history of conversation with a researcher on whose method it was inspired from. I planned to submit my paper to upcoming CVPR. What would be the best course of action for me to take it down and claim ownership? Thank you", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Had something similar happen to a colleague. Being brief, your chances are slim. Do not ever share your research with anyone not involved, the academic community is usually not so morally inclined as some make it to be.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Just saw that the research paper I have been working on for a year is published by someone else. Whats should I do? I have been told to post on this subreddit. Looking for advice on what should be the best course of action and if any one ever faced this issue I would like to learn from their experience. I have been working on a project and hoping to publish a paper for more then a year. I have been often asking about advice regarding it on a fee subreddits because my uni professors did not had expertise in this field. As a result I made mistake of asking stranger in internet if they could go over my paper and review it since I could not get it reviewed from my uni. I shared the paper with 2 people via email but they are the not the one to publish. Today I saw someone has it published on Hindawi.com I am shocked and heartbroken. The paper contains images of my home. It mentions a custom dataset that I never made public and only reside with me. I have pushed this paper to a private github repo before it was submitted here. I also own the overleaf doc on which it was written and it contains history of it. I have also have history of conversation with a researcher on whose method it was inspired from. I planned to submit my paper to upcoming CVPR. What would be the best course of action for me to take it down and claim ownership? Thank you", "role": "user" }, { "content": "You should talk to your university's legal department. They might be able to help.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Discussing Stagnant PhD Stipends I've been talking with my fellow PhD students recently about grad student pay, specifically why its viewed as normal to be so much less than minimum wage. We are at a supposedly top-tier Canadian research university in a city where the official poverty line is now >$28,000, roughly equal to full-time minimum wage, but our program's minimum stipends are $17,000 (which is actually LOWER than it was 5 years ago). Many of us don't get additional pay despite winning fellowships (I get 20k/year from external funds and not an extra cent from my lab), and because we're in a graduate-only program there are no classes to TA for extra money. We are only required to take 16 credits for the entire program so we are very much expected to be spending at least 40 hours / week in the lab. There's a common sentiment that we are having to make greater and greater sacrifices to survive on these wages - cutting out meals, moving into seriously sub-standard housing, taking out loans. Part-time jobs are also forbidden by the program (students have been threatened with expulsion for taking jobs), and spending time on things other than our research feels like it will ruin our career chances. The burden also feels worse as the average time to graduate is >5 years, and will certainly be longer for us due to covid, meaning those of us who did MSc's beforehand will be 30 with at least half a decade of lab experience, but will still be paid the same as new students almost a decade ago. With the rapidly increasing cost of living, lengthening degree durations, and awful career prospects for graduates, I believe the current stipend is unsustainable and unjustified. I brought these points up (as well as the fact that I've brought in over $80 000 in fellowships) with my PI and asked for a raise and he tentatively agreed, but he has brushed me off every time I've tried to bring it up the past few weeks and I'm getting increasingly agitated. I absolutely need him as a reference so I feel I have no leverage, as is the case for most students. I'm curious how this compares with other students' situations as it seems like PhDs are better off in other countries, and the perspective of PIs as to whether low student stipends are still justified. If anyone has examples of successful campaigns to increase stipends, or relevant statistics or other readings, that would also be great. We don't have a student union but are currently recruiting as many students as we can to a Facebook group to share information and grievances, and hopefully organize some action in the future.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I can only speak from an American perspective, but I am sure the Canadian academic situation has the same problem. A big obstacle is that NSF/NIH grants haven't really increased over time (in fact, the NIH modular grant has been $250,000 for over 2 decades, giving you a 2021 purchasing power that is ~50% of your 2001 purchasing power). As a result, PIs have only a couple of options with respect to trainee salaries: 1. Increase salaries but hire less trainees (decreasing scientific output) 2. Increase salaries and obtain more grants 3. Maintain salaries and try to survive while inflation chips away at everything else. Unfortunately, most PIs (by choice or, more often, by circumstance) choose option #3. What I have noticed is that many of the \"top\" institutions (by whatever metric you want to choose) have been slowly but surely increasing trainee salary (Columbia graduate students in STEM can make well over $40k if you include summer stipends) and providing subsidizing housing for their PhD students. I expect this to continue for those types of institutions while the \"other\" institutions get left behind. I think we can all agree this bifurcation of graduate education is not a good thing but it seems rather inevitable at this point. The only options graduate students have is to *not* join institutions that do not pay their trainees a living wage, or to join a union. Unfortunately, I think there are limits to joining a union due to external funding difficulties.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Discussing Stagnant PhD Stipends I've been talking with my fellow PhD students recently about grad student pay, specifically why its viewed as normal to be so much less than minimum wage. We are at a supposedly top-tier Canadian research university in a city where the official poverty line is now >$28,000, roughly equal to full-time minimum wage, but our program's minimum stipends are $17,000 (which is actually LOWER than it was 5 years ago). Many of us don't get additional pay despite winning fellowships (I get 20k/year from external funds and not an extra cent from my lab), and because we're in a graduate-only program there are no classes to TA for extra money. We are only required to take 16 credits for the entire program so we are very much expected to be spending at least 40 hours / week in the lab. There's a common sentiment that we are having to make greater and greater sacrifices to survive on these wages - cutting out meals, moving into seriously sub-standard housing, taking out loans. Part-time jobs are also forbidden by the program (students have been threatened with expulsion for taking jobs), and spending time on things other than our research feels like it will ruin our career chances. The burden also feels worse as the average time to graduate is >5 years, and will certainly be longer for us due to covid, meaning those of us who did MSc's beforehand will be 30 with at least half a decade of lab experience, but will still be paid the same as new students almost a decade ago. With the rapidly increasing cost of living, lengthening degree durations, and awful career prospects for graduates, I believe the current stipend is unsustainable and unjustified. I brought these points up (as well as the fact that I've brought in over $80 000 in fellowships) with my PI and asked for a raise and he tentatively agreed, but he has brushed me off every time I've tried to bring it up the past few weeks and I'm getting increasingly agitated. I absolutely need him as a reference so I feel I have no leverage, as is the case for most students. I'm curious how this compares with other students' situations as it seems like PhDs are better off in other countries, and the perspective of PIs as to whether low student stipends are still justified. If anyone has examples of successful campaigns to increase stipends, or relevant statistics or other readings, that would also be great. We don't have a student union but are currently recruiting as many students as we can to a Facebook group to share information and grievances, and hopefully organize some action in the future.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "$17k--Canadian--No mandatory supplementary fund despite bringing in external money...the beautiful University of Toronto, if I'm guessing right. ​ U of T is absolutely abhorrent with this, even when compared to UBC and McGill (where I did my master's). I have no concrete advice besides a lot of empathy and solidarity, but I do have a friend there now in STEM who was in a very similar position as you (brought in multiple external funds with little to no wage increase from his NSERC chair supervisor). He essentially played hard ball: made it clear he is going to stop taking on the countless side projects that only he could get done for his advisor, and also explictly mentioned how ridiculous the base stipend is + the amount of money he's brought in that essentially affords his advisor another grad student. He suggested concrete alternatives: teach his advisor's course for his remaining years and get paid additional lecturer salary; allow summers off for industry partnership positions; or, I want an explicit fund increase from the money that I brought in. He eventually got a mix of request 2 and 3. ​ Whether you can do this yourself or not obviously depends on a lot of things: your relationship to your supervisor, your vulnerability (are you an international student? domestic? etc), and the realistic alternatives you can propose (are you capable of teaching a class? do you have a relationship with an industry partner you can leverage?), but just a concrete example for you to work with. ​ And last (this one takes the most work and most likely won't be realized in during your tenure), ORGANIZE!!! If there's no union, start reading, start talking, and get the ball rolling to stop this exploitation from happening, if not to you, for future generations to come. ​ Canadian higher ed is so stingy, partially because of our limited funding sources, but also because I think Canadian academic culture is just lethargic and undriven in general. We moan about brain drain to the US, but do nothing concrete to attract and retain talent. ​ All the best.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Discussing Stagnant PhD Stipends I've been talking with my fellow PhD students recently about grad student pay, specifically why its viewed as normal to be so much less than minimum wage. We are at a supposedly top-tier Canadian research university in a city where the official poverty line is now >$28,000, roughly equal to full-time minimum wage, but our program's minimum stipends are $17,000 (which is actually LOWER than it was 5 years ago). Many of us don't get additional pay despite winning fellowships (I get 20k/year from external funds and not an extra cent from my lab), and because we're in a graduate-only program there are no classes to TA for extra money. We are only required to take 16 credits for the entire program so we are very much expected to be spending at least 40 hours / week in the lab. There's a common sentiment that we are having to make greater and greater sacrifices to survive on these wages - cutting out meals, moving into seriously sub-standard housing, taking out loans. Part-time jobs are also forbidden by the program (students have been threatened with expulsion for taking jobs), and spending time on things other than our research feels like it will ruin our career chances. The burden also feels worse as the average time to graduate is >5 years, and will certainly be longer for us due to covid, meaning those of us who did MSc's beforehand will be 30 with at least half a decade of lab experience, but will still be paid the same as new students almost a decade ago. With the rapidly increasing cost of living, lengthening degree durations, and awful career prospects for graduates, I believe the current stipend is unsustainable and unjustified. I brought these points up (as well as the fact that I've brought in over $80 000 in fellowships) with my PI and asked for a raise and he tentatively agreed, but he has brushed me off every time I've tried to bring it up the past few weeks and I'm getting increasingly agitated. I absolutely need him as a reference so I feel I have no leverage, as is the case for most students. I'm curious how this compares with other students' situations as it seems like PhDs are better off in other countries, and the perspective of PIs as to whether low student stipends are still justified. If anyone has examples of successful campaigns to increase stipends, or relevant statistics or other readings, that would also be great. We don't have a student union but are currently recruiting as many students as we can to a Facebook group to share information and grievances, and hopefully organize some action in the future.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "As a reference: in Austria, where I did my PhD, PhD students are usually employed under a collective agreement contract as a \"project assisstant\", but officially only 30h / week. This still amounts to \\~30k € (\\~45k CAD) per year before tax/social insurance. So, luckily, fairly decent for PhD. In Austria we have very strong unions (in this case, not only for students, but for all university employees), which is why these collective agreements are possible. I don't know the situation in Canada, but I guess that similar agreements via unions (for university of public sector in general) would be ideal.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Discussing Stagnant PhD Stipends I've been talking with my fellow PhD students recently about grad student pay, specifically why its viewed as normal to be so much less than minimum wage. We are at a supposedly top-tier Canadian research university in a city where the official poverty line is now >$28,000, roughly equal to full-time minimum wage, but our program's minimum stipends are $17,000 (which is actually LOWER than it was 5 years ago). Many of us don't get additional pay despite winning fellowships (I get 20k/year from external funds and not an extra cent from my lab), and because we're in a graduate-only program there are no classes to TA for extra money. We are only required to take 16 credits for the entire program so we are very much expected to be spending at least 40 hours / week in the lab. There's a common sentiment that we are having to make greater and greater sacrifices to survive on these wages - cutting out meals, moving into seriously sub-standard housing, taking out loans. Part-time jobs are also forbidden by the program (students have been threatened with expulsion for taking jobs), and spending time on things other than our research feels like it will ruin our career chances. The burden also feels worse as the average time to graduate is >5 years, and will certainly be longer for us due to covid, meaning those of us who did MSc's beforehand will be 30 with at least half a decade of lab experience, but will still be paid the same as new students almost a decade ago. With the rapidly increasing cost of living, lengthening degree durations, and awful career prospects for graduates, I believe the current stipend is unsustainable and unjustified. I brought these points up (as well as the fact that I've brought in over $80 000 in fellowships) with my PI and asked for a raise and he tentatively agreed, but he has brushed me off every time I've tried to bring it up the past few weeks and I'm getting increasingly agitated. I absolutely need him as a reference so I feel I have no leverage, as is the case for most students. I'm curious how this compares with other students' situations as it seems like PhDs are better off in other countries, and the perspective of PIs as to whether low student stipends are still justified. If anyone has examples of successful campaigns to increase stipends, or relevant statistics or other readings, that would also be great. We don't have a student union but are currently recruiting as many students as we can to a Facebook group to share information and grievances, and hopefully organize some action in the future.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "$17k--Canadian--No mandatory supplementary fund despite bringing in external money...the beautiful University of Toronto, if I'm guessing right. ​ U of T is absolutely abhorrent with this, even when compared to UBC and McGill (where I did my master's). I have no concrete advice besides a lot of empathy and solidarity, but I do have a friend there now in STEM who was in a very similar position as you (brought in multiple external funds with little to no wage increase from his NSERC chair supervisor). He essentially played hard ball: made it clear he is going to stop taking on the countless side projects that only he could get done for his advisor, and also explictly mentioned how ridiculous the base stipend is + the amount of money he's brought in that essentially affords his advisor another grad student. He suggested concrete alternatives: teach his advisor's course for his remaining years and get paid additional lecturer salary; allow summers off for industry partnership positions; or, I want an explicit fund increase from the money that I brought in. He eventually got a mix of request 2 and 3. ​ Whether you can do this yourself or not obviously depends on a lot of things: your relationship to your supervisor, your vulnerability (are you an international student? domestic? etc), and the realistic alternatives you can propose (are you capable of teaching a class? do you have a relationship with an industry partner you can leverage?), but just a concrete example for you to work with. ​ And last (this one takes the most work and most likely won't be realized in during your tenure), ORGANIZE!!! If there's no union, start reading, start talking, and get the ball rolling to stop this exploitation from happening, if not to you, for future generations to come. ​ Canadian higher ed is so stingy, partially because of our limited funding sources, but also because I think Canadian academic culture is just lethargic and undriven in general. We moan about brain drain to the US, but do nothing concrete to attract and retain talent. ​ All the best.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Discussing Stagnant PhD Stipends I've been talking with my fellow PhD students recently about grad student pay, specifically why its viewed as normal to be so much less than minimum wage. We are at a supposedly top-tier Canadian research university in a city where the official poverty line is now >$28,000, roughly equal to full-time minimum wage, but our program's minimum stipends are $17,000 (which is actually LOWER than it was 5 years ago). Many of us don't get additional pay despite winning fellowships (I get 20k/year from external funds and not an extra cent from my lab), and because we're in a graduate-only program there are no classes to TA for extra money. We are only required to take 16 credits for the entire program so we are very much expected to be spending at least 40 hours / week in the lab. There's a common sentiment that we are having to make greater and greater sacrifices to survive on these wages - cutting out meals, moving into seriously sub-standard housing, taking out loans. Part-time jobs are also forbidden by the program (students have been threatened with expulsion for taking jobs), and spending time on things other than our research feels like it will ruin our career chances. The burden also feels worse as the average time to graduate is >5 years, and will certainly be longer for us due to covid, meaning those of us who did MSc's beforehand will be 30 with at least half a decade of lab experience, but will still be paid the same as new students almost a decade ago. With the rapidly increasing cost of living, lengthening degree durations, and awful career prospects for graduates, I believe the current stipend is unsustainable and unjustified. I brought these points up (as well as the fact that I've brought in over $80 000 in fellowships) with my PI and asked for a raise and he tentatively agreed, but he has brushed me off every time I've tried to bring it up the past few weeks and I'm getting increasingly agitated. I absolutely need him as a reference so I feel I have no leverage, as is the case for most students. I'm curious how this compares with other students' situations as it seems like PhDs are better off in other countries, and the perspective of PIs as to whether low student stipends are still justified. If anyone has examples of successful campaigns to increase stipends, or relevant statistics or other readings, that would also be great. We don't have a student union but are currently recruiting as many students as we can to a Facebook group to share information and grievances, and hopefully organize some action in the future.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "A few things to consider (US perspective). First, PIs often do not have control over stipends due to University rules and/or funder stipulations. Second, and while this may not apply in your specific case, consider that at many US state-supported universities, faculty and staff salaries have remained stagnant for years (and you can infer from there how graduate student stipend increase requests may be perceived). Finally, along the lines of another commenter, your tuition as a STEM student should be covered and so when you add the cost of tuition to your stipend, that $ amount can be quite substantial. Your stipend also comes with lots of other overhead costs that you or your PI don't see per se, but someone has to pay for it. I'm not saying any of this is right, but some things to keep in mind. One big way a PI can offset some graduate student expenses is to pay in full for their attendance at conferences, etc. While students should be seeking funding for such opportunities, often these opportunities are limited and only cover some costs. I think it's pretty shitty when PIs expect their graduate students to pay their own way to attend and present at major conferences in their field.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Discussing Stagnant PhD Stipends I've been talking with my fellow PhD students recently about grad student pay, specifically why its viewed as normal to be so much less than minimum wage. We are at a supposedly top-tier Canadian research university in a city where the official poverty line is now >$28,000, roughly equal to full-time minimum wage, but our program's minimum stipends are $17,000 (which is actually LOWER than it was 5 years ago). Many of us don't get additional pay despite winning fellowships (I get 20k/year from external funds and not an extra cent from my lab), and because we're in a graduate-only program there are no classes to TA for extra money. We are only required to take 16 credits for the entire program so we are very much expected to be spending at least 40 hours / week in the lab. There's a common sentiment that we are having to make greater and greater sacrifices to survive on these wages - cutting out meals, moving into seriously sub-standard housing, taking out loans. Part-time jobs are also forbidden by the program (students have been threatened with expulsion for taking jobs), and spending time on things other than our research feels like it will ruin our career chances. The burden also feels worse as the average time to graduate is >5 years, and will certainly be longer for us due to covid, meaning those of us who did MSc's beforehand will be 30 with at least half a decade of lab experience, but will still be paid the same as new students almost a decade ago. With the rapidly increasing cost of living, lengthening degree durations, and awful career prospects for graduates, I believe the current stipend is unsustainable and unjustified. I brought these points up (as well as the fact that I've brought in over $80 000 in fellowships) with my PI and asked for a raise and he tentatively agreed, but he has brushed me off every time I've tried to bring it up the past few weeks and I'm getting increasingly agitated. I absolutely need him as a reference so I feel I have no leverage, as is the case for most students. I'm curious how this compares with other students' situations as it seems like PhDs are better off in other countries, and the perspective of PIs as to whether low student stipends are still justified. If anyone has examples of successful campaigns to increase stipends, or relevant statistics or other readings, that would also be great. We don't have a student union but are currently recruiting as many students as we can to a Facebook group to share information and grievances, and hopefully organize some action in the future.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Others have gone into funding barriers, but let's not forget there is some toxic classism inherent in academia. A few years ago when I was still a postdoc, I was in a discussion about the pending unionization of postdocs and how they and the grad student union were fighting for increases in wages. It was disheartening and astounding to hear a postdoc in the department claim that \"postdoc wages aren't meant to be self-sufficient\" and go on about how we're trainees so we deserve to be paid less, the work is it's own reward, and how raising trainee salaries would \"ruin\" labs so we should all be willing to sacrifice for the greater good, etc. Then you have higher ups chiding us that \"if you're looking for money, you shouldn't be in science.\" Never mind that we're not asking for six figures or anything outrageous, just enough that we're not constantly living paycheck to paycheck and on the verge of crisis when something unexpected happens. I'm constantly bumping into these attitudes more and more when I bring up things like paying undergraduates, increasing funding for grad students and postdocs, etc and it's infuriating.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Discussing Stagnant PhD Stipends I've been talking with my fellow PhD students recently about grad student pay, specifically why its viewed as normal to be so much less than minimum wage. We are at a supposedly top-tier Canadian research university in a city where the official poverty line is now >$28,000, roughly equal to full-time minimum wage, but our program's minimum stipends are $17,000 (which is actually LOWER than it was 5 years ago). Many of us don't get additional pay despite winning fellowships (I get 20k/year from external funds and not an extra cent from my lab), and because we're in a graduate-only program there are no classes to TA for extra money. We are only required to take 16 credits for the entire program so we are very much expected to be spending at least 40 hours / week in the lab. There's a common sentiment that we are having to make greater and greater sacrifices to survive on these wages - cutting out meals, moving into seriously sub-standard housing, taking out loans. Part-time jobs are also forbidden by the program (students have been threatened with expulsion for taking jobs), and spending time on things other than our research feels like it will ruin our career chances. The burden also feels worse as the average time to graduate is >5 years, and will certainly be longer for us due to covid, meaning those of us who did MSc's beforehand will be 30 with at least half a decade of lab experience, but will still be paid the same as new students almost a decade ago. With the rapidly increasing cost of living, lengthening degree durations, and awful career prospects for graduates, I believe the current stipend is unsustainable and unjustified. I brought these points up (as well as the fact that I've brought in over $80 000 in fellowships) with my PI and asked for a raise and he tentatively agreed, but he has brushed me off every time I've tried to bring it up the past few weeks and I'm getting increasingly agitated. I absolutely need him as a reference so I feel I have no leverage, as is the case for most students. I'm curious how this compares with other students' situations as it seems like PhDs are better off in other countries, and the perspective of PIs as to whether low student stipends are still justified. If anyone has examples of successful campaigns to increase stipends, or relevant statistics or other readings, that would also be great. We don't have a student union but are currently recruiting as many students as we can to a Facebook group to share information and grievances, and hopefully organize some action in the future.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "As a reference: in Austria, where I did my PhD, PhD students are usually employed under a collective agreement contract as a \"project assisstant\", but officially only 30h / week. This still amounts to \\~30k € (\\~45k CAD) per year before tax/social insurance. So, luckily, fairly decent for PhD. In Austria we have very strong unions (in this case, not only for students, but for all university employees), which is why these collective agreements are possible. I don't know the situation in Canada, but I guess that similar agreements via unions (for university of public sector in general) would be ideal.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Discussing Stagnant PhD Stipends I've been talking with my fellow PhD students recently about grad student pay, specifically why its viewed as normal to be so much less than minimum wage. We are at a supposedly top-tier Canadian research university in a city where the official poverty line is now >$28,000, roughly equal to full-time minimum wage, but our program's minimum stipends are $17,000 (which is actually LOWER than it was 5 years ago). Many of us don't get additional pay despite winning fellowships (I get 20k/year from external funds and not an extra cent from my lab), and because we're in a graduate-only program there are no classes to TA for extra money. We are only required to take 16 credits for the entire program so we are very much expected to be spending at least 40 hours / week in the lab. There's a common sentiment that we are having to make greater and greater sacrifices to survive on these wages - cutting out meals, moving into seriously sub-standard housing, taking out loans. Part-time jobs are also forbidden by the program (students have been threatened with expulsion for taking jobs), and spending time on things other than our research feels like it will ruin our career chances. The burden also feels worse as the average time to graduate is >5 years, and will certainly be longer for us due to covid, meaning those of us who did MSc's beforehand will be 30 with at least half a decade of lab experience, but will still be paid the same as new students almost a decade ago. With the rapidly increasing cost of living, lengthening degree durations, and awful career prospects for graduates, I believe the current stipend is unsustainable and unjustified. I brought these points up (as well as the fact that I've brought in over $80 000 in fellowships) with my PI and asked for a raise and he tentatively agreed, but he has brushed me off every time I've tried to bring it up the past few weeks and I'm getting increasingly agitated. I absolutely need him as a reference so I feel I have no leverage, as is the case for most students. I'm curious how this compares with other students' situations as it seems like PhDs are better off in other countries, and the perspective of PIs as to whether low student stipends are still justified. If anyone has examples of successful campaigns to increase stipends, or relevant statistics or other readings, that would also be great. We don't have a student union but are currently recruiting as many students as we can to a Facebook group to share information and grievances, and hopefully organize some action in the future.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Others have gone into funding barriers, but let's not forget there is some toxic classism inherent in academia. A few years ago when I was still a postdoc, I was in a discussion about the pending unionization of postdocs and how they and the grad student union were fighting for increases in wages. It was disheartening and astounding to hear a postdoc in the department claim that \"postdoc wages aren't meant to be self-sufficient\" and go on about how we're trainees so we deserve to be paid less, the work is it's own reward, and how raising trainee salaries would \"ruin\" labs so we should all be willing to sacrifice for the greater good, etc. Then you have higher ups chiding us that \"if you're looking for money, you shouldn't be in science.\" Never mind that we're not asking for six figures or anything outrageous, just enough that we're not constantly living paycheck to paycheck and on the verge of crisis when something unexpected happens. I'm constantly bumping into these attitudes more and more when I bring up things like paying undergraduates, increasing funding for grad students and postdocs, etc and it's infuriating.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Discussing Stagnant PhD Stipends I've been talking with my fellow PhD students recently about grad student pay, specifically why its viewed as normal to be so much less than minimum wage. We are at a supposedly top-tier Canadian research university in a city where the official poverty line is now >$28,000, roughly equal to full-time minimum wage, but our program's minimum stipends are $17,000 (which is actually LOWER than it was 5 years ago). Many of us don't get additional pay despite winning fellowships (I get 20k/year from external funds and not an extra cent from my lab), and because we're in a graduate-only program there are no classes to TA for extra money. We are only required to take 16 credits for the entire program so we are very much expected to be spending at least 40 hours / week in the lab. There's a common sentiment that we are having to make greater and greater sacrifices to survive on these wages - cutting out meals, moving into seriously sub-standard housing, taking out loans. Part-time jobs are also forbidden by the program (students have been threatened with expulsion for taking jobs), and spending time on things other than our research feels like it will ruin our career chances. The burden also feels worse as the average time to graduate is >5 years, and will certainly be longer for us due to covid, meaning those of us who did MSc's beforehand will be 30 with at least half a decade of lab experience, but will still be paid the same as new students almost a decade ago. With the rapidly increasing cost of living, lengthening degree durations, and awful career prospects for graduates, I believe the current stipend is unsustainable and unjustified. I brought these points up (as well as the fact that I've brought in over $80 000 in fellowships) with my PI and asked for a raise and he tentatively agreed, but he has brushed me off every time I've tried to bring it up the past few weeks and I'm getting increasingly agitated. I absolutely need him as a reference so I feel I have no leverage, as is the case for most students. I'm curious how this compares with other students' situations as it seems like PhDs are better off in other countries, and the perspective of PIs as to whether low student stipends are still justified. If anyone has examples of successful campaigns to increase stipends, or relevant statistics or other readings, that would also be great. We don't have a student union but are currently recruiting as many students as we can to a Facebook group to share information and grievances, and hopefully organize some action in the future.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Yes grad student stipends are a joke in most universities in most countries. In my university (public R1 in the southeast US) the standardized stipend for Microbiology PhD students is $18,000 USD a year minus $2,400 a year in required fees that are not covered under our tuition waiver, so basically $15,600 a year salary. I helped write a $500,000 grant but it still did not change my stipend. 2 years ago the program had a vote for a new graduate program chair. Two finalists gave presentations on how they saw the program moving forward and specifically how they would prioritize future funding. One professor said they would use the money to buy more equipment while the other said they would prioritize increasing grad student stipends both to provide a living wage and to be more competitive for top applicants. The tenured professors voted and guess who won? Professor A who wanted to use money on equipment in a landslide. It was clearly about this one issue as professor B had been in the program longer (25+ years), is loved by the grad students (is on basically ever PhD committee I know of) and about a year later was chosen for a senior administrative role for the grant funding program for the entire college after securing a $8 million grant. Oh yeah and our graduate student association tried to unionize but was blocked by the not just the university but the actual state because we are technically not employees and therefore have no rights to unionize.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Discussing Stagnant PhD Stipends I've been talking with my fellow PhD students recently about grad student pay, specifically why its viewed as normal to be so much less than minimum wage. We are at a supposedly top-tier Canadian research university in a city where the official poverty line is now >$28,000, roughly equal to full-time minimum wage, but our program's minimum stipends are $17,000 (which is actually LOWER than it was 5 years ago). Many of us don't get additional pay despite winning fellowships (I get 20k/year from external funds and not an extra cent from my lab), and because we're in a graduate-only program there are no classes to TA for extra money. We are only required to take 16 credits for the entire program so we are very much expected to be spending at least 40 hours / week in the lab. There's a common sentiment that we are having to make greater and greater sacrifices to survive on these wages - cutting out meals, moving into seriously sub-standard housing, taking out loans. Part-time jobs are also forbidden by the program (students have been threatened with expulsion for taking jobs), and spending time on things other than our research feels like it will ruin our career chances. The burden also feels worse as the average time to graduate is >5 years, and will certainly be longer for us due to covid, meaning those of us who did MSc's beforehand will be 30 with at least half a decade of lab experience, but will still be paid the same as new students almost a decade ago. With the rapidly increasing cost of living, lengthening degree durations, and awful career prospects for graduates, I believe the current stipend is unsustainable and unjustified. I brought these points up (as well as the fact that I've brought in over $80 000 in fellowships) with my PI and asked for a raise and he tentatively agreed, but he has brushed me off every time I've tried to bring it up the past few weeks and I'm getting increasingly agitated. I absolutely need him as a reference so I feel I have no leverage, as is the case for most students. I'm curious how this compares with other students' situations as it seems like PhDs are better off in other countries, and the perspective of PIs as to whether low student stipends are still justified. If anyone has examples of successful campaigns to increase stipends, or relevant statistics or other readings, that would also be great. We don't have a student union but are currently recruiting as many students as we can to a Facebook group to share information and grievances, and hopefully organize some action in the future.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Others have gone into funding barriers, but let's not forget there is some toxic classism inherent in academia. A few years ago when I was still a postdoc, I was in a discussion about the pending unionization of postdocs and how they and the grad student union were fighting for increases in wages. It was disheartening and astounding to hear a postdoc in the department claim that \"postdoc wages aren't meant to be self-sufficient\" and go on about how we're trainees so we deserve to be paid less, the work is it's own reward, and how raising trainee salaries would \"ruin\" labs so we should all be willing to sacrifice for the greater good, etc. Then you have higher ups chiding us that \"if you're looking for money, you shouldn't be in science.\" Never mind that we're not asking for six figures or anything outrageous, just enough that we're not constantly living paycheck to paycheck and on the verge of crisis when something unexpected happens. I'm constantly bumping into these attitudes more and more when I bring up things like paying undergraduates, increasing funding for grad students and postdocs, etc and it's infuriating.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "UPDATE: LWIFU. How did I recover? (Translation: Last Week I Fucked Up.) I posted this last week and got a ton of good advice, and some requests for an update. Long story short, I \"met\" (remotely) with my PI and some muckety-mucks from my graduate program, and it was painfully awkward but ultimately fine. They had a \"not angry, just disappointed\" tone. Most of the meeting was logistics about how to recoup the lost money. It turns out I have some funds from a fellowship that I didn't realize could be used this way, and they made sure I had all the necessary permissions to get reimbursed that way. But each one of them made sure to remind me how important it is to maintain composure, to represent the program well, etc. They presented it like \"just trying to help you out here\" as if I had no idea that I had fucked up. But I just took the note and didn't argue with them. There was one more uncomfortable but nice(ish) coda to the whole situation. An even higher higher-up called me on the phone after the meeting. He said my email debacle had made its way to him. At first my stomach sank and I thought this was the moment they were going to actually reprimand me in some way. Instead, he said he had no idea I was going through so much, and asked if he could help. I nearly started crying but I just thanked him and tried to get off the phone as quickly as possibly. I know he meant it kindly but to be honest I just want the whole thing to go away and I felt even more embarrassed that it clearly was getting forwarded around. But it is nice to know there are some actual human beings running this show. Anyway, thanks for all the advice. Now to put this all behind me.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Glad to hear that you were able to recuperate the funds and that they were generally understanding. Remember you're still learning your way around academia, so hopefully you'll know how to better approach this kind of situation if it comes up in the future.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "UPDATE: LWIFU. How did I recover? (Translation: Last Week I Fucked Up.) I posted this last week and got a ton of good advice, and some requests for an update. Long story short, I \"met\" (remotely) with my PI and some muckety-mucks from my graduate program, and it was painfully awkward but ultimately fine. They had a \"not angry, just disappointed\" tone. Most of the meeting was logistics about how to recoup the lost money. It turns out I have some funds from a fellowship that I didn't realize could be used this way, and they made sure I had all the necessary permissions to get reimbursed that way. But each one of them made sure to remind me how important it is to maintain composure, to represent the program well, etc. They presented it like \"just trying to help you out here\" as if I had no idea that I had fucked up. But I just took the note and didn't argue with them. There was one more uncomfortable but nice(ish) coda to the whole situation. An even higher higher-up called me on the phone after the meeting. He said my email debacle had made its way to him. At first my stomach sank and I thought this was the moment they were going to actually reprimand me in some way. Instead, he said he had no idea I was going through so much, and asked if he could help. I nearly started crying but I just thanked him and tried to get off the phone as quickly as possibly. I know he meant it kindly but to be honest I just want the whole thing to go away and I felt even more embarrassed that it clearly was getting forwarded around. But it is nice to know there are some actual human beings running this show. Anyway, thanks for all the advice. Now to put this all behind me.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Now you know why that higher higher up has that job. Be sure to send him a nice note of thanks. And don’t be embarrassed to reach out for help. Good people help each other in times of need.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "UPDATE: LWIFU. How did I recover? (Translation: Last Week I Fucked Up.) I posted this last week and got a ton of good advice, and some requests for an update. Long story short, I \"met\" (remotely) with my PI and some muckety-mucks from my graduate program, and it was painfully awkward but ultimately fine. They had a \"not angry, just disappointed\" tone. Most of the meeting was logistics about how to recoup the lost money. It turns out I have some funds from a fellowship that I didn't realize could be used this way, and they made sure I had all the necessary permissions to get reimbursed that way. But each one of them made sure to remind me how important it is to maintain composure, to represent the program well, etc. They presented it like \"just trying to help you out here\" as if I had no idea that I had fucked up. But I just took the note and didn't argue with them. There was one more uncomfortable but nice(ish) coda to the whole situation. An even higher higher-up called me on the phone after the meeting. He said my email debacle had made its way to him. At first my stomach sank and I thought this was the moment they were going to actually reprimand me in some way. Instead, he said he had no idea I was going through so much, and asked if he could help. I nearly started crying but I just thanked him and tried to get off the phone as quickly as possibly. I know he meant it kindly but to be honest I just want the whole thing to go away and I felt even more embarrassed that it clearly was getting forwarded around. But it is nice to know there are some actual human beings running this show. Anyway, thanks for all the advice. Now to put this all behind me.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Glad it worked out. Thanks for the follow up.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "UPDATE: LWIFU. How did I recover? (Translation: Last Week I Fucked Up.) I posted this last week and got a ton of good advice, and some requests for an update. Long story short, I \"met\" (remotely) with my PI and some muckety-mucks from my graduate program, and it was painfully awkward but ultimately fine. They had a \"not angry, just disappointed\" tone. Most of the meeting was logistics about how to recoup the lost money. It turns out I have some funds from a fellowship that I didn't realize could be used this way, and they made sure I had all the necessary permissions to get reimbursed that way. But each one of them made sure to remind me how important it is to maintain composure, to represent the program well, etc. They presented it like \"just trying to help you out here\" as if I had no idea that I had fucked up. But I just took the note and didn't argue with them. There was one more uncomfortable but nice(ish) coda to the whole situation. An even higher higher-up called me on the phone after the meeting. He said my email debacle had made its way to him. At first my stomach sank and I thought this was the moment they were going to actually reprimand me in some way. Instead, he said he had no idea I was going through so much, and asked if he could help. I nearly started crying but I just thanked him and tried to get off the phone as quickly as possibly. I know he meant it kindly but to be honest I just want the whole thing to go away and I felt even more embarrassed that it clearly was getting forwarded around. But it is nice to know there are some actual human beings running this show. Anyway, thanks for all the advice. Now to put this all behind me.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Now you know why that higher higher up has that job. Be sure to send him a nice note of thanks. And don’t be embarrassed to reach out for help. Good people help each other in times of need.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "UPDATE: LWIFU. How did I recover? (Translation: Last Week I Fucked Up.) I posted this last week and got a ton of good advice, and some requests for an update. Long story short, I \"met\" (remotely) with my PI and some muckety-mucks from my graduate program, and it was painfully awkward but ultimately fine. They had a \"not angry, just disappointed\" tone. Most of the meeting was logistics about how to recoup the lost money. It turns out I have some funds from a fellowship that I didn't realize could be used this way, and they made sure I had all the necessary permissions to get reimbursed that way. But each one of them made sure to remind me how important it is to maintain composure, to represent the program well, etc. They presented it like \"just trying to help you out here\" as if I had no idea that I had fucked up. But I just took the note and didn't argue with them. There was one more uncomfortable but nice(ish) coda to the whole situation. An even higher higher-up called me on the phone after the meeting. He said my email debacle had made its way to him. At first my stomach sank and I thought this was the moment they were going to actually reprimand me in some way. Instead, he said he had no idea I was going through so much, and asked if he could help. I nearly started crying but I just thanked him and tried to get off the phone as quickly as possibly. I know he meant it kindly but to be honest I just want the whole thing to go away and I felt even more embarrassed that it clearly was getting forwarded around. But it is nice to know there are some actual human beings running this show. Anyway, thanks for all the advice. Now to put this all behind me.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Glad to hear that you were able to recuperate the funds and that they were generally understanding. Remember you're still learning your way around academia, so hopefully you'll know how to better approach this kind of situation if it comes up in the future.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "UPDATE: LWIFU. How did I recover? (Translation: Last Week I Fucked Up.) I posted this last week and got a ton of good advice, and some requests for an update. Long story short, I \"met\" (remotely) with my PI and some muckety-mucks from my graduate program, and it was painfully awkward but ultimately fine. They had a \"not angry, just disappointed\" tone. Most of the meeting was logistics about how to recoup the lost money. It turns out I have some funds from a fellowship that I didn't realize could be used this way, and they made sure I had all the necessary permissions to get reimbursed that way. But each one of them made sure to remind me how important it is to maintain composure, to represent the program well, etc. They presented it like \"just trying to help you out here\" as if I had no idea that I had fucked up. But I just took the note and didn't argue with them. There was one more uncomfortable but nice(ish) coda to the whole situation. An even higher higher-up called me on the phone after the meeting. He said my email debacle had made its way to him. At first my stomach sank and I thought this was the moment they were going to actually reprimand me in some way. Instead, he said he had no idea I was going through so much, and asked if he could help. I nearly started crying but I just thanked him and tried to get off the phone as quickly as possibly. I know he meant it kindly but to be honest I just want the whole thing to go away and I felt even more embarrassed that it clearly was getting forwarded around. But it is nice to know there are some actual human beings running this show. Anyway, thanks for all the advice. Now to put this all behind me.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Good for you. For what it's worth, the higher up is the only one who seems human. Are you I'm the US? This is such odd behaviour to me, maybe I'm just lucky but all the supervisors I've had would focus on the personal first and ensure your okay mentally before advising you gently on how to better conduct yourself in emails. Bottom of the priorities is how you represent the programme. You're human, you were grieving, for apologised, now forgive yourself and move on. Good luck!", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "UPDATE: LWIFU. How did I recover? (Translation: Last Week I Fucked Up.) I posted this last week and got a ton of good advice, and some requests for an update. Long story short, I \"met\" (remotely) with my PI and some muckety-mucks from my graduate program, and it was painfully awkward but ultimately fine. They had a \"not angry, just disappointed\" tone. Most of the meeting was logistics about how to recoup the lost money. It turns out I have some funds from a fellowship that I didn't realize could be used this way, and they made sure I had all the necessary permissions to get reimbursed that way. But each one of them made sure to remind me how important it is to maintain composure, to represent the program well, etc. They presented it like \"just trying to help you out here\" as if I had no idea that I had fucked up. But I just took the note and didn't argue with them. There was one more uncomfortable but nice(ish) coda to the whole situation. An even higher higher-up called me on the phone after the meeting. He said my email debacle had made its way to him. At first my stomach sank and I thought this was the moment they were going to actually reprimand me in some way. Instead, he said he had no idea I was going through so much, and asked if he could help. I nearly started crying but I just thanked him and tried to get off the phone as quickly as possibly. I know he meant it kindly but to be honest I just want the whole thing to go away and I felt even more embarrassed that it clearly was getting forwarded around. But it is nice to know there are some actual human beings running this show. Anyway, thanks for all the advice. Now to put this all behind me.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Glad to hear that you were able to recuperate the funds and that they were generally understanding. Remember you're still learning your way around academia, so hopefully you'll know how to better approach this kind of situation if it comes up in the future.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "UPDATE: LWIFU. How did I recover? (Translation: Last Week I Fucked Up.) I posted this last week and got a ton of good advice, and some requests for an update. Long story short, I \"met\" (remotely) with my PI and some muckety-mucks from my graduate program, and it was painfully awkward but ultimately fine. They had a \"not angry, just disappointed\" tone. Most of the meeting was logistics about how to recoup the lost money. It turns out I have some funds from a fellowship that I didn't realize could be used this way, and they made sure I had all the necessary permissions to get reimbursed that way. But each one of them made sure to remind me how important it is to maintain composure, to represent the program well, etc. They presented it like \"just trying to help you out here\" as if I had no idea that I had fucked up. But I just took the note and didn't argue with them. There was one more uncomfortable but nice(ish) coda to the whole situation. An even higher higher-up called me on the phone after the meeting. He said my email debacle had made its way to him. At first my stomach sank and I thought this was the moment they were going to actually reprimand me in some way. Instead, he said he had no idea I was going through so much, and asked if he could help. I nearly started crying but I just thanked him and tried to get off the phone as quickly as possibly. I know he meant it kindly but to be honest I just want the whole thing to go away and I felt even more embarrassed that it clearly was getting forwarded around. But it is nice to know there are some actual human beings running this show. Anyway, thanks for all the advice. Now to put this all behind me.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Quite frankly, the higher up is the only one who seems like a decent human being. I know you feel like you got off lightly but if I was your advisor my concerns would be (in order): 1. Your well-being. 2. Impressing on you the fact that you didn’t do anything wrong (even if it would be polite to pretend you did). 3. Dragging the conference chairs’ ass over hot coals. **They used a national disaster as an excuse to steal money from grad students.** I know you said that they had legalese to cover their asses, but all that means is that you can’t sue them. It definitely doesn’t mean you can’t drag their names all over the academic world. They used a national disaster as an excuse to steal money from grad students, and then used a moment of weakness to make the student they were stealing from feel like shit. They’re the bad guys in this story.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "UPDATE: LWIFU. How did I recover? (Translation: Last Week I Fucked Up.) I posted this last week and got a ton of good advice, and some requests for an update. Long story short, I \"met\" (remotely) with my PI and some muckety-mucks from my graduate program, and it was painfully awkward but ultimately fine. They had a \"not angry, just disappointed\" tone. Most of the meeting was logistics about how to recoup the lost money. It turns out I have some funds from a fellowship that I didn't realize could be used this way, and they made sure I had all the necessary permissions to get reimbursed that way. But each one of them made sure to remind me how important it is to maintain composure, to represent the program well, etc. They presented it like \"just trying to help you out here\" as if I had no idea that I had fucked up. But I just took the note and didn't argue with them. There was one more uncomfortable but nice(ish) coda to the whole situation. An even higher higher-up called me on the phone after the meeting. He said my email debacle had made its way to him. At first my stomach sank and I thought this was the moment they were going to actually reprimand me in some way. Instead, he said he had no idea I was going through so much, and asked if he could help. I nearly started crying but I just thanked him and tried to get off the phone as quickly as possibly. I know he meant it kindly but to be honest I just want the whole thing to go away and I felt even more embarrassed that it clearly was getting forwarded around. But it is nice to know there are some actual human beings running this show. Anyway, thanks for all the advice. Now to put this all behind me.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Glad it worked out. Thanks for the follow up.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "UPDATE: LWIFU. How did I recover? (Translation: Last Week I Fucked Up.) I posted this last week and got a ton of good advice, and some requests for an update. Long story short, I \"met\" (remotely) with my PI and some muckety-mucks from my graduate program, and it was painfully awkward but ultimately fine. They had a \"not angry, just disappointed\" tone. Most of the meeting was logistics about how to recoup the lost money. It turns out I have some funds from a fellowship that I didn't realize could be used this way, and they made sure I had all the necessary permissions to get reimbursed that way. But each one of them made sure to remind me how important it is to maintain composure, to represent the program well, etc. They presented it like \"just trying to help you out here\" as if I had no idea that I had fucked up. But I just took the note and didn't argue with them. There was one more uncomfortable but nice(ish) coda to the whole situation. An even higher higher-up called me on the phone after the meeting. He said my email debacle had made its way to him. At first my stomach sank and I thought this was the moment they were going to actually reprimand me in some way. Instead, he said he had no idea I was going through so much, and asked if he could help. I nearly started crying but I just thanked him and tried to get off the phone as quickly as possibly. I know he meant it kindly but to be honest I just want the whole thing to go away and I felt even more embarrassed that it clearly was getting forwarded around. But it is nice to know there are some actual human beings running this show. Anyway, thanks for all the advice. Now to put this all behind me.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Quite frankly, the higher up is the only one who seems like a decent human being. I know you feel like you got off lightly but if I was your advisor my concerns would be (in order): 1. Your well-being. 2. Impressing on you the fact that you didn’t do anything wrong (even if it would be polite to pretend you did). 3. Dragging the conference chairs’ ass over hot coals. **They used a national disaster as an excuse to steal money from grad students.** I know you said that they had legalese to cover their asses, but all that means is that you can’t sue them. It definitely doesn’t mean you can’t drag their names all over the academic world. They used a national disaster as an excuse to steal money from grad students, and then used a moment of weakness to make the student they were stealing from feel like shit. They’re the bad guys in this story.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Got my PhD almost a year ago, struggling to find a job. Hey /r/AskAcademia , Australian PhD graduate here. My doctorate was (broadly) in risk communication and natural hazards research. I started when I was 23 straight after undergrad and was awarded last year at 29. I worked as a sessional/casual academic during that period, mostly teaching management science at my university. I'm 30 now. At the start of this year, I took the savings I had and called it quits with the university. I never wanted to be a teacher and I couldn't take the institutional exploitation by the university anymore. It's also a fairly bad time to be a non-STEM academic in Australia. I've been applying for jobs full time, but I can't even get so much as an interview for a position. I applied for a position at the CFA (Country Fire Authority, the main body for fire management in my state) that was almost a natural extension of the work I did in my doctorate. The application was ignored for six weeks until I emailed asking for an update, at which point they updated the application from \"In Progress\" to \"Finished\" and told me they wouldn't be inviting me to interview. I suspect they had an internal candidate in mind and the job posting was just a legal requirement and never actually checked. Still, it hurts to not have even had the opportunity to interview, after all that time building an expertise on the subject. I've also been applying for any and every researcher or consultant role I can find, but I'm turned down at the first stage every time. To be honest, I'm starting to get really scared. It's been almost 12 months since I graduated and I don't feel like I'm any closer to a career. I spent six years in some truly awful conditions, sacrificing a lot to get my doctorate finished. The thing that kept me going the whole time was the idea that a PhD would be valuable, prestigious, and make it easier to find a job. Now I look at my testamur and I just want to burn it. It feels like all the suffering was meaningless and has no context. My self-worth, mental state and finances are rapidly deteriorating and I'm not sure what to do next. Is anyone able to give me some advice on leaving academia and finding a job?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Hey, I'm in the same boat right now. Don't have anything too helpful to say unfortunately, but hit me up if you want to practice consulting cases for the interviews. And try to post your CV to r/resumes for feedback.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Got my PhD almost a year ago, struggling to find a job. Hey /r/AskAcademia , Australian PhD graduate here. My doctorate was (broadly) in risk communication and natural hazards research. I started when I was 23 straight after undergrad and was awarded last year at 29. I worked as a sessional/casual academic during that period, mostly teaching management science at my university. I'm 30 now. At the start of this year, I took the savings I had and called it quits with the university. I never wanted to be a teacher and I couldn't take the institutional exploitation by the university anymore. It's also a fairly bad time to be a non-STEM academic in Australia. I've been applying for jobs full time, but I can't even get so much as an interview for a position. I applied for a position at the CFA (Country Fire Authority, the main body for fire management in my state) that was almost a natural extension of the work I did in my doctorate. The application was ignored for six weeks until I emailed asking for an update, at which point they updated the application from \"In Progress\" to \"Finished\" and told me they wouldn't be inviting me to interview. I suspect they had an internal candidate in mind and the job posting was just a legal requirement and never actually checked. Still, it hurts to not have even had the opportunity to interview, after all that time building an expertise on the subject. I've also been applying for any and every researcher or consultant role I can find, but I'm turned down at the first stage every time. To be honest, I'm starting to get really scared. It's been almost 12 months since I graduated and I don't feel like I'm any closer to a career. I spent six years in some truly awful conditions, sacrificing a lot to get my doctorate finished. The thing that kept me going the whole time was the idea that a PhD would be valuable, prestigious, and make it easier to find a job. Now I look at my testamur and I just want to burn it. It feels like all the suffering was meaningless and has no context. My self-worth, mental state and finances are rapidly deteriorating and I'm not sure what to do next. Is anyone able to give me some advice on leaving academia and finding a job?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Can you get someone who's familiar with hiring PhDs into non-academia jobs to review your CV and a sample of your cover letters? You'll need to include the job ads with the cover letters for review, because each cover letter needs to be tailored specifically to the job, especially if you're applying for things that aren't the 100% obvious next step for your career path. You talk about applying but not about networking. If you haven't already, I'd suggest you put some of this effort into finding out what professional associations or meetings are relevant to the people you want to work for and attend those. Ask them what they need from candidates in these roles. Lastly, if you haven't already, you should be looking up the people who currently do the kinds of jobs you're applying for. Check out their educational path and experience and see if you can spot something that you're missing.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Got my PhD almost a year ago, struggling to find a job. Hey /r/AskAcademia , Australian PhD graduate here. My doctorate was (broadly) in risk communication and natural hazards research. I started when I was 23 straight after undergrad and was awarded last year at 29. I worked as a sessional/casual academic during that period, mostly teaching management science at my university. I'm 30 now. At the start of this year, I took the savings I had and called it quits with the university. I never wanted to be a teacher and I couldn't take the institutional exploitation by the university anymore. It's also a fairly bad time to be a non-STEM academic in Australia. I've been applying for jobs full time, but I can't even get so much as an interview for a position. I applied for a position at the CFA (Country Fire Authority, the main body for fire management in my state) that was almost a natural extension of the work I did in my doctorate. The application was ignored for six weeks until I emailed asking for an update, at which point they updated the application from \"In Progress\" to \"Finished\" and told me they wouldn't be inviting me to interview. I suspect they had an internal candidate in mind and the job posting was just a legal requirement and never actually checked. Still, it hurts to not have even had the opportunity to interview, after all that time building an expertise on the subject. I've also been applying for any and every researcher or consultant role I can find, but I'm turned down at the first stage every time. To be honest, I'm starting to get really scared. It's been almost 12 months since I graduated and I don't feel like I'm any closer to a career. I spent six years in some truly awful conditions, sacrificing a lot to get my doctorate finished. The thing that kept me going the whole time was the idea that a PhD would be valuable, prestigious, and make it easier to find a job. Now I look at my testamur and I just want to burn it. It feels like all the suffering was meaningless and has no context. My self-worth, mental state and finances are rapidly deteriorating and I'm not sure what to do next. Is anyone able to give me some advice on leaving academia and finding a job?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I did my PhD in Australia and it was drummed into me that I would probably have to leave Australia to get a job. So I did. Sorry if that's nto an option for you, it sucks. I have been out of Australia over 10 years now and the job market there still sucks for my line of work. (I'm in the UK now in a permanent position, but did a postdoc in Belgium.)", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Got my PhD almost a year ago, struggling to find a job. Hey /r/AskAcademia , Australian PhD graduate here. My doctorate was (broadly) in risk communication and natural hazards research. I started when I was 23 straight after undergrad and was awarded last year at 29. I worked as a sessional/casual academic during that period, mostly teaching management science at my university. I'm 30 now. At the start of this year, I took the savings I had and called it quits with the university. I never wanted to be a teacher and I couldn't take the institutional exploitation by the university anymore. It's also a fairly bad time to be a non-STEM academic in Australia. I've been applying for jobs full time, but I can't even get so much as an interview for a position. I applied for a position at the CFA (Country Fire Authority, the main body for fire management in my state) that was almost a natural extension of the work I did in my doctorate. The application was ignored for six weeks until I emailed asking for an update, at which point they updated the application from \"In Progress\" to \"Finished\" and told me they wouldn't be inviting me to interview. I suspect they had an internal candidate in mind and the job posting was just a legal requirement and never actually checked. Still, it hurts to not have even had the opportunity to interview, after all that time building an expertise on the subject. I've also been applying for any and every researcher or consultant role I can find, but I'm turned down at the first stage every time. To be honest, I'm starting to get really scared. It's been almost 12 months since I graduated and I don't feel like I'm any closer to a career. I spent six years in some truly awful conditions, sacrificing a lot to get my doctorate finished. The thing that kept me going the whole time was the idea that a PhD would be valuable, prestigious, and make it easier to find a job. Now I look at my testamur and I just want to burn it. It feels like all the suffering was meaningless and has no context. My self-worth, mental state and finances are rapidly deteriorating and I'm not sure what to do next. Is anyone able to give me some advice on leaving academia and finding a job?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Hey, I am a social science Ph.D. as well and had no intention of staying in academia. I basically sold my analytics ability in the market. I did my Ph.D. on a completely unrelated topic as I now work in peace and development research. The think tank I work in has absolutely no connection to my Ph.D. except that the questionnaire uses a lot of subjective indicators. It's kind of ironic because most of the places I used to send manuscripts to turned them down because I used subjective indicators. However, that got me the job! I don't have a clear-cut solution but this is what I did. I was desperate, just had got married and my wife was also a Ph.D. student in the US then. I cast a really wide net, a really really wide net. I must have applied to close to 600 jobs from December 2019 (kind of semi-desperate) to June 2020 (full-blown desperation) end (my stipend had ended in May) and I started my job in July. So to start with I applied to a lot of places, a lot of them not even directly related to what I do but even if there was a small niche I could make myself relevant in, I would apply. I didn't network at all. I find academic gatherings fake - I can't stand them, so I went to Linkedin and I kept following pages, organizations, and people whose jobs I liked. I kept adding them, kept following pages, and finally, I started getting a lot of job openings. Not just those that come up on the normal search but general people posting and talking about stuff. Finally in the middle of the pandemic - I got three calls. 1. Position for a volunteer in IRC - somewhere in NY/NJ, USA 2. A really small NGO which was opening up a data team - starting with two people. 3. A really cool think tank in Europe, where I thought I had no chance. I got rejected as a volunteer by IRC. In the interview with the NGO, I got a rejection as well. Guess, I didn't quite fit in the mould they were looking for. Eventually, the think tank in Europe gave me a job in July. Pay is not that great but they take care of health and don't make work like indentured labour. They have a good reputation and I hope to stay for 2-3 years and then make a transition to monitoring and evals in NGOs. Maybe IRC can finally stop rejecting me for volunteer positions with a Ph.D. and actually offer me a job. ; ) Point is that I was lucky, right place and right time but the issue is you have to talk to people, within academia, on LinkedIn, apply to a hundred thousand places. I can't deal with the fake atmosphere of academia, so that option was closed for me but I contacted people on Linkedin, asked them for advice, and kept applying. It would be helpful if you ask help with resumes and cover letters and also make sure that your applications are steered to the job.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Those of you who don't fit into the typical profile of someone in your area of study, have you had others show skepticism about your knowledge or abilities due to your age, race, gender, etc? One of my friends from undergraduate is a super bubbly blonde girly girl (think Reese Witherspoon from Legally Blonde) who also happened to graduate valedictorian in engineering and then went on to a top graduate school. She would get some funny reactions when telling people what she did for a living, but the neat thing about engineering is its objectivity: she could *prove* her competence. How about you?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Yes, I’m a mathematician. No, I’m not socially incompetent. Yes, I’m autistic. No, whatever it is that you’re thinking right now is wrong. Also, if you say the word “rain man” I might punch you. Yes, I’m very good at what I do. No, I’m not a savant and I’m not only good at mathematics because I have autism superpowers. I have these other superpowers called “hard work” “studiousness” and “intelligence.”", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Those of you who don't fit into the typical profile of someone in your area of study, have you had others show skepticism about your knowledge or abilities due to your age, race, gender, etc? One of my friends from undergraduate is a super bubbly blonde girly girl (think Reese Witherspoon from Legally Blonde) who also happened to graduate valedictorian in engineering and then went on to a top graduate school. She would get some funny reactions when telling people what she did for a living, but the neat thing about engineering is its objectivity: she could *prove* her competence. How about you?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "It used to happen all the time with people I would meet, probably up until my 30s. I'm a woman and a geneticist/computational biologist, I dress pretty stylishly and (though very \"introverted\" by nature) I used to be quite the social butterfly at parties and a big entertainer. Folks were always saying, \"wow, you don't look/seem like a scientist.\" Now, people take it more in their stride, I'm sure partly because I at least look more professorial by dint of being older. I never had an issue with a student, but I have issues all the time with colleagues and higher-ups. They say that men are judged on their potential and women on their results, I very much feel that has been the case for me. I feel like I have to do twice as much to get the same recognition as my male colleagues. The ranking among white people in my field feels like: (1) straight men or straight-acting men, (2) gay men, (3) women who are good looking but don't dress or look particularly nice in the conventional sense (this includes more \"butch\" gay women), (4) straight women who are more femme or high femme. (The only exception to this I have seen is a transwoman who transitioned after she had tenure and was an established scholar.) If you're a woman of color, you are definitely picking up the rear. I have an Asian woman colleague who is often treated quite poorly. She is the most productive member of the department and a real rising star, so that protects her from a lot. However, even with that, the more senior people still treat her like a pet and someone who doesn't know any better. For example, when it was time for everyone to get annual raises, afterward she encountered the provost. When she saw him he immediately grinned at her and said she is surely happy with her big raise - as if she would never have the wherewithal to find out how much he had actually stiffed her compared the men at her stage. And I can't imagine the provost suggesting one of our male colleagues be openly grateful to him right at that moment for a raise that was clearly earned.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Those of you who don't fit into the typical profile of someone in your area of study, have you had others show skepticism about your knowledge or abilities due to your age, race, gender, etc? One of my friends from undergraduate is a super bubbly blonde girly girl (think Reese Witherspoon from Legally Blonde) who also happened to graduate valedictorian in engineering and then went on to a top graduate school. She would get some funny reactions when telling people what she did for a living, but the neat thing about engineering is its objectivity: she could *prove* her competence. How about you?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Yes absolutely, I'm a latinx woman in a predominantly white, male field. I've been sidelined on math/technical heavy projects (despite years of significant, successful coursework in both) and when I've earned honors or competitions or awards I've had at least one peer suggest that it's either a) because of my racial/gender identity or b) impressive because of my racial/gender identity", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Those of you who don't fit into the typical profile of someone in your area of study, have you had others show skepticism about your knowledge or abilities due to your age, race, gender, etc? One of my friends from undergraduate is a super bubbly blonde girly girl (think Reese Witherspoon from Legally Blonde) who also happened to graduate valedictorian in engineering and then went on to a top graduate school. She would get some funny reactions when telling people what she did for a living, but the neat thing about engineering is its objectivity: she could *prove* her competence. How about you?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "It used to happen all the time with people I would meet, probably up until my 30s. I'm a woman and a geneticist/computational biologist, I dress pretty stylishly and (though very \"introverted\" by nature) I used to be quite the social butterfly at parties and a big entertainer. Folks were always saying, \"wow, you don't look/seem like a scientist.\" Now, people take it more in their stride, I'm sure partly because I at least look more professorial by dint of being older. I never had an issue with a student, but I have issues all the time with colleagues and higher-ups. They say that men are judged on their potential and women on their results, I very much feel that has been the case for me. I feel like I have to do twice as much to get the same recognition as my male colleagues. The ranking among white people in my field feels like: (1) straight men or straight-acting men, (2) gay men, (3) women who are good looking but don't dress or look particularly nice in the conventional sense (this includes more \"butch\" gay women), (4) straight women who are more femme or high femme. (The only exception to this I have seen is a transwoman who transitioned after she had tenure and was an established scholar.) If you're a woman of color, you are definitely picking up the rear. I have an Asian woman colleague who is often treated quite poorly. She is the most productive member of the department and a real rising star, so that protects her from a lot. However, even with that, the more senior people still treat her like a pet and someone who doesn't know any better. For example, when it was time for everyone to get annual raises, afterward she encountered the provost. When she saw him he immediately grinned at her and said she is surely happy with her big raise - as if she would never have the wherewithal to find out how much he had actually stiffed her compared the men at her stage. And I can't imagine the provost suggesting one of our male colleagues be openly grateful to him right at that moment for a raise that was clearly earned.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Those of you who don't fit into the typical profile of someone in your area of study, have you had others show skepticism about your knowledge or abilities due to your age, race, gender, etc? One of my friends from undergraduate is a super bubbly blonde girly girl (think Reese Witherspoon from Legally Blonde) who also happened to graduate valedictorian in engineering and then went on to a top graduate school. She would get some funny reactions when telling people what she did for a living, but the neat thing about engineering is its objectivity: she could *prove* her competence. How about you?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I’m a formerly undocumented, later DACAmented, immigrant from El Salvador with a supremely unique first name. I’m also in a PhD in Economics, which rarely sees anyone from my country, let alone Central America, let alone with my immigration background. I have faced a lot of skepticism and prejudice before people find out what I do, but I carry myself well and try to teach them that stereotypes only make them look foolish.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Those of you who don't fit into the typical profile of someone in your area of study, have you had others show skepticism about your knowledge or abilities due to your age, race, gender, etc? One of my friends from undergraduate is a super bubbly blonde girly girl (think Reese Witherspoon from Legally Blonde) who also happened to graduate valedictorian in engineering and then went on to a top graduate school. She would get some funny reactions when telling people what she did for a living, but the neat thing about engineering is its objectivity: she could *prove* her competence. How about you?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I’m a (white, cis) woman in Computer Science. My favorite example: Toward the end of grad school, I was chatting with some male labmates at a multidisciplinary conference when a very friendly first year grad student from another university came to introduce himself. He was in one of the non-computational disciplines that fit the conference and was very excited to hear that my labmates were in CS and who their advisor was (never gave me a chance to introduce myself). He started asking them about a particular algorithm he’d heard of that might be useful for modeling his work. My labmates suggested something else might work better—at which point the student turned to me. “So XYZ algorithm is a computational technique...” I interrupted him, told him that I knew very well what that algorithm was, and finally introduced myself. He was clearly surprised and embarrassed. He may have even apologized. But that incident really made it clear to me that the default assumption would never be that I am an expert in my field.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Those of you who don't fit into the typical profile of someone in your area of study, have you had others show skepticism about your knowledge or abilities due to your age, race, gender, etc? One of my friends from undergraduate is a super bubbly blonde girly girl (think Reese Witherspoon from Legally Blonde) who also happened to graduate valedictorian in engineering and then went on to a top graduate school. She would get some funny reactions when telling people what she did for a living, but the neat thing about engineering is its objectivity: she could *prove* her competence. How about you?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Yes, I’m a mathematician. No, I’m not socially incompetent. Yes, I’m autistic. No, whatever it is that you’re thinking right now is wrong. Also, if you say the word “rain man” I might punch you. Yes, I’m very good at what I do. No, I’m not a savant and I’m not only good at mathematics because I have autism superpowers. I have these other superpowers called “hard work” “studiousness” and “intelligence.”", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Those of you who don't fit into the typical profile of someone in your area of study, have you had others show skepticism about your knowledge or abilities due to your age, race, gender, etc? One of my friends from undergraduate is a super bubbly blonde girly girl (think Reese Witherspoon from Legally Blonde) who also happened to graduate valedictorian in engineering and then went on to a top graduate school. She would get some funny reactions when telling people what she did for a living, but the neat thing about engineering is its objectivity: she could *prove* her competence. How about you?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I’m a (white, cis) woman in Computer Science. My favorite example: Toward the end of grad school, I was chatting with some male labmates at a multidisciplinary conference when a very friendly first year grad student from another university came to introduce himself. He was in one of the non-computational disciplines that fit the conference and was very excited to hear that my labmates were in CS and who their advisor was (never gave me a chance to introduce myself). He started asking them about a particular algorithm he’d heard of that might be useful for modeling his work. My labmates suggested something else might work better—at which point the student turned to me. “So XYZ algorithm is a computational technique...” I interrupted him, told him that I knew very well what that algorithm was, and finally introduced myself. He was clearly surprised and embarrassed. He may have even apologized. But that incident really made it clear to me that the default assumption would never be that I am an expert in my field.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Those of you who don't fit into the typical profile of someone in your area of study, have you had others show skepticism about your knowledge or abilities due to your age, race, gender, etc? One of my friends from undergraduate is a super bubbly blonde girly girl (think Reese Witherspoon from Legally Blonde) who also happened to graduate valedictorian in engineering and then went on to a top graduate school. She would get some funny reactions when telling people what she did for a living, but the neat thing about engineering is its objectivity: she could *prove* her competence. How about you?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "A atheist layperson told me I didn’t know anything about science because I am an orthodox Christian (I can’t remember what the initial discussion was). When I pointed out that I actually have a PhD in physics and have published papers in good journals he said he didn’t respect me as a scientist. Well, at least I *am* one.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Those of you who don't fit into the typical profile of someone in your area of study, have you had others show skepticism about your knowledge or abilities due to your age, race, gender, etc? One of my friends from undergraduate is a super bubbly blonde girly girl (think Reese Witherspoon from Legally Blonde) who also happened to graduate valedictorian in engineering and then went on to a top graduate school. She would get some funny reactions when telling people what she did for a living, but the neat thing about engineering is its objectivity: she could *prove* her competence. How about you?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I’m a (white, cis) woman in Computer Science. My favorite example: Toward the end of grad school, I was chatting with some male labmates at a multidisciplinary conference when a very friendly first year grad student from another university came to introduce himself. He was in one of the non-computational disciplines that fit the conference and was very excited to hear that my labmates were in CS and who their advisor was (never gave me a chance to introduce myself). He started asking them about a particular algorithm he’d heard of that might be useful for modeling his work. My labmates suggested something else might work better—at which point the student turned to me. “So XYZ algorithm is a computational technique...” I interrupted him, told him that I knew very well what that algorithm was, and finally introduced myself. He was clearly surprised and embarrassed. He may have even apologized. But that incident really made it clear to me that the default assumption would never be that I am an expert in my field.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Stock phrases to answer talk questions Just met with a graduate student who was concerned that a recent talk had been derailed by a persistent questioner. I told them that question management is a skill that develops over time, but also provided a few stock phrases that can be used to deflect questions when you don't have a good answer. Here are some of mine - any suggestions? * For interrupters: \"I might address that later in the talk - could you ask me again at the end if I haven't answered the question by then?\" * For repeated questioners who won't stop: \"This is a really interesting exchange but just because we're short on time and I want to give others a chance to ask questions, can we talk about it afterwards?\" * For people who offer dumb criticisms of your methods: \"That's an interesting point, what would you have done differently?\" * For questions that are nonsensical: \"That's an interesting point, what are your thoughts?\" * For questions that point out limitations: \"That's something I've thought a lot. Although this study wasn't set up to address that comprehensively, it's something we're going to look at in future studies.\" For context, I'm in social psychology and do quantitative research.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I’ve had to use that last one quite a lot so far. Sometimes the comment is surprisingly insightful - even ended up collaborating with a group after discussing the matter after the session.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Stock phrases to answer talk questions Just met with a graduate student who was concerned that a recent talk had been derailed by a persistent questioner. I told them that question management is a skill that develops over time, but also provided a few stock phrases that can be used to deflect questions when you don't have a good answer. Here are some of mine - any suggestions? * For interrupters: \"I might address that later in the talk - could you ask me again at the end if I haven't answered the question by then?\" * For repeated questioners who won't stop: \"This is a really interesting exchange but just because we're short on time and I want to give others a chance to ask questions, can we talk about it afterwards?\" * For people who offer dumb criticisms of your methods: \"That's an interesting point, what would you have done differently?\" * For questions that are nonsensical: \"That's an interesting point, what are your thoughts?\" * For questions that point out limitations: \"That's something I've thought a lot. Although this study wasn't set up to address that comprehensively, it's something we're going to look at in future studies.\" For context, I'm in social psychology and do quantitative research.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I like the idea of having some of them ready beforehand, and I have used the first two many times. The only difference is that I do not ask if we can talk about it later, I assert it. I generally allow clarification questions during my talks, but defer discussion questions to the end with something like, \"That's a great question. I want to make sure I make it through my prepared material, but there should be time for some discussion at the end of my talk.\"", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Stock phrases to answer talk questions Just met with a graduate student who was concerned that a recent talk had been derailed by a persistent questioner. I told them that question management is a skill that develops over time, but also provided a few stock phrases that can be used to deflect questions when you don't have a good answer. Here are some of mine - any suggestions? * For interrupters: \"I might address that later in the talk - could you ask me again at the end if I haven't answered the question by then?\" * For repeated questioners who won't stop: \"This is a really interesting exchange but just because we're short on time and I want to give others a chance to ask questions, can we talk about it afterwards?\" * For people who offer dumb criticisms of your methods: \"That's an interesting point, what would you have done differently?\" * For questions that are nonsensical: \"That's an interesting point, what are your thoughts?\" * For questions that point out limitations: \"That's something I've thought a lot. Although this study wasn't set up to address that comprehensively, it's something we're going to look at in future studies.\" For context, I'm in social psychology and do quantitative research.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Another strategy is to preemptively explain how you will deal with questions. Sometimes the person introducing the speaker will do that formally other times it's left up to the speaker to say something like \"Today I'll be sharing some developments in Advanced Basket Weaving. My presentation will be about 15 minutes and then we'll have time for questions at the end. If you have clarification questions, please let me know, but other discussion we'll save for the after the presentation.\" \\[or not include that last sentence\\]", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Stock phrases to answer talk questions Just met with a graduate student who was concerned that a recent talk had been derailed by a persistent questioner. I told them that question management is a skill that develops over time, but also provided a few stock phrases that can be used to deflect questions when you don't have a good answer. Here are some of mine - any suggestions? * For interrupters: \"I might address that later in the talk - could you ask me again at the end if I haven't answered the question by then?\" * For repeated questioners who won't stop: \"This is a really interesting exchange but just because we're short on time and I want to give others a chance to ask questions, can we talk about it afterwards?\" * For people who offer dumb criticisms of your methods: \"That's an interesting point, what would you have done differently?\" * For questions that are nonsensical: \"That's an interesting point, what are your thoughts?\" * For questions that point out limitations: \"That's something I've thought a lot. Although this study wasn't set up to address that comprehensively, it's something we're going to look at in future studies.\" For context, I'm in social psychology and do quantitative research.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "This is why I like engineering conferences, as they always seem to have moderators. For interrupters, you don't have to say anything, you let the conference organizers skin them alive for the interruption.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Stock phrases to answer talk questions Just met with a graduate student who was concerned that a recent talk had been derailed by a persistent questioner. I told them that question management is a skill that develops over time, but also provided a few stock phrases that can be used to deflect questions when you don't have a good answer. Here are some of mine - any suggestions? * For interrupters: \"I might address that later in the talk - could you ask me again at the end if I haven't answered the question by then?\" * For repeated questioners who won't stop: \"This is a really interesting exchange but just because we're short on time and I want to give others a chance to ask questions, can we talk about it afterwards?\" * For people who offer dumb criticisms of your methods: \"That's an interesting point, what would you have done differently?\" * For questions that are nonsensical: \"That's an interesting point, what are your thoughts?\" * For questions that point out limitations: \"That's something I've thought a lot. Although this study wasn't set up to address that comprehensively, it's something we're going to look at in future studies.\" For context, I'm in social psychology and do quantitative research.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "\"that's a good question, here is a better one: \" then say something that will lead on to your next point. 'how does this affect the energy spectrum? which is shown here in the next figure'.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Stock phrases to answer talk questions Just met with a graduate student who was concerned that a recent talk had been derailed by a persistent questioner. I told them that question management is a skill that develops over time, but also provided a few stock phrases that can be used to deflect questions when you don't have a good answer. Here are some of mine - any suggestions? * For interrupters: \"I might address that later in the talk - could you ask me again at the end if I haven't answered the question by then?\" * For repeated questioners who won't stop: \"This is a really interesting exchange but just because we're short on time and I want to give others a chance to ask questions, can we talk about it afterwards?\" * For people who offer dumb criticisms of your methods: \"That's an interesting point, what would you have done differently?\" * For questions that are nonsensical: \"That's an interesting point, what are your thoughts?\" * For questions that point out limitations: \"That's something I've thought a lot. Although this study wasn't set up to address that comprehensively, it's something we're going to look at in future studies.\" For context, I'm in social psychology and do quantitative research.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Some advice I got early on as a grad student was the following. When someone asks you a completely stupid question, find some way to \"misunderstand\" it as a good question and answer that instead.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Conducted my first lecture today. It did not go well I’m a TA and this term I am conducting classes for one of the intro lectures for first years. It’s like a general knowledge module on my country (so we cover history, econ, politics etc). I had my first independent lecture today on a topic I’m not familiar with at all. And it was so bad. I couldn’t pronounce a few names (it was on the origin of our language), my explanations were all over the place and I couldn’t answer a question a student had (I did answer it later though). I found out the topic yesterday so I didn’t have enough time to prepare. I’m not sure how to deal with this. This was their first impression of me and I’m a little worried that I’ll make things worse for them. Was anyone ever in a similar situation? How do I recover from this?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I don't think that's very representative of most first experiences, I started giving short guest lectures in my supervisors classes, then doing seminars discussing their lectures, then later my own lectures on content I had made myself; that way is a much more smooth transition. So don't take it as a bad sign for the future, just be honest about your experience with whoever assigned you to teach something you didn't know so it doesn't happen again. It might be harder to build up relationship with students again, but you still have the whole semester to do so. Good luck!", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Conducted my first lecture today. It did not go well I’m a TA and this term I am conducting classes for one of the intro lectures for first years. It’s like a general knowledge module on my country (so we cover history, econ, politics etc). I had my first independent lecture today on a topic I’m not familiar with at all. And it was so bad. I couldn’t pronounce a few names (it was on the origin of our language), my explanations were all over the place and I couldn’t answer a question a student had (I did answer it later though). I found out the topic yesterday so I didn’t have enough time to prepare. I’m not sure how to deal with this. This was their first impression of me and I’m a little worried that I’ll make things worse for them. Was anyone ever in a similar situation? How do I recover from this?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Own it. Don't marinade in it. It happens. Rolling into the next class with some version of \"Full disclosure guys, I don't know what you thought but I felt like last class was rough. That's not my usual style. Here's how today is going to go differently ... \" Praise them for asking good questions that stumped you. That means their listening and thinking critically. Don't make excuses or ask for forgiveness but take some reasonable steps to do better using your personal strengths. If they ask a question and I don't know the answer, I tell them it's a great question and ask if anyone else in the class knows. If not, I joke \"me neither - haha! Let's find out. Who can search up the answer fastest?\" Edit: now that a re-read your post Idk. Opening the door for possibility while maybe not your ideal lecture, it wasn't as bad as it seems? We're often our own worst critic, especially when we're nervous and being observed. None of what you've described sounds terrible. You didn't insult anyone or make them cry ... Ive had professors do that and still recover. This will be okay for you too.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Conducted my first lecture today. It did not go well I’m a TA and this term I am conducting classes for one of the intro lectures for first years. It’s like a general knowledge module on my country (so we cover history, econ, politics etc). I had my first independent lecture today on a topic I’m not familiar with at all. And it was so bad. I couldn’t pronounce a few names (it was on the origin of our language), my explanations were all over the place and I couldn’t answer a question a student had (I did answer it later though). I found out the topic yesterday so I didn’t have enough time to prepare. I’m not sure how to deal with this. This was their first impression of me and I’m a little worried that I’ll make things worse for them. Was anyone ever in a similar situation? How do I recover from this?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "My first time leading full classes was last semester. I've been in a similar situation with my teaching experience so far. I've TAed for 3 courses all of which I hadn't taken before. I was trusted to just lead classes anyway (which I guess is normal but I still find that super weird). For the first course I TAed for, I led class every other week plus review sessions. It felt super overwhelming to me at first, but I got used to it pretty quickly. My main source of worry before every session is that I will not know the answer to student's questions and that I am somehow letting them down. There have been times I didn't know the answer but I have never had an issue just telling them \"I'm not sure but I will find out for you\" -- just make sure you actually do find out for them. It feels weird to admit to students that you don't know something, but I try to remind myself that I am a student too and I am also learning (especially so for courses that I have never actually taken lol). When I get worried about them judging me I try to remind myself of when I was in undergrad. Most of the class, myself included sometimes, half payed attention for most lectures. Chances are if you mess up many of them won't even notice. And even if they do, they won't likely remember it -- I can't think of a single time that my professors/TAs messed up during my classes in undergrad. Each time you do this you will get more confident and it will get easier!", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Conducted my first lecture today. It did not go well I’m a TA and this term I am conducting classes for one of the intro lectures for first years. It’s like a general knowledge module on my country (so we cover history, econ, politics etc). I had my first independent lecture today on a topic I’m not familiar with at all. And it was so bad. I couldn’t pronounce a few names (it was on the origin of our language), my explanations were all over the place and I couldn’t answer a question a student had (I did answer it later though). I found out the topic yesterday so I didn’t have enough time to prepare. I’m not sure how to deal with this. This was their first impression of me and I’m a little worried that I’ll make things worse for them. Was anyone ever in a similar situation? How do I recover from this?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Own it. Don't marinade in it. It happens. Rolling into the next class with some version of \"Full disclosure guys, I don't know what you thought but I felt like last class was rough. That's not my usual style. Here's how today is going to go differently ... \" Praise them for asking good questions that stumped you. That means their listening and thinking critically. Don't make excuses or ask for forgiveness but take some reasonable steps to do better using your personal strengths. If they ask a question and I don't know the answer, I tell them it's a great question and ask if anyone else in the class knows. If not, I joke \"me neither - haha! Let's find out. Who can search up the answer fastest?\" Edit: now that a re-read your post Idk. Opening the door for possibility while maybe not your ideal lecture, it wasn't as bad as it seems? We're often our own worst critic, especially when we're nervous and being observed. None of what you've described sounds terrible. You didn't insult anyone or make them cry ... Ive had professors do that and still recover. This will be okay for you too.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Conducted my first lecture today. It did not go well I’m a TA and this term I am conducting classes for one of the intro lectures for first years. It’s like a general knowledge module on my country (so we cover history, econ, politics etc). I had my first independent lecture today on a topic I’m not familiar with at all. And it was so bad. I couldn’t pronounce a few names (it was on the origin of our language), my explanations were all over the place and I couldn’t answer a question a student had (I did answer it later though). I found out the topic yesterday so I didn’t have enough time to prepare. I’m not sure how to deal with this. This was their first impression of me and I’m a little worried that I’ll make things worse for them. Was anyone ever in a similar situation? How do I recover from this?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "It happens. Reflect on what you could do differently or something that would have helped given the circumstances. Remember that and do a little better next time. Your first lecture is a starting point, not representative of your ability as a lecturer.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Conducted my first lecture today. It did not go well I’m a TA and this term I am conducting classes for one of the intro lectures for first years. It’s like a general knowledge module on my country (so we cover history, econ, politics etc). I had my first independent lecture today on a topic I’m not familiar with at all. And it was so bad. I couldn’t pronounce a few names (it was on the origin of our language), my explanations were all over the place and I couldn’t answer a question a student had (I did answer it later though). I found out the topic yesterday so I didn’t have enough time to prepare. I’m not sure how to deal with this. This was their first impression of me and I’m a little worried that I’ll make things worse for them. Was anyone ever in a similar situation? How do I recover from this?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Hopefully this is reassuring. I remember being a student when what you described happened to an T.A. (I'm sure everyone else forgot it, but it was a field I was thinking of going into and I wanted to know what the heck a first job looked like.) I thought \"Wow, I feel kinda bad for them.\" And then two days later they got up again, did fine, and they became one of my favorite people to learn from. So the first impression doesn't stick. Students'll remember how well you went on to do.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Conducted my first lecture today. It did not go well I’m a TA and this term I am conducting classes for one of the intro lectures for first years. It’s like a general knowledge module on my country (so we cover history, econ, politics etc). I had my first independent lecture today on a topic I’m not familiar with at all. And it was so bad. I couldn’t pronounce a few names (it was on the origin of our language), my explanations were all over the place and I couldn’t answer a question a student had (I did answer it later though). I found out the topic yesterday so I didn’t have enough time to prepare. I’m not sure how to deal with this. This was their first impression of me and I’m a little worried that I’ll make things worse for them. Was anyone ever in a similar situation? How do I recover from this?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I've been teaching for years and still have the occasional train wreck lecture. Sometimes it's even on material I've covered hundreds of times. The best advice I can give is be honest with your students and laugh it off. It's amazing how a little self-deprecating humor can diffuse an awkward classroom. Especially when you mispronounce something. I'm super bad about that. As for not being able to answer all questions off the top of your head... someone else already mentioned admitting that you're not sure but promising you'll look it up and get back to them. This is great advice. Not only does it ensure you give them the proper information it's teaching your students that's it's okay not to have all the answers all the time. My mentor in grad school taught me a lot but the thing that has stuck with me all these years is that unless you have a photographic memory you're never going to remember every little thing about your subject. What you need to learn is what questions you should be asking and where to find the answers. It's a philosophy I live by both in research and teaching.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Conducted my first lecture today. It did not go well I’m a TA and this term I am conducting classes for one of the intro lectures for first years. It’s like a general knowledge module on my country (so we cover history, econ, politics etc). I had my first independent lecture today on a topic I’m not familiar with at all. And it was so bad. I couldn’t pronounce a few names (it was on the origin of our language), my explanations were all over the place and I couldn’t answer a question a student had (I did answer it later though). I found out the topic yesterday so I didn’t have enough time to prepare. I’m not sure how to deal with this. This was their first impression of me and I’m a little worried that I’ll make things worse for them. Was anyone ever in a similar situation? How do I recover from this?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Hopefully this is reassuring. I remember being a student when what you described happened to an T.A. (I'm sure everyone else forgot it, but it was a field I was thinking of going into and I wanted to know what the heck a first job looked like.) I thought \"Wow, I feel kinda bad for them.\" And then two days later they got up again, did fine, and they became one of my favorite people to learn from. So the first impression doesn't stick. Students'll remember how well you went on to do.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Conducted my first lecture today. It did not go well I’m a TA and this term I am conducting classes for one of the intro lectures for first years. It’s like a general knowledge module on my country (so we cover history, econ, politics etc). I had my first independent lecture today on a topic I’m not familiar with at all. And it was so bad. I couldn’t pronounce a few names (it was on the origin of our language), my explanations were all over the place and I couldn’t answer a question a student had (I did answer it later though). I found out the topic yesterday so I didn’t have enough time to prepare. I’m not sure how to deal with this. This was their first impression of me and I’m a little worried that I’ll make things worse for them. Was anyone ever in a similar situation? How do I recover from this?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "It happens. Reflect on what you could do differently or something that would have helped given the circumstances. Remember that and do a little better next time. Your first lecture is a starting point, not representative of your ability as a lecturer.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Conducted my first lecture today. It did not go well I’m a TA and this term I am conducting classes for one of the intro lectures for first years. It’s like a general knowledge module on my country (so we cover history, econ, politics etc). I had my first independent lecture today on a topic I’m not familiar with at all. And it was so bad. I couldn’t pronounce a few names (it was on the origin of our language), my explanations were all over the place and I couldn’t answer a question a student had (I did answer it later though). I found out the topic yesterday so I didn’t have enough time to prepare. I’m not sure how to deal with this. This was their first impression of me and I’m a little worried that I’ll make things worse for them. Was anyone ever in a similar situation? How do I recover from this?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I just finished my PhD in curriculum studies, and have continued teaching high school during grad school. When I became a teacher 15 years ago, it was through an accelerated process, that involved a ton of mentoring during my first year of teaching. One of my mentors mentioned, kind of off-handedly, that it was somewhere around his 7th year of teaching the same, narrow subject (chemistry, in his case) that he was able to walk into the room and teach pretty well, without doing several hours of prep for each hour of class. As others have said above, you were put into an unreasonable position, because you didn't have time to prep. Hopefully, you know (or have control over) the content of the second class, and can put the prep in. There's lots of good advice above (even though the suggestions move in several very different directions) on how to address day 1. Pick the one that most appeals to you, and include it as part of how you prepare for the second class. I'll just add to that advice: It's okay to tell your students that you weren't given enough time to prep the first class, and you have prepared much more thoroughly for the second. That can help your students reconcile the different experiences, if they were concerned about your trustworthiness as a TA after that first class, and to recognize that you're better than that first impression might have left.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Why am I slacking off days even in my post-PhD life? Background: I recently received my PhD (30F). I worked very hard to secure a good postdoc fellowship during my PhD. Now that I am here, I am finding myself in some patterns and old habits of slacking off that I am quite alarmed by. During graduate school I had a cycles that once every few weeks I had developed a habit of just lazing around and binge watching or slacking off. This was true even I managed to shutt off all SM on phone and laptop. I would find just some way to surf the internet and search random stuff...the day(s) would just pass by. Until, I snapped out of it and back to work. Somehow this cycle felt more acceptable in graduate school because I was just a \"student\" after all. Now that I am officially in a postdoc position, for the first time it's hitting me that this is goddamn real job with real money. It's hitting me that there are other 30 year olds in other fields working their ass of 10 -12hours a day for a living, with a serious work ethic. I guess part of being an academic is that you set your own milestones and there is a very little accountability to others. Everyone in my work place kinda works remotely (theoretical astrophysics) and so I don't have a community around me. I am not lonely. I am currently staying with parents (Asian fam here), eat well and excercise regularly. Yet, this last 10 days, when I go back to my computer I have found every excuse to not work (even with all SM blocked). I am sitting here feeling so alarmed because I realize this is an unhealthy work ethic. Don't get me wrong - I am good at what I do..I've published in top journals, won many awards, and this prestigious postdoc fellowship - but I've come to realize that I am appalled by the sloth and inconsistency with which I approach it. I feel ashamed of talking about this with anyone else. I feel like I'm in 30s (and not an undergrad) and I should have figured out this by now. I get so queasy thinking..if I were in a tenure tracked job as an assistant professor and continued with these habits, that would be simply be awful! I'm just wondering if anyone has had a similar experience and how they turned it around. More importantly, how they remained consistent about it.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Why does it matter if others work more hours than you? As long as you're getting your shit done, the \"work ethic\" isn't an issue. Hell, your work ethic sounds much healthier.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Why am I slacking off days even in my post-PhD life? Background: I recently received my PhD (30F). I worked very hard to secure a good postdoc fellowship during my PhD. Now that I am here, I am finding myself in some patterns and old habits of slacking off that I am quite alarmed by. During graduate school I had a cycles that once every few weeks I had developed a habit of just lazing around and binge watching or slacking off. This was true even I managed to shutt off all SM on phone and laptop. I would find just some way to surf the internet and search random stuff...the day(s) would just pass by. Until, I snapped out of it and back to work. Somehow this cycle felt more acceptable in graduate school because I was just a \"student\" after all. Now that I am officially in a postdoc position, for the first time it's hitting me that this is goddamn real job with real money. It's hitting me that there are other 30 year olds in other fields working their ass of 10 -12hours a day for a living, with a serious work ethic. I guess part of being an academic is that you set your own milestones and there is a very little accountability to others. Everyone in my work place kinda works remotely (theoretical astrophysics) and so I don't have a community around me. I am not lonely. I am currently staying with parents (Asian fam here), eat well and excercise regularly. Yet, this last 10 days, when I go back to my computer I have found every excuse to not work (even with all SM blocked). I am sitting here feeling so alarmed because I realize this is an unhealthy work ethic. Don't get me wrong - I am good at what I do..I've published in top journals, won many awards, and this prestigious postdoc fellowship - but I've come to realize that I am appalled by the sloth and inconsistency with which I approach it. I feel ashamed of talking about this with anyone else. I feel like I'm in 30s (and not an undergrad) and I should have figured out this by now. I get so queasy thinking..if I were in a tenure tracked job as an assistant professor and continued with these habits, that would be simply be awful! I'm just wondering if anyone has had a similar experience and how they turned it around. More importantly, how they remained consistent about it.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "\"other 30 year olds in other fields working their ass of 10 -12hours a day for a living, with a serious work ethic\" This is an unrealistic expectation of work ethic. Academia sets us up for outrageous burnout. The fact that you are 'cycling' in your ability to focus is actually a symptom of chronic burnout. I have moved from academia to industry, and am noticing a stark difference in the way people protect their off-work time. I work 7.5 hours a day, monday to friday, no more, no less (and if more, claim overtime) and am far more effective day after day than I was in academia pulling 12-16 hr days. As is a constant theme in these subreddits and I'm sure you know - A lot of aspects of academia are extremely toxic. I think a way to 'turn it around' is to realize that the expectations are unreasonable and that it's okay if it doesn't work for you. Work for a few isolated hours a day. Build those up if you can. If you can't but are still productive, that's fine. Lower the bar to something reasonable for you, because you are your own worst critic.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Why am I slacking off days even in my post-PhD life? Background: I recently received my PhD (30F). I worked very hard to secure a good postdoc fellowship during my PhD. Now that I am here, I am finding myself in some patterns and old habits of slacking off that I am quite alarmed by. During graduate school I had a cycles that once every few weeks I had developed a habit of just lazing around and binge watching or slacking off. This was true even I managed to shutt off all SM on phone and laptop. I would find just some way to surf the internet and search random stuff...the day(s) would just pass by. Until, I snapped out of it and back to work. Somehow this cycle felt more acceptable in graduate school because I was just a \"student\" after all. Now that I am officially in a postdoc position, for the first time it's hitting me that this is goddamn real job with real money. It's hitting me that there are other 30 year olds in other fields working their ass of 10 -12hours a day for a living, with a serious work ethic. I guess part of being an academic is that you set your own milestones and there is a very little accountability to others. Everyone in my work place kinda works remotely (theoretical astrophysics) and so I don't have a community around me. I am not lonely. I am currently staying with parents (Asian fam here), eat well and excercise regularly. Yet, this last 10 days, when I go back to my computer I have found every excuse to not work (even with all SM blocked). I am sitting here feeling so alarmed because I realize this is an unhealthy work ethic. Don't get me wrong - I am good at what I do..I've published in top journals, won many awards, and this prestigious postdoc fellowship - but I've come to realize that I am appalled by the sloth and inconsistency with which I approach it. I feel ashamed of talking about this with anyone else. I feel like I'm in 30s (and not an undergrad) and I should have figured out this by now. I get so queasy thinking..if I were in a tenure tracked job as an assistant professor and continued with these habits, that would be simply be awful! I'm just wondering if anyone has had a similar experience and how they turned it around. More importantly, how they remained consistent about it.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Sounds a bit like me. I was recently diagnosed with ADHD which probably at least partially explains my productivity problems. I have found I need external deadlines and accountability to keep me on track.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Why am I slacking off days even in my post-PhD life? Background: I recently received my PhD (30F). I worked very hard to secure a good postdoc fellowship during my PhD. Now that I am here, I am finding myself in some patterns and old habits of slacking off that I am quite alarmed by. During graduate school I had a cycles that once every few weeks I had developed a habit of just lazing around and binge watching or slacking off. This was true even I managed to shutt off all SM on phone and laptop. I would find just some way to surf the internet and search random stuff...the day(s) would just pass by. Until, I snapped out of it and back to work. Somehow this cycle felt more acceptable in graduate school because I was just a \"student\" after all. Now that I am officially in a postdoc position, for the first time it's hitting me that this is goddamn real job with real money. It's hitting me that there are other 30 year olds in other fields working their ass of 10 -12hours a day for a living, with a serious work ethic. I guess part of being an academic is that you set your own milestones and there is a very little accountability to others. Everyone in my work place kinda works remotely (theoretical astrophysics) and so I don't have a community around me. I am not lonely. I am currently staying with parents (Asian fam here), eat well and excercise regularly. Yet, this last 10 days, when I go back to my computer I have found every excuse to not work (even with all SM blocked). I am sitting here feeling so alarmed because I realize this is an unhealthy work ethic. Don't get me wrong - I am good at what I do..I've published in top journals, won many awards, and this prestigious postdoc fellowship - but I've come to realize that I am appalled by the sloth and inconsistency with which I approach it. I feel ashamed of talking about this with anyone else. I feel like I'm in 30s (and not an undergrad) and I should have figured out this by now. I get so queasy thinking..if I were in a tenure tracked job as an assistant professor and continued with these habits, that would be simply be awful! I'm just wondering if anyone has had a similar experience and how they turned it around. More importantly, how they remained consistent about it.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "\"other 30 year olds in other fields working their ass of 10 -12hours a day for a living, with a serious work ethic\" This is an unrealistic expectation of work ethic. Academia sets us up for outrageous burnout. The fact that you are 'cycling' in your ability to focus is actually a symptom of chronic burnout. I have moved from academia to industry, and am noticing a stark difference in the way people protect their off-work time. I work 7.5 hours a day, monday to friday, no more, no less (and if more, claim overtime) and am far more effective day after day than I was in academia pulling 12-16 hr days. As is a constant theme in these subreddits and I'm sure you know - A lot of aspects of academia are extremely toxic. I think a way to 'turn it around' is to realize that the expectations are unreasonable and that it's okay if it doesn't work for you. Work for a few isolated hours a day. Build those up if you can. If you can't but are still productive, that's fine. Lower the bar to something reasonable for you, because you are your own worst critic.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Why am I slacking off days even in my post-PhD life? Background: I recently received my PhD (30F). I worked very hard to secure a good postdoc fellowship during my PhD. Now that I am here, I am finding myself in some patterns and old habits of slacking off that I am quite alarmed by. During graduate school I had a cycles that once every few weeks I had developed a habit of just lazing around and binge watching or slacking off. This was true even I managed to shutt off all SM on phone and laptop. I would find just some way to surf the internet and search random stuff...the day(s) would just pass by. Until, I snapped out of it and back to work. Somehow this cycle felt more acceptable in graduate school because I was just a \"student\" after all. Now that I am officially in a postdoc position, for the first time it's hitting me that this is goddamn real job with real money. It's hitting me that there are other 30 year olds in other fields working their ass of 10 -12hours a day for a living, with a serious work ethic. I guess part of being an academic is that you set your own milestones and there is a very little accountability to others. Everyone in my work place kinda works remotely (theoretical astrophysics) and so I don't have a community around me. I am not lonely. I am currently staying with parents (Asian fam here), eat well and excercise regularly. Yet, this last 10 days, when I go back to my computer I have found every excuse to not work (even with all SM blocked). I am sitting here feeling so alarmed because I realize this is an unhealthy work ethic. Don't get me wrong - I am good at what I do..I've published in top journals, won many awards, and this prestigious postdoc fellowship - but I've come to realize that I am appalled by the sloth and inconsistency with which I approach it. I feel ashamed of talking about this with anyone else. I feel like I'm in 30s (and not an undergrad) and I should have figured out this by now. I get so queasy thinking..if I were in a tenure tracked job as an assistant professor and continued with these habits, that would be simply be awful! I'm just wondering if anyone has had a similar experience and how they turned it around. More importantly, how they remained consistent about it.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I’m here to tell you I do struggle with the same things. When I work “full-on” I feel like I’m a beast. Great presentations, reports what not. And then there are days that are so slow I want to do nothing but binge watch or scroll through Reddit. My husband is a workaholic constantly powering through but he is on the verge of a serious breakdown if he doesn’t stop. So I’m not sure which is worse, to be honest. I have noticed, I work better with white noise in the background, taking regular breaks & accepting that there are certain days of the month that I’m going to be “hazy”. It does coincide with my PMS dates and I’m trying to make my peace with that.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Why am I slacking off days even in my post-PhD life? Background: I recently received my PhD (30F). I worked very hard to secure a good postdoc fellowship during my PhD. Now that I am here, I am finding myself in some patterns and old habits of slacking off that I am quite alarmed by. During graduate school I had a cycles that once every few weeks I had developed a habit of just lazing around and binge watching or slacking off. This was true even I managed to shutt off all SM on phone and laptop. I would find just some way to surf the internet and search random stuff...the day(s) would just pass by. Until, I snapped out of it and back to work. Somehow this cycle felt more acceptable in graduate school because I was just a \"student\" after all. Now that I am officially in a postdoc position, for the first time it's hitting me that this is goddamn real job with real money. It's hitting me that there are other 30 year olds in other fields working their ass of 10 -12hours a day for a living, with a serious work ethic. I guess part of being an academic is that you set your own milestones and there is a very little accountability to others. Everyone in my work place kinda works remotely (theoretical astrophysics) and so I don't have a community around me. I am not lonely. I am currently staying with parents (Asian fam here), eat well and excercise regularly. Yet, this last 10 days, when I go back to my computer I have found every excuse to not work (even with all SM blocked). I am sitting here feeling so alarmed because I realize this is an unhealthy work ethic. Don't get me wrong - I am good at what I do..I've published in top journals, won many awards, and this prestigious postdoc fellowship - but I've come to realize that I am appalled by the sloth and inconsistency with which I approach it. I feel ashamed of talking about this with anyone else. I feel like I'm in 30s (and not an undergrad) and I should have figured out this by now. I get so queasy thinking..if I were in a tenure tracked job as an assistant professor and continued with these habits, that would be simply be awful! I'm just wondering if anyone has had a similar experience and how they turned it around. More importantly, how they remained consistent about it.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "\"other 30 year olds in other fields working their ass of 10 -12hours a day for a living, with a serious work ethic\" This is an unrealistic expectation of work ethic. Academia sets us up for outrageous burnout. The fact that you are 'cycling' in your ability to focus is actually a symptom of chronic burnout. I have moved from academia to industry, and am noticing a stark difference in the way people protect their off-work time. I work 7.5 hours a day, monday to friday, no more, no less (and if more, claim overtime) and am far more effective day after day than I was in academia pulling 12-16 hr days. As is a constant theme in these subreddits and I'm sure you know - A lot of aspects of academia are extremely toxic. I think a way to 'turn it around' is to realize that the expectations are unreasonable and that it's okay if it doesn't work for you. Work for a few isolated hours a day. Build those up if you can. If you can't but are still productive, that's fine. Lower the bar to something reasonable for you, because you are your own worst critic.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Why am I slacking off days even in my post-PhD life? Background: I recently received my PhD (30F). I worked very hard to secure a good postdoc fellowship during my PhD. Now that I am here, I am finding myself in some patterns and old habits of slacking off that I am quite alarmed by. During graduate school I had a cycles that once every few weeks I had developed a habit of just lazing around and binge watching or slacking off. This was true even I managed to shutt off all SM on phone and laptop. I would find just some way to surf the internet and search random stuff...the day(s) would just pass by. Until, I snapped out of it and back to work. Somehow this cycle felt more acceptable in graduate school because I was just a \"student\" after all. Now that I am officially in a postdoc position, for the first time it's hitting me that this is goddamn real job with real money. It's hitting me that there are other 30 year olds in other fields working their ass of 10 -12hours a day for a living, with a serious work ethic. I guess part of being an academic is that you set your own milestones and there is a very little accountability to others. Everyone in my work place kinda works remotely (theoretical astrophysics) and so I don't have a community around me. I am not lonely. I am currently staying with parents (Asian fam here), eat well and excercise regularly. Yet, this last 10 days, when I go back to my computer I have found every excuse to not work (even with all SM blocked). I am sitting here feeling so alarmed because I realize this is an unhealthy work ethic. Don't get me wrong - I am good at what I do..I've published in top journals, won many awards, and this prestigious postdoc fellowship - but I've come to realize that I am appalled by the sloth and inconsistency with which I approach it. I feel ashamed of talking about this with anyone else. I feel like I'm in 30s (and not an undergrad) and I should have figured out this by now. I get so queasy thinking..if I were in a tenure tracked job as an assistant professor and continued with these habits, that would be simply be awful! I'm just wondering if anyone has had a similar experience and how they turned it around. More importantly, how they remained consistent about it.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Hey have you considered PMDD? It is very common for mensturating women to go through changes in motivation, energy throughout their cycle and it can be quiet drastic for women with PMDD. I find it very hard to stay focused or exert energy in the 7-10 days before my period and even my cognitive skills drop a few notches during this time. Often resorting to low energy activities like scrolling the internet etc.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Why am I slacking off days even in my post-PhD life? Background: I recently received my PhD (30F). I worked very hard to secure a good postdoc fellowship during my PhD. Now that I am here, I am finding myself in some patterns and old habits of slacking off that I am quite alarmed by. During graduate school I had a cycles that once every few weeks I had developed a habit of just lazing around and binge watching or slacking off. This was true even I managed to shutt off all SM on phone and laptop. I would find just some way to surf the internet and search random stuff...the day(s) would just pass by. Until, I snapped out of it and back to work. Somehow this cycle felt more acceptable in graduate school because I was just a \"student\" after all. Now that I am officially in a postdoc position, for the first time it's hitting me that this is goddamn real job with real money. It's hitting me that there are other 30 year olds in other fields working their ass of 10 -12hours a day for a living, with a serious work ethic. I guess part of being an academic is that you set your own milestones and there is a very little accountability to others. Everyone in my work place kinda works remotely (theoretical astrophysics) and so I don't have a community around me. I am not lonely. I am currently staying with parents (Asian fam here), eat well and excercise regularly. Yet, this last 10 days, when I go back to my computer I have found every excuse to not work (even with all SM blocked). I am sitting here feeling so alarmed because I realize this is an unhealthy work ethic. Don't get me wrong - I am good at what I do..I've published in top journals, won many awards, and this prestigious postdoc fellowship - but I've come to realize that I am appalled by the sloth and inconsistency with which I approach it. I feel ashamed of talking about this with anyone else. I feel like I'm in 30s (and not an undergrad) and I should have figured out this by now. I get so queasy thinking..if I were in a tenure tracked job as an assistant professor and continued with these habits, that would be simply be awful! I'm just wondering if anyone has had a similar experience and how they turned it around. More importantly, how they remained consistent about it.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "\"other 30 year olds in other fields working their ass of 10 -12hours a day for a living, with a serious work ethic\" This is an unrealistic expectation of work ethic. Academia sets us up for outrageous burnout. The fact that you are 'cycling' in your ability to focus is actually a symptom of chronic burnout. I have moved from academia to industry, and am noticing a stark difference in the way people protect their off-work time. I work 7.5 hours a day, monday to friday, no more, no less (and if more, claim overtime) and am far more effective day after day than I was in academia pulling 12-16 hr days. As is a constant theme in these subreddits and I'm sure you know - A lot of aspects of academia are extremely toxic. I think a way to 'turn it around' is to realize that the expectations are unreasonable and that it's okay if it doesn't work for you. Work for a few isolated hours a day. Build those up if you can. If you can't but are still productive, that's fine. Lower the bar to something reasonable for you, because you are your own worst critic.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Why am I slacking off days even in my post-PhD life? Background: I recently received my PhD (30F). I worked very hard to secure a good postdoc fellowship during my PhD. Now that I am here, I am finding myself in some patterns and old habits of slacking off that I am quite alarmed by. During graduate school I had a cycles that once every few weeks I had developed a habit of just lazing around and binge watching or slacking off. This was true even I managed to shutt off all SM on phone and laptop. I would find just some way to surf the internet and search random stuff...the day(s) would just pass by. Until, I snapped out of it and back to work. Somehow this cycle felt more acceptable in graduate school because I was just a \"student\" after all. Now that I am officially in a postdoc position, for the first time it's hitting me that this is goddamn real job with real money. It's hitting me that there are other 30 year olds in other fields working their ass of 10 -12hours a day for a living, with a serious work ethic. I guess part of being an academic is that you set your own milestones and there is a very little accountability to others. Everyone in my work place kinda works remotely (theoretical astrophysics) and so I don't have a community around me. I am not lonely. I am currently staying with parents (Asian fam here), eat well and excercise regularly. Yet, this last 10 days, when I go back to my computer I have found every excuse to not work (even with all SM blocked). I am sitting here feeling so alarmed because I realize this is an unhealthy work ethic. Don't get me wrong - I am good at what I do..I've published in top journals, won many awards, and this prestigious postdoc fellowship - but I've come to realize that I am appalled by the sloth and inconsistency with which I approach it. I feel ashamed of talking about this with anyone else. I feel like I'm in 30s (and not an undergrad) and I should have figured out this by now. I get so queasy thinking..if I were in a tenure tracked job as an assistant professor and continued with these habits, that would be simply be awful! I'm just wondering if anyone has had a similar experience and how they turned it around. More importantly, how they remained consistent about it.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Hey have you considered PMDD? It is very common for mensturating women to go through changes in motivation, energy throughout their cycle and it can be quiet drastic for women with PMDD. I find it very hard to stay focused or exert energy in the 7-10 days before my period and even my cognitive skills drop a few notches during this time. Often resorting to low energy activities like scrolling the internet etc.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Why am I slacking off days even in my post-PhD life? Background: I recently received my PhD (30F). I worked very hard to secure a good postdoc fellowship during my PhD. Now that I am here, I am finding myself in some patterns and old habits of slacking off that I am quite alarmed by. During graduate school I had a cycles that once every few weeks I had developed a habit of just lazing around and binge watching or slacking off. This was true even I managed to shutt off all SM on phone and laptop. I would find just some way to surf the internet and search random stuff...the day(s) would just pass by. Until, I snapped out of it and back to work. Somehow this cycle felt more acceptable in graduate school because I was just a \"student\" after all. Now that I am officially in a postdoc position, for the first time it's hitting me that this is goddamn real job with real money. It's hitting me that there are other 30 year olds in other fields working their ass of 10 -12hours a day for a living, with a serious work ethic. I guess part of being an academic is that you set your own milestones and there is a very little accountability to others. Everyone in my work place kinda works remotely (theoretical astrophysics) and so I don't have a community around me. I am not lonely. I am currently staying with parents (Asian fam here), eat well and excercise regularly. Yet, this last 10 days, when I go back to my computer I have found every excuse to not work (even with all SM blocked). I am sitting here feeling so alarmed because I realize this is an unhealthy work ethic. Don't get me wrong - I am good at what I do..I've published in top journals, won many awards, and this prestigious postdoc fellowship - but I've come to realize that I am appalled by the sloth and inconsistency with which I approach it. I feel ashamed of talking about this with anyone else. I feel like I'm in 30s (and not an undergrad) and I should have figured out this by now. I get so queasy thinking..if I were in a tenure tracked job as an assistant professor and continued with these habits, that would be simply be awful! I'm just wondering if anyone has had a similar experience and how they turned it around. More importantly, how they remained consistent about it.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Sounds a bit like me. I was recently diagnosed with ADHD which probably at least partially explains my productivity problems. I have found I need external deadlines and accountability to keep me on track.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you ever feel \"reviewer's guilt\"? Recently reviewed a paper and couldn't help but give it a very critical review with a recommendation to the editor to reject. I gave a very detailed review with both specific and general comments, and tried to write something constructive. I can't help but empathize with the writer. Probably a PhD student trying to get published, worked hard and did what his advisor suggested and likely poured his guts in to it. I couldn't suggest to accept it but I can't help feeling guilty for \"being mean\" to the authors and ruining their day/week/month. Anyone else feel this? How do you deal with it?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Maybe inspect your review for tone and see if you really are being “mean,” or just responding to a lot of things that need work. There are constructive ways to say pretty much everything, and knowing how to frame things is important. If you think that article is written by a grad student, well, would you say those same things in a meeting with your own student? It’s not that you have to be nice exactly, but people are more likely to take constructive feedback. if you truly want to help them make the manuscript better, being constructive is more likely to do that. The anonymity of the peer review process turns some people into total assholes, saying things they’d never say to a colleague. You can get away with it, of course, but there’s a higher road than taking out personal frustrations via peer review.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you ever feel \"reviewer's guilt\"? Recently reviewed a paper and couldn't help but give it a very critical review with a recommendation to the editor to reject. I gave a very detailed review with both specific and general comments, and tried to write something constructive. I can't help but empathize with the writer. Probably a PhD student trying to get published, worked hard and did what his advisor suggested and likely poured his guts in to it. I couldn't suggest to accept it but I can't help feeling guilty for \"being mean\" to the authors and ruining their day/week/month. Anyone else feel this? How do you deal with it?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I am the student you speak of. As long as there is feedback I can use please don't feel guilty. Obviosuly publishing is the best outcome for me, but having someone read your paper, actually care and provide feedback is a good 2nd.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you ever feel \"reviewer's guilt\"? Recently reviewed a paper and couldn't help but give it a very critical review with a recommendation to the editor to reject. I gave a very detailed review with both specific and general comments, and tried to write something constructive. I can't help but empathize with the writer. Probably a PhD student trying to get published, worked hard and did what his advisor suggested and likely poured his guts in to it. I couldn't suggest to accept it but I can't help feeling guilty for \"being mean\" to the authors and ruining their day/week/month. Anyone else feel this? How do you deal with it?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I often feel guilt for not understanding a paper well enough or not having spent enough time on a paper to give it a very helpful review. Most of the time I still recommend acceptance or if not, then I give the authors the opportunity to resubmit their work. This probably does not apply to you, but perhaps it can help. I have a mental health condition (OCD) that makes me prone to guilt. I sometimes tell myself this and remind myself that the guilt is not real. Of course, it is not possible to be 100% certain if guilt is warranted or not. The idea is to accept that uncertainty and do/think about something else in the present moment", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you ever feel \"reviewer's guilt\"? Recently reviewed a paper and couldn't help but give it a very critical review with a recommendation to the editor to reject. I gave a very detailed review with both specific and general comments, and tried to write something constructive. I can't help but empathize with the writer. Probably a PhD student trying to get published, worked hard and did what his advisor suggested and likely poured his guts in to it. I couldn't suggest to accept it but I can't help feeling guilty for \"being mean\" to the authors and ruining their day/week/month. Anyone else feel this? How do you deal with it?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I am the student you speak of. As long as there is feedback I can use please don't feel guilty. Obviosuly publishing is the best outcome for me, but having someone read your paper, actually care and provide feedback is a good 2nd.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you ever feel \"reviewer's guilt\"? Recently reviewed a paper and couldn't help but give it a very critical review with a recommendation to the editor to reject. I gave a very detailed review with both specific and general comments, and tried to write something constructive. I can't help but empathize with the writer. Probably a PhD student trying to get published, worked hard and did what his advisor suggested and likely poured his guts in to it. I couldn't suggest to accept it but I can't help feeling guilty for \"being mean\" to the authors and ruining their day/week/month. Anyone else feel this? How do you deal with it?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "The way I see it, you're providing a great service to others and society by doing your work this way.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you ever feel \"reviewer's guilt\"? Recently reviewed a paper and couldn't help but give it a very critical review with a recommendation to the editor to reject. I gave a very detailed review with both specific and general comments, and tried to write something constructive. I can't help but empathize with the writer. Probably a PhD student trying to get published, worked hard and did what his advisor suggested and likely poured his guts in to it. I couldn't suggest to accept it but I can't help feeling guilty for \"being mean\" to the authors and ruining their day/week/month. Anyone else feel this? How do you deal with it?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I am the student you speak of. As long as there is feedback I can use please don't feel guilty. Obviosuly publishing is the best outcome for me, but having someone read your paper, actually care and provide feedback is a good 2nd.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you ever feel \"reviewer's guilt\"? Recently reviewed a paper and couldn't help but give it a very critical review with a recommendation to the editor to reject. I gave a very detailed review with both specific and general comments, and tried to write something constructive. I can't help but empathize with the writer. Probably a PhD student trying to get published, worked hard and did what his advisor suggested and likely poured his guts in to it. I couldn't suggest to accept it but I can't help feeling guilty for \"being mean\" to the authors and ruining their day/week/month. Anyone else feel this? How do you deal with it?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Maybe inspect your review for tone and see if you really are being “mean,” or just responding to a lot of things that need work. There are constructive ways to say pretty much everything, and knowing how to frame things is important. If you think that article is written by a grad student, well, would you say those same things in a meeting with your own student? It’s not that you have to be nice exactly, but people are more likely to take constructive feedback. if you truly want to help them make the manuscript better, being constructive is more likely to do that. The anonymity of the peer review process turns some people into total assholes, saying things they’d never say to a colleague. You can get away with it, of course, but there’s a higher road than taking out personal frustrations via peer review.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you ever feel \"reviewer's guilt\"? Recently reviewed a paper and couldn't help but give it a very critical review with a recommendation to the editor to reject. I gave a very detailed review with both specific and general comments, and tried to write something constructive. I can't help but empathize with the writer. Probably a PhD student trying to get published, worked hard and did what his advisor suggested and likely poured his guts in to it. I couldn't suggest to accept it but I can't help feeling guilty for \"being mean\" to the authors and ruining their day/week/month. Anyone else feel this? How do you deal with it?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Your main objective as a reviewer is to help authors to enhance the paper. If you provide constructive feedback and suggest ways of improving it then there is nothing really to feel guilty about. You should feel that you have provided help. Just avoid comments such as \"the paper does not meet the quality standards of this journal\" or similar :) That would be perceived as mean especially coming from an anonymous reviewer.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you ever feel \"reviewer's guilt\"? Recently reviewed a paper and couldn't help but give it a very critical review with a recommendation to the editor to reject. I gave a very detailed review with both specific and general comments, and tried to write something constructive. I can't help but empathize with the writer. Probably a PhD student trying to get published, worked hard and did what his advisor suggested and likely poured his guts in to it. I couldn't suggest to accept it but I can't help feeling guilty for \"being mean\" to the authors and ruining their day/week/month. Anyone else feel this? How do you deal with it?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I often feel guilt for not understanding a paper well enough or not having spent enough time on a paper to give it a very helpful review. Most of the time I still recommend acceptance or if not, then I give the authors the opportunity to resubmit their work. This probably does not apply to you, but perhaps it can help. I have a mental health condition (OCD) that makes me prone to guilt. I sometimes tell myself this and remind myself that the guilt is not real. Of course, it is not possible to be 100% certain if guilt is warranted or not. The idea is to accept that uncertainty and do/think about something else in the present moment", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you ever feel \"reviewer's guilt\"? Recently reviewed a paper and couldn't help but give it a very critical review with a recommendation to the editor to reject. I gave a very detailed review with both specific and general comments, and tried to write something constructive. I can't help but empathize with the writer. Probably a PhD student trying to get published, worked hard and did what his advisor suggested and likely poured his guts in to it. I couldn't suggest to accept it but I can't help feeling guilty for \"being mean\" to the authors and ruining their day/week/month. Anyone else feel this? How do you deal with it?", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Your main objective as a reviewer is to help authors to enhance the paper. If you provide constructive feedback and suggest ways of improving it then there is nothing really to feel guilty about. You should feel that you have provided help. Just avoid comments such as \"the paper does not meet the quality standards of this journal\" or similar :) That would be perceived as mean especially coming from an anonymous reviewer.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "My advisor might be dying and I don't know what to do. I'm a 4th year PhD student in the natural sciences, USA. I'm trying to be vague for privacy reasons; if you need clarification, please ask. My advisor's health took a turn for the worse in May. He's not doing well. We're a very small group - 3 grad students, of which I'm the oldest, 2 post-docs, and my advisor - working on a multi-institution project. We're the only group in the collaboration responsible for our component, and it's pretty mission-critical. I am, to put it bluntly, terrified. The most experienced post-doc, who helms the group when our advisor isn't available and holds a major leadership role in the collaboration, is in a tenuous position w.r.t. their visa. The other post-doc will leave for industry if our advisor passes. Neither of the other grad students have finished their qual or formed an advisory committee, the youngest barely has her project started. No one else at my institution can support me staying on this project - I'd have to transfer to another group/institution on our collaboration to have a prayer of finishing my degree, and if our post-doc leaves for industry it *still* may not be possible. This man took a risk on me no one else was willing to take. He's a second father to me. I have never been so scared, I have no idea what I'm doing, I desperately need *any* kind of advice. How do I support the younger grad students? How do I navigate our funding? What do I say to collaboration leadership (who are all in the dark)? How would I even approach an advisor at another institution about picking up the pieces of our shattered little team? Please help me, I feel like I'm drowning.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Your advisor should be working on ensuring that all of you will finish. Yes, he has a lot on his plate but if he is an experienced mentor you all are the first thoughts after his family. That said...4th year? Get writing man. I had one of my committee die suddenly and 2 of the remaining 3 were in their 60s. Put the fear of God into me and I holed up and wrote my thesis in 3 weeks after not having been in any hurry for the past 3 years.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "My advisor might be dying and I don't know what to do. I'm a 4th year PhD student in the natural sciences, USA. I'm trying to be vague for privacy reasons; if you need clarification, please ask. My advisor's health took a turn for the worse in May. He's not doing well. We're a very small group - 3 grad students, of which I'm the oldest, 2 post-docs, and my advisor - working on a multi-institution project. We're the only group in the collaboration responsible for our component, and it's pretty mission-critical. I am, to put it bluntly, terrified. The most experienced post-doc, who helms the group when our advisor isn't available and holds a major leadership role in the collaboration, is in a tenuous position w.r.t. their visa. The other post-doc will leave for industry if our advisor passes. Neither of the other grad students have finished their qual or formed an advisory committee, the youngest barely has her project started. No one else at my institution can support me staying on this project - I'd have to transfer to another group/institution on our collaboration to have a prayer of finishing my degree, and if our post-doc leaves for industry it *still* may not be possible. This man took a risk on me no one else was willing to take. He's a second father to me. I have never been so scared, I have no idea what I'm doing, I desperately need *any* kind of advice. How do I support the younger grad students? How do I navigate our funding? What do I say to collaboration leadership (who are all in the dark)? How would I even approach an advisor at another institution about picking up the pieces of our shattered little team? Please help me, I feel like I'm drowning.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "This happened recently in my field. I’m assuming your professor is reasonably well established. Reach out to former students of your professor who are now faculty themselves: you might be surprised by the amount of support you may receive from them.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "My advisor might be dying and I don't know what to do. I'm a 4th year PhD student in the natural sciences, USA. I'm trying to be vague for privacy reasons; if you need clarification, please ask. My advisor's health took a turn for the worse in May. He's not doing well. We're a very small group - 3 grad students, of which I'm the oldest, 2 post-docs, and my advisor - working on a multi-institution project. We're the only group in the collaboration responsible for our component, and it's pretty mission-critical. I am, to put it bluntly, terrified. The most experienced post-doc, who helms the group when our advisor isn't available and holds a major leadership role in the collaboration, is in a tenuous position w.r.t. their visa. The other post-doc will leave for industry if our advisor passes. Neither of the other grad students have finished their qual or formed an advisory committee, the youngest barely has her project started. No one else at my institution can support me staying on this project - I'd have to transfer to another group/institution on our collaboration to have a prayer of finishing my degree, and if our post-doc leaves for industry it *still* may not be possible. This man took a risk on me no one else was willing to take. He's a second father to me. I have never been so scared, I have no idea what I'm doing, I desperately need *any* kind of advice. How do I support the younger grad students? How do I navigate our funding? What do I say to collaboration leadership (who are all in the dark)? How would I even approach an advisor at another institution about picking up the pieces of our shattered little team? Please help me, I feel like I'm drowning.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I'm sorry you are going through this. Has the Director of the graduate program contacted you? They will likely have a plan in mind for you and the other graduate students. Since you are further along, its possible you can finish your current project while being mentored by another group (weekly meetings with PI and attending lab meetings). I have seen this sort of arrangement happen in the past. Given the other graduate students are early on, they are more likely than not starting over in another lab. You can support them by being there, encouraging them, and perhaps suggesting some labs they could pivot to, if that is what they want. But, its the graduate program administration's job to support the students. They should take care of it. Deep breaths!! It's not your responsibility to figure out funding, or how to break the news to collaborators. The department chair and perhaps the postdocs will take care of these things. I am trully sorry you are going through this- this is just brutal to read. Just know you are not alone!", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "My advisor might be dying and I don't know what to do. I'm a 4th year PhD student in the natural sciences, USA. I'm trying to be vague for privacy reasons; if you need clarification, please ask. My advisor's health took a turn for the worse in May. He's not doing well. We're a very small group - 3 grad students, of which I'm the oldest, 2 post-docs, and my advisor - working on a multi-institution project. We're the only group in the collaboration responsible for our component, and it's pretty mission-critical. I am, to put it bluntly, terrified. The most experienced post-doc, who helms the group when our advisor isn't available and holds a major leadership role in the collaboration, is in a tenuous position w.r.t. their visa. The other post-doc will leave for industry if our advisor passes. Neither of the other grad students have finished their qual or formed an advisory committee, the youngest barely has her project started. No one else at my institution can support me staying on this project - I'd have to transfer to another group/institution on our collaboration to have a prayer of finishing my degree, and if our post-doc leaves for industry it *still* may not be possible. This man took a risk on me no one else was willing to take. He's a second father to me. I have never been so scared, I have no idea what I'm doing, I desperately need *any* kind of advice. How do I support the younger grad students? How do I navigate our funding? What do I say to collaboration leadership (who are all in the dark)? How would I even approach an advisor at another institution about picking up the pieces of our shattered little team? Please help me, I feel like I'm drowning.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "This happened recently in my field. I’m assuming your professor is reasonably well established. Reach out to former students of your professor who are now faculty themselves: you might be surprised by the amount of support you may receive from them.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "My advisor might be dying and I don't know what to do. I'm a 4th year PhD student in the natural sciences, USA. I'm trying to be vague for privacy reasons; if you need clarification, please ask. My advisor's health took a turn for the worse in May. He's not doing well. We're a very small group - 3 grad students, of which I'm the oldest, 2 post-docs, and my advisor - working on a multi-institution project. We're the only group in the collaboration responsible for our component, and it's pretty mission-critical. I am, to put it bluntly, terrified. The most experienced post-doc, who helms the group when our advisor isn't available and holds a major leadership role in the collaboration, is in a tenuous position w.r.t. their visa. The other post-doc will leave for industry if our advisor passes. Neither of the other grad students have finished their qual or formed an advisory committee, the youngest barely has her project started. No one else at my institution can support me staying on this project - I'd have to transfer to another group/institution on our collaboration to have a prayer of finishing my degree, and if our post-doc leaves for industry it *still* may not be possible. This man took a risk on me no one else was willing to take. He's a second father to me. I have never been so scared, I have no idea what I'm doing, I desperately need *any* kind of advice. How do I support the younger grad students? How do I navigate our funding? What do I say to collaboration leadership (who are all in the dark)? How would I even approach an advisor at another institution about picking up the pieces of our shattered little team? Please help me, I feel like I'm drowning.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Your advisor should be working on ensuring that all of you will finish. Yes, he has a lot on his plate but if he is an experienced mentor you all are the first thoughts after his family. That said...4th year? Get writing man. I had one of my committee die suddenly and 2 of the remaining 3 were in their 60s. Put the fear of God into me and I holed up and wrote my thesis in 3 weeks after not having been in any hurry for the past 3 years.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "My advisor might be dying and I don't know what to do. I'm a 4th year PhD student in the natural sciences, USA. I'm trying to be vague for privacy reasons; if you need clarification, please ask. My advisor's health took a turn for the worse in May. He's not doing well. We're a very small group - 3 grad students, of which I'm the oldest, 2 post-docs, and my advisor - working on a multi-institution project. We're the only group in the collaboration responsible for our component, and it's pretty mission-critical. I am, to put it bluntly, terrified. The most experienced post-doc, who helms the group when our advisor isn't available and holds a major leadership role in the collaboration, is in a tenuous position w.r.t. their visa. The other post-doc will leave for industry if our advisor passes. Neither of the other grad students have finished their qual or formed an advisory committee, the youngest barely has her project started. No one else at my institution can support me staying on this project - I'd have to transfer to another group/institution on our collaboration to have a prayer of finishing my degree, and if our post-doc leaves for industry it *still* may not be possible. This man took a risk on me no one else was willing to take. He's a second father to me. I have never been so scared, I have no idea what I'm doing, I desperately need *any* kind of advice. How do I support the younger grad students? How do I navigate our funding? What do I say to collaboration leadership (who are all in the dark)? How would I even approach an advisor at another institution about picking up the pieces of our shattered little team? Please help me, I feel like I'm drowning.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "As a 4th year, you *should* be able to complete your PhD at that university given these circumstances. The younger students, especially the one that has barely started, may not be able to complete at all. In their cases, (particularly the newer of the two students), they'll likely need to start over or maybe continue what they've started under the guidance of another advisor. Basically, once you're far enough along in a PhD program, even if your advisor dies/leaves/quits, you can often get some grace provided to you from your department and allow you to finish. If you're relatively new to a PhD program (haven't completed quals in particular), you're more likely to have to restart in a new lab.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "My advisor might be dying and I don't know what to do. I'm a 4th year PhD student in the natural sciences, USA. I'm trying to be vague for privacy reasons; if you need clarification, please ask. My advisor's health took a turn for the worse in May. He's not doing well. We're a very small group - 3 grad students, of which I'm the oldest, 2 post-docs, and my advisor - working on a multi-institution project. We're the only group in the collaboration responsible for our component, and it's pretty mission-critical. I am, to put it bluntly, terrified. The most experienced post-doc, who helms the group when our advisor isn't available and holds a major leadership role in the collaboration, is in a tenuous position w.r.t. their visa. The other post-doc will leave for industry if our advisor passes. Neither of the other grad students have finished their qual or formed an advisory committee, the youngest barely has her project started. No one else at my institution can support me staying on this project - I'd have to transfer to another group/institution on our collaboration to have a prayer of finishing my degree, and if our post-doc leaves for industry it *still* may not be possible. This man took a risk on me no one else was willing to take. He's a second father to me. I have never been so scared, I have no idea what I'm doing, I desperately need *any* kind of advice. How do I support the younger grad students? How do I navigate our funding? What do I say to collaboration leadership (who are all in the dark)? How would I even approach an advisor at another institution about picking up the pieces of our shattered little team? Please help me, I feel like I'm drowning.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I'm sorry you are going through this. Has the Director of the graduate program contacted you? They will likely have a plan in mind for you and the other graduate students. Since you are further along, its possible you can finish your current project while being mentored by another group (weekly meetings with PI and attending lab meetings). I have seen this sort of arrangement happen in the past. Given the other graduate students are early on, they are more likely than not starting over in another lab. You can support them by being there, encouraging them, and perhaps suggesting some labs they could pivot to, if that is what they want. But, its the graduate program administration's job to support the students. They should take care of it. Deep breaths!! It's not your responsibility to figure out funding, or how to break the news to collaborators. The department chair and perhaps the postdocs will take care of these things. I am trully sorry you are going through this- this is just brutal to read. Just know you are not alone!", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "My advisor might be dying and I don't know what to do. I'm a 4th year PhD student in the natural sciences, USA. I'm trying to be vague for privacy reasons; if you need clarification, please ask. My advisor's health took a turn for the worse in May. He's not doing well. We're a very small group - 3 grad students, of which I'm the oldest, 2 post-docs, and my advisor - working on a multi-institution project. We're the only group in the collaboration responsible for our component, and it's pretty mission-critical. I am, to put it bluntly, terrified. The most experienced post-doc, who helms the group when our advisor isn't available and holds a major leadership role in the collaboration, is in a tenuous position w.r.t. their visa. The other post-doc will leave for industry if our advisor passes. Neither of the other grad students have finished their qual or formed an advisory committee, the youngest barely has her project started. No one else at my institution can support me staying on this project - I'd have to transfer to another group/institution on our collaboration to have a prayer of finishing my degree, and if our post-doc leaves for industry it *still* may not be possible. This man took a risk on me no one else was willing to take. He's a second father to me. I have never been so scared, I have no idea what I'm doing, I desperately need *any* kind of advice. How do I support the younger grad students? How do I navigate our funding? What do I say to collaboration leadership (who are all in the dark)? How would I even approach an advisor at another institution about picking up the pieces of our shattered little team? Please help me, I feel like I'm drowning.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "As a 4th year, you *should* be able to complete your PhD at that university given these circumstances. The younger students, especially the one that has barely started, may not be able to complete at all. In their cases, (particularly the newer of the two students), they'll likely need to start over or maybe continue what they've started under the guidance of another advisor. Basically, once you're far enough along in a PhD program, even if your advisor dies/leaves/quits, you can often get some grace provided to you from your department and allow you to finish. If you're relatively new to a PhD program (haven't completed quals in particular), you're more likely to have to restart in a new lab.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Should I Speak up About Homophobia in Research Center? **I am a gay graduate student who's part of an NSF research center in the hard sciences. An external evaluator is polling members about the center's climate to send to the administrators and to the NSF. I've been on the receiving end of homophobia on a number of occasions in the center.** In one instance, another grad student learned about me while we were at a conference and spent the next day following me around and calling me gay slurs when others were out of earshot. They also told people not to trust me and that I don't belong at the conference. At a professional lunch with another lab in the center, the other graduate students made horrible gay jokes throughout the meal. Two of them managed to mockingly imitate a gay couple and a third dropped the f-bomb a few times for good measure. I have more examples that I won't list here, but there's an atmosphere around the center that makes me feel unwelcome and at risk of being treated unfairly. Having to hide myself has probably has affected my mental state and therefor my research. The only other gay student in the center ended up leaving because of this environment. **I've been considering anonymously emailing the person evaluating the research center to let them know about my experiences, but have been struggling with the decision.** I want someone to know and for something to be done. On the other hand, I'm worried about danger to my professional life if I speak up and don't think anything will change even if I am heard and go through that risk. Talking to the evaluator could be seen by the administrators as me sabotaging the center's funding, but I am mainly concerned about what would happen if people in my home lab learn that I am gay from the report. They don't know about me, but if people hear about someone complaining in the center then it wouldn't be hard to find out who it is since I'm the only gay one in a tiny research center. My advisor is super catholic and Russian and a lot of the people I work with are also pretty religious. I'm only a year away from graduating and am thinking that I should just suck it up and then leave this bad situation when I get my degree. However, I also feel like such a coward for not being able to speak up about this and having to pretend that everything is great when I am literally fantasizing about leaving the field I am in to be around more accepting researchers. **What do you think Reddit? Has anyone dealt with a similar situation and what did you do?**", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I'm not sure if this is a wise suggestion at all, but maybe I would consider writing the report as if you were not the person directly affected by the situation. You can pretend you are one of your peers, and write something like \"a colleague of mine told me... They don't dare speaking up themselves in fear of ripercussions... It is a serious issue I thought should be reported and I thought I'd do it even if they [aka you, OP] decided not to report the situation themselves...\" Something like this. It will not hide for long that you are the gay student in the center, but it will maybe help avoiding the blame for the report. I'm not sure this helps. I do think you would do a good thing for yourself and for students who might find themselves in your current situation in the future by reporting this. I know it is a big burden and it takes a lot of courage. Don't forget that there is really no blame on you if you can't gather this much courage. For you, it is going to be tough either way (although in different ways, maybe) unfortunately. It is just up to you to choose whether to face possible consequences but bring some kind of attention to the problem or just leave it (if you can tolerate it) and just be done with that place as soon as you graduate. Whatever option you choose, you won't choose wrong.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Should I Speak up About Homophobia in Research Center? **I am a gay graduate student who's part of an NSF research center in the hard sciences. An external evaluator is polling members about the center's climate to send to the administrators and to the NSF. I've been on the receiving end of homophobia on a number of occasions in the center.** In one instance, another grad student learned about me while we were at a conference and spent the next day following me around and calling me gay slurs when others were out of earshot. They also told people not to trust me and that I don't belong at the conference. At a professional lunch with another lab in the center, the other graduate students made horrible gay jokes throughout the meal. Two of them managed to mockingly imitate a gay couple and a third dropped the f-bomb a few times for good measure. I have more examples that I won't list here, but there's an atmosphere around the center that makes me feel unwelcome and at risk of being treated unfairly. Having to hide myself has probably has affected my mental state and therefor my research. The only other gay student in the center ended up leaving because of this environment. **I've been considering anonymously emailing the person evaluating the research center to let them know about my experiences, but have been struggling with the decision.** I want someone to know and for something to be done. On the other hand, I'm worried about danger to my professional life if I speak up and don't think anything will change even if I am heard and go through that risk. Talking to the evaluator could be seen by the administrators as me sabotaging the center's funding, but I am mainly concerned about what would happen if people in my home lab learn that I am gay from the report. They don't know about me, but if people hear about someone complaining in the center then it wouldn't be hard to find out who it is since I'm the only gay one in a tiny research center. My advisor is super catholic and Russian and a lot of the people I work with are also pretty religious. I'm only a year away from graduating and am thinking that I should just suck it up and then leave this bad situation when I get my degree. However, I also feel like such a coward for not being able to speak up about this and having to pretend that everything is great when I am literally fantasizing about leaving the field I am in to be around more accepting researchers. **What do you think Reddit? Has anyone dealt with a similar situation and what did you do?**", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I am an older lesbian working in higher education admin. Here's my take:its not you responsibility to tank your life o er this situation. Survival is key. If it were me, I would probably tough it out while building a case to submit to the institution and government agency after I left. I mean daily documentation of dates and times and actors and passive observers of each incident in the notes in my phone that I would transcribe to a document. Then the hot second I either found a better environment or finished and left off it would go to both of those entities. I'd also find out how to get representation through the aclu and or glaad or whomever. Then I'd go on about my damn life and let those folks Duke it out. At that point you have essentially provided a dossier and insulated yourself from repercussion. But again. You are under no obligation to take any action which threatens your safety or well being if it goes against who you are to do so.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Should I Speak up About Homophobia in Research Center? **I am a gay graduate student who's part of an NSF research center in the hard sciences. An external evaluator is polling members about the center's climate to send to the administrators and to the NSF. I've been on the receiving end of homophobia on a number of occasions in the center.** In one instance, another grad student learned about me while we were at a conference and spent the next day following me around and calling me gay slurs when others were out of earshot. They also told people not to trust me and that I don't belong at the conference. At a professional lunch with another lab in the center, the other graduate students made horrible gay jokes throughout the meal. Two of them managed to mockingly imitate a gay couple and a third dropped the f-bomb a few times for good measure. I have more examples that I won't list here, but there's an atmosphere around the center that makes me feel unwelcome and at risk of being treated unfairly. Having to hide myself has probably has affected my mental state and therefor my research. The only other gay student in the center ended up leaving because of this environment. **I've been considering anonymously emailing the person evaluating the research center to let them know about my experiences, but have been struggling with the decision.** I want someone to know and for something to be done. On the other hand, I'm worried about danger to my professional life if I speak up and don't think anything will change even if I am heard and go through that risk. Talking to the evaluator could be seen by the administrators as me sabotaging the center's funding, but I am mainly concerned about what would happen if people in my home lab learn that I am gay from the report. They don't know about me, but if people hear about someone complaining in the center then it wouldn't be hard to find out who it is since I'm the only gay one in a tiny research center. My advisor is super catholic and Russian and a lot of the people I work with are also pretty religious. I'm only a year away from graduating and am thinking that I should just suck it up and then leave this bad situation when I get my degree. However, I also feel like such a coward for not being able to speak up about this and having to pretend that everything is great when I am literally fantasizing about leaving the field I am in to be around more accepting researchers. **What do you think Reddit? Has anyone dealt with a similar situation and what did you do?**", "role": "user" }, { "content": "You shouldn’t do this alone, look for two other people you are sure will support you. Also, if they behave like this toward gays they are likely also racist and sexist so talk to the women and colored and see if it’s something systemic and then start gathering evidence, record them. Forget about the NSF, send this to the media and then share it here and we will all go up in arms online to criticize the center, and we will demand that its head step down since he has enabled a climate of fear and abuse to flourish. Just an idea :)", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Should I Speak up About Homophobia in Research Center? **I am a gay graduate student who's part of an NSF research center in the hard sciences. An external evaluator is polling members about the center's climate to send to the administrators and to the NSF. I've been on the receiving end of homophobia on a number of occasions in the center.** In one instance, another grad student learned about me while we were at a conference and spent the next day following me around and calling me gay slurs when others were out of earshot. They also told people not to trust me and that I don't belong at the conference. At a professional lunch with another lab in the center, the other graduate students made horrible gay jokes throughout the meal. Two of them managed to mockingly imitate a gay couple and a third dropped the f-bomb a few times for good measure. I have more examples that I won't list here, but there's an atmosphere around the center that makes me feel unwelcome and at risk of being treated unfairly. Having to hide myself has probably has affected my mental state and therefor my research. The only other gay student in the center ended up leaving because of this environment. **I've been considering anonymously emailing the person evaluating the research center to let them know about my experiences, but have been struggling with the decision.** I want someone to know and for something to be done. On the other hand, I'm worried about danger to my professional life if I speak up and don't think anything will change even if I am heard and go through that risk. Talking to the evaluator could be seen by the administrators as me sabotaging the center's funding, but I am mainly concerned about what would happen if people in my home lab learn that I am gay from the report. They don't know about me, but if people hear about someone complaining in the center then it wouldn't be hard to find out who it is since I'm the only gay one in a tiny research center. My advisor is super catholic and Russian and a lot of the people I work with are also pretty religious. I'm only a year away from graduating and am thinking that I should just suck it up and then leave this bad situation when I get my degree. However, I also feel like such a coward for not being able to speak up about this and having to pretend that everything is great when I am literally fantasizing about leaving the field I am in to be around more accepting researchers. **What do you think Reddit? Has anyone dealt with a similar situation and what did you do?**", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I am an older lesbian working in higher education admin. Here's my take:its not you responsibility to tank your life o er this situation. Survival is key. If it were me, I would probably tough it out while building a case to submit to the institution and government agency after I left. I mean daily documentation of dates and times and actors and passive observers of each incident in the notes in my phone that I would transcribe to a document. Then the hot second I either found a better environment or finished and left off it would go to both of those entities. I'd also find out how to get representation through the aclu and or glaad or whomever. Then I'd go on about my damn life and let those folks Duke it out. At that point you have essentially provided a dossier and insulated yourself from repercussion. But again. You are under no obligation to take any action which threatens your safety or well being if it goes against who you are to do so.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Should I Speak up About Homophobia in Research Center? **I am a gay graduate student who's part of an NSF research center in the hard sciences. An external evaluator is polling members about the center's climate to send to the administrators and to the NSF. I've been on the receiving end of homophobia on a number of occasions in the center.** In one instance, another grad student learned about me while we were at a conference and spent the next day following me around and calling me gay slurs when others were out of earshot. They also told people not to trust me and that I don't belong at the conference. At a professional lunch with another lab in the center, the other graduate students made horrible gay jokes throughout the meal. Two of them managed to mockingly imitate a gay couple and a third dropped the f-bomb a few times for good measure. I have more examples that I won't list here, but there's an atmosphere around the center that makes me feel unwelcome and at risk of being treated unfairly. Having to hide myself has probably has affected my mental state and therefor my research. The only other gay student in the center ended up leaving because of this environment. **I've been considering anonymously emailing the person evaluating the research center to let them know about my experiences, but have been struggling with the decision.** I want someone to know and for something to be done. On the other hand, I'm worried about danger to my professional life if I speak up and don't think anything will change even if I am heard and go through that risk. Talking to the evaluator could be seen by the administrators as me sabotaging the center's funding, but I am mainly concerned about what would happen if people in my home lab learn that I am gay from the report. They don't know about me, but if people hear about someone complaining in the center then it wouldn't be hard to find out who it is since I'm the only gay one in a tiny research center. My advisor is super catholic and Russian and a lot of the people I work with are also pretty religious. I'm only a year away from graduating and am thinking that I should just suck it up and then leave this bad situation when I get my degree. However, I also feel like such a coward for not being able to speak up about this and having to pretend that everything is great when I am literally fantasizing about leaving the field I am in to be around more accepting researchers. **What do you think Reddit? Has anyone dealt with a similar situation and what did you do?**", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Does your Center have an anonymous suggestion ox? Is there someone (like head of outreach) you feel comfortable speaking with? Without bringing this up to someone in the Center first, and bringing this to external evaluators before anyone else in the Center may, sadly, cause you a lot of (undeserved) continued or worsened discomfort (ex. External evaluation presents anonymous findings, everyone is taken aback, you sit there silent, knowing it’s true, but worried you will be found out, and you feel some (undeserved) blame for the negative impression of your Center and source of funding)", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Should I Speak up About Homophobia in Research Center? **I am a gay graduate student who's part of an NSF research center in the hard sciences. An external evaluator is polling members about the center's climate to send to the administrators and to the NSF. I've been on the receiving end of homophobia on a number of occasions in the center.** In one instance, another grad student learned about me while we were at a conference and spent the next day following me around and calling me gay slurs when others were out of earshot. They also told people not to trust me and that I don't belong at the conference. At a professional lunch with another lab in the center, the other graduate students made horrible gay jokes throughout the meal. Two of them managed to mockingly imitate a gay couple and a third dropped the f-bomb a few times for good measure. I have more examples that I won't list here, but there's an atmosphere around the center that makes me feel unwelcome and at risk of being treated unfairly. Having to hide myself has probably has affected my mental state and therefor my research. The only other gay student in the center ended up leaving because of this environment. **I've been considering anonymously emailing the person evaluating the research center to let them know about my experiences, but have been struggling with the decision.** I want someone to know and for something to be done. On the other hand, I'm worried about danger to my professional life if I speak up and don't think anything will change even if I am heard and go through that risk. Talking to the evaluator could be seen by the administrators as me sabotaging the center's funding, but I am mainly concerned about what would happen if people in my home lab learn that I am gay from the report. They don't know about me, but if people hear about someone complaining in the center then it wouldn't be hard to find out who it is since I'm the only gay one in a tiny research center. My advisor is super catholic and Russian and a lot of the people I work with are also pretty religious. I'm only a year away from graduating and am thinking that I should just suck it up and then leave this bad situation when I get my degree. However, I also feel like such a coward for not being able to speak up about this and having to pretend that everything is great when I am literally fantasizing about leaving the field I am in to be around more accepting researchers. **What do you think Reddit? Has anyone dealt with a similar situation and what did you do?**", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I am an older lesbian working in higher education admin. Here's my take:its not you responsibility to tank your life o er this situation. Survival is key. If it were me, I would probably tough it out while building a case to submit to the institution and government agency after I left. I mean daily documentation of dates and times and actors and passive observers of each incident in the notes in my phone that I would transcribe to a document. Then the hot second I either found a better environment or finished and left off it would go to both of those entities. I'd also find out how to get representation through the aclu and or glaad or whomever. Then I'd go on about my damn life and let those folks Duke it out. At that point you have essentially provided a dossier and insulated yourself from repercussion. But again. You are under no obligation to take any action which threatens your safety or well being if it goes against who you are to do so.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Should I Speak up About Homophobia in Research Center? **I am a gay graduate student who's part of an NSF research center in the hard sciences. An external evaluator is polling members about the center's climate to send to the administrators and to the NSF. I've been on the receiving end of homophobia on a number of occasions in the center.** In one instance, another grad student learned about me while we were at a conference and spent the next day following me around and calling me gay slurs when others were out of earshot. They also told people not to trust me and that I don't belong at the conference. At a professional lunch with another lab in the center, the other graduate students made horrible gay jokes throughout the meal. Two of them managed to mockingly imitate a gay couple and a third dropped the f-bomb a few times for good measure. I have more examples that I won't list here, but there's an atmosphere around the center that makes me feel unwelcome and at risk of being treated unfairly. Having to hide myself has probably has affected my mental state and therefor my research. The only other gay student in the center ended up leaving because of this environment. **I've been considering anonymously emailing the person evaluating the research center to let them know about my experiences, but have been struggling with the decision.** I want someone to know and for something to be done. On the other hand, I'm worried about danger to my professional life if I speak up and don't think anything will change even if I am heard and go through that risk. Talking to the evaluator could be seen by the administrators as me sabotaging the center's funding, but I am mainly concerned about what would happen if people in my home lab learn that I am gay from the report. They don't know about me, but if people hear about someone complaining in the center then it wouldn't be hard to find out who it is since I'm the only gay one in a tiny research center. My advisor is super catholic and Russian and a lot of the people I work with are also pretty religious. I'm only a year away from graduating and am thinking that I should just suck it up and then leave this bad situation when I get my degree. However, I also feel like such a coward for not being able to speak up about this and having to pretend that everything is great when I am literally fantasizing about leaving the field I am in to be around more accepting researchers. **What do you think Reddit? Has anyone dealt with a similar situation and what did you do?**", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Hey just wanted to say I'm really sorry this is happening to you and not all academia is like this. I'm bi and my department has 2 other gay men and used to have a bi woman adjunct married to a woman. My school even has a \"queer faculty and staff caucus\" where we get together (well, over zoom now) and hang out with other queer faculty/staff. One thing I love about academia is that I can be myself after growing up super religious so it makes me so sad to hear this. I like the suggestion of reporting witnessing harassment and not saying it was you. But if you have less than a year to go I might stay quiet and report it on my way out personally. I don't think either is the wrong decision and it is fine to work in your best interest even if you don't save your whole center from homophobia in the future...that is not actually your job. There is a a great group on facebook called Queer PHD network.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Should I Speak up About Homophobia in Research Center? **I am a gay graduate student who's part of an NSF research center in the hard sciences. An external evaluator is polling members about the center's climate to send to the administrators and to the NSF. I've been on the receiving end of homophobia on a number of occasions in the center.** In one instance, another grad student learned about me while we were at a conference and spent the next day following me around and calling me gay slurs when others were out of earshot. They also told people not to trust me and that I don't belong at the conference. At a professional lunch with another lab in the center, the other graduate students made horrible gay jokes throughout the meal. Two of them managed to mockingly imitate a gay couple and a third dropped the f-bomb a few times for good measure. I have more examples that I won't list here, but there's an atmosphere around the center that makes me feel unwelcome and at risk of being treated unfairly. Having to hide myself has probably has affected my mental state and therefor my research. The only other gay student in the center ended up leaving because of this environment. **I've been considering anonymously emailing the person evaluating the research center to let them know about my experiences, but have been struggling with the decision.** I want someone to know and for something to be done. On the other hand, I'm worried about danger to my professional life if I speak up and don't think anything will change even if I am heard and go through that risk. Talking to the evaluator could be seen by the administrators as me sabotaging the center's funding, but I am mainly concerned about what would happen if people in my home lab learn that I am gay from the report. They don't know about me, but if people hear about someone complaining in the center then it wouldn't be hard to find out who it is since I'm the only gay one in a tiny research center. My advisor is super catholic and Russian and a lot of the people I work with are also pretty religious. I'm only a year away from graduating and am thinking that I should just suck it up and then leave this bad situation when I get my degree. However, I also feel like such a coward for not being able to speak up about this and having to pretend that everything is great when I am literally fantasizing about leaving the field I am in to be around more accepting researchers. **What do you think Reddit? Has anyone dealt with a similar situation and what did you do?**", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I am an older lesbian working in higher education admin. Here's my take:its not you responsibility to tank your life o er this situation. Survival is key. If it were me, I would probably tough it out while building a case to submit to the institution and government agency after I left. I mean daily documentation of dates and times and actors and passive observers of each incident in the notes in my phone that I would transcribe to a document. Then the hot second I either found a better environment or finished and left off it would go to both of those entities. I'd also find out how to get representation through the aclu and or glaad or whomever. Then I'd go on about my damn life and let those folks Duke it out. At that point you have essentially provided a dossier and insulated yourself from repercussion. But again. You are under no obligation to take any action which threatens your safety or well being if it goes against who you are to do so.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Should I Speak up About Homophobia in Research Center? **I am a gay graduate student who's part of an NSF research center in the hard sciences. An external evaluator is polling members about the center's climate to send to the administrators and to the NSF. I've been on the receiving end of homophobia on a number of occasions in the center.** In one instance, another grad student learned about me while we were at a conference and spent the next day following me around and calling me gay slurs when others were out of earshot. They also told people not to trust me and that I don't belong at the conference. At a professional lunch with another lab in the center, the other graduate students made horrible gay jokes throughout the meal. Two of them managed to mockingly imitate a gay couple and a third dropped the f-bomb a few times for good measure. I have more examples that I won't list here, but there's an atmosphere around the center that makes me feel unwelcome and at risk of being treated unfairly. Having to hide myself has probably has affected my mental state and therefor my research. The only other gay student in the center ended up leaving because of this environment. **I've been considering anonymously emailing the person evaluating the research center to let them know about my experiences, but have been struggling with the decision.** I want someone to know and for something to be done. On the other hand, I'm worried about danger to my professional life if I speak up and don't think anything will change even if I am heard and go through that risk. Talking to the evaluator could be seen by the administrators as me sabotaging the center's funding, but I am mainly concerned about what would happen if people in my home lab learn that I am gay from the report. They don't know about me, but if people hear about someone complaining in the center then it wouldn't be hard to find out who it is since I'm the only gay one in a tiny research center. My advisor is super catholic and Russian and a lot of the people I work with are also pretty religious. I'm only a year away from graduating and am thinking that I should just suck it up and then leave this bad situation when I get my degree. However, I also feel like such a coward for not being able to speak up about this and having to pretend that everything is great when I am literally fantasizing about leaving the field I am in to be around more accepting researchers. **What do you think Reddit? Has anyone dealt with a similar situation and what did you do?**", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Your center has a diversity office and/ or a title IX office ( whomever deals with such things in your school). And HR. They are the ones that need to know and can implement change.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Should I Speak up About Homophobia in Research Center? **I am a gay graduate student who's part of an NSF research center in the hard sciences. An external evaluator is polling members about the center's climate to send to the administrators and to the NSF. I've been on the receiving end of homophobia on a number of occasions in the center.** In one instance, another grad student learned about me while we were at a conference and spent the next day following me around and calling me gay slurs when others were out of earshot. They also told people not to trust me and that I don't belong at the conference. At a professional lunch with another lab in the center, the other graduate students made horrible gay jokes throughout the meal. Two of them managed to mockingly imitate a gay couple and a third dropped the f-bomb a few times for good measure. I have more examples that I won't list here, but there's an atmosphere around the center that makes me feel unwelcome and at risk of being treated unfairly. Having to hide myself has probably has affected my mental state and therefor my research. The only other gay student in the center ended up leaving because of this environment. **I've been considering anonymously emailing the person evaluating the research center to let them know about my experiences, but have been struggling with the decision.** I want someone to know and for something to be done. On the other hand, I'm worried about danger to my professional life if I speak up and don't think anything will change even if I am heard and go through that risk. Talking to the evaluator could be seen by the administrators as me sabotaging the center's funding, but I am mainly concerned about what would happen if people in my home lab learn that I am gay from the report. They don't know about me, but if people hear about someone complaining in the center then it wouldn't be hard to find out who it is since I'm the only gay one in a tiny research center. My advisor is super catholic and Russian and a lot of the people I work with are also pretty religious. I'm only a year away from graduating and am thinking that I should just suck it up and then leave this bad situation when I get my degree. However, I also feel like such a coward for not being able to speak up about this and having to pretend that everything is great when I am literally fantasizing about leaving the field I am in to be around more accepting researchers. **What do you think Reddit? Has anyone dealt with a similar situation and what did you do?**", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I am an older lesbian working in higher education admin. Here's my take:its not you responsibility to tank your life o er this situation. Survival is key. If it were me, I would probably tough it out while building a case to submit to the institution and government agency after I left. I mean daily documentation of dates and times and actors and passive observers of each incident in the notes in my phone that I would transcribe to a document. Then the hot second I either found a better environment or finished and left off it would go to both of those entities. I'd also find out how to get representation through the aclu and or glaad or whomever. Then I'd go on about my damn life and let those folks Duke it out. At that point you have essentially provided a dossier and insulated yourself from repercussion. But again. You are under no obligation to take any action which threatens your safety or well being if it goes against who you are to do so.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Trying to change toxicity in Academia Hello all. Myself and a group of faculty and students are trying to get together a group of signatures from faculty, postdocs and trainees in multiple institutions in the USA. Our goal is to ask NIH to make public the names of PIs that have been found guilty and fired (or asked to retire) after being found guilty of harassment (sexual or not). There are too many stories where PIs move from institutions, repeating the toxic behaviors and maintaining their reputation and ability to keep NIH dollars. It's time the NIH takes a bold approach at stoping toxic environmemts. If you want to be part of this movement, please send me a private message. We plan to make calls for media attention, get in contact with NIH leadership (we have already started this), make a web page and use social media. We need as many signatures as possible to make our voices heard. We look forward to hear from you!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "If they already got fired or forced to retire, then they won’t be making the environment toxic. Am I missing the point? I’m not pro harassment, of course. I just don’t know if this will achieve anything. If any of these cases went to court, you can access the court files and publish the names if you want to. However, if the person was accused but the case never went to court, there are no records and for all practical purposes, the harassment didn’t happen or it’s hearsay.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Trying to change toxicity in Academia Hello all. Myself and a group of faculty and students are trying to get together a group of signatures from faculty, postdocs and trainees in multiple institutions in the USA. Our goal is to ask NIH to make public the names of PIs that have been found guilty and fired (or asked to retire) after being found guilty of harassment (sexual or not). There are too many stories where PIs move from institutions, repeating the toxic behaviors and maintaining their reputation and ability to keep NIH dollars. It's time the NIH takes a bold approach at stoping toxic environmemts. If you want to be part of this movement, please send me a private message. We plan to make calls for media attention, get in contact with NIH leadership (we have already started this), make a web page and use social media. We need as many signatures as possible to make our voices heard. We look forward to hear from you!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "This is a terrible idea. The NIH will not defame PIs who have never been convicted of anything in a court of law. You may as well ask them to make public the names of students who have been found guilty of academic honesty or conduct violations so that PIs know to avoid them.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Trying to change toxicity in Academia Hello all. Myself and a group of faculty and students are trying to get together a group of signatures from faculty, postdocs and trainees in multiple institutions in the USA. Our goal is to ask NIH to make public the names of PIs that have been found guilty and fired (or asked to retire) after being found guilty of harassment (sexual or not). There are too many stories where PIs move from institutions, repeating the toxic behaviors and maintaining their reputation and ability to keep NIH dollars. It's time the NIH takes a bold approach at stoping toxic environmemts. If you want to be part of this movement, please send me a private message. We plan to make calls for media attention, get in contact with NIH leadership (we have already started this), make a web page and use social media. We need as many signatures as possible to make our voices heard. We look forward to hear from you!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "If they already got fired or forced to retire, then they won’t be making the environment toxic. Am I missing the point? I’m not pro harassment, of course. I just don’t know if this will achieve anything. If any of these cases went to court, you can access the court files and publish the names if you want to. However, if the person was accused but the case never went to court, there are no records and for all practical purposes, the harassment didn’t happen or it’s hearsay.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Trying to change toxicity in Academia Hello all. Myself and a group of faculty and students are trying to get together a group of signatures from faculty, postdocs and trainees in multiple institutions in the USA. Our goal is to ask NIH to make public the names of PIs that have been found guilty and fired (or asked to retire) after being found guilty of harassment (sexual or not). There are too many stories where PIs move from institutions, repeating the toxic behaviors and maintaining their reputation and ability to keep NIH dollars. It's time the NIH takes a bold approach at stoping toxic environmemts. If you want to be part of this movement, please send me a private message. We plan to make calls for media attention, get in contact with NIH leadership (we have already started this), make a web page and use social media. We need as many signatures as possible to make our voices heard. We look forward to hear from you!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "how would the NIH know this? the government isn't all seeing and all knowing. these things happen behind closed doors at the unviversity", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Trying to change toxicity in Academia Hello all. Myself and a group of faculty and students are trying to get together a group of signatures from faculty, postdocs and trainees in multiple institutions in the USA. Our goal is to ask NIH to make public the names of PIs that have been found guilty and fired (or asked to retire) after being found guilty of harassment (sexual or not). There are too many stories where PIs move from institutions, repeating the toxic behaviors and maintaining their reputation and ability to keep NIH dollars. It's time the NIH takes a bold approach at stoping toxic environmemts. If you want to be part of this movement, please send me a private message. We plan to make calls for media attention, get in contact with NIH leadership (we have already started this), make a web page and use social media. We need as many signatures as possible to make our voices heard. We look forward to hear from you!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "If they already got fired or forced to retire, then they won’t be making the environment toxic. Am I missing the point? I’m not pro harassment, of course. I just don’t know if this will achieve anything. If any of these cases went to court, you can access the court files and publish the names if you want to. However, if the person was accused but the case never went to court, there are no records and for all practical purposes, the harassment didn’t happen or it’s hearsay.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Trying to change toxicity in Academia Hello all. Myself and a group of faculty and students are trying to get together a group of signatures from faculty, postdocs and trainees in multiple institutions in the USA. Our goal is to ask NIH to make public the names of PIs that have been found guilty and fired (or asked to retire) after being found guilty of harassment (sexual or not). There are too many stories where PIs move from institutions, repeating the toxic behaviors and maintaining their reputation and ability to keep NIH dollars. It's time the NIH takes a bold approach at stoping toxic environmemts. If you want to be part of this movement, please send me a private message. We plan to make calls for media attention, get in contact with NIH leadership (we have already started this), make a web page and use social media. We need as many signatures as possible to make our voices heard. We look forward to hear from you!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "No thanks. Keeping lists of harassers (accused or otherwise) unless they’ve actually been found guilty in a court of law is a really bad idea. Something like this could easily be abused by trainees that think they were treated unfairly from their perspective but just maybe didn’t gel with a PI who is highly motivated and a bit pushy. If a PI is victimizing people, let the institution and authorities deal with it rather than keeping a list like some vigilante.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Trying to change toxicity in Academia Hello all. Myself and a group of faculty and students are trying to get together a group of signatures from faculty, postdocs and trainees in multiple institutions in the USA. Our goal is to ask NIH to make public the names of PIs that have been found guilty and fired (or asked to retire) after being found guilty of harassment (sexual or not). There are too many stories where PIs move from institutions, repeating the toxic behaviors and maintaining their reputation and ability to keep NIH dollars. It's time the NIH takes a bold approach at stoping toxic environmemts. If you want to be part of this movement, please send me a private message. We plan to make calls for media attention, get in contact with NIH leadership (we have already started this), make a web page and use social media. We need as many signatures as possible to make our voices heard. We look forward to hear from you!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Just sharing this since it is relevant to the post: https://academic-sexual-misconduct-database.org/incidents", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Trying to change toxicity in Academia Hello all. Myself and a group of faculty and students are trying to get together a group of signatures from faculty, postdocs and trainees in multiple institutions in the USA. Our goal is to ask NIH to make public the names of PIs that have been found guilty and fired (or asked to retire) after being found guilty of harassment (sexual or not). There are too many stories where PIs move from institutions, repeating the toxic behaviors and maintaining their reputation and ability to keep NIH dollars. It's time the NIH takes a bold approach at stoping toxic environmemts. If you want to be part of this movement, please send me a private message. We plan to make calls for media attention, get in contact with NIH leadership (we have already started this), make a web page and use social media. We need as many signatures as possible to make our voices heard. We look forward to hear from you!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "uh why/how would the NIH even know this?", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Trying to change toxicity in Academia Hello all. Myself and a group of faculty and students are trying to get together a group of signatures from faculty, postdocs and trainees in multiple institutions in the USA. Our goal is to ask NIH to make public the names of PIs that have been found guilty and fired (or asked to retire) after being found guilty of harassment (sexual or not). There are too many stories where PIs move from institutions, repeating the toxic behaviors and maintaining their reputation and ability to keep NIH dollars. It's time the NIH takes a bold approach at stoping toxic environmemts. If you want to be part of this movement, please send me a private message. We plan to make calls for media attention, get in contact with NIH leadership (we have already started this), make a web page and use social media. We need as many signatures as possible to make our voices heard. We look forward to hear from you!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I’d use a different word than toxic since that can mean things as small as being rude to coworkers or more broadly a competitive, up or out atmosphere, you are clearly interested in different stuff. That said, I don’t know if moving to a trial by the court of public opinion is a great idea long term.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Trying to change toxicity in Academia Hello all. Myself and a group of faculty and students are trying to get together a group of signatures from faculty, postdocs and trainees in multiple institutions in the USA. Our goal is to ask NIH to make public the names of PIs that have been found guilty and fired (or asked to retire) after being found guilty of harassment (sexual or not). There are too many stories where PIs move from institutions, repeating the toxic behaviors and maintaining their reputation and ability to keep NIH dollars. It's time the NIH takes a bold approach at stoping toxic environmemts. If you want to be part of this movement, please send me a private message. We plan to make calls for media attention, get in contact with NIH leadership (we have already started this), make a web page and use social media. We need as many signatures as possible to make our voices heard. We look forward to hear from you!", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Even if this would work, it wouldn't tackle the problem because OP assumes only PIs are toxic. Moreover, it assumes universities care about toxicity versus, for example, grant funding., This is like making drug dealers' names public. Sure, they might be part of the problem but doing that doesn't solve the problem as long as there is a need for them.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Accessing Elsevier papers First of all: F**k you Elsevier, for making contributions and most importantly access to science damn expensive, especially for the students (such as me) that really need these papers. This leads me directly to my question: Unfortunately in my field a lot of relevant papers are constantly published in Elsevier Journals, which I can’t access through my university, Sci-Hub also doesn’t help with these in a lot of cases. Any further ideas? I do not endorse piracy, but it drives me nuts if I can’t access the relevant papers in my niche research field close to the end of my PhD. Especially for my theoretical part I would need this access.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "1) Email the authors directly or via social media 2) Request through research gate 3) Embrace the pirate life", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Accessing Elsevier papers First of all: F**k you Elsevier, for making contributions and most importantly access to science damn expensive, especially for the students (such as me) that really need these papers. This leads me directly to my question: Unfortunately in my field a lot of relevant papers are constantly published in Elsevier Journals, which I can’t access through my university, Sci-Hub also doesn’t help with these in a lot of cases. Any further ideas? I do not endorse piracy, but it drives me nuts if I can’t access the relevant papers in my niche research field close to the end of my PhD. Especially for my theoretical part I would need this access.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "If you have time, just email the researcher. I've done this a handful of times and it gives me an excuse to establish a new professional connection. Researchers are always delighted to share their papers for free; the only entity who benefits from these paywalls is Elsevier.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Accessing Elsevier papers First of all: F**k you Elsevier, for making contributions and most importantly access to science damn expensive, especially for the students (such as me) that really need these papers. This leads me directly to my question: Unfortunately in my field a lot of relevant papers are constantly published in Elsevier Journals, which I can’t access through my university, Sci-Hub also doesn’t help with these in a lot of cases. Any further ideas? I do not endorse piracy, but it drives me nuts if I can’t access the relevant papers in my niche research field close to the end of my PhD. Especially for my theoretical part I would need this access.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I'm surprised. sci-hub just works for me when I can't be bothered to go on my uni's VPN. All Elsevier journals should be working. The other option is the #icanhazpdf hashtag on twitter. Tweet the journal article and an email address with the hashtag and someone should be able to provide the pdf.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Accessing Elsevier papers First of all: F**k you Elsevier, for making contributions and most importantly access to science damn expensive, especially for the students (such as me) that really need these papers. This leads me directly to my question: Unfortunately in my field a lot of relevant papers are constantly published in Elsevier Journals, which I can’t access through my university, Sci-Hub also doesn’t help with these in a lot of cases. Any further ideas? I do not endorse piracy, but it drives me nuts if I can’t access the relevant papers in my niche research field close to the end of my PhD. Especially for my theoretical part I would need this access.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "If you need to download paywalled articles and resources and don’t have institutional access, here are some tips to jump the paywall: 1- Check the authors’ personal website(s). In many cases you’ll find version of the article you need archived there. If not, you’ll find their email addresses, which you’ll need for option #2. 2- Ask the author: If you email the author and ask nicely, they’ll most likely email you back a copy. 3- Check the “All versions” link in Google Scholar search results: (https://scholar.google.com/). Run a Google Scholar query then click on “All…versions” found under each of the search results. Sometimes you can find free/open mirrors for paywalled articles within these expanded search results. 4- Crowd-source access to the article: Several options here, but the most well-known are the#ICanHazPDF hashtag on twitter (https://twitter.com/hashtag/icanhazpdf), for which you obviously need to be on Twitter, or the /r/Scholar subreddit on Reddit (https://www.reddit.com/r/scholar). In either option, you post a request with the relevant URL or DOI and see if someone can access and upload it for you. 5- Sci-Hub: http://sci-hub.cc/ is essentially the academic equivalent of the Pirate Bay. (be advised that it is blocked in many countries, but you can always find an online mirror). Up-to-date information on Sci-Hub’s status are found on the /r/Scholar subreddit. Sci-hub also has a Tor address scihub22266oqcxt.onion 6- Library Genesis: Similar to Sci-hub, but is an actual massive repository of articles as opposed to a scanner for open proxies like Sci-Hub. Also like Sci-Hub, has several mirrors. At the time of this writing this mirror is online http://gen.lib.rus.ec/", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Accessing Elsevier papers First of all: F**k you Elsevier, for making contributions and most importantly access to science damn expensive, especially for the students (such as me) that really need these papers. This leads me directly to my question: Unfortunately in my field a lot of relevant papers are constantly published in Elsevier Journals, which I can’t access through my university, Sci-Hub also doesn’t help with these in a lot of cases. Any further ideas? I do not endorse piracy, but it drives me nuts if I can’t access the relevant papers in my niche research field close to the end of my PhD. Especially for my theoretical part I would need this access.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "you got two options: contact the researcher and ask for a copy. Or ask for a loan through your library from another Univ.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Accessing Elsevier papers First of all: F**k you Elsevier, for making contributions and most importantly access to science damn expensive, especially for the students (such as me) that really need these papers. This leads me directly to my question: Unfortunately in my field a lot of relevant papers are constantly published in Elsevier Journals, which I can’t access through my university, Sci-Hub also doesn’t help with these in a lot of cases. Any further ideas? I do not endorse piracy, but it drives me nuts if I can’t access the relevant papers in my niche research field close to the end of my PhD. Especially for my theoretical part I would need this access.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "If you need to download paywalled articles and resources and don’t have institutional access, here are some tips to jump the paywall: 1- Check the authors’ personal website(s). In many cases you’ll find version of the article you need archived there. If not, you’ll find their email addresses, which you’ll need for option #2. 2- Ask the author: If you email the author and ask nicely, they’ll most likely email you back a copy. 3- Check the “All versions” link in Google Scholar search results: (https://scholar.google.com/). Run a Google Scholar query then click on “All…versions” found under each of the search results. Sometimes you can find free/open mirrors for paywalled articles within these expanded search results. 4- Crowd-source access to the article: Several options here, but the most well-known are the#ICanHazPDF hashtag on twitter (https://twitter.com/hashtag/icanhazpdf), for which you obviously need to be on Twitter, or the /r/Scholar subreddit on Reddit (https://www.reddit.com/r/scholar). In either option, you post a request with the relevant URL or DOI and see if someone can access and upload it for you. 5- Sci-Hub: http://sci-hub.cc/ is essentially the academic equivalent of the Pirate Bay. (be advised that it is blocked in many countries, but you can always find an online mirror). Up-to-date information on Sci-Hub’s status are found on the /r/Scholar subreddit. Sci-hub also has a Tor address scihub22266oqcxt.onion 6- Library Genesis: Similar to Sci-hub, but is an actual massive repository of articles as opposed to a scanner for open proxies like Sci-Hub. Also like Sci-Hub, has several mirrors. At the time of this writing this mirror is online http://gen.lib.rus.ec/", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Accessing Elsevier papers First of all: F**k you Elsevier, for making contributions and most importantly access to science damn expensive, especially for the students (such as me) that really need these papers. This leads me directly to my question: Unfortunately in my field a lot of relevant papers are constantly published in Elsevier Journals, which I can’t access through my university, Sci-Hub also doesn’t help with these in a lot of cases. Any further ideas? I do not endorse piracy, but it drives me nuts if I can’t access the relevant papers in my niche research field close to the end of my PhD. Especially for my theoretical part I would need this access.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "r/Scholar is an excellent place to ask folks to send you papers that you need. They are pretty quick to respond to requests.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Accessing Elsevier papers First of all: F**k you Elsevier, for making contributions and most importantly access to science damn expensive, especially for the students (such as me) that really need these papers. This leads me directly to my question: Unfortunately in my field a lot of relevant papers are constantly published in Elsevier Journals, which I can’t access through my university, Sci-Hub also doesn’t help with these in a lot of cases. Any further ideas? I do not endorse piracy, but it drives me nuts if I can’t access the relevant papers in my niche research field close to the end of my PhD. Especially for my theoretical part I would need this access.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "If you need to download paywalled articles and resources and don’t have institutional access, here are some tips to jump the paywall: 1- Check the authors’ personal website(s). In many cases you’ll find version of the article you need archived there. If not, you’ll find their email addresses, which you’ll need for option #2. 2- Ask the author: If you email the author and ask nicely, they’ll most likely email you back a copy. 3- Check the “All versions” link in Google Scholar search results: (https://scholar.google.com/). Run a Google Scholar query then click on “All…versions” found under each of the search results. Sometimes you can find free/open mirrors for paywalled articles within these expanded search results. 4- Crowd-source access to the article: Several options here, but the most well-known are the#ICanHazPDF hashtag on twitter (https://twitter.com/hashtag/icanhazpdf), for which you obviously need to be on Twitter, or the /r/Scholar subreddit on Reddit (https://www.reddit.com/r/scholar). In either option, you post a request with the relevant URL or DOI and see if someone can access and upload it for you. 5- Sci-Hub: http://sci-hub.cc/ is essentially the academic equivalent of the Pirate Bay. (be advised that it is blocked in many countries, but you can always find an online mirror). Up-to-date information on Sci-Hub’s status are found on the /r/Scholar subreddit. Sci-hub also has a Tor address scihub22266oqcxt.onion 6- Library Genesis: Similar to Sci-hub, but is an actual massive repository of articles as opposed to a scanner for open proxies like Sci-Hub. Also like Sci-Hub, has several mirrors. At the time of this writing this mirror is online http://gen.lib.rus.ec/", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Accessing Elsevier papers First of all: F**k you Elsevier, for making contributions and most importantly access to science damn expensive, especially for the students (such as me) that really need these papers. This leads me directly to my question: Unfortunately in my field a lot of relevant papers are constantly published in Elsevier Journals, which I can’t access through my university, Sci-Hub also doesn’t help with these in a lot of cases. Any further ideas? I do not endorse piracy, but it drives me nuts if I can’t access the relevant papers in my niche research field close to the end of my PhD. Especially for my theoretical part I would need this access.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I totally agree with what was previously mentioned: asking the authors or the institute directly. You can also lookup on ResearchGate. A lot of scientist have freely accessible copies of their papers there. booksc.xyz is also sometimes helpful when sci-hub or libgen do not have what you are looking for", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Accessing Elsevier papers First of all: F**k you Elsevier, for making contributions and most importantly access to science damn expensive, especially for the students (such as me) that really need these papers. This leads me directly to my question: Unfortunately in my field a lot of relevant papers are constantly published in Elsevier Journals, which I can’t access through my university, Sci-Hub also doesn’t help with these in a lot of cases. Any further ideas? I do not endorse piracy, but it drives me nuts if I can’t access the relevant papers in my niche research field close to the end of my PhD. Especially for my theoretical part I would need this access.", "role": "user" }, { "content": "If you need to download paywalled articles and resources and don’t have institutional access, here are some tips to jump the paywall: 1- Check the authors’ personal website(s). In many cases you’ll find version of the article you need archived there. If not, you’ll find their email addresses, which you’ll need for option #2. 2- Ask the author: If you email the author and ask nicely, they’ll most likely email you back a copy. 3- Check the “All versions” link in Google Scholar search results: (https://scholar.google.com/). Run a Google Scholar query then click on “All…versions” found under each of the search results. Sometimes you can find free/open mirrors for paywalled articles within these expanded search results. 4- Crowd-source access to the article: Several options here, but the most well-known are the#ICanHazPDF hashtag on twitter (https://twitter.com/hashtag/icanhazpdf), for which you obviously need to be on Twitter, or the /r/Scholar subreddit on Reddit (https://www.reddit.com/r/scholar). In either option, you post a request with the relevant URL or DOI and see if someone can access and upload it for you. 5- Sci-Hub: http://sci-hub.cc/ is essentially the academic equivalent of the Pirate Bay. (be advised that it is blocked in many countries, but you can always find an online mirror). Up-to-date information on Sci-Hub’s status are found on the /r/Scholar subreddit. Sci-hub also has a Tor address scihub22266oqcxt.onion 6- Library Genesis: Similar to Sci-hub, but is an actual massive repository of articles as opposed to a scanner for open proxies like Sci-Hub. Also like Sci-Hub, has several mirrors. At the time of this writing this mirror is online http://gen.lib.rus.ec/", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you find that many people in academia have \"tunnel vision\" where they are excessively preoccupied with their field of study and that critical thinking doesn't transfer to other domains? It would appear at first glance that the skills of reading a technical paper and logically critiquing it would generalize to thinking rationally in other areas of life as well. However, I've increasingly seen that many professors are often able to be brilliant in their own field, while having silly opinions in real life, apparently without experiencing much cognitive dissonance (of course, this is a generalization...). The kinds of arguments that they advance for their opinions in real life would get them laughed out of the park if they were applied to their own field of scientific inquiry. I have a strong suspicion that academia self-selects for those people who are highly intelligent but have \"tunnel vision\" in the sense of having singular interests (or very narrow interests) and are rather conformist in their beliefs otherwise. Is it just me? What has been your experience? Have you felt the same way? (For my background: I'm a STEM masters student, and this came up quite often in a group consisting of masters and PhD students.)", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Judging from: * my one colleague insisting that artificial sweeteners \"give you cancer\" * my colleagues that ignore decades of evidence-based educational knowledge in the design of their courses * my colleagues utterly incapable of seeing the relative merits of methodological approaches from other domains I'd say... yeah.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you find that many people in academia have \"tunnel vision\" where they are excessively preoccupied with their field of study and that critical thinking doesn't transfer to other domains? It would appear at first glance that the skills of reading a technical paper and logically critiquing it would generalize to thinking rationally in other areas of life as well. However, I've increasingly seen that many professors are often able to be brilliant in their own field, while having silly opinions in real life, apparently without experiencing much cognitive dissonance (of course, this is a generalization...). The kinds of arguments that they advance for their opinions in real life would get them laughed out of the park if they were applied to their own field of scientific inquiry. I have a strong suspicion that academia self-selects for those people who are highly intelligent but have \"tunnel vision\" in the sense of having singular interests (or very narrow interests) and are rather conformist in their beliefs otherwise. Is it just me? What has been your experience? Have you felt the same way? (For my background: I'm a STEM masters student, and this came up quite often in a group consisting of masters and PhD students.)", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Relevant comic.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you find that many people in academia have \"tunnel vision\" where they are excessively preoccupied with their field of study and that critical thinking doesn't transfer to other domains? It would appear at first glance that the skills of reading a technical paper and logically critiquing it would generalize to thinking rationally in other areas of life as well. However, I've increasingly seen that many professors are often able to be brilliant in their own field, while having silly opinions in real life, apparently without experiencing much cognitive dissonance (of course, this is a generalization...). The kinds of arguments that they advance for their opinions in real life would get them laughed out of the park if they were applied to their own field of scientific inquiry. I have a strong suspicion that academia self-selects for those people who are highly intelligent but have \"tunnel vision\" in the sense of having singular interests (or very narrow interests) and are rather conformist in their beliefs otherwise. Is it just me? What has been your experience? Have you felt the same way? (For my background: I'm a STEM masters student, and this came up quite often in a group consisting of masters and PhD students.)", "role": "user" }, { "content": "\"\\[T\\]he typical citizen drops down to a lower level of mental performance as soon as he enters the political field. He argues and analyzes in a way which he would readily recognize as infantile within the sphere of his real interests. He becomes a primitive again.\" \\- Joseph Schumpeter, *Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy* (1942)", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you find that many people in academia have \"tunnel vision\" where they are excessively preoccupied with their field of study and that critical thinking doesn't transfer to other domains? It would appear at first glance that the skills of reading a technical paper and logically critiquing it would generalize to thinking rationally in other areas of life as well. However, I've increasingly seen that many professors are often able to be brilliant in their own field, while having silly opinions in real life, apparently without experiencing much cognitive dissonance (of course, this is a generalization...). The kinds of arguments that they advance for their opinions in real life would get them laughed out of the park if they were applied to their own field of scientific inquiry. I have a strong suspicion that academia self-selects for those people who are highly intelligent but have \"tunnel vision\" in the sense of having singular interests (or very narrow interests) and are rather conformist in their beliefs otherwise. Is it just me? What has been your experience? Have you felt the same way? (For my background: I'm a STEM masters student, and this came up quite often in a group consisting of masters and PhD students.)", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Relevant comic.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you find that many people in academia have \"tunnel vision\" where they are excessively preoccupied with their field of study and that critical thinking doesn't transfer to other domains? It would appear at first glance that the skills of reading a technical paper and logically critiquing it would generalize to thinking rationally in other areas of life as well. However, I've increasingly seen that many professors are often able to be brilliant in their own field, while having silly opinions in real life, apparently without experiencing much cognitive dissonance (of course, this is a generalization...). The kinds of arguments that they advance for their opinions in real life would get them laughed out of the park if they were applied to their own field of scientific inquiry. I have a strong suspicion that academia self-selects for those people who are highly intelligent but have \"tunnel vision\" in the sense of having singular interests (or very narrow interests) and are rather conformist in their beliefs otherwise. Is it just me? What has been your experience? Have you felt the same way? (For my background: I'm a STEM masters student, and this came up quite often in a group consisting of masters and PhD students.)", "role": "user" }, { "content": "I've noticed this quite often. I admit that I am this way too. For me, I try to have hobbies and do activities unrelated to my field of study. For instance, I study earth sciences, but I've been reading some Greek mythology and philosophy lately. I think that opens the mind up to different ways of thinking. But yes, over the years, I've experienced some people, from postdocs to professors, who spend their whole life doing one thing - their work - and don't really have any life outside of that, and it's difficult to carry on conversations with them about anything other than work. Some just don't want to talk about anything other than work, even when we're having beer in the evening after a conference, they still talk about nothing but their research.", "role": "assistant" } ]

[ { "content": "Do you find that many people in academia have \"tunnel vision\" where they are excessively preoccupied with their field of study and that critical thinking doesn't transfer to other domains? It would appear at first glance that the skills of reading a technical paper and logically critiquing it would generalize to thinking rationally in other areas of life as well. However, I've increasingly seen that many professors are often able to be brilliant in their own field, while having silly opinions in real life, apparently without experiencing much cognitive dissonance (of course, this is a generalization...). The kinds of arguments that they advance for their opinions in real life would get them laughed out of the park if they were applied to their own field of scientific inquiry. I have a strong suspicion that academia self-selects for those people who are highly intelligent but have \"tunnel vision\" in the sense of having singular interests (or very narrow interests) and are rather conformist in their beliefs otherwise. Is it just me? What has been your experience? Have you felt the same way? (For my background: I'm a STEM masters student, and this came up quite often in a group consisting of masters and PhD students.)", "role": "user" }, { "content": "Relevant comic.", "role": "assistant" } ]