Blue Lab Coats

No, not mine. HA- fooled you. I’m down at the moment, but not out- at least not yet. On my last post… Enrique left a comment about PIs having to dissolve their labs…

Topic: what happens when your PI’s gov. grant is not renewed (resubmission # > 1) and the concomitant dissolvation of the lab. Anyone want to hunker a guess on the time said dissolvation will take?

Well, I’ve had a front row seat to this for the last couple of years. DrMrA was struggling with his renewal for more than two years. I don’t usually share too much about DrMrA- he’s not into publicity- so I’ll just share how this went from where I was sitting. First, Continue reading ‘Dissolving the Lab’

The end of the week is within reach. I am overwhelmed with work at the moment… so this will be only a brief celebratory post.

DrMrA found out this morning that he was awarded a federal grant that he applied for. After submitting in the neighborhood of 20 federal grant proposals and struggling with funding quite a bit in the last 5 years (despite excellent productivity and good journals) Continue reading ‘Celebrate…’

Your seminar-giving, interviewing, chalk-talking skills are going to get better and better the more interviews you go on. But you will not get better at waiting for the search committee to decide on their favorite candidates. As Physioprof pointed out in the comments to my last post about this (Pt. 12), it’s very appropriate to inquire about the status of a search, and inform the chair of other offers once you have an offer in an institution of equal or greater quality (I don’t know if that’s the right word but you get my drift). Every search committee I have been on has interviewed all 4-5 candidates they flagged for an interview before they have a discussion about/make a decision on who is the top candidate. I think that sometimes when there is a clear favorite, an offer goes out prior to this- but I haven’t personally seen a situation where that happened. Then, if you are the lucky winner, the chair of the hiring department Continue reading ‘Unsolicited Advice: Job Search (Pt. 13)’

Interviewing.

Now that we have covered the preparation and practice of your interviewing ‘seminar’ and the chalk talk- we can spend a few minutes on the interview itself. Usually the inviting department will prepare a schedule for your visit- hopefully you will get a copy of this schedule a few days before you are to travel. Make sure you get a copy in advance… if necessary, ask nicely. Continue reading ‘Unsolicited Advice: Job Search (Pt. 11)’

Well, my soccermom-dom has reached a critical point. Most of the members of my older daughter’s soccer team, including the coach, are going to go competitive next season (i.e. no longer ‘recreational’ now ‘club’). This transition involves try-outs, and if she makes the team there will be lots of traveling to games out of town, two tournaments per semester, and a much longer soccer season. The traveling will involve at least 3 hours of driving for 1/2 of the season’s games, in addition to two practices per week and the regular schedule of home games that we currently have.

I am honestly conflicted about whether or not we should let her play up to club soccer. Continue reading ‘Now what?’

Moving from the RESEARCH TRACK to the TENURE TRACK…

There is no delicate way to talk about moving from the research-track to the tenure-track. Many institutions have Assistant Professor for Research positions (on the non-tenure track, also sometimes called Assistant Professor(R) and may be similar to Instructor positions). These are useful positions, because typically they allow you to write and submit your own grants, but in reality they are glorified post-doc positions in many cases. These are generally soft-money positions- meaning that the institution doesn’t contribute much (if at all) to the salary of these employees. Different institutions have different requirements for giving these titles, and different policies about how the salary gets paid. I am not trying to be overly negative about these positions (I had one myself, after all)- because actually they give you something you didn’t have as a post-doc- the ability to write/submit/and hold a federal grant…. And this is enormously valuable prep and pay for if and when you seek a tenure track position.

Make no mistake though- a tenure-track position will not be handed to you as the next step up in the department where you are non-tenure track faculty. You will have to go out on a national job search, and probably get a written offer from another institution- before the institution where you are non-tenure track faculty will offer to put you on the tenure track. Why? I hear you cry. It’s pretty simple. Departments like to hire candidates that they think are competitive in the market, and that are going to be able to successfully get federal grants. They have to use their judgment in many cases on that second part- but as for the first part- how can you possibly be considered competitive in the market if you apply for only one tenure-track job…. In the department where you are currently non-tenure track? Right- you won’t be.

I have met a whole lot of two-academic-science-career couples where ½ of the party is in a non-tenure track faculty position… usually the woman. From personal experience I know that these fine and capable women will NOT be offered a tenure track role without a going on a national job search- even if the tenure-track (or tenured) part of their party is federally funded, a great colleague etc. Unfair, maybe- shortsighted, probably- and in fairness there are lots of reasons for this that would take me pages and pages to elaborate upon (note both PP and Drug Monkey’s comments). So- if you are in a non-tenure track position and have aspirations for a tenure track one (regardless of your situation) don’t WAIT for a tenure track job to fall from the sky, and don’t wait for one HOPING that somebody notices how hard you are working and how valuable you are. YOU MUST ACTIVELY GO ON A FULL FLEDGED JOB SEARCH, even if what you want is to convert your current non-tenure track position into a tenure track one…

Ok, gotta go- getting questionable sideways glances from other soccer moms… plus I have twice almost gotten hit with the soccer ball while writing this. It’s a sign.

In my last post about looking for an academic job, we were laying the groundwork for applying for positions by deciding (with our advisor of course) which projects to take, preparing a CV, and statements of research interests and teaching. Ok, so now we are ready to move forward.

First, let me point out that there is a seasonality to the academic job search. I don’t mean to say that all post-docs are ready to move on at the same time, what I mean by this is that because many institutions have teaching responsibilities and thus are tied to an academic calendar- they are looking to hire people to arrive on campus when the academic year begins, usually in September (I realize that’s a horrifying run-on sentence, don’t put any of those in your applications!). Because the hiring process takes a long time (nearly a year in most cases) - most positions, and the largest number of positions will be advertised in the preceding fall. What you should realize is that the most positions are advertised between August and November, and then the number of ads drops off significantly. Interviewing will start in December, and continue for a few months, then there will be a round of second interviews and offers in the hope of having candidates hired in the spring or early summer for arrival in the fall. This isn’t ALWAYS how it works, and there will be ads in the off season, so don’t stop looking at them… but in general this is the flow of things. The take home message is: 1. Seasonality to the ads/searches, and 2. Process takes a long time… sometimes up to a year.

Digest that, and I’ll come back and cover … cover letters (if you must read ahead see the ‘Application Pkg’ tab where there is a section on cover letters) and which ads you should respond to…

The second half of my two-academic-career family (the half that’s better at this) just finished a couple of months of teaching, grants due, papers submitted etc. I was picking up all of the slack at home during that time- and I don’t mind. We have had overlapping grant deadlines before, and our kids forget our names when this happens, it’s just NOT a good thing. … Now he is done, and its my turn. I’ll have June 1 and July 1 deadlines for NIH… and I’m ready for it.

On Monday I submitted my first truly independent paper. Online submission is at once a wonderful and horrible invention. If you have tried this, then what I say needs no explanation. Anyway- I held onto that manuscript longer than I probably should have, but getting that last Western to be perfect (or at least good enough) really took longer than I thought it would (3 weeks), and the efforts of a postdoc AND a graduate student. I have watched my also-an-academic-scientist-husband wait and wait for that last figure so many times in the last 6 years- and be agitated about not having it done… I can totally sympathize. I am irrationally proud of this paper, its just gratifying to take a gene of unknown function, discover that it is important, and figure out what it does… and actually be lucky enough to show it. Now that I said that, I’m sure the paper will come right back. I don’t know what’s going on with it now- I was on vacation with my kids for a few days, and free from all electronics…- so I’ll probably cry on your shoulder about a rejection shortly.

Hopefully I haven’t lost too many readers during my short hiatus…

There won’t be any unsolicited advice today, I swear.

A lot happened this week. There were two grants to be submitted, two papers were (or were supposed to be!) reviewed, two papers being written, three thesis defenses, two lab meetings, two seminar speakers (one hosted and one to be met with)… are you getting the idea… not to mention the attending the caucus, arranging two babysitters, going to the theater (Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, in case you are wondering), and managing two blogs. Are you begging me to stop yet?? And, two kids to be attended to - I’ve got this all wrong- that should have been at the front of the list.

Believe it or not, Friday afternoon/evening was the only quiet time I had in my office to concentrate-and I was really waiting for that uninterrupted time… but then two things happened. My younger daughter (who is 5 1/2 for those of you that don’t know) called me from her after-school program to tell me that her bum was itchy- and only I, the all powerful mommy, could fix that. I think what she actually meant was- it sucked that you couldn’t put me to bed last night because you were not here…. and now I miss you and want you to come home… In 5-year-old-speak. Now I’m conflicted over wanting that quiet concentrated time to myself.

Anyway, about 5 minutes later, a friend in my department came into my office and mentioned to me that a youngish female colleague of ours passed away unexpectedly, leaving behind 2 small children. So, so. sad- and hit me hard in the context of the previous paragraph.

I will try to remember that there is life and there is making a living. As much as I enjoy my job (and it can be consuming) - it is making a living- and should, without qualifiers (unless.. aaahem… the -80 is crashing and the entire rest of the lab is out of town simultaneously), come second to taking care of an itchy bum or tucking someone into bed.