08/4/08 PHD comic: 'The mid-tenure crisis'

[Greg Bernhardt]

Piled Higher & Deeper by Jorge Cham www.phdcomics.com
http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive/phd080408s.gif title: "The mid-tenure crisis" - originally published 8/4/2008 For the latest news in PHD Comics, CLICK HERE! (http://www.phdcomics.com/comics.php)




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[quark1005]

not bad

[Andy Resnick]

Something about this was bugging me- I realize it's a comic strip and a joke, but even so-

Would that the first two frames were true: submit a grant, grant is accepted. In fact, (for me) it's the opposite: I'm getting tired of the constant scratching and fighting for funding. There's too much at stake- my job, student positions, post-docs, techs... and there's too little support (either financial or in-kind) from institutions.

In the current enviroment, having a sound research program means that the PI is running a small business. Which is fine, except that we are supposed to operate under the assumption that we are "generating knowledge" or something equally vague- in any case, it has nothing to do with the educational purpose of a university.

[kingdomof]

Something about this was bugging me- I realize it's a comic strip and a joke, but even so-

Would that the first two frames were true: submit a grant, grant is accepted. In fact, (for me) it's the opposite: I'm getting tired of the constant scratching and fighting for funding. There's too much at stake- my job, student positions, post-docs, techs... and there's too little support (either financial or in-kind) from institutions.

In the current enviroment, having a sound research program means that the PI is running a small business. Which is fine, except that we are supposed to operate under the assumption that we are "generating knowledge" or something equally vague- in any case, it has nothing to do with the educational purpose of a university.

I see where you're coming from with this.

It seems that the big name universities and institutes get a vastly disproportional amount of money in grants and research funding when compared to the average school. Grant writing is tedious and not to mention, pretty goddamn cutthroat. An institution with the same types of equipment and ability to research shouldn't be overlooked because they aren't MIT.

It does seem that PIs are pseudo business managers, but in all actuality I'd argue that most people would get bored of routine lab techniques and the subtle tediums within them before they retire, however, this does not support the fact that research is something done exclusively by those in the lesser levels of the hierarchy.

With all that being said, I'm happy to have my mentor and I think he's extremely active in his job to help his students learn, yet he still tries hard to fight for money and is successful in it, at least in my opinion. Basically, I feel it's more up to the person to be the teacher.

Though, from what I've heard, the current political situations America is in is what is keeping away government based grant funding.