In article <342muk$ivo at dartvax.dartmouth.edu> Julia.A.Keith at dartmouth.edu (Julia A. Keith) writes:
I see a lot of people, male and female, in my
>department and elsewhere who follow "the path" to large university
>academia because it's "what you do if you're good". I was encouraged
>to hear in a recent posting that's not so, because as an NSF
>predoctoral fellow, I'm often expected to be shooting for "the big
>time" when all I really want to do is teach, with a little research on
>the side. I'd love to hear from others who chose the road less
>traveled.
This is certainly a favorite subject of mine. I'll try to restrain myself from
going on too much about it (in either a positive or negative direction) but I
will give my point of view. I got a Ph.D. in 1987 at an Ivy league school,
where it was taken for granted that we all wanted to get postdoc positions at
exclusive research institutions, then we wanted to get faculty positions at
(preferably) an Ivy league school, or another private school or exclusive
research institution, or maybe a state school since times are tough. Until
about the time I left, almost nobody even talked about going into industry.
And leaving the bench didn't seem to be an option at all. After doing 2
postdocs (yes, at one of those excl. res. insts) I realized that I wasn't
happy. Actually I realized it during the first postdoc but with all that
ingrained in me about the "right" way to do science I felt that it was
probably just me, I wasn't working hard enough, etc. etc. Plus I felt horribly
guilty about the prospect of what I had been led to think of as turning my
back on my 10 years of training. I did a lot of investigating and
soul-searching and found that the skills I was using at the bench did not
overlap well with the skills I have. The turning point came when I heard
myself say something like "I'm smart at home, why am I stupid in the lab?". I
always have had the ability to think logically through the best way to do
something, solve a problem etc- but I could not seem to apply this in the lab.
So I decided to look for a career that was still in science, not at the bench,
and which used my writing and communications skills. For the last 3.5 yr I
have been a patent agent at a small/medium biotech company. I talk science all
day long, write a lot, edit a lot, and generally spend my day communicating
science. I translate between lawyers and the other scientists, and never get
bored because I constantly jump from one fascinating topic to another. Plus-
nobody brings their negative or inconclusive results to be patented, so I only
have to write up the fun stuff! I am sure that there are people (old
classmates, etc) who talk about me in hushed tones because I have "left
science". They couldn't be further from the truth- I use much more of my
training now than when I was researching one small aspect of biology. But I
know that and they don't, and what they think doesn't bother me anymore. I do
regret the lack of career options I was exposed to as a student (undergrad and
grad) and consequently I speak at AWIS functions about careers beyond the lab,
and try to make myself available for people who have questions on this topic.
I don't know if I am unusual at having found my niche on the first shot (I
suspect so because at the last AWIS brunch I attended, I overheard someone
whisper "that's the one, she's _happy_") but that was the hardest decision
I've ever made and I still thank God- no, I thank myself- that I finally did
it.
OK, nobody asked for my life story. But the moral is, don't follow The
Path just because nobody told you there was another road open. If academic
research is for you, fine- I wish you luck (and grants). If not- get out there
and look around. Apply for all kinds of things just to see what your options
are.
--
Laurel Bernstein -- lbernstein at isisph.com
These are my opinions- you can get your own
