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FUN Newsletter
From the president, continued...
philosophy tethered to the "work hard...good things will come" and "the cream will always rise to the top" mantras.
But my concerns about how to help students make informed decisions about their professional development have become more significant in the recent years. So much so that I would imagine that many of our members are struggling
with the same concerns and that there might be a need for us to come together with a "vision for undergraduate neuroscien st development" that we could move forward with, as a group.
My ini al concern deals with a seemingly disconnected rela onship between what we "think" we need and what our
actual "needs" are in science. The most recent budget request from the Office of the President included 3.1 billion
(large number, yes, but only a small percentage of the 2.9 trillion total budget request) in support of programs that enhance science, technology, engineering, and mathema cs (STEM)1. But not all STEM needs are equal - across the four
le ers that contribute to the abbrevia on, that is. Seventy-one percent of new STEM jobs will be in the compu ng "T"
industry, 16% in engineering "E", 7% in the physical sciences and 4% in the life sciences "S", and the math "M" opportuni es make up the remaining 2%. The projected es mated need for the "science" occupaons in STEM disciplines through 2018, (i.e. all jobs available in life/physical sciences) make
Too much growth
up only 13% of all STEM jobs2. In addi on, of all the projected STEM jobs, only 24% of them
has occurred so that require a graduate degree2. Again, do not take the informa on I am presen ng as an “an STEM programs” perspec ve. I simply argue that we need to understand that STEM, in
there are too many
terms of voca onal opportuni es, actually looks more like sTEm as compared to STEM. I
believe MORE support is required to promote STEM proficiencies at all levels of formal edscien sts and too
uca on, but my current ques ons/concerns are directed toward the development of the
li le support for
next genera on of scien sts; that is, the producers of science, not the consumers.
those inves gators
A recent PNAS ar cle tled, "Rescuing US biomedical research from its systemic flaws"3
that was authored by several well-respected scien sts – and this was really the ar cle that
broke this camel's back -- outlined the doom and gloom of the future of gainful employment for new scien sts. The key
thesis of this report was that the current funding system in the biomedical sciences is flawed and unsustainable. Too
much growth has occurred so that there are too many scien sts and too li le support for those inves gators. They
state that the assump on of growth of the science enterprise can be maintained indefinitely is incorrect. The problem
is amplified due to the necessity of having trainees (appren ces) in their established laboratories to perform the principle inves gators research. So for every inves gator, there are numerous addi onal young inves gators being produced
and released into the system, each previous appren ce now either looking for a posi on so that they may establish
their own laboratory (and hire their own appren ces). If no posi on can be found, they then wash out of the current
scien fic system and seek employment outside of their chosen field. As the genera ons have proceeded, fewer and
fewer new scien sts find their way to their "dream" (i.e. any gainful employment where their degree/experiences align
with their posi on) jobs in science and more are finding employment in non-science "alterna ve" voca ons. Note: the
use of the word "alterna ve" is in quotes because in most cases the "alterna ve" is not a decision made by the person,
but is due to no other op ons being available to them.
The authors of the PNAS ar cle make several recommenda ons to try to balance/control this uncontrolled growth. The
first and most logical (at least from the authors’ perspec ves) is to increase funding. These addi onal funds would
greatly expand and grow science...leading to a greater need for appren ces, and (admi edly, by the authors) we are
right back where we started: too many graduates, not enough opportuni es. The second recommenda on is to no
longer pay graduate students using monies received from research grants. Instead, make the students compete for
their own training grants and fellowships. Of course, though it was not pointed out by the authors, there would then be
far fewer students due to the limited funds for training grants and fellowships. The few that win the support should
have more