As a newly minted Associate Professor, I sort of feel like I ought to say something about the recent tenure discussions. These were kicked off by Rob Knop's recent despairing post (though it should be noted that Rob's been worried about this for a while), and most of the discussion has taken place at Cosmic Variance, with the discussion expanding into comments about academia in general, via Sean's illustrative example.
Really, though, my chief reaction to most of this has been "Thank God we didn't have academic blogs back when I was an undergraduate."
As Mark Trodden notes, the discussion has tended toward the soul-crushing. The tenure system is fundamentally broken, academia is a pyramid scheme, nobody should ever think about pursuing an academic career, etc. It's no surprise that one student reading the discussion is quoted in Mark's post as having second thoughts about the whole thing.
Had I seen this litany of woe as an undergraduate, I don't quite know what I would've done. I was a B/ B+ student in college-- at one of the most elite liberal arts colleges in the country, mind, and my overall GPA owed a lot to my misspent sophomore year, but I wasn't a superstar by any stretch. I got rejected by most of the graduate schools I applied to, in fact, and I didn't even apply to the Harvard/ MIT/ Caltech tier of schools.
And yet, my plan heading into grad school was, well, to end up where I am, as a faculty member at a liberal arts college. Given the discussion at Cosmic Variance, you would have to think this was an act of utter madness, but I didn't have anybody telling me about the odds.
Which is not to say that I got bad advice. My undergraduate advisor gave me extremely sensible advice about the grad school application and decision process, and was very clear that the only reason to go to graduate school was in order to pursue a career in research-- which, it should be noted, is not identically equal to academia. A Ph.D. is the key credential to do research in academia or in industry, and while the job market wasn't good at the time (1993), the options for a Ph.D. were a lot better than those for a BA, so I went to graduate school.
I've been extremely fortunate in my career. I got into a great research group as a graduate student, and I got an excellent post-doc after that. When I got hired at Union, I was able to get an external grant to fund my initial proposal, and I lucked into an idea that led to getting an NSF grant. I have a fairly high opinion of my own abilities, of course-- I wouldn't blog if I didn't-- but at the same time, I'm aware that I've had good fortune along the way.
But at the same time, I think the picture painted by a lot of blogs and blog comments is much too bleak. Yes, everybody knows stories of incredibly brilliant students who go off to graduate school and get crushed by the system. At the same time, though, there are middle-of-the-pack students who go off to graduate school, and one way or another manage to make a good career for themselves. And, as Rob notes in comments, it's a good life, when it works out.
My point, then, is that if you're a student in the sciences thinking about graduate school, don't give too much weight to the negative things that you hear. You should absolutely be aware that the odds of getting a tenured professorship at a top-tier research university aren't good, and it would be folly to count on ending up in one of those places. But there are plenty of good career options outside the very top rank of institutions (look at, well, most of the physcis bloggers out there-- I can only think of a handful who are at Top Ten research universities, and one of those is barking mad), and you can make a good life for yourself by going into academia with your eyes open.
Grad school is not a path to fame and fortune, but it's also not a sure path to having your soul destroyed by the academic system. If you really love doing science, it can be a great experience, provided you go in with your eyes open, and keep a realistic view of what your options are.
- Log in to post comments
Thanks for posting this. Rob's post was one of many academic horror stories that have caused me (as an undergrad) to be wary about an academic career. It's good to hear the other side of the story before I go way off the deep end.
I must also give a word of thanks for this article. I think my adviser was trying to say something to this affect. Had I only thought his view, though: I would end up walking the road blind.
Thank you
PS- Give this link to all your undergrad students, if you do not do so already!
You know, it's odd, but I get the same sort of horror stories and gloomy outlook from the industrial end of things. When I write about the job situation for chemists (which comes up once in a while, since I was laid off in January), plenty of comments always come up in the "Don't get a PhD, don't expect to get a job" vein.
I think that there's a tendency for people to go overboard with the doom and gloom. For the people who are really in a bad situation, it can be emotionally compelling to write about it, and it's certainly exciting (often in a bad way) to read about. But compelling and exciting don't always mean "true".
But compelling and exciting don't always mean "true".
Dude, my situation is quite true.
Just because it's rosy for Chad and lots of other people who've made it to the other side of the tenure decision doesn't mean that there are those of us getting ground underneath the system at the moment.
The worst part of it for me is the large quantity of positive feedback I've received. Given that Vanderbilt has indicated that I lose my job if I can't get the NSF golden ring, all that positive feedback is empty and meaningless.
I'm not exaggerating anything here. I'm talking about my own, real, true situation. Convince yourself that I'm making it all up if that will help you build your fairy tale, but it's true. I'm not lying.
Chad is right-- there's a lot of good things about all of this. A lot of people thrive.
I am not one of those, alas.
-Rob
It is good to know people do make it to the other side. We do need people coming into the sciences (not to mention work on diversifying in various fields). Undergraduate advisors/mentors should encourage students with talent to think about graduate school but should also talk with said students about the challenges that are out there, letting them know there is luck involved. That though is being a good advisor. An advisor should really think what he/she says to a student before speaking to put aside his/her biases when need be. Students with potential should also be made to feel that it is ok if they don't choose graduate school and not made to feel they are "wasting" their talents by not going.
Derek #3; perhaps you mean, rather, to say that '...compelling and exciting don't always mean "representative"'?
Oh, this kind of thing is "true" alright. I myself have been screwed (imo) out of tenure twice; once (like Knop) for insufficient fundraising and once for...I still don't really know why. It really, really sucks. I was lucky to get a full-time teaching gig at a crappy community college, but I still want to be a scientist when I grow up...
But compelling and exciting don't always mean "true".
Dude, my situation is quite true.
Just because it's rosy for Chad and lots of other people who've made it to the other side of the tenure decision doesn't mean that there are those of us getting ground underneath the system at the moment.
The worst part of it for me is the large quantity of positive feedback I've received. Given that Vanderbilt has indicated that I lose my job if I can't get the NSF golden ring, all that positive feedback is empty and meaningless.
I'm not exaggerating anything here. I'm talking about my own, real, true situation. Convince yourself that I'm making it all up if that will help you build your fairy tale, but it's true. I'm not lying.
Chad is right-- there's a lot of good things about all of this. A lot of people thrive.
I am not one of those, alas.
-Rob
oops -- sorry about that. Double posted 'cause of server errors. Chad, can you delete?
Some of us weren't ignorant of this even in the pre-blog days, but it was quite a revelation coming from high school where academia is still the be-all and end-all.
That's why I got a Ph.D. way back in the dark ages when one had to have two foreign languages (mine were German and Fortran), written prelims in half a dozen areas outside one's major concentration, and so on. And I've worked in industry (10 years ending as a systems scientist in an aerospace & defense research center), academia (20 years ending as a tenured full professor at a private liberal arts college not unlike Union), and again in a different industry (16 years running my own small company, at first for zero pay).
If one sets as a goal one specific kind of job, one specific career track -- say a tenure track position at a research university, or, quite different, at a teaching liberal arts college -- then it's a real chancy process. There are rocks and shoals in any of those streams, and one is almost certain to run aground along the way. But there are other streams.
It used to amaze me to get a freshman advisee who knew precisely what he or she wanted to do with the rest of life. That suggested to me that the student had closed off all other potential options, all other possible tracks, in favor of a track decided upon in ignorance of all the alternatives at age 17 or 18! That's scary. Hell, I did one of my undergraduate majors in a discipline I'd barely heard of before my sophomore year.
Yesterday I listened to a podcast of an interview with Randy Olson, maker of "A Flock of Dodos". He switched from tenured prof to film-making (going back to school in the latter) at age 38. I switched careers (resigning a tenured full professorship to start my own company) at age 50. You kids have so damned many opportunities that it's amazing to me that one would think that one is locked into a single path, somehow believing that the rest of the world doesn't exist.
I think you make some good points, and that realistic expectations are key. When I started grad school at a solid but not top-tier physics program (William and Mary) my prospective PhD advisor told me that numerically speaking... there are around as many working tenured research positions in theoretical particle physics as their are players in the NBA. When I told him that what I really wanted to do was teach, and that a small SLAC (or even a nice private high school) would be a fine place to wind up, and that I just wanted to do my PhD in high energy stuff because it was what I find interesting, he said Ok and agreed to be my advisor.
I can't imagine what life would be like if I felt I HAD TO BE some kind of NSF funded research superstar. Reading Rob's article makes me ill... and really happy that I can keep long term employment where I am as long as I get something in "The Physics Teacher" every now and then, and present at AAPT every couple of years.
Heh. When I was a sophomore, my first meeting with my advisor didn't go so well in part because while I was absolutely certain I wanted to "do physics" for the rest of my life, I didn't know details past that. I was lectured on how if I didn't have goals, then I would never be able to achieve them. As it turned out, this professor was an ass, and I wound up switching advisors after less than a year.
Thank you for this. I think a lot of people disparage the academic route because they figure anyone who could be convinced away from academia by such remarks shouldn't go that route anyway (i.e., you should only go into academia if you love science, and want to do it come what may). Although this might be true, the result is that those who do choose to go the graduate school route can't sleep at night for fear that we're destroying our lives. It's quite comforting to hear a success story like yours (especially for me, an undergraduate much like the one you've described). Thank you.
Congratulations on receiving tenure, I was hoping they would give it to you.
I don't regret going to grad school even though I didn't end up doing research as a career. I'm probably monetarily poorer for it, and it was isolating and unnerving at times. But I learned many things that I would have regretted not knowing, and did and encountered things that have enriched my life ever since.
Since then, I think my refusal to have any grand lifelong career goals has helped keep me flexible and employed doing interesting things. (Thinking about my work makes me happy and thinking about my career makes me unhappy, so I try to do more of the former, and it always seems to work out pretty well for my career anyway.)
Of course now I have a family and a mortgage to worry about, but there's leeway otherwise.
Ping.
Perhaps you should start each new class with statistics on how many will complete the course, complete their degree, go on to grad school, enter teaching, get tenure, etc. I think it would be a real eye opener for your students and offer them some real expectations.