Jobs
drorzel | December 2, 2014I've decided to do a new round of profiles in the Project for Non-Academic Science (acronym deliberately chosen to coincide with a journal), as a way of getting a little more information out there to students studying in STEM fields who will likely end up with jobs off the "standard" academic science track.
Eighth in this round is Grant Goodyear, who started life as a theoretical chemist, and now does nuclear physics in the oil industry.
1) What is your non-academic job? These days I'm a nuclear physicist who works on the design and characterization of nuclear well-logging tools that are used…
drorzel | December 1, 2014I've decided to do a new round of profiles in the Project for Non-Academic Science (acronym deliberately chosen to coincide with a journal), as a way of getting a little more information out there to students studying in STEM fields who will likely end up with jobs off the "standard" academic science track.
Seventh in this round is a physics major who went into teaching high school, then decided to try medical school, and now works with the youngest possible subjects. He also had the excellent taste to send along a picture of himself with his dog...
1) What is your non-academic job? I am the…
drorzel | November 26, 2014I've decided to do a new round of profiles in the Project for Non-Academic Science (acronym deliberately chosen to coincide with a journal), as a way of getting a little more information out there to students studying in STEM fields who will likely end up with jobs off the "standard" academic science track.
Sixth in this round is an "adult-onset engineer" working at NASA on some cool stuff.
1) What is your non-academic job? I am a thermal engineer at NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab, working in the Cryogenic Systems Engineering group. Our group provides thermal engineering support (both cryogenic…
drorzel | November 25, 2014I've decided to do a new round of profiles in the Project for Non-Academic Science (acronym deliberately chosen to coincide with a journal), as a way of getting a little more information out there to students studying in STEM fields who will likely end up with jobs off the "standard" academic science track.
Fifth in this round is a bio major who now works on sustainably managing Atlantic coastal fisheries.
1) What is your non-academic job? Fishery Management Plan Coordinator at the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (management agency for fisheries)
2) What is your science background…
drorzel | November 24, 2014I've decided to do a new round of profiles in the Project for Non-Academic Science (acronym deliberately chosen to coincide with a journal), as a way of getting a little more information out there to students studying in STEM fields who will likely end up with jobs off the "standard" academic science track.
Fourth in this round is a Union alumn (another nice bonus of this is getting to promote some of my college's former students...) who prefers to remain anonymous, but is a computer engineer turned web developer for a public relations firm.
1) What is your non-academic job? I'm a web…
drorzel | November 21, 2014I've decided to do a new round of profiles in the Project for Non-Academic Science (acronym deliberately chosen to coincide with a journal), as a way of getting a little more information out there to students studying in STEM fields who will likely end up with jobs off the "standard" academic science track.
Third in this round is a physics teacher turned developer of physics education technology at Vernier.
1) What is your non-academic job? Title: Physics Education Technology Specialist
Dept: Tech Support and R&D
Responsibilities:
Support teachers using Vernier sensors, interfaces, and…
drorzel | November 20, 2014I've decided to do a new round of profiles in the Project for Non-Academic Science (acronym deliberately chosen to coincide with a journal), as a way of getting a little more information out there to students studying in STEM fields who will likely end up with jobs off the "standard" academic science track.
Second in this round is a computer scientist turned underwater warrior. With bonus video!
1) What is your non-academic job? I am a computer scientist at the Naval Undersea Warfare Center in Newport, RI. I work in the Ranges Department as a part of the Range Software branch. That means I…
drorzel | November 19, 2014I've decided to do a new round of profiles in the Project for Non-Academic Science (acronym deliberately chosen to coincide with a journal), as a way of getting a little more information out there to students studying in STEM fields who will likely end up with jobs off the "standard" academic science track.
First up in this round is a CS major turned IP lawyer.
1) What is your non-academic job? I am an intellectual property attorney. I work for a "boutique" law firm, which means it specializes in one area of law (that being intellectual property, naturally). I work on all areas of IP,…
drorzel | November 18, 2014I've been doing a lot of darkness-cursing lately (mostly off-line), so we could stand to have a little candle-lighting. It's been a few years since I last did a round of profiles of scientists outside academia, so let's see if that will fly again...
So, if you 1) Have a degree in a STEM field (BA/BS, MA/MS, Ph.D., whatever), 2) Have a career that doesn't involve people calling you "Professor," and 3) Are willing to share answers to a few simple questions about how you got there and how your science background helps, drop me a line. You can leave a comment here, email me (orzelc at steelypips…
drorzel | September 3, 2014I've posted this before, but a reminder can't hurt: We're hiring two tenure-track faculty this fall. The targeted research fields:
We invite applications for two tenure-track Assistant Professor positions starting in September 2015, one in any area of theoretical physics or astrophysics, the other with a strong preference for biophysics or soft condensed matter (either experimental or theoretical). We encourage applications from interdisciplinary scientists and those who could make use of the college’s shared instrumentation resources (including AFM, SEM, micro-Raman and micro-FTIR…
drorzel | July 9, 2014Text of the ad we're running for our searches this fall. This will go live on the usual sites at the start of August, but as a sort of experiment in the power of social media, I'm going to share it here first, and see what that gets us.
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We invite applications for two tenure-track Assistant Professor positions starting in September 2015, one in any area of theoretical physics or astrophysics, the other with a strong preference for biophysics or soft condensed matter (either experimental or theoretical). We encourage applications from interdisciplinary scientists and those who could make…
drorzel | June 10, 2014I had a couple of conversations at DAMOP last week about career issues, and I just want to note that I will never get used to the idea that I'm a respected elder anything, whose advice would be valued. I basically feel like I lucked into my whole career, so I hesitate to advise others as to what they should do. But then, there's a huge element of luck in any tenure-track career, given the tiny ratio of jobs to candidates.
One thing that came up was, of course, the question of how it is I run a blog, which connects to the larger question of work-life balance. One of the people I spoke to…
drorzel | April 1, 2014It's the time of year where colleges and grad schools are making admissions decisions, and faculty job search season is winding down (for tenure-track positions in physics, anyway-- our search for a visiting professor for next year is still underway). In the spirit of the season, then, Matt "Dean Dad" Reed asks about the writing of reference letters.
Given how much letters can count, I’m struck that we almost never talk about how to write them. They’re a genre of their own.
For example, I’ve been told -- and I don’t know how true this is -- that without a FERPA waiver, it’s illegal to…
drorzel | January 28, 2014The Pip was sick this weekend, I had a deadline for a bunch of administrative crap that I pushed off back in December when I was rushing to finish the book, and I'm giving an exam on Thursday. So, I'm not doing lengthy blogging right now, but two quick notices:
1) A reminder (I think I posted this before) that the Union College Department of Physics and Astronomy is hiring a visitor, for up to three years (contingent on performance). If you're in the market for an academic job, albeit a temporary one, check out the ad. If you know anybody who might be interested, point it out to them.
2)…
drorzel | November 19, 2013My trip into the office today was for the express purpose of posting this job ad:
We invite applications for Visiting Assistant Professor starting in September 2014. This position is available for up to three years, contingent on satisfactory performance. Applicants should have some teaching experience and a strong commitment to undergraduate education. Union is a highly selective, small (2200 students) liberal arts college with an engineering program, located in the Capital District of New York State, a region heavily engaged in science and R&D. The Department of Physics and Astronomy (…
drorzel | August 26, 2013In one of those Information Supercollider moments, two very different articles crossed in my social media feeds, and suddenly seemed to be related. The first was this New York Post piece by a college essay consultant:
Finally, after 15 or so years of parents managing every variable, there comes the time when a student is expected to do something all by herself: fill out the actual application. Write an essay in her own voice.
By this point, our coddled child has no faith in her own words at all. Her own ideas and feelings, like a language she has not practiced, have fallen away.
Her parents…
drorzel | July 24, 2013I've spent a bunch of time recently blogging about baseball statistics, which you might be inclined to write off as some quirk of a sports-obsessed scientist. I was very amused, therefore, to see Inside Higher Ed and ZapperZ writing about a new AIP report on women in physics (PDF) that uses essentially the same sort of rudimentary statistical analysis to address an important question.
I say "amused" because of the coincidence in methods, not because of the content. And, in fact, the content is... not likely to make them friends in a certain quarter of the blogosphere. I actually flinched when…
aardvarchaeology | April 17, 20132009. University of Lund publishes the PhD thesis Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning in Created Agricultural Wetlands, dealing with biological diversity and ecosystem services in ponds in the agricultural landscape (and commented on here).
2013: Same department advertises a post-doc in the field "Biological Diversity and Ecosystem Services in Ponds in the Agricultural Landscape".
Because in the Scandinavian countries' public sectors, you always have to go through these elaborate charades to suggest that you're really looking open-mindedly for the best candidate for a job, not simply for…
drorzel | February 28, 2013Every now and then, I run across a couple of items that tie together a whole bunch of different issues that weigh heavily on my mind. That happened yesterday courtesy of Timothy Burke, whose blog post about an NPR story is so good that there aren't enough +1 buttons on the entire Internet for it.
The NPR piece is about eating and exercise habits, and the way families struggle to do what they know they ought to:
More than half of children ate or drank something during the "crunch time" window that can lead to unhealthy weight gain, as perceived by their parents. And more than a quarter of…
drorzel | February 22, 2013We've got calls out to the local grad programs, and I've mentioned this on Twitter a couple of times, but it can't hurt anything to post it here as well: we've got a huge overabundance of first-year engineering students that is forcing us to open extra sections of our intro physics classes to accommodate them. The problem is, we don't have people to teach the new sections. Thus, we are looking for an adjunct to take one section of intro physics or introductory astronomy labs, starting in April and running through mid-June.
If you're within convenient distance of Schenectady, NY, and might be…