Wanted: Information. Callier, V. & Vanderford, N. L. 519(7541):121–122.
Wanted: Information [link]Paper  doi  abstract   bibtex   
Detailed career data will help people to plan for life after a PhD, say Viviane Callier and Nathan L. Vanderford. [Excerpt] Most students who enrol in US science and engineering PhD programmes hope to pursue an academic career. However, the gulf between the supply of newly minted PhDs and the availability of faculty positions widens each year. Some 36,000 people earned science and engineering PhDs in the United States in 2011, but US universities create only around 3,000 tenure-track positions annually. And with about 70\,% of those graduates taking a postdoctorate (M. Schillebeeckx, B. Maricque and C. Lewis Nature Biotechnol. 31, 938-941; 2013), many trainees end up in a holding pattern, waiting for faculty jobs that are unlikely to materialize. [\n] This is because the higher-education sector has not delivered an essential component of an efficient market: current and precise information about job prospects, including the specific attributes and training that have enabled PhD holders to find success in and outside academia, and the differences in those job markets for science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) subfields. [...] [\n] These data will help funding agencies to craft policies that encourage institutions to give people with PhDs options for careers in non-faculty positions. One way to do this is to provide diverse education and training to PhD trainees so they can pursue careers in industry, consulting, entrepreneurship, science policy, writing and editing, administration or management. Federal funding agencies must find ways to ease pressure on trainees to work day and night for publications and grants, and instead foster ways to gain work experience and explore non-academic career paths while still in training. [\n] These long-term solutions will not help current graduate students and postdocs, who must seek professional-development counselling, develop transferable skills and network within and outside academia. Ultimately, the careers of hundreds of thousands of future PhD holders depend on access to career information that will help to better match supply with demand.
@article{callierWantedInformation2015,
  title = {Wanted: Information},
  author = {Callier, Viviane and Vanderford, Nathan L.},
  date = {2015-03},
  journaltitle = {Nature},
  volume = {519},
  pages = {121--122},
  issn = {0028-0836},
  doi = {10.1038/nj7541-121a},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1038/nj7541-121a},
  abstract = {Detailed career data will help people to plan for life after a PhD, say Viviane Callier and Nathan L. Vanderford.

[Excerpt] Most students who enrol in US science and engineering PhD programmes hope to pursue an academic career. However, the gulf between the supply of newly minted PhDs and the availability of faculty positions widens each year. Some 36,000 people earned science and engineering PhDs in the United States in 2011, but US universities create only around 3,000 tenure-track positions annually. And with about 70\,\% of those graduates taking a postdoctorate (M. Schillebeeckx, B. Maricque and C. Lewis Nature Biotechnol. 31, 938-941; 2013), many trainees end up in a holding pattern, waiting for faculty jobs that are unlikely to materialize.

[\textbackslash n] This is because the higher-education sector has not delivered an essential component of an efficient market: current and precise information about job prospects, including the specific attributes and training that have enabled PhD holders to find success in and outside academia, and the differences in those job markets for science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) subfields. [...]

[\textbackslash n] These data will help funding agencies to craft policies that encourage institutions to give people with PhDs options for careers in non-faculty positions. One way to do this is to provide diverse education and training to PhD trainees so they can pursue careers in industry, consulting, entrepreneurship, science policy, writing and editing, administration or management. Federal funding agencies must find ways to ease pressure on trainees to work day and night for publications and grants, and instead foster ways to gain work experience and explore non-academic career paths while still in training.

[\textbackslash n] These long-term solutions will not help current graduate students and postdocs, who must seek professional-development counselling, develop transferable skills and network within and outside academia. Ultimately, the careers of hundreds of thousands of future PhD holders depend on access to career information that will help to better match supply with demand.},
  keywords = {*imported-from-citeulike-INRMM,~INRMM-MiD:c-13534551,~to-add-doi-URL,publish-or-perish,research-management,science-ethics},
  number = {7541}
}

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