the hum drum phd

Without a doubt, one of the proudest moments of my life was an early December morning in 2006. I stood in front of my peers and professors for three hours and defended my graduate work I had been working on for the previous five years. At the end of the three hours, four professors convened, discussed, and agreed that I indeed, earned my doctorate. One step was done on my penultimate goal-Research Professor.

The path to an acadamic or professor these days seems to be getting more ludicrous every year, despite the fact that higher education is the one industry that seems to be recession proof. The path starts with 4 years of college, 4-6 years of grad school, and 2-4 years of post-doc experience. That 10-14 years of training is just a tip of the iceberg. A recent post-doc in my lab was searching for an assistant professor position, and one of the things they (hiring commitees) was looking for was 10+ published journals. I might as well shoot myself in the head now--I dont have anywhere near that number. And for what? Assistant professor positions start at pay around 50-60K, around the price of a chemical engineering student with a BS degree.

Once you have the covetted professor position, you better work your ass off for five years, or no tenure, and your out of a job. A recent Nature article showed that despite a rise in biologist positions, tenure had remained static for the last 16 years! And getting funding from the NIH is harder than robbing a bank. For young investigators (not tenured) only 6% of the R01 grants were awarded to them. In fact, the average age of an awarded R01 grant currently is 42. In 1970 it was 34. For those that dont know, the NIH RO1 grant is about the only method you can consistently fund a laboratory.

So in a nutshell, train for 12 years, work 80 hrs per week so you can publish like crazy, take a job that gives you half the pay as your industry brothers, spend all your measly pay on college loans, apply for a grant that you have a 1 in 20 chance of getting, fund said laboratory with grad students, post-docs so you have a good chance of getting fired in 5 years because the old pusses around you can say you didnt try hard enough.

So as I left the hallowed halls of my grad school back in December of 2006, my vision was clear and the future confident. But, life happens. Doing a post-doc, one starts to look at other options beside academia with a curious eye. Perhaps the FDA is for me, or biotech, or industry, or tree farming. Yeah, tree farming. I think I would like quarterly meetings with only me and the trees.

Im off to bed now, Im taking two of my favorite bedtime pills--trade name 'Fukitol'.