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gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft8ycgn | ft92btd | 1,591,514,749 | 1,591,518,732 | 4 | 9 | Lie others say, yes, and if it’s important to you you will find the time. It also depends on what your graduate program is like. So many people talk about the long hours they work and the non existent work/life balance they have. My PhD program is like a 9 to 5. I work 8 hours then I go home. | Yes, it is possible, but you have to manage your time well. Before the pandemic I was going 6 times a week and I was able to do everything else. The gym was always the first item on my schedule. I'd wake up around 6:15, eat something, get there around 7 and workout for 1 to 1.5 hours. After going back home, taking a shower and eating, I'd get to work around 9:30. This worked really well for me. I could stay longer at the university if needed, without having to skip workout. | 0 | 3,983 | 2.25 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft8yh66 | ft92btd | 1,591,514,879 | 1,591,518,732 | 2 | 9 | of course, don't let anyone tell you otherewise | Yes, it is possible, but you have to manage your time well. Before the pandemic I was going 6 times a week and I was able to do everything else. The gym was always the first item on my schedule. I'd wake up around 6:15, eat something, get there around 7 and workout for 1 to 1.5 hours. After going back home, taking a shower and eating, I'd get to work around 9:30. This worked really well for me. I could stay longer at the university if needed, without having to skip workout. | 0 | 3,853 | 4.5 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft8ycgn | ft95g8y | 1,591,514,749 | 1,591,522,002 | 4 | 5 | Lie others say, yes, and if it’s important to you you will find the time. It also depends on what your graduate program is like. So many people talk about the long hours they work and the non existent work/life balance they have. My PhD program is like a 9 to 5. I work 8 hours then I go home. | Yes, I worked out a lot during my PhD, just make sure you have enough down time, it is easy to overwork yourself if you get stressed and pressured. Your schedule is somewhat determined by your outcomes so depending on how fast you are getting things done and how successful (or lucky) you are being with experiments etc you may have to work some crazy hours. | 0 | 7,253 | 1.25 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft95g8y | ft946ug | 1,591,522,002 | 1,591,520,657 | 5 | 4 | Yes, I worked out a lot during my PhD, just make sure you have enough down time, it is easy to overwork yourself if you get stressed and pressured. Your schedule is somewhat determined by your outcomes so depending on how fast you are getting things done and how successful (or lucky) you are being with experiments etc you may have to work some crazy hours. | There's no better time to get yoked as fuck - may the gains be with you my friend. | 1 | 1,345 | 1.25 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft92zri | ft946ug | 1,591,519,413 | 1,591,520,657 | 3 | 4 | ABSOLUTELY YES! Make it fit into your schedule! Exercise is amazing during the PhD to keep you fresh and healthy mentally too. | There's no better time to get yoked as fuck - may the gains be with you my friend. | 0 | 1,244 | 1.333333 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft8yh66 | ft946ug | 1,591,514,879 | 1,591,520,657 | 2 | 4 | of course, don't let anyone tell you otherewise | There's no better time to get yoked as fuck - may the gains be with you my friend. | 0 | 5,778 | 2 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft92zri | ft95g8y | 1,591,519,413 | 1,591,522,002 | 3 | 5 | ABSOLUTELY YES! Make it fit into your schedule! Exercise is amazing during the PhD to keep you fresh and healthy mentally too. | Yes, I worked out a lot during my PhD, just make sure you have enough down time, it is easy to overwork yourself if you get stressed and pressured. Your schedule is somewhat determined by your outcomes so depending on how fast you are getting things done and how successful (or lucky) you are being with experiments etc you may have to work some crazy hours. | 0 | 2,589 | 1.666667 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft95g8y | ft95b4f | 1,591,522,002 | 1,591,521,849 | 5 | 3 | Yes, I worked out a lot during my PhD, just make sure you have enough down time, it is easy to overwork yourself if you get stressed and pressured. Your schedule is somewhat determined by your outcomes so depending on how fast you are getting things done and how successful (or lucky) you are being with experiments etc you may have to work some crazy hours. | 100% In fact, it will be crucial for your mental health | 1 | 153 | 1.666667 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft95g8y | ft8yh66 | 1,591,522,002 | 1,591,514,879 | 5 | 2 | Yes, I worked out a lot during my PhD, just make sure you have enough down time, it is easy to overwork yourself if you get stressed and pressured. Your schedule is somewhat determined by your outcomes so depending on how fast you are getting things done and how successful (or lucky) you are being with experiments etc you may have to work some crazy hours. | of course, don't let anyone tell you otherewise | 1 | 7,123 | 2.5 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft92zri | ft9a75p | 1,591,519,413 | 1,591,526,856 | 3 | 4 | ABSOLUTELY YES! Make it fit into your schedule! Exercise is amazing during the PhD to keep you fresh and healthy mentally too. | I lifted 4-5 mornings a week before going into lab! Plus also usually yoga or cycle on weekends. I certainly had to have the discipline to go to bed early so that I could get up at 4:20/5:00, which meant missing out on a lot of social events on weeknights, but my sleep was important for my mental health. If it’s your priority, you’ll make it happen. | 0 | 7,443 | 1.333333 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft95b4f | ft9a75p | 1,591,521,849 | 1,591,526,856 | 3 | 4 | 100% In fact, it will be crucial for your mental health | I lifted 4-5 mornings a week before going into lab! Plus also usually yoga or cycle on weekends. I certainly had to have the discipline to go to bed early so that I could get up at 4:20/5:00, which meant missing out on a lot of social events on weeknights, but my sleep was important for my mental health. If it’s your priority, you’ll make it happen. | 0 | 5,007 | 1.333333 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft9a75p | ft993io | 1,591,526,856 | 1,591,525,746 | 4 | 3 | I lifted 4-5 mornings a week before going into lab! Plus also usually yoga or cycle on weekends. I certainly had to have the discipline to go to bed early so that I could get up at 4:20/5:00, which meant missing out on a lot of social events on weeknights, but my sleep was important for my mental health. If it’s your priority, you’ll make it happen. | Absolutely. I did an Ironman triathlon a few months before defending my proposal. ...you just won’t have much of a social life depending on how much working out you plan to do. | 1 | 1,110 | 1.333333 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft9a75p | ft8yh66 | 1,591,526,856 | 1,591,514,879 | 4 | 2 | I lifted 4-5 mornings a week before going into lab! Plus also usually yoga or cycle on weekends. I certainly had to have the discipline to go to bed early so that I could get up at 4:20/5:00, which meant missing out on a lot of social events on weeknights, but my sleep was important for my mental health. If it’s your priority, you’ll make it happen. | of course, don't let anyone tell you otherewise | 1 | 11,977 | 2 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft92zri | ft9ewln | 1,591,519,413 | 1,591,531,314 | 3 | 4 | ABSOLUTELY YES! Make it fit into your schedule! Exercise is amazing during the PhD to keep you fresh and healthy mentally too. | I’m a cycling captain here and a second year PhD student. Yes it can be done, but you will have a lot less free time. Don’t take time out of your PhD for your sport. Accept you won’t be able to do everything and that you might have to catch up. I find I have better time management than most of my lab mates but a few times I’ve had to not go cycling due to deadlines | 0 | 11,901 | 1.333333 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft95b4f | ft9ewln | 1,591,521,849 | 1,591,531,314 | 3 | 4 | 100% In fact, it will be crucial for your mental health | I’m a cycling captain here and a second year PhD student. Yes it can be done, but you will have a lot less free time. Don’t take time out of your PhD for your sport. Accept you won’t be able to do everything and that you might have to catch up. I find I have better time management than most of my lab mates but a few times I’ve had to not go cycling due to deadlines | 0 | 9,465 | 1.333333 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft993io | ft9ewln | 1,591,525,746 | 1,591,531,314 | 3 | 4 | Absolutely. I did an Ironman triathlon a few months before defending my proposal. ...you just won’t have much of a social life depending on how much working out you plan to do. | I’m a cycling captain here and a second year PhD student. Yes it can be done, but you will have a lot less free time. Don’t take time out of your PhD for your sport. Accept you won’t be able to do everything and that you might have to catch up. I find I have better time management than most of my lab mates but a few times I’ve had to not go cycling due to deadlines | 0 | 5,568 | 1.333333 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft9ewln | ft8yh66 | 1,591,531,314 | 1,591,514,879 | 4 | 2 | I’m a cycling captain here and a second year PhD student. Yes it can be done, but you will have a lot less free time. Don’t take time out of your PhD for your sport. Accept you won’t be able to do everything and that you might have to catch up. I find I have better time management than most of my lab mates but a few times I’ve had to not go cycling due to deadlines | of course, don't let anyone tell you otherewise | 1 | 16,435 | 2 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft8yh66 | ft92zri | 1,591,514,879 | 1,591,519,413 | 2 | 3 | of course, don't let anyone tell you otherewise | ABSOLUTELY YES! Make it fit into your schedule! Exercise is amazing during the PhD to keep you fresh and healthy mentally too. | 0 | 4,534 | 1.5 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft95b4f | ft8yh66 | 1,591,521,849 | 1,591,514,879 | 3 | 2 | 100% In fact, it will be crucial for your mental health | of course, don't let anyone tell you otherewise | 1 | 6,970 | 1.5 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft8yh66 | ft993io | 1,591,514,879 | 1,591,525,746 | 2 | 3 | of course, don't let anyone tell you otherewise | Absolutely. I did an Ironman triathlon a few months before defending my proposal. ...you just won’t have much of a social life depending on how much working out you plan to do. | 0 | 10,867 | 1.5 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft8yh66 | ft9m082 | 1,591,514,879 | 1,591,536,771 | 2 | 3 | of course, don't let anyone tell you otherewise | Yes. And I know this PhD student who is still doing his gymnastic stuff, all while publishing quality papers like a printer. | 0 | 21,892 | 1.5 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft8yh66 | ft9uc6i | 1,591,514,879 | 1,591,542,036 | 2 | 3 | of course, don't let anyone tell you otherewise | It’s extremely important not to give up things you love when you start your PhD. Someone gave me this advice my first year and I ignored it. I was miserable year 1. I gave up reading for pleasure, opting to read journal articles before bed instead. I also gave up sewing which is a hobby I really enjoy. I’m not effective at work when I’m not also spending some time making myself happy outside of work. | 0 | 27,157 | 1.5 |
gy6y0o | askacademia_train | 0.92 | For Ph.D. students that used to work out consistently during college. Is it possible to do it during a Ph.D.? I'll be starting my Ph.D. this Fall. I've been lifting all of college, would such a lifestyle still be possible during my Ph.D.? I'd spend about 1 hour and 30 minutes at the gym 4-5 times a week (still do). Do any of you guys lift on the regular while still finishing your responsabilities? ​ I love fitness and its a big part of my life. ​ Thank you. | ft9yvv8 | ft8yh66 | 1,591,544,640 | 1,591,514,879 | 3 | 2 | I know two PhD students who manage to remain competitive as international-standard runners. It's definitely possible | of course, don't let anyone tell you otherewise | 1 | 29,761 | 1.5 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjb583o | fjazybl | 1,583,186,720 | 1,583,183,807 | 97 | 16 | As an undergrad that sucks at writing the best thing was if I was given the opportunity to submit a regrade. This way I understood my mistakes and was able to fix them to not fail. I also learned a lot from doing evaluations on other student essays. | Clear instructions, easy to understand rubrics, and exemplars. Also - if you have particular expectations on writing you should be giving some amount of instruction on it. | 1 | 2,913 | 6.0625 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjb4wsf | fjb583o | 1,583,186,539 | 1,583,186,720 | 10 | 97 | As all other said, rubrics... Also, I’ve used going to the campus writing center for a point of extra credit as a good incentive. Their writing improves, their grades improve, your sanity improves. | As an undergrad that sucks at writing the best thing was if I was given the opportunity to submit a regrade. This way I understood my mistakes and was able to fix them to not fail. I also learned a lot from doing evaluations on other student essays. | 0 | 181 | 9.7 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjazybl | fjb6yz8 | 1,583,183,807 | 1,583,187,724 | 16 | 38 | Clear instructions, easy to understand rubrics, and exemplars. Also - if you have particular expectations on writing you should be giving some amount of instruction on it. | Clear rubrics are a good start, but let's be honest, if they haven't been taught how to write a clear sentence/paragraph, a rubric isn't going to open that door for them. You need to set real (reasonable and high) expectations and help them reach them. Here are some other ideas to throw in the mix: * Specific, narrowly-focused writing prompts/assignments * Unlimited re-writes. Your students are all turning in their first drafts and just getting them to re-write a second draft will be extremely useful for most of them. No one will do that many draft, the "unlimited" part kind of just speaks to the spirit of the process. * Give low grades (Cs, Ds, Fs) to bad first drafts, and give them liberally, but give them clear feedback and allow re-writes. Refer them to the writing center on campus. * The #1 thing that will really help them is **one-on-one feedback sessions** outside of class where you go through what they turned in, discuss what's working and what isn't and make sure they understand what they should do. This is a lot more work for you and for them, so it really depends on how invested you are in this mission. * The absolute best tip you can give them is to start the second draft in a completely blank new document. If any of them take this advice I guarantee that (1) you will be able to tell and (2) that draft will be 2+ letter grades higher than the first one. Most students will not take this tip because they think they are lazy, when in fact starting from a blank new document for draft #2 is the laziest way to improve dramatically without breaking a sweat. | 0 | 3,917 | 2.375 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjb6yz8 | fjb4wsf | 1,583,187,724 | 1,583,186,539 | 38 | 10 | Clear rubrics are a good start, but let's be honest, if they haven't been taught how to write a clear sentence/paragraph, a rubric isn't going to open that door for them. You need to set real (reasonable and high) expectations and help them reach them. Here are some other ideas to throw in the mix: * Specific, narrowly-focused writing prompts/assignments * Unlimited re-writes. Your students are all turning in their first drafts and just getting them to re-write a second draft will be extremely useful for most of them. No one will do that many draft, the "unlimited" part kind of just speaks to the spirit of the process. * Give low grades (Cs, Ds, Fs) to bad first drafts, and give them liberally, but give them clear feedback and allow re-writes. Refer them to the writing center on campus. * The #1 thing that will really help them is **one-on-one feedback sessions** outside of class where you go through what they turned in, discuss what's working and what isn't and make sure they understand what they should do. This is a lot more work for you and for them, so it really depends on how invested you are in this mission. * The absolute best tip you can give them is to start the second draft in a completely blank new document. If any of them take this advice I guarantee that (1) you will be able to tell and (2) that draft will be 2+ letter grades higher than the first one. Most students will not take this tip because they think they are lazy, when in fact starting from a blank new document for draft #2 is the laziest way to improve dramatically without breaking a sweat. | As all other said, rubrics... Also, I’ve used going to the campus writing center for a point of extra credit as a good incentive. Their writing improves, their grades improve, your sanity improves. | 1 | 1,185 | 3.8 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjb6t9o | fjb6yz8 | 1,583,187,633 | 1,583,187,724 | 3 | 38 | Is it possible to not assign essays? As in, find some other writing format that makes sense for your field--I've found annotated bibliographies are pretty magical for teaching research, and response essays improve when I give them extremely specific goals. Also, echoing rubrics. AND including a space on the rubric for 'being on topic' because holy mother of cheese, that is a thing. Oh, last thing: if you have time in your semester, I would suggest a grade norming mini lesson. Show them what a good paper looks like, what a bad paper looks like, what a good but poorly worded paper looks like, etc. | Clear rubrics are a good start, but let's be honest, if they haven't been taught how to write a clear sentence/paragraph, a rubric isn't going to open that door for them. You need to set real (reasonable and high) expectations and help them reach them. Here are some other ideas to throw in the mix: * Specific, narrowly-focused writing prompts/assignments * Unlimited re-writes. Your students are all turning in their first drafts and just getting them to re-write a second draft will be extremely useful for most of them. No one will do that many draft, the "unlimited" part kind of just speaks to the spirit of the process. * Give low grades (Cs, Ds, Fs) to bad first drafts, and give them liberally, but give them clear feedback and allow re-writes. Refer them to the writing center on campus. * The #1 thing that will really help them is **one-on-one feedback sessions** outside of class where you go through what they turned in, discuss what's working and what isn't and make sure they understand what they should do. This is a lot more work for you and for them, so it really depends on how invested you are in this mission. * The absolute best tip you can give them is to start the second draft in a completely blank new document. If any of them take this advice I guarantee that (1) you will be able to tell and (2) that draft will be 2+ letter grades higher than the first one. Most students will not take this tip because they think they are lazy, when in fact starting from a blank new document for draft #2 is the laziest way to improve dramatically without breaking a sweat. | 0 | 91 | 12.666667 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjazybl | fjb7uyd | 1,583,183,807 | 1,583,188,236 | 16 | 27 | Clear instructions, easy to understand rubrics, and exemplars. Also - if you have particular expectations on writing you should be giving some amount of instruction on it. | So, I’m teaching writing to first year undergraduates. Their first papers were absolutely awful and I couldn’t detect claims or arguments. After having them talk through their papers, though, it was really clear that they did have arguments and claims, but they were running into two problems: (1) They have been conditioned not to take strong stances; which prevents them from taking clear stances. (2) They have no concept of how paragraphs should work. Students would start a point at the start of one paragraph and reach the end of it by the middle of the next paragraph, where they would then begin another point. Or they would intertwine points throughout. Often, this meant that their sentences made sense, but not how they were supposed to fit together. Also, it meant that often the critical sentence in an argument was buried in the middle of the paragraph. After discussing this with them and going through their papers, the clarity of their papers increased tremendously. It’s still bad...but it’s bad in a way that’s clear and which then allows me to actually give meaningful feedback. So...yes, rubrics...but if you have the bandwidth, consider spending some time on what you expect their papers to look like and how you expect them to be structured. | 0 | 4,429 | 1.6875 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjb4wsf | fjb7uyd | 1,583,186,539 | 1,583,188,236 | 10 | 27 | As all other said, rubrics... Also, I’ve used going to the campus writing center for a point of extra credit as a good incentive. Their writing improves, their grades improve, your sanity improves. | So, I’m teaching writing to first year undergraduates. Their first papers were absolutely awful and I couldn’t detect claims or arguments. After having them talk through their papers, though, it was really clear that they did have arguments and claims, but they were running into two problems: (1) They have been conditioned not to take strong stances; which prevents them from taking clear stances. (2) They have no concept of how paragraphs should work. Students would start a point at the start of one paragraph and reach the end of it by the middle of the next paragraph, where they would then begin another point. Or they would intertwine points throughout. Often, this meant that their sentences made sense, but not how they were supposed to fit together. Also, it meant that often the critical sentence in an argument was buried in the middle of the paragraph. After discussing this with them and going through their papers, the clarity of their papers increased tremendously. It’s still bad...but it’s bad in a way that’s clear and which then allows me to actually give meaningful feedback. So...yes, rubrics...but if you have the bandwidth, consider spending some time on what you expect their papers to look like and how you expect them to be structured. | 0 | 1,697 | 2.7 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjb7uyd | fjb75ss | 1,583,188,236 | 1,583,187,834 | 27 | 6 | So, I’m teaching writing to first year undergraduates. Their first papers were absolutely awful and I couldn’t detect claims or arguments. After having them talk through their papers, though, it was really clear that they did have arguments and claims, but they were running into two problems: (1) They have been conditioned not to take strong stances; which prevents them from taking clear stances. (2) They have no concept of how paragraphs should work. Students would start a point at the start of one paragraph and reach the end of it by the middle of the next paragraph, where they would then begin another point. Or they would intertwine points throughout. Often, this meant that their sentences made sense, but not how they were supposed to fit together. Also, it meant that often the critical sentence in an argument was buried in the middle of the paragraph. After discussing this with them and going through their papers, the clarity of their papers increased tremendously. It’s still bad...but it’s bad in a way that’s clear and which then allows me to actually give meaningful feedback. So...yes, rubrics...but if you have the bandwidth, consider spending some time on what you expect their papers to look like and how you expect them to be structured. | As everyone else said: very detailed rubrics that clearly award points for specific content is key to ensuring students are graded fairly and not just on their writing abilities. I provided a made-up rubric example to illustrate what I mean by grading for specific content. I often will provide partial credit and will explain why in my grading, for example: 0.5/1: You gave your opinion on what the future of bananas as a consumer good looks like, but you didn't provide any evidence for it. Additionally, I will often provide extra credit part of the way through the semester (once they get the shock of the first few grades under their belts) to any student that takes their assignments to the campus writing center for revision. I allow them to take any assignment from the time I announce the EC opportunity to the writing center, and simply ask that they provide a few bullet points detailing the suggestions and revisions that they get from their session. I've found that students who do this noticeably improve their writing as the semester goes on! *Rubric Example* *Write a 350 word research essay about ONE current consumer good that has recently been either rising or falling in popularity (10 points total)* *Thesis statement: 2 points* *The history of your chosen consumer good: 2 points* *Statistics from reputable sources indicating the current market value of your chosen consumer good in X country (these should support your thesis statement): 1 point* *Factors contributing to the good's rise/fall: 2 points* *Your opinion of what the future of this good looks like, with evidence from reputable sources to support it: 1 point* *Works Cited AND in-text references: 1 point* | 1 | 402 | 4.5 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjb7uyd | fjb6t9o | 1,583,188,236 | 1,583,187,633 | 27 | 3 | So, I’m teaching writing to first year undergraduates. Their first papers were absolutely awful and I couldn’t detect claims or arguments. After having them talk through their papers, though, it was really clear that they did have arguments and claims, but they were running into two problems: (1) They have been conditioned not to take strong stances; which prevents them from taking clear stances. (2) They have no concept of how paragraphs should work. Students would start a point at the start of one paragraph and reach the end of it by the middle of the next paragraph, where they would then begin another point. Or they would intertwine points throughout. Often, this meant that their sentences made sense, but not how they were supposed to fit together. Also, it meant that often the critical sentence in an argument was buried in the middle of the paragraph. After discussing this with them and going through their papers, the clarity of their papers increased tremendously. It’s still bad...but it’s bad in a way that’s clear and which then allows me to actually give meaningful feedback. So...yes, rubrics...but if you have the bandwidth, consider spending some time on what you expect their papers to look like and how you expect them to be structured. | Is it possible to not assign essays? As in, find some other writing format that makes sense for your field--I've found annotated bibliographies are pretty magical for teaching research, and response essays improve when I give them extremely specific goals. Also, echoing rubrics. AND including a space on the rubric for 'being on topic' because holy mother of cheese, that is a thing. Oh, last thing: if you have time in your semester, I would suggest a grade norming mini lesson. Show them what a good paper looks like, what a bad paper looks like, what a good but poorly worded paper looks like, etc. | 1 | 603 | 9 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjbbghw | fjb75ss | 1,583,189,858 | 1,583,187,834 | 7 | 6 | I was the same way and made a few substantial changes that made a huge impact. These are a few of the tools I started using depending on size/scope of the assignment. * Depending on the topic, I require them to use Diigo if they have to do any research. * Peer evaluation prior to final submission. They hate it but I love it. They use a rubric to critique each other and I require a copy of the rubric but I do not look at this draft. * Self-critique checklist. This acts as a cover sheet but also includes the key elements of the rubric (including quality). Many times they grade themselves quite harshly. * For big assignments, I have them make the rubric. I tell them what I want and have to ultimately approve it but this was probably the biggest game changer - though I only use it for certain assignments. I’ve also adjusted several writing assignments and now require them to take content and create blog posts, infographics, tweets, etc. | As everyone else said: very detailed rubrics that clearly award points for specific content is key to ensuring students are graded fairly and not just on their writing abilities. I provided a made-up rubric example to illustrate what I mean by grading for specific content. I often will provide partial credit and will explain why in my grading, for example: 0.5/1: You gave your opinion on what the future of bananas as a consumer good looks like, but you didn't provide any evidence for it. Additionally, I will often provide extra credit part of the way through the semester (once they get the shock of the first few grades under their belts) to any student that takes their assignments to the campus writing center for revision. I allow them to take any assignment from the time I announce the EC opportunity to the writing center, and simply ask that they provide a few bullet points detailing the suggestions and revisions that they get from their session. I've found that students who do this noticeably improve their writing as the semester goes on! *Rubric Example* *Write a 350 word research essay about ONE current consumer good that has recently been either rising or falling in popularity (10 points total)* *Thesis statement: 2 points* *The history of your chosen consumer good: 2 points* *Statistics from reputable sources indicating the current market value of your chosen consumer good in X country (these should support your thesis statement): 1 point* *Factors contributing to the good's rise/fall: 2 points* *Your opinion of what the future of this good looks like, with evidence from reputable sources to support it: 1 point* *Works Cited AND in-text references: 1 point* | 1 | 2,024 | 1.166667 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjbbghw | fjb6t9o | 1,583,189,858 | 1,583,187,633 | 7 | 3 | I was the same way and made a few substantial changes that made a huge impact. These are a few of the tools I started using depending on size/scope of the assignment. * Depending on the topic, I require them to use Diigo if they have to do any research. * Peer evaluation prior to final submission. They hate it but I love it. They use a rubric to critique each other and I require a copy of the rubric but I do not look at this draft. * Self-critique checklist. This acts as a cover sheet but also includes the key elements of the rubric (including quality). Many times they grade themselves quite harshly. * For big assignments, I have them make the rubric. I tell them what I want and have to ultimately approve it but this was probably the biggest game changer - though I only use it for certain assignments. I’ve also adjusted several writing assignments and now require them to take content and create blog posts, infographics, tweets, etc. | Is it possible to not assign essays? As in, find some other writing format that makes sense for your field--I've found annotated bibliographies are pretty magical for teaching research, and response essays improve when I give them extremely specific goals. Also, echoing rubrics. AND including a space on the rubric for 'being on topic' because holy mother of cheese, that is a thing. Oh, last thing: if you have time in your semester, I would suggest a grade norming mini lesson. Show them what a good paper looks like, what a bad paper looks like, what a good but poorly worded paper looks like, etc. | 1 | 2,225 | 2.333333 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjb75ss | fjb6t9o | 1,583,187,834 | 1,583,187,633 | 6 | 3 | As everyone else said: very detailed rubrics that clearly award points for specific content is key to ensuring students are graded fairly and not just on their writing abilities. I provided a made-up rubric example to illustrate what I mean by grading for specific content. I often will provide partial credit and will explain why in my grading, for example: 0.5/1: You gave your opinion on what the future of bananas as a consumer good looks like, but you didn't provide any evidence for it. Additionally, I will often provide extra credit part of the way through the semester (once they get the shock of the first few grades under their belts) to any student that takes their assignments to the campus writing center for revision. I allow them to take any assignment from the time I announce the EC opportunity to the writing center, and simply ask that they provide a few bullet points detailing the suggestions and revisions that they get from their session. I've found that students who do this noticeably improve their writing as the semester goes on! *Rubric Example* *Write a 350 word research essay about ONE current consumer good that has recently been either rising or falling in popularity (10 points total)* *Thesis statement: 2 points* *The history of your chosen consumer good: 2 points* *Statistics from reputable sources indicating the current market value of your chosen consumer good in X country (these should support your thesis statement): 1 point* *Factors contributing to the good's rise/fall: 2 points* *Your opinion of what the future of this good looks like, with evidence from reputable sources to support it: 1 point* *Works Cited AND in-text references: 1 point* | Is it possible to not assign essays? As in, find some other writing format that makes sense for your field--I've found annotated bibliographies are pretty magical for teaching research, and response essays improve when I give them extremely specific goals. Also, echoing rubrics. AND including a space on the rubric for 'being on topic' because holy mother of cheese, that is a thing. Oh, last thing: if you have time in your semester, I would suggest a grade norming mini lesson. Show them what a good paper looks like, what a bad paper looks like, what a good but poorly worded paper looks like, etc. | 1 | 201 | 2 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjbm7hc | fjcaj7g | 1,583,196,453 | 1,583,213,275 | 4 | 6 | Here's a thought: Teach your students some basic structure for essay writing... or at least make some resources available and make your expectations clear. | Yes to rubrics and all that--but I want to suggest that the general attitude of "these essays suck" and joking that we need beer to survive this grading is also unhelpful. Teaching is an experiment and grading is your results. Did the experiment work? No? Then back to the drawing board. You change your methods and test again. It's your job. To expect to run continual experiments with perfect results is irrational and masochistic. We can make our experiment process easier or more efficient, but we have to be prepared to fail and try again--and probably more often than we succeed. Staying optimistic and grateful to do this work is a good tonic for frustration. Empathy is also healthy. Students are giving it all they've got in some sense--even when they're not. Their lack of skill is generally not their fault, nor ours. Are they sleeping? Hungry? Being abused? Did they grow up in a household where everyone spoke Spanish to them and go to a high school that was underfunded and overcrowded? Are the working 40 hours a week to pay for their mom's prescriptions? Are they undocumented? Depressed? Anxious? Autistic? Or just not that convinced that college is worth the loans, which may or may not be true? I find many of these factors impact most of my kids, so I don't take it personally when they can't perform. They don't want to be "bad" writers and slackers any more than we want them to be. One of my students was strangled. She didn't have her essay done but came on time to our appointment to look it over. I saw the finger-shaped bruises on her neck and the burst blood vessels in her eyes. The fact that she stayed in my class and improved her writing was a fucking miracle. I was ecstatic to grade her work, rough as it was. She stayed in school! I was like, yes, give me all your terrible sentences! Just stay here and stay safe and let me catch a glimpse of you every now and then now that you're not in my class anymore, just so I know you're okay. We can control what we can control: Our teaching, our grading process, our attitudes. Doing what we can is not passing the buck, but acknowledging that we work in a rigged system and that we are 100% human. We are also *human:* We can be patient and faithful. We can change systems slowly if we try. And we have an enormous community (like here!) to lean on if we look for it. We do good stuff. Our self-love should equal or exceed our critique of ourselves and our students. | 0 | 16,822 | 1.5 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjcaj7g | fjc4ybf | 1,583,213,275 | 1,583,208,721 | 6 | 5 | Yes to rubrics and all that--but I want to suggest that the general attitude of "these essays suck" and joking that we need beer to survive this grading is also unhelpful. Teaching is an experiment and grading is your results. Did the experiment work? No? Then back to the drawing board. You change your methods and test again. It's your job. To expect to run continual experiments with perfect results is irrational and masochistic. We can make our experiment process easier or more efficient, but we have to be prepared to fail and try again--and probably more often than we succeed. Staying optimistic and grateful to do this work is a good tonic for frustration. Empathy is also healthy. Students are giving it all they've got in some sense--even when they're not. Their lack of skill is generally not their fault, nor ours. Are they sleeping? Hungry? Being abused? Did they grow up in a household where everyone spoke Spanish to them and go to a high school that was underfunded and overcrowded? Are the working 40 hours a week to pay for their mom's prescriptions? Are they undocumented? Depressed? Anxious? Autistic? Or just not that convinced that college is worth the loans, which may or may not be true? I find many of these factors impact most of my kids, so I don't take it personally when they can't perform. They don't want to be "bad" writers and slackers any more than we want them to be. One of my students was strangled. She didn't have her essay done but came on time to our appointment to look it over. I saw the finger-shaped bruises on her neck and the burst blood vessels in her eyes. The fact that she stayed in my class and improved her writing was a fucking miracle. I was ecstatic to grade her work, rough as it was. She stayed in school! I was like, yes, give me all your terrible sentences! Just stay here and stay safe and let me catch a glimpse of you every now and then now that you're not in my class anymore, just so I know you're okay. We can control what we can control: Our teaching, our grading process, our attitudes. Doing what we can is not passing the buck, but acknowledging that we work in a rigged system and that we are 100% human. We are also *human:* We can be patient and faithful. We can change systems slowly if we try. And we have an enormous community (like here!) to lean on if we look for it. We do good stuff. Our self-love should equal or exceed our critique of ourselves and our students. | Hiya! Writing Instructor here. I do a lot of faculty outreach and this is the number 1 compliant I see. My general advice: 1. Make your assignment prompt annoyingly specific. 2. Create a formatting template or require specific formatting guidelines (eg APA) 3. Require students go to the Writing Center or other academic tutoring agency on campus at least once with their paper to get feedback. Make the tutoring a requirement of its own with its own grade or embed the grade in the assignment itself (eg failure to attend tutoring results in a 10% reduction from final earned grade) 4. I assume this isn’t a writing-based class, but consider offering opportunity’s for peer review. Peer review needs to be purposeful though. One of my favorite peer review tactics is to get students into groups and have them read their essays aloud to one another. As the other student is listening, they have to come up with 3 questions about the reader’s paper, specifically areas where they’re confused. The reader tends to hear grammatical errors and other organization issues when they’re forced to read aloud. 5. RUBRICS. Use them religiously. Like the assignment prompt, these need to be annoyingly specific. 6. When you collect the essays, ask students to print the rubric and go through their assignment with the rubric. Give them the opportunity to assess their own work. This might give you insight into if there’s something you’re miscommunicating (Like is they all think they did fantastic but the essays are garbage) or some other issue (like they’re lazy and not doing the work but still think they deserve an A). | 1 | 4,554 | 1.2 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjcaj7g | fjb6t9o | 1,583,213,275 | 1,583,187,633 | 6 | 3 | Yes to rubrics and all that--but I want to suggest that the general attitude of "these essays suck" and joking that we need beer to survive this grading is also unhelpful. Teaching is an experiment and grading is your results. Did the experiment work? No? Then back to the drawing board. You change your methods and test again. It's your job. To expect to run continual experiments with perfect results is irrational and masochistic. We can make our experiment process easier or more efficient, but we have to be prepared to fail and try again--and probably more often than we succeed. Staying optimistic and grateful to do this work is a good tonic for frustration. Empathy is also healthy. Students are giving it all they've got in some sense--even when they're not. Their lack of skill is generally not their fault, nor ours. Are they sleeping? Hungry? Being abused? Did they grow up in a household where everyone spoke Spanish to them and go to a high school that was underfunded and overcrowded? Are the working 40 hours a week to pay for their mom's prescriptions? Are they undocumented? Depressed? Anxious? Autistic? Or just not that convinced that college is worth the loans, which may or may not be true? I find many of these factors impact most of my kids, so I don't take it personally when they can't perform. They don't want to be "bad" writers and slackers any more than we want them to be. One of my students was strangled. She didn't have her essay done but came on time to our appointment to look it over. I saw the finger-shaped bruises on her neck and the burst blood vessels in her eyes. The fact that she stayed in my class and improved her writing was a fucking miracle. I was ecstatic to grade her work, rough as it was. She stayed in school! I was like, yes, give me all your terrible sentences! Just stay here and stay safe and let me catch a glimpse of you every now and then now that you're not in my class anymore, just so I know you're okay. We can control what we can control: Our teaching, our grading process, our attitudes. Doing what we can is not passing the buck, but acknowledging that we work in a rigged system and that we are 100% human. We are also *human:* We can be patient and faithful. We can change systems slowly if we try. And we have an enormous community (like here!) to lean on if we look for it. We do good stuff. Our self-love should equal or exceed our critique of ourselves and our students. | Is it possible to not assign essays? As in, find some other writing format that makes sense for your field--I've found annotated bibliographies are pretty magical for teaching research, and response essays improve when I give them extremely specific goals. Also, echoing rubrics. AND including a space on the rubric for 'being on topic' because holy mother of cheese, that is a thing. Oh, last thing: if you have time in your semester, I would suggest a grade norming mini lesson. Show them what a good paper looks like, what a bad paper looks like, what a good but poorly worded paper looks like, etc. | 1 | 25,642 | 2 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjcaj7g | fjbgdfu | 1,583,213,275 | 1,583,192,676 | 6 | 4 | Yes to rubrics and all that--but I want to suggest that the general attitude of "these essays suck" and joking that we need beer to survive this grading is also unhelpful. Teaching is an experiment and grading is your results. Did the experiment work? No? Then back to the drawing board. You change your methods and test again. It's your job. To expect to run continual experiments with perfect results is irrational and masochistic. We can make our experiment process easier or more efficient, but we have to be prepared to fail and try again--and probably more often than we succeed. Staying optimistic and grateful to do this work is a good tonic for frustration. Empathy is also healthy. Students are giving it all they've got in some sense--even when they're not. Their lack of skill is generally not their fault, nor ours. Are they sleeping? Hungry? Being abused? Did they grow up in a household where everyone spoke Spanish to them and go to a high school that was underfunded and overcrowded? Are the working 40 hours a week to pay for their mom's prescriptions? Are they undocumented? Depressed? Anxious? Autistic? Or just not that convinced that college is worth the loans, which may or may not be true? I find many of these factors impact most of my kids, so I don't take it personally when they can't perform. They don't want to be "bad" writers and slackers any more than we want them to be. One of my students was strangled. She didn't have her essay done but came on time to our appointment to look it over. I saw the finger-shaped bruises on her neck and the burst blood vessels in her eyes. The fact that she stayed in my class and improved her writing was a fucking miracle. I was ecstatic to grade her work, rough as it was. She stayed in school! I was like, yes, give me all your terrible sentences! Just stay here and stay safe and let me catch a glimpse of you every now and then now that you're not in my class anymore, just so I know you're okay. We can control what we can control: Our teaching, our grading process, our attitudes. Doing what we can is not passing the buck, but acknowledging that we work in a rigged system and that we are 100% human. We are also *human:* We can be patient and faithful. We can change systems slowly if we try. And we have an enormous community (like here!) to lean on if we look for it. We do good stuff. Our self-love should equal or exceed our critique of ourselves and our students. | Doesn’t anyone else have useless Writing Centers like ours? All the tutors are undergrads themselves with only limited understanding of good writing themselves. I tried a process of requiring my students to work with a tutor this semester in between draft 1 and draft 2 of an APA style research paper. It was 90% useless and in some cases even counterproductive as tutors told my bad writers how good they were. 🙄 | 1 | 20,599 | 1.5 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjcaj7g | fjbk8ax | 1,583,213,275 | 1,583,195,160 | 6 | 4 | Yes to rubrics and all that--but I want to suggest that the general attitude of "these essays suck" and joking that we need beer to survive this grading is also unhelpful. Teaching is an experiment and grading is your results. Did the experiment work? No? Then back to the drawing board. You change your methods and test again. It's your job. To expect to run continual experiments with perfect results is irrational and masochistic. We can make our experiment process easier or more efficient, but we have to be prepared to fail and try again--and probably more often than we succeed. Staying optimistic and grateful to do this work is a good tonic for frustration. Empathy is also healthy. Students are giving it all they've got in some sense--even when they're not. Their lack of skill is generally not their fault, nor ours. Are they sleeping? Hungry? Being abused? Did they grow up in a household where everyone spoke Spanish to them and go to a high school that was underfunded and overcrowded? Are the working 40 hours a week to pay for their mom's prescriptions? Are they undocumented? Depressed? Anxious? Autistic? Or just not that convinced that college is worth the loans, which may or may not be true? I find many of these factors impact most of my kids, so I don't take it personally when they can't perform. They don't want to be "bad" writers and slackers any more than we want them to be. One of my students was strangled. She didn't have her essay done but came on time to our appointment to look it over. I saw the finger-shaped bruises on her neck and the burst blood vessels in her eyes. The fact that she stayed in my class and improved her writing was a fucking miracle. I was ecstatic to grade her work, rough as it was. She stayed in school! I was like, yes, give me all your terrible sentences! Just stay here and stay safe and let me catch a glimpse of you every now and then now that you're not in my class anymore, just so I know you're okay. We can control what we can control: Our teaching, our grading process, our attitudes. Doing what we can is not passing the buck, but acknowledging that we work in a rigged system and that we are 100% human. We are also *human:* We can be patient and faithful. We can change systems slowly if we try. And we have an enormous community (like here!) to lean on if we look for it. We do good stuff. Our self-love should equal or exceed our critique of ourselves and our students. | Some of this depends on the subject/field. Unless it is a language or literature course, I tend to think grammar and spelling mistakes - or confusing writing - shouldn't detract much from the grade so long as you can understand the gist of what is being said - determine whether that substance merits a particular grade and go with that. Perhaps do so with a note asking them to either come in to see you during office hours, or explaining they had many mistakes and should seek assistance from the university writing center, ask for a re-write, etc. Rubrics can be helpful as others have pointed out, but they can also cause their own set of problems. At times they can be overly arbitrary and result in students getting grades that are too high, or worse, too low compared to the actual quality and substance of the paper. Make sure to give yourself some wiggle room if using one (or use it but don't release it to students). Talk about the issue in class, even if briefly, and say that you'll be grading harder on grammar and spelling on the next essay so students will be expected to proofread better if they expect to maintain a similar grade on the next assignment. If it is really bad? Grade it accordingly - one thing I believe grad students, and full-fledged PhDs, have a hard-time doing when they first start teaching is being willing to fail a student on an assignment. But, sometimes it is clear that the student just didn't give a shit, didn't pay attention in class, hasn't read anything and tried to throw the essay together in an hour right before it was due and in those cases they 'earned' an F, or at least a D. If you just can't tell what they are saying at all? Fail them and explain, briefly, why - and ask them to come see you. If they engage the material, but seem woefully out of their depth, maybe go a bit easier on them with the caveat that they must come speak with you outside class-time to discuss their performance and understanding of course material. Two exceptions to this I would personally make: (1) Junior/Senior courses should be held to higher standards than introductory courses, courses open to all majors, basic pre-reqs; etc and (2) courses where there is a special emphasis on grammar, spelling, clear communication of ideas are going to necessarily require this be a serious component of the student's grade (e.g. literature; history; language; philosophy; education; communications) | 1 | 18,115 | 1.5 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjbndpp | fjcaj7g | 1,583,197,218 | 1,583,213,275 | 4 | 6 | You didn't write like that as an undergrad, though you objectively wrote more poorly than you do now--not everyone is interested or capable of going as far as required to be in your current position. I suspect that you should be looking to make an analysis across the body of the class for trends that you see commonly and address those specifically. What sorts of mistakes do you see most commonly? Teach those. You can't fix everything, but you can at least work on the more onerous problems. | Yes to rubrics and all that--but I want to suggest that the general attitude of "these essays suck" and joking that we need beer to survive this grading is also unhelpful. Teaching is an experiment and grading is your results. Did the experiment work? No? Then back to the drawing board. You change your methods and test again. It's your job. To expect to run continual experiments with perfect results is irrational and masochistic. We can make our experiment process easier or more efficient, but we have to be prepared to fail and try again--and probably more often than we succeed. Staying optimistic and grateful to do this work is a good tonic for frustration. Empathy is also healthy. Students are giving it all they've got in some sense--even when they're not. Their lack of skill is generally not their fault, nor ours. Are they sleeping? Hungry? Being abused? Did they grow up in a household where everyone spoke Spanish to them and go to a high school that was underfunded and overcrowded? Are the working 40 hours a week to pay for their mom's prescriptions? Are they undocumented? Depressed? Anxious? Autistic? Or just not that convinced that college is worth the loans, which may or may not be true? I find many of these factors impact most of my kids, so I don't take it personally when they can't perform. They don't want to be "bad" writers and slackers any more than we want them to be. One of my students was strangled. She didn't have her essay done but came on time to our appointment to look it over. I saw the finger-shaped bruises on her neck and the burst blood vessels in her eyes. The fact that she stayed in my class and improved her writing was a fucking miracle. I was ecstatic to grade her work, rough as it was. She stayed in school! I was like, yes, give me all your terrible sentences! Just stay here and stay safe and let me catch a glimpse of you every now and then now that you're not in my class anymore, just so I know you're okay. We can control what we can control: Our teaching, our grading process, our attitudes. Doing what we can is not passing the buck, but acknowledging that we work in a rigged system and that we are 100% human. We are also *human:* We can be patient and faithful. We can change systems slowly if we try. And we have an enormous community (like here!) to lean on if we look for it. We do good stuff. Our self-love should equal or exceed our critique of ourselves and our students. | 0 | 16,057 | 1.5 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjcaj7g | fjbvn9l | 1,583,213,275 | 1,583,202,428 | 6 | 3 | Yes to rubrics and all that--but I want to suggest that the general attitude of "these essays suck" and joking that we need beer to survive this grading is also unhelpful. Teaching is an experiment and grading is your results. Did the experiment work? No? Then back to the drawing board. You change your methods and test again. It's your job. To expect to run continual experiments with perfect results is irrational and masochistic. We can make our experiment process easier or more efficient, but we have to be prepared to fail and try again--and probably more often than we succeed. Staying optimistic and grateful to do this work is a good tonic for frustration. Empathy is also healthy. Students are giving it all they've got in some sense--even when they're not. Their lack of skill is generally not their fault, nor ours. Are they sleeping? Hungry? Being abused? Did they grow up in a household where everyone spoke Spanish to them and go to a high school that was underfunded and overcrowded? Are the working 40 hours a week to pay for their mom's prescriptions? Are they undocumented? Depressed? Anxious? Autistic? Or just not that convinced that college is worth the loans, which may or may not be true? I find many of these factors impact most of my kids, so I don't take it personally when they can't perform. They don't want to be "bad" writers and slackers any more than we want them to be. One of my students was strangled. She didn't have her essay done but came on time to our appointment to look it over. I saw the finger-shaped bruises on her neck and the burst blood vessels in her eyes. The fact that she stayed in my class and improved her writing was a fucking miracle. I was ecstatic to grade her work, rough as it was. She stayed in school! I was like, yes, give me all your terrible sentences! Just stay here and stay safe and let me catch a glimpse of you every now and then now that you're not in my class anymore, just so I know you're okay. We can control what we can control: Our teaching, our grading process, our attitudes. Doing what we can is not passing the buck, but acknowledging that we work in a rigged system and that we are 100% human. We are also *human:* We can be patient and faithful. We can change systems slowly if we try. And we have an enormous community (like here!) to lean on if we look for it. We do good stuff. Our self-love should equal or exceed our critique of ourselves and our students. | One strategy I’ve had success with is diagramming. Having students diagram their essays shows them how the various parts fit together. This doesn’t help you now, but it greatly supports the essay writing process. | 1 | 10,847 | 2 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjbm7hc | fjc4ybf | 1,583,196,453 | 1,583,208,721 | 4 | 5 | Here's a thought: Teach your students some basic structure for essay writing... or at least make some resources available and make your expectations clear. | Hiya! Writing Instructor here. I do a lot of faculty outreach and this is the number 1 compliant I see. My general advice: 1. Make your assignment prompt annoyingly specific. 2. Create a formatting template or require specific formatting guidelines (eg APA) 3. Require students go to the Writing Center or other academic tutoring agency on campus at least once with their paper to get feedback. Make the tutoring a requirement of its own with its own grade or embed the grade in the assignment itself (eg failure to attend tutoring results in a 10% reduction from final earned grade) 4. I assume this isn’t a writing-based class, but consider offering opportunity’s for peer review. Peer review needs to be purposeful though. One of my favorite peer review tactics is to get students into groups and have them read their essays aloud to one another. As the other student is listening, they have to come up with 3 questions about the reader’s paper, specifically areas where they’re confused. The reader tends to hear grammatical errors and other organization issues when they’re forced to read aloud. 5. RUBRICS. Use them religiously. Like the assignment prompt, these need to be annoyingly specific. 6. When you collect the essays, ask students to print the rubric and go through their assignment with the rubric. Give them the opportunity to assess their own work. This might give you insight into if there’s something you’re miscommunicating (Like is they all think they did fantastic but the essays are garbage) or some other issue (like they’re lazy and not doing the work but still think they deserve an A). | 0 | 12,268 | 1.25 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjb6t9o | fjbm7hc | 1,583,187,633 | 1,583,196,453 | 3 | 4 | Is it possible to not assign essays? As in, find some other writing format that makes sense for your field--I've found annotated bibliographies are pretty magical for teaching research, and response essays improve when I give them extremely specific goals. Also, echoing rubrics. AND including a space on the rubric for 'being on topic' because holy mother of cheese, that is a thing. Oh, last thing: if you have time in your semester, I would suggest a grade norming mini lesson. Show them what a good paper looks like, what a bad paper looks like, what a good but poorly worded paper looks like, etc. | Here's a thought: Teach your students some basic structure for essay writing... or at least make some resources available and make your expectations clear. | 0 | 8,820 | 1.333333 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjb6t9o | fjc4ybf | 1,583,187,633 | 1,583,208,721 | 3 | 5 | Is it possible to not assign essays? As in, find some other writing format that makes sense for your field--I've found annotated bibliographies are pretty magical for teaching research, and response essays improve when I give them extremely specific goals. Also, echoing rubrics. AND including a space on the rubric for 'being on topic' because holy mother of cheese, that is a thing. Oh, last thing: if you have time in your semester, I would suggest a grade norming mini lesson. Show them what a good paper looks like, what a bad paper looks like, what a good but poorly worded paper looks like, etc. | Hiya! Writing Instructor here. I do a lot of faculty outreach and this is the number 1 compliant I see. My general advice: 1. Make your assignment prompt annoyingly specific. 2. Create a formatting template or require specific formatting guidelines (eg APA) 3. Require students go to the Writing Center or other academic tutoring agency on campus at least once with their paper to get feedback. Make the tutoring a requirement of its own with its own grade or embed the grade in the assignment itself (eg failure to attend tutoring results in a 10% reduction from final earned grade) 4. I assume this isn’t a writing-based class, but consider offering opportunity’s for peer review. Peer review needs to be purposeful though. One of my favorite peer review tactics is to get students into groups and have them read their essays aloud to one another. As the other student is listening, they have to come up with 3 questions about the reader’s paper, specifically areas where they’re confused. The reader tends to hear grammatical errors and other organization issues when they’re forced to read aloud. 5. RUBRICS. Use them religiously. Like the assignment prompt, these need to be annoyingly specific. 6. When you collect the essays, ask students to print the rubric and go through their assignment with the rubric. Give them the opportunity to assess their own work. This might give you insight into if there’s something you’re miscommunicating (Like is they all think they did fantastic but the essays are garbage) or some other issue (like they’re lazy and not doing the work but still think they deserve an A). | 0 | 21,088 | 1.666667 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjc4ybf | fjbgdfu | 1,583,208,721 | 1,583,192,676 | 5 | 4 | Hiya! Writing Instructor here. I do a lot of faculty outreach and this is the number 1 compliant I see. My general advice: 1. Make your assignment prompt annoyingly specific. 2. Create a formatting template or require specific formatting guidelines (eg APA) 3. Require students go to the Writing Center or other academic tutoring agency on campus at least once with their paper to get feedback. Make the tutoring a requirement of its own with its own grade or embed the grade in the assignment itself (eg failure to attend tutoring results in a 10% reduction from final earned grade) 4. I assume this isn’t a writing-based class, but consider offering opportunity’s for peer review. Peer review needs to be purposeful though. One of my favorite peer review tactics is to get students into groups and have them read their essays aloud to one another. As the other student is listening, they have to come up with 3 questions about the reader’s paper, specifically areas where they’re confused. The reader tends to hear grammatical errors and other organization issues when they’re forced to read aloud. 5. RUBRICS. Use them religiously. Like the assignment prompt, these need to be annoyingly specific. 6. When you collect the essays, ask students to print the rubric and go through their assignment with the rubric. Give them the opportunity to assess their own work. This might give you insight into if there’s something you’re miscommunicating (Like is they all think they did fantastic but the essays are garbage) or some other issue (like they’re lazy and not doing the work but still think they deserve an A). | Doesn’t anyone else have useless Writing Centers like ours? All the tutors are undergrads themselves with only limited understanding of good writing themselves. I tried a process of requiring my students to work with a tutor this semester in between draft 1 and draft 2 of an APA style research paper. It was 90% useless and in some cases even counterproductive as tutors told my bad writers how good they were. 🙄 | 1 | 16,045 | 1.25 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjc4ybf | fjbk8ax | 1,583,208,721 | 1,583,195,160 | 5 | 4 | Hiya! Writing Instructor here. I do a lot of faculty outreach and this is the number 1 compliant I see. My general advice: 1. Make your assignment prompt annoyingly specific. 2. Create a formatting template or require specific formatting guidelines (eg APA) 3. Require students go to the Writing Center or other academic tutoring agency on campus at least once with their paper to get feedback. Make the tutoring a requirement of its own with its own grade or embed the grade in the assignment itself (eg failure to attend tutoring results in a 10% reduction from final earned grade) 4. I assume this isn’t a writing-based class, but consider offering opportunity’s for peer review. Peer review needs to be purposeful though. One of my favorite peer review tactics is to get students into groups and have them read their essays aloud to one another. As the other student is listening, they have to come up with 3 questions about the reader’s paper, specifically areas where they’re confused. The reader tends to hear grammatical errors and other organization issues when they’re forced to read aloud. 5. RUBRICS. Use them religiously. Like the assignment prompt, these need to be annoyingly specific. 6. When you collect the essays, ask students to print the rubric and go through their assignment with the rubric. Give them the opportunity to assess their own work. This might give you insight into if there’s something you’re miscommunicating (Like is they all think they did fantastic but the essays are garbage) or some other issue (like they’re lazy and not doing the work but still think they deserve an A). | Some of this depends on the subject/field. Unless it is a language or literature course, I tend to think grammar and spelling mistakes - or confusing writing - shouldn't detract much from the grade so long as you can understand the gist of what is being said - determine whether that substance merits a particular grade and go with that. Perhaps do so with a note asking them to either come in to see you during office hours, or explaining they had many mistakes and should seek assistance from the university writing center, ask for a re-write, etc. Rubrics can be helpful as others have pointed out, but they can also cause their own set of problems. At times they can be overly arbitrary and result in students getting grades that are too high, or worse, too low compared to the actual quality and substance of the paper. Make sure to give yourself some wiggle room if using one (or use it but don't release it to students). Talk about the issue in class, even if briefly, and say that you'll be grading harder on grammar and spelling on the next essay so students will be expected to proofread better if they expect to maintain a similar grade on the next assignment. If it is really bad? Grade it accordingly - one thing I believe grad students, and full-fledged PhDs, have a hard-time doing when they first start teaching is being willing to fail a student on an assignment. But, sometimes it is clear that the student just didn't give a shit, didn't pay attention in class, hasn't read anything and tried to throw the essay together in an hour right before it was due and in those cases they 'earned' an F, or at least a D. If you just can't tell what they are saying at all? Fail them and explain, briefly, why - and ask them to come see you. If they engage the material, but seem woefully out of their depth, maybe go a bit easier on them with the caveat that they must come speak with you outside class-time to discuss their performance and understanding of course material. Two exceptions to this I would personally make: (1) Junior/Senior courses should be held to higher standards than introductory courses, courses open to all majors, basic pre-reqs; etc and (2) courses where there is a special emphasis on grammar, spelling, clear communication of ideas are going to necessarily require this be a serious component of the student's grade (e.g. literature; history; language; philosophy; education; communications) | 1 | 13,561 | 1.25 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjbndpp | fjc4ybf | 1,583,197,218 | 1,583,208,721 | 4 | 5 | You didn't write like that as an undergrad, though you objectively wrote more poorly than you do now--not everyone is interested or capable of going as far as required to be in your current position. I suspect that you should be looking to make an analysis across the body of the class for trends that you see commonly and address those specifically. What sorts of mistakes do you see most commonly? Teach those. You can't fix everything, but you can at least work on the more onerous problems. | Hiya! Writing Instructor here. I do a lot of faculty outreach and this is the number 1 compliant I see. My general advice: 1. Make your assignment prompt annoyingly specific. 2. Create a formatting template or require specific formatting guidelines (eg APA) 3. Require students go to the Writing Center or other academic tutoring agency on campus at least once with their paper to get feedback. Make the tutoring a requirement of its own with its own grade or embed the grade in the assignment itself (eg failure to attend tutoring results in a 10% reduction from final earned grade) 4. I assume this isn’t a writing-based class, but consider offering opportunity’s for peer review. Peer review needs to be purposeful though. One of my favorite peer review tactics is to get students into groups and have them read their essays aloud to one another. As the other student is listening, they have to come up with 3 questions about the reader’s paper, specifically areas where they’re confused. The reader tends to hear grammatical errors and other organization issues when they’re forced to read aloud. 5. RUBRICS. Use them religiously. Like the assignment prompt, these need to be annoyingly specific. 6. When you collect the essays, ask students to print the rubric and go through their assignment with the rubric. Give them the opportunity to assess their own work. This might give you insight into if there’s something you’re miscommunicating (Like is they all think they did fantastic but the essays are garbage) or some other issue (like they’re lazy and not doing the work but still think they deserve an A). | 0 | 11,503 | 1.25 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjc4ybf | fjbvn9l | 1,583,208,721 | 1,583,202,428 | 5 | 3 | Hiya! Writing Instructor here. I do a lot of faculty outreach and this is the number 1 compliant I see. My general advice: 1. Make your assignment prompt annoyingly specific. 2. Create a formatting template or require specific formatting guidelines (eg APA) 3. Require students go to the Writing Center or other academic tutoring agency on campus at least once with their paper to get feedback. Make the tutoring a requirement of its own with its own grade or embed the grade in the assignment itself (eg failure to attend tutoring results in a 10% reduction from final earned grade) 4. I assume this isn’t a writing-based class, but consider offering opportunity’s for peer review. Peer review needs to be purposeful though. One of my favorite peer review tactics is to get students into groups and have them read their essays aloud to one another. As the other student is listening, they have to come up with 3 questions about the reader’s paper, specifically areas where they’re confused. The reader tends to hear grammatical errors and other organization issues when they’re forced to read aloud. 5. RUBRICS. Use them religiously. Like the assignment prompt, these need to be annoyingly specific. 6. When you collect the essays, ask students to print the rubric and go through their assignment with the rubric. Give them the opportunity to assess their own work. This might give you insight into if there’s something you’re miscommunicating (Like is they all think they did fantastic but the essays are garbage) or some other issue (like they’re lazy and not doing the work but still think they deserve an A). | One strategy I’ve had success with is diagramming. Having students diagram their essays shows them how the various parts fit together. This doesn’t help you now, but it greatly supports the essay writing process. | 1 | 6,293 | 1.666667 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjbgdfu | fjb6t9o | 1,583,192,676 | 1,583,187,633 | 4 | 3 | Doesn’t anyone else have useless Writing Centers like ours? All the tutors are undergrads themselves with only limited understanding of good writing themselves. I tried a process of requiring my students to work with a tutor this semester in between draft 1 and draft 2 of an APA style research paper. It was 90% useless and in some cases even counterproductive as tutors told my bad writers how good they were. 🙄 | Is it possible to not assign essays? As in, find some other writing format that makes sense for your field--I've found annotated bibliographies are pretty magical for teaching research, and response essays improve when I give them extremely specific goals. Also, echoing rubrics. AND including a space on the rubric for 'being on topic' because holy mother of cheese, that is a thing. Oh, last thing: if you have time in your semester, I would suggest a grade norming mini lesson. Show them what a good paper looks like, what a bad paper looks like, what a good but poorly worded paper looks like, etc. | 1 | 5,043 | 1.333333 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjb6t9o | fjbk8ax | 1,583,187,633 | 1,583,195,160 | 3 | 4 | Is it possible to not assign essays? As in, find some other writing format that makes sense for your field--I've found annotated bibliographies are pretty magical for teaching research, and response essays improve when I give them extremely specific goals. Also, echoing rubrics. AND including a space on the rubric for 'being on topic' because holy mother of cheese, that is a thing. Oh, last thing: if you have time in your semester, I would suggest a grade norming mini lesson. Show them what a good paper looks like, what a bad paper looks like, what a good but poorly worded paper looks like, etc. | Some of this depends on the subject/field. Unless it is a language or literature course, I tend to think grammar and spelling mistakes - or confusing writing - shouldn't detract much from the grade so long as you can understand the gist of what is being said - determine whether that substance merits a particular grade and go with that. Perhaps do so with a note asking them to either come in to see you during office hours, or explaining they had many mistakes and should seek assistance from the university writing center, ask for a re-write, etc. Rubrics can be helpful as others have pointed out, but they can also cause their own set of problems. At times they can be overly arbitrary and result in students getting grades that are too high, or worse, too low compared to the actual quality and substance of the paper. Make sure to give yourself some wiggle room if using one (or use it but don't release it to students). Talk about the issue in class, even if briefly, and say that you'll be grading harder on grammar and spelling on the next essay so students will be expected to proofread better if they expect to maintain a similar grade on the next assignment. If it is really bad? Grade it accordingly - one thing I believe grad students, and full-fledged PhDs, have a hard-time doing when they first start teaching is being willing to fail a student on an assignment. But, sometimes it is clear that the student just didn't give a shit, didn't pay attention in class, hasn't read anything and tried to throw the essay together in an hour right before it was due and in those cases they 'earned' an F, or at least a D. If you just can't tell what they are saying at all? Fail them and explain, briefly, why - and ask them to come see you. If they engage the material, but seem woefully out of their depth, maybe go a bit easier on them with the caveat that they must come speak with you outside class-time to discuss their performance and understanding of course material. Two exceptions to this I would personally make: (1) Junior/Senior courses should be held to higher standards than introductory courses, courses open to all majors, basic pre-reqs; etc and (2) courses where there is a special emphasis on grammar, spelling, clear communication of ideas are going to necessarily require this be a serious component of the student's grade (e.g. literature; history; language; philosophy; education; communications) | 0 | 7,527 | 1.333333 |
fcingy | askacademia_train | 0.98 | My undergraduate students suck at writing essays. How do I even grade them fairly? Long story short, my undergraduate students are terrible at writing essays. So bad, that I can't understand a single idea being communicated by many of them. I know that I most likely wrote like this in undergrad, but I'm having a hard time grading their papers consistently. What strategy do you use, and how have you been able to help improve your students' writing? | fjb6t9o | fjbndpp | 1,583,187,633 | 1,583,197,218 | 3 | 4 | Is it possible to not assign essays? As in, find some other writing format that makes sense for your field--I've found annotated bibliographies are pretty magical for teaching research, and response essays improve when I give them extremely specific goals. Also, echoing rubrics. AND including a space on the rubric for 'being on topic' because holy mother of cheese, that is a thing. Oh, last thing: if you have time in your semester, I would suggest a grade norming mini lesson. Show them what a good paper looks like, what a bad paper looks like, what a good but poorly worded paper looks like, etc. | You didn't write like that as an undergrad, though you objectively wrote more poorly than you do now--not everyone is interested or capable of going as far as required to be in your current position. I suspect that you should be looking to make an analysis across the body of the class for trends that you see commonly and address those specifically. What sorts of mistakes do you see most commonly? Teach those. You can't fix everything, but you can at least work on the more onerous problems. | 0 | 9,585 | 1.333333 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6otqs | gr6oqmt | 1,615,941,025 | 1,615,940,979 | 155 | 45 | No kids and a spouse who also has a career. It allowed me to spend as much time as I wanted publishing papers that I really enjoyed writing. I’m not crazy prolific, but I do tend to fall above the mean. The prolific folks I know in my field (social sciences) seem to be in that boat (at least in the earlier stages of their career). The most prolific person in my field publishes 20 or so a year first author. In chatting with him, it’s because he has a formula he uses to “tell the story” for each article. It works really well and his articles are always some of the best I ever read. | Countless writers have some variation of this, but I like David McCullough’s story. He saw an older author at a party who published nearly 100 books. When McCullough asked him how he was so prolific, he replied: “Simple. I write four pages every day.” There really is no trick to it, no shortcut. Just write—consistently! Now, obviously questions of quality quickly emerge, but in the short term, just write. | 1 | 46 | 3.444444 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6pnpa | gr6p1o4 | 1,615,941,465 | 1,615,941,143 | 118 | 108 | I publish significantly more than my peers (12-14 papers a year compared to a peer average of 4-5/yr). I don’t think there’s really any one secret, though. Here are a few things I try to keep in mind: 1. Pick projects that are important enough that even middling results yield papers. 2. Know when to wrap up a project into a paper (I.e. don’t do too many experiments). Once each of the important figures are in place, start writing immediately and finish writing in 3-4 days. 3. Say “no” to extraneous, non-productive tasks within the university. 4. Work HARD for the 9 hours you’re at work (no internet, no coffee breaks, no colleague gossip, short lunch), and try not to think about work the rest of the time (nights and weekends). 5. WRITE. Just write. Stop talking about writing. Stop thinking about writing. Just write. And love it. 6. Don’t vomit words onto paper. Think as you write, so that what you’re writing can be the first of three drafts (the third ready for publication). | I’m in history and area studies. I like to think of my projects in terms of trilogies of interrelated articles, which are vehicles to communicate new information and perspectives while the longer-term project is ongoing. Associating myself with European and East Asian grant-funded research projects has also helped, since those often have publication requirements, which less to articles in special issues, edited volume chapters, etc. Also, colleagues and I (at a poor institution where we had to push extra hard to get external funding and a chance to move) used to talk about the “minimum publishable unit” (MPU). An MPU roughly represents the amount of data and analysis necessary to make a valuable contribution to the field, such that it would be publishable as a journal article roughly 6,000-10,000 words in length. Thinking in terms of MPUs helped us restrain our natural tendency to put too much information into an article, and pushed us instead to streamline our writing and target a specific audience. For example: If an article draft is 12,000 words and covers two related topics... maybe that’s actually 2 MPUs, and ought to be divided into two articles, so the ideas have space to breathe. If a draft uses three methodologies to examine one subject... could it be 3 MPUs, each of which ought to go to a different journal? Could each part be fleshed out? If not, maybe it’s just 1 MPU. 4-6 MPUs, of course, would be a book. 1-2 of those MPUs could be published separately as articles earlier on. The idea isn’t to cheapen our work, but to avoid the compulsion to say everything in one massive super-article, and instead sharpen our arguments and speak to different audiences. I’ve seen senior European academics in my field do something similar. | 1 | 322 | 1.092593 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6pnpa | gr6oqmt | 1,615,941,465 | 1,615,940,979 | 118 | 45 | I publish significantly more than my peers (12-14 papers a year compared to a peer average of 4-5/yr). I don’t think there’s really any one secret, though. Here are a few things I try to keep in mind: 1. Pick projects that are important enough that even middling results yield papers. 2. Know when to wrap up a project into a paper (I.e. don’t do too many experiments). Once each of the important figures are in place, start writing immediately and finish writing in 3-4 days. 3. Say “no” to extraneous, non-productive tasks within the university. 4. Work HARD for the 9 hours you’re at work (no internet, no coffee breaks, no colleague gossip, short lunch), and try not to think about work the rest of the time (nights and weekends). 5. WRITE. Just write. Stop talking about writing. Stop thinking about writing. Just write. And love it. 6. Don’t vomit words onto paper. Think as you write, so that what you’re writing can be the first of three drafts (the third ready for publication). | Countless writers have some variation of this, but I like David McCullough’s story. He saw an older author at a party who published nearly 100 books. When McCullough asked him how he was so prolific, he replied: “Simple. I write four pages every day.” There really is no trick to it, no shortcut. Just write—consistently! Now, obviously questions of quality quickly emerge, but in the short term, just write. | 1 | 486 | 2.622222 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6p1o4 | gr6oqmt | 1,615,941,143 | 1,615,940,979 | 108 | 45 | I’m in history and area studies. I like to think of my projects in terms of trilogies of interrelated articles, which are vehicles to communicate new information and perspectives while the longer-term project is ongoing. Associating myself with European and East Asian grant-funded research projects has also helped, since those often have publication requirements, which less to articles in special issues, edited volume chapters, etc. Also, colleagues and I (at a poor institution where we had to push extra hard to get external funding and a chance to move) used to talk about the “minimum publishable unit” (MPU). An MPU roughly represents the amount of data and analysis necessary to make a valuable contribution to the field, such that it would be publishable as a journal article roughly 6,000-10,000 words in length. Thinking in terms of MPUs helped us restrain our natural tendency to put too much information into an article, and pushed us instead to streamline our writing and target a specific audience. For example: If an article draft is 12,000 words and covers two related topics... maybe that’s actually 2 MPUs, and ought to be divided into two articles, so the ideas have space to breathe. If a draft uses three methodologies to examine one subject... could it be 3 MPUs, each of which ought to go to a different journal? Could each part be fleshed out? If not, maybe it’s just 1 MPU. 4-6 MPUs, of course, would be a book. 1-2 of those MPUs could be published separately as articles earlier on. The idea isn’t to cheapen our work, but to avoid the compulsion to say everything in one massive super-article, and instead sharpen our arguments and speak to different audiences. I’ve seen senior European academics in my field do something similar. | Countless writers have some variation of this, but I like David McCullough’s story. He saw an older author at a party who published nearly 100 books. When McCullough asked him how he was so prolific, he replied: “Simple. I write four pages every day.” There really is no trick to it, no shortcut. Just write—consistently! Now, obviously questions of quality quickly emerge, but in the short term, just write. | 1 | 164 | 2.4 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6sskj | gr6w3zn | 1,615,943,110 | 1,615,944,885 | 64 | 74 | Collaboration, so you’re one author on many papers. I knew an extremely prolific publisher who said he always looked for a publication from whatever he was doing. If he read a book, he wrote a book review. If he read an article he disagreed with, he wrote a reply. If he gave a speech, he wrote a paper. He had his own institute when I knew him, with loads of contracts with companies that provided data in return for consultation and money to pay an army of research assistants and students (he was in marketing). He worked a lot, and his wife worked in the same institute. | My old PI was prolific. Her secret was: -have a lot of graduate students (5-8) -be mostly absent so you aren't bothered by interruptions. -write a book and fly around speaking, gaining collaborators. -introduce the graduate students and collaborators, think of a study. -don't spend any time doing research, have grad students do it all and train each other. -have your grad students run the study, analyze the data, write the first draft of everything. -don't waste time with datasets, organizing them or analyzing. Don't waste time on research assistants. -have grad students co-apply to grants, where they write the first draft and you edit, to keep the funding flowing. | 0 | 1,775 | 1.15625 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6oqmt | gr6w3zn | 1,615,940,979 | 1,615,944,885 | 45 | 74 | Countless writers have some variation of this, but I like David McCullough’s story. He saw an older author at a party who published nearly 100 books. When McCullough asked him how he was so prolific, he replied: “Simple. I write four pages every day.” There really is no trick to it, no shortcut. Just write—consistently! Now, obviously questions of quality quickly emerge, but in the short term, just write. | My old PI was prolific. Her secret was: -have a lot of graduate students (5-8) -be mostly absent so you aren't bothered by interruptions. -write a book and fly around speaking, gaining collaborators. -introduce the graduate students and collaborators, think of a study. -don't spend any time doing research, have grad students do it all and train each other. -have your grad students run the study, analyze the data, write the first draft of everything. -don't waste time with datasets, organizing them or analyzing. Don't waste time on research assistants. -have grad students co-apply to grants, where they write the first draft and you edit, to keep the funding flowing. | 0 | 3,906 | 1.644444 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6qytc | gr6w3zn | 1,615,942,147 | 1,615,944,885 | 38 | 74 | Performance = ability x motivation x support This is in every management textbook. I don’t know who to credit. It’s important to consider your motivation and support (time, resources, teaching load, etc.) but don’t forget ability. I can write all day every day but I’m not going to out publish someone who is also hardworking but more capable. People tend to think that everyone is equally smart but that’s not likely to be true, just like not everyone is equally good in basketball or whatever else you choose. | My old PI was prolific. Her secret was: -have a lot of graduate students (5-8) -be mostly absent so you aren't bothered by interruptions. -write a book and fly around speaking, gaining collaborators. -introduce the graduate students and collaborators, think of a study. -don't spend any time doing research, have grad students do it all and train each other. -have your grad students run the study, analyze the data, write the first draft of everything. -don't waste time with datasets, organizing them or analyzing. Don't waste time on research assistants. -have grad students co-apply to grants, where they write the first draft and you edit, to keep the funding flowing. | 0 | 2,738 | 1.947368 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6qfxx | gr6w3zn | 1,615,941,872 | 1,615,944,885 | 33 | 74 | A few anecdotal observations as a PhD student - a lot of people who publish prolifically appear to do so because they are successful at grant writing - grant money means research assistants, research assistants means a lot of the groundwork gets done for you. Also, a lot of prolific writers I’ve worked with have a big network. They collaborate a lot but also get exposed to a lot of ideas that appears to spark inspiration or debate. Lastly, some scholars seem to lack basic organizational skills and that can create a gap in output between scholars. Research is amenable to project management, just like other work tasks. Keeping track of a lot of moving pieces (ideas, funding, new research, data, etc.) seems to help save time and improve efficiency. | My old PI was prolific. Her secret was: -have a lot of graduate students (5-8) -be mostly absent so you aren't bothered by interruptions. -write a book and fly around speaking, gaining collaborators. -introduce the graduate students and collaborators, think of a study. -don't spend any time doing research, have grad students do it all and train each other. -have your grad students run the study, analyze the data, write the first draft of everything. -don't waste time with datasets, organizing them or analyzing. Don't waste time on research assistants. -have grad students co-apply to grants, where they write the first draft and you edit, to keep the funding flowing. | 0 | 3,013 | 2.242424 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6rx3t | gr6w3zn | 1,615,942,650 | 1,615,944,885 | 31 | 74 | I dialed way back in recent years but my approach used to be to treat it like a job with set hours. I would write MWF from 8-noon. I worked in a space where I did not have access to the Internet to avoid the temptation to browse and kept my phone in my backpack across the room. I would outline what I was going to write and gathered printed copies of any research I needed the night before and only used that four hour block to write. It was easy to write when you had absolutely nothing else you could do for four hours at a time. | My old PI was prolific. Her secret was: -have a lot of graduate students (5-8) -be mostly absent so you aren't bothered by interruptions. -write a book and fly around speaking, gaining collaborators. -introduce the graduate students and collaborators, think of a study. -don't spend any time doing research, have grad students do it all and train each other. -have your grad students run the study, analyze the data, write the first draft of everything. -don't waste time with datasets, organizing them or analyzing. Don't waste time on research assistants. -have grad students co-apply to grants, where they write the first draft and you edit, to keep the funding flowing. | 0 | 2,235 | 2.387097 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6v2ql | gr6w3zn | 1,615,944,329 | 1,615,944,885 | 24 | 74 | My former PI works in a hot field (structural biology) and over the course of his 25 years he has developed an instinct for publishing the least amount of data required to sell a story. As a result, he has tons of unpublished data that is essentially held in reserve. About once or twice a year, another lab will publish something adjacent to his work and he will very quickly locate some old unpublished data of interest, write up a communication or response, and send it out. It helps that many of his students, including myself, have entire thesis chapters sitting unpublished that could suddenly become relevant given new findings. His voracious appetite for literature, combined with his encyclopedic memory for the work of his previous students, puts him in a position where he is current with the field without asking his students to put in the hours implied by the lab bibliography. Here's the thing: the more current/timely a research topic is, the more likely reviewers will tolerate lower-than-normal quality data. Therefore, the data might be noisy or visually unimpressive because they are old, but if you move fast enough then the quality can be explained away by stating that "this is urgent and needs to be published ASAP, we don't have time to be perfect". Additionally, I get the impression that communication journals encourage this kind of responsive research as it is more widely cited than research that is more deliberate, but isolated from the broader scientific discourse. **TLDR** Sell stories, not data. Save data whenever possible because it might be useful later. | My old PI was prolific. Her secret was: -have a lot of graduate students (5-8) -be mostly absent so you aren't bothered by interruptions. -write a book and fly around speaking, gaining collaborators. -introduce the graduate students and collaborators, think of a study. -don't spend any time doing research, have grad students do it all and train each other. -have your grad students run the study, analyze the data, write the first draft of everything. -don't waste time with datasets, organizing them or analyzing. Don't waste time on research assistants. -have grad students co-apply to grants, where they write the first draft and you edit, to keep the funding flowing. | 0 | 556 | 3.083333 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6s3bq | gr6w3zn | 1,615,942,739 | 1,615,944,885 | 21 | 74 | I'll just leave this here... Something something quality and quantity | My old PI was prolific. Her secret was: -have a lot of graduate students (5-8) -be mostly absent so you aren't bothered by interruptions. -write a book and fly around speaking, gaining collaborators. -introduce the graduate students and collaborators, think of a study. -don't spend any time doing research, have grad students do it all and train each other. -have your grad students run the study, analyze the data, write the first draft of everything. -don't waste time with datasets, organizing them or analyzing. Don't waste time on research assistants. -have grad students co-apply to grants, where they write the first draft and you edit, to keep the funding flowing. | 0 | 2,146 | 3.52381 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6sskj | gr6oqmt | 1,615,943,110 | 1,615,940,979 | 64 | 45 | Collaboration, so you’re one author on many papers. I knew an extremely prolific publisher who said he always looked for a publication from whatever he was doing. If he read a book, he wrote a book review. If he read an article he disagreed with, he wrote a reply. If he gave a speech, he wrote a paper. He had his own institute when I knew him, with loads of contracts with companies that provided data in return for consultation and money to pay an army of research assistants and students (he was in marketing). He worked a lot, and his wife worked in the same institute. | Countless writers have some variation of this, but I like David McCullough’s story. He saw an older author at a party who published nearly 100 books. When McCullough asked him how he was so prolific, he replied: “Simple. I write four pages every day.” There really is no trick to it, no shortcut. Just write—consistently! Now, obviously questions of quality quickly emerge, but in the short term, just write. | 1 | 2,131 | 1.422222 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6qytc | gr6sskj | 1,615,942,147 | 1,615,943,110 | 38 | 64 | Performance = ability x motivation x support This is in every management textbook. I don’t know who to credit. It’s important to consider your motivation and support (time, resources, teaching load, etc.) but don’t forget ability. I can write all day every day but I’m not going to out publish someone who is also hardworking but more capable. People tend to think that everyone is equally smart but that’s not likely to be true, just like not everyone is equally good in basketball or whatever else you choose. | Collaboration, so you’re one author on many papers. I knew an extremely prolific publisher who said he always looked for a publication from whatever he was doing. If he read a book, he wrote a book review. If he read an article he disagreed with, he wrote a reply. If he gave a speech, he wrote a paper. He had his own institute when I knew him, with loads of contracts with companies that provided data in return for consultation and money to pay an army of research assistants and students (he was in marketing). He worked a lot, and his wife worked in the same institute. | 0 | 963 | 1.684211 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6sskj | gr6qfxx | 1,615,943,110 | 1,615,941,872 | 64 | 33 | Collaboration, so you’re one author on many papers. I knew an extremely prolific publisher who said he always looked for a publication from whatever he was doing. If he read a book, he wrote a book review. If he read an article he disagreed with, he wrote a reply. If he gave a speech, he wrote a paper. He had his own institute when I knew him, with loads of contracts with companies that provided data in return for consultation and money to pay an army of research assistants and students (he was in marketing). He worked a lot, and his wife worked in the same institute. | A few anecdotal observations as a PhD student - a lot of people who publish prolifically appear to do so because they are successful at grant writing - grant money means research assistants, research assistants means a lot of the groundwork gets done for you. Also, a lot of prolific writers I’ve worked with have a big network. They collaborate a lot but also get exposed to a lot of ideas that appears to spark inspiration or debate. Lastly, some scholars seem to lack basic organizational skills and that can create a gap in output between scholars. Research is amenable to project management, just like other work tasks. Keeping track of a lot of moving pieces (ideas, funding, new research, data, etc.) seems to help save time and improve efficiency. | 1 | 1,238 | 1.939394 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6rx3t | gr6sskj | 1,615,942,650 | 1,615,943,110 | 31 | 64 | I dialed way back in recent years but my approach used to be to treat it like a job with set hours. I would write MWF from 8-noon. I worked in a space where I did not have access to the Internet to avoid the temptation to browse and kept my phone in my backpack across the room. I would outline what I was going to write and gathered printed copies of any research I needed the night before and only used that four hour block to write. It was easy to write when you had absolutely nothing else you could do for four hours at a time. | Collaboration, so you’re one author on many papers. I knew an extremely prolific publisher who said he always looked for a publication from whatever he was doing. If he read a book, he wrote a book review. If he read an article he disagreed with, he wrote a reply. If he gave a speech, he wrote a paper. He had his own institute when I knew him, with loads of contracts with companies that provided data in return for consultation and money to pay an army of research assistants and students (he was in marketing). He worked a lot, and his wife worked in the same institute. | 0 | 460 | 2.064516 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6s3bq | gr6sskj | 1,615,942,739 | 1,615,943,110 | 21 | 64 | I'll just leave this here... Something something quality and quantity | Collaboration, so you’re one author on many papers. I knew an extremely prolific publisher who said he always looked for a publication from whatever he was doing. If he read a book, he wrote a book review. If he read an article he disagreed with, he wrote a reply. If he gave a speech, he wrote a paper. He had his own institute when I knew him, with loads of contracts with companies that provided data in return for consultation and money to pay an army of research assistants and students (he was in marketing). He worked a lot, and his wife worked in the same institute. | 0 | 371 | 3.047619 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr7f0xt | gr6oqmt | 1,615,955,977 | 1,615,940,979 | 49 | 45 | As a first year PhD student in a field where most people get a single first author paper over the course of their PhD or postdoc: what the actual fuck are with these comments and the insane publication rate. | Countless writers have some variation of this, but I like David McCullough’s story. He saw an older author at a party who published nearly 100 books. When McCullough asked him how he was so prolific, he replied: “Simple. I write four pages every day.” There really is no trick to it, no shortcut. Just write—consistently! Now, obviously questions of quality quickly emerge, but in the short term, just write. | 1 | 14,998 | 1.088889 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr7f0xt | gr6qytc | 1,615,955,977 | 1,615,942,147 | 49 | 38 | As a first year PhD student in a field where most people get a single first author paper over the course of their PhD or postdoc: what the actual fuck are with these comments and the insane publication rate. | Performance = ability x motivation x support This is in every management textbook. I don’t know who to credit. It’s important to consider your motivation and support (time, resources, teaching load, etc.) but don’t forget ability. I can write all day every day but I’m not going to out publish someone who is also hardworking but more capable. People tend to think that everyone is equally smart but that’s not likely to be true, just like not everyone is equally good in basketball or whatever else you choose. | 1 | 13,830 | 1.289474 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr7f0xt | gr6qfxx | 1,615,955,977 | 1,615,941,872 | 49 | 33 | As a first year PhD student in a field where most people get a single first author paper over the course of their PhD or postdoc: what the actual fuck are with these comments and the insane publication rate. | A few anecdotal observations as a PhD student - a lot of people who publish prolifically appear to do so because they are successful at grant writing - grant money means research assistants, research assistants means a lot of the groundwork gets done for you. Also, a lot of prolific writers I’ve worked with have a big network. They collaborate a lot but also get exposed to a lot of ideas that appears to spark inspiration or debate. Lastly, some scholars seem to lack basic organizational skills and that can create a gap in output between scholars. Research is amenable to project management, just like other work tasks. Keeping track of a lot of moving pieces (ideas, funding, new research, data, etc.) seems to help save time and improve efficiency. | 1 | 14,105 | 1.484848 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6rx3t | gr7f0xt | 1,615,942,650 | 1,615,955,977 | 31 | 49 | I dialed way back in recent years but my approach used to be to treat it like a job with set hours. I would write MWF from 8-noon. I worked in a space where I did not have access to the Internet to avoid the temptation to browse and kept my phone in my backpack across the room. I would outline what I was going to write and gathered printed copies of any research I needed the night before and only used that four hour block to write. It was easy to write when you had absolutely nothing else you could do for four hours at a time. | As a first year PhD student in a field where most people get a single first author paper over the course of their PhD or postdoc: what the actual fuck are with these comments and the insane publication rate. | 0 | 13,327 | 1.580645 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr7f0xt | gr6v2ql | 1,615,955,977 | 1,615,944,329 | 49 | 24 | As a first year PhD student in a field where most people get a single first author paper over the course of their PhD or postdoc: what the actual fuck are with these comments and the insane publication rate. | My former PI works in a hot field (structural biology) and over the course of his 25 years he has developed an instinct for publishing the least amount of data required to sell a story. As a result, he has tons of unpublished data that is essentially held in reserve. About once or twice a year, another lab will publish something adjacent to his work and he will very quickly locate some old unpublished data of interest, write up a communication or response, and send it out. It helps that many of his students, including myself, have entire thesis chapters sitting unpublished that could suddenly become relevant given new findings. His voracious appetite for literature, combined with his encyclopedic memory for the work of his previous students, puts him in a position where he is current with the field without asking his students to put in the hours implied by the lab bibliography. Here's the thing: the more current/timely a research topic is, the more likely reviewers will tolerate lower-than-normal quality data. Therefore, the data might be noisy or visually unimpressive because they are old, but if you move fast enough then the quality can be explained away by stating that "this is urgent and needs to be published ASAP, we don't have time to be perfect". Additionally, I get the impression that communication journals encourage this kind of responsive research as it is more widely cited than research that is more deliberate, but isolated from the broader scientific discourse. **TLDR** Sell stories, not data. Save data whenever possible because it might be useful later. | 1 | 11,648 | 2.041667 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr71rtz | gr7f0xt | 1,615,947,914 | 1,615,955,977 | 19 | 49 | Can we also get answers coming from the Humanities please? | As a first year PhD student in a field where most people get a single first author paper over the course of their PhD or postdoc: what the actual fuck are with these comments and the insane publication rate. | 0 | 8,063 | 2.578947 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6s3bq | gr7f0xt | 1,615,942,739 | 1,615,955,977 | 21 | 49 | I'll just leave this here... Something something quality and quantity | As a first year PhD student in a field where most people get a single first author paper over the course of their PhD or postdoc: what the actual fuck are with these comments and the insane publication rate. | 0 | 13,238 | 2.333333 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr7f0xt | gr79thq | 1,615,955,977 | 1,615,952,579 | 49 | 11 | As a first year PhD student in a field where most people get a single first author paper over the course of their PhD or postdoc: what the actual fuck are with these comments and the insane publication rate. | **THE BEST ARTICLE:** See "Thousands of scientists publish a paper every five days" in Nature: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-06185-8 And – most interesting! – **81 raw-text responses** from the most prolific authors explaining how they did it (PDF): https://www.nature.com/magazine-assets/d41586-018-06185-8/16110186 "Common themes were: * hard work; * love of research; * mentorship of very many young researchers; * leadership of a research team, or even of many teams; * extensive collaboration; * working on multiple research areas or in core services; * availability of suitable extensive resources and data; * culmination of a large project; * personal values such as generosity and sharing; * experiences growing up; and * sleeping only a few hours per day." | 1 | 3,398 | 4.454545 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr7dn80 | gr7f0xt | 1,615,955,033 | 1,615,955,977 | 10 | 49 | In my undergrad school, I had a prof like that (social sciences). And she would make it mandatory for students in her class (about 80 ppl) to take part in her experiments for credit. I took her class 3 times, and in every class she had about 2\~3 experiments. So every semester, she easily gathered about 80 samples of data for 2\~3 experiments, which was sufficient for several full papers. | As a first year PhD student in a field where most people get a single first author paper over the course of their PhD or postdoc: what the actual fuck are with these comments and the insane publication rate. | 0 | 944 | 4.9 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6qfxx | gr6qytc | 1,615,941,872 | 1,615,942,147 | 33 | 38 | A few anecdotal observations as a PhD student - a lot of people who publish prolifically appear to do so because they are successful at grant writing - grant money means research assistants, research assistants means a lot of the groundwork gets done for you. Also, a lot of prolific writers I’ve worked with have a big network. They collaborate a lot but also get exposed to a lot of ideas that appears to spark inspiration or debate. Lastly, some scholars seem to lack basic organizational skills and that can create a gap in output between scholars. Research is amenable to project management, just like other work tasks. Keeping track of a lot of moving pieces (ideas, funding, new research, data, etc.) seems to help save time and improve efficiency. | Performance = ability x motivation x support This is in every management textbook. I don’t know who to credit. It’s important to consider your motivation and support (time, resources, teaching load, etc.) but don’t forget ability. I can write all day every day but I’m not going to out publish someone who is also hardworking but more capable. People tend to think that everyone is equally smart but that’s not likely to be true, just like not everyone is equally good in basketball or whatever else you choose. | 0 | 275 | 1.151515 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr6v2ql | gr6s3bq | 1,615,944,329 | 1,615,942,739 | 24 | 21 | My former PI works in a hot field (structural biology) and over the course of his 25 years he has developed an instinct for publishing the least amount of data required to sell a story. As a result, he has tons of unpublished data that is essentially held in reserve. About once or twice a year, another lab will publish something adjacent to his work and he will very quickly locate some old unpublished data of interest, write up a communication or response, and send it out. It helps that many of his students, including myself, have entire thesis chapters sitting unpublished that could suddenly become relevant given new findings. His voracious appetite for literature, combined with his encyclopedic memory for the work of his previous students, puts him in a position where he is current with the field without asking his students to put in the hours implied by the lab bibliography. Here's the thing: the more current/timely a research topic is, the more likely reviewers will tolerate lower-than-normal quality data. Therefore, the data might be noisy or visually unimpressive because they are old, but if you move fast enough then the quality can be explained away by stating that "this is urgent and needs to be published ASAP, we don't have time to be perfect". Additionally, I get the impression that communication journals encourage this kind of responsive research as it is more widely cited than research that is more deliberate, but isolated from the broader scientific discourse. **TLDR** Sell stories, not data. Save data whenever possible because it might be useful later. | I'll just leave this here... Something something quality and quantity | 1 | 1,590 | 1.142857 |
m6m5ne | askacademia_train | 0.98 | Academics who publish more than your peers: what do you do differently? I've been using Scopus to compare publication records of academics in my field who have received early career grants to get an idea of what I should be aiming for. In doing this I've noticed that most people have a similar number of publications - usually 1-2 first author papers per year, plus a more variable number of co-authored papers further down the author list. However, there are some people who are comparably prolific, publishing upwards of 4 first-author publications a year multiple times in the first 5 years of their career (highest I've seen is 7 in one year), usually alongside many more co-authored papers. These authors are publishing in reputable journals with solid citations so they aren't just targeting easier journals. I've noticed that this usually occurs when the authors sticks closely to the same topic, sometimes even the same dataset (cohort studies in public health/psychology/psychiatry), or studies of different cohorts testing the same/similar research question. I'm curious about some less obvious differences that might be present. Writing on the same topic/data over and over of course is going to make writing faster and reduce time spent collecting data, but I don't think it's the whole story. I assume there must be other contextual factors at play, as well some differences in how these authors work. If you are someone with a lot of first-author publications (in a field where that matters) compared to your peers, or you know someone like this, what do you think allows them to publish twice as much as their peers? | gr7vuqz | gr85p5v | 1,615,971,017 | 1,615,980,656 | 9 | 10 | In my 4 year PhD (in mathematics/theoretical computer science) I had 15 publications, 7 of which were single author papers, plus another 4 unpublished preprints. I think my secret was to take really good notes when I was working out some details of papers I read. Several times those notes naturally lead to a short paper that could be published. My record there was a paper that got from earliest notes to accepted manuscript in about a month. The other important thing is that the perfect is the enemy of the good. Looking at some of my colleagues who are excellent mathematicians, but often we would be discussing ideas or results that they had never bothered to write up, because they didn't feel it was interesting enough or complete enough of a story to bother publishing. The other other important thing is to not put too much crap in a single publication. The goal of an article is to communicatie new ideas and results, but the longer the article is, the less likely people are to read it in its entirety. So longer papers naturally succeed less at communicating the results. It also helps that I quite like writing and finding the right way to communicate a new result or convince the reader that what I did is interesting to them. | Controversial opinion alert. I am very frustrated with the publication pressure because the contributions end up being redundant and marginal. Which makes sense, it takes an awful lot of time to become an expert in any field, and once researchers discover the magic formula, they will stick to it to produce, often times this implies changing a small parameter or applying the same methodology to endless case studies, or you name it. This creates an overload in the literature. Who will have time to read all of these mildly different publications? Further, what is considered 'valuable contributions' is off. A failed experiment would never get published, but would actually provide insight to other peers on what route not to explore. Overall, I think we really need to rethink the academic reward system linked to publications. | 0 | 9,639 | 1.111111 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmgsnw | fsmig4i | 1,591,095,369 | 1,591,096,870 | 7 | 196 | Upvoting so more people see and maybe someone has good advice. Brain machine interface stuff is going to go big though. Your MD would really help some tech companies here in the US | I just want to advise, you need to stop thinking there is a wrong choice. All of your choices can be good choices, you also have a lot of skills to fall back on. Whatever you do you’ll be fine. I don’t think the human brain is really set up to have so many good choices and it has a tendency to stall people when it happens. I bet you’ll know more about this than me! | 0 | 1,501 | 28 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmkve3 | fsmlzea | 1,591,098,897 | 1,591,099,777 | 43 | 58 | I don't have some specific advice, but I am very familiar with the feeling that I am useless outside of my particular field of expertise (I am a postdoc too). One thing I try to remind myself of is that *it is not your responsibility to be the judge of that:* it is the responsibility of the person hiring you. So don't overthink things, and don't hesitate to aim for things that look interesting, even if you don't feel particularly suited for the job. Self-censorship is your worse enemy! | I made the same choice recently - I was around a year through my first postdoc, and had a good relationship with faculty, etc - there was the possibility of a lectureship further down the line. But... I'm now 29 and living in London, and I just needed more financial certainty in my life. So I took an exit to industry (engineering), which has happened in the last couple of months. There are definitely regrets - I'll miss the academic environment, freedom and travel. But, I'm enjoying a new role, and at this stage I just coudn't turn down a ~80% salary increase. Unfortunately the reality of getting a house/kids/life has taken precedence, and it's a trade-off I don't think a lot of the more senior staff understand. | 0 | 880 | 1.348837 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmlzea | fsmgsnw | 1,591,099,777 | 1,591,095,369 | 58 | 7 | I made the same choice recently - I was around a year through my first postdoc, and had a good relationship with faculty, etc - there was the possibility of a lectureship further down the line. But... I'm now 29 and living in London, and I just needed more financial certainty in my life. So I took an exit to industry (engineering), which has happened in the last couple of months. There are definitely regrets - I'll miss the academic environment, freedom and travel. But, I'm enjoying a new role, and at this stage I just coudn't turn down a ~80% salary increase. Unfortunately the reality of getting a house/kids/life has taken precedence, and it's a trade-off I don't think a lot of the more senior staff understand. | Upvoting so more people see and maybe someone has good advice. Brain machine interface stuff is going to go big though. Your MD would really help some tech companies here in the US | 1 | 4,408 | 8.285714 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmgsnw | fsmkve3 | 1,591,095,369 | 1,591,098,897 | 7 | 43 | Upvoting so more people see and maybe someone has good advice. Brain machine interface stuff is going to go big though. Your MD would really help some tech companies here in the US | I don't have some specific advice, but I am very familiar with the feeling that I am useless outside of my particular field of expertise (I am a postdoc too). One thing I try to remind myself of is that *it is not your responsibility to be the judge of that:* it is the responsibility of the person hiring you. So don't overthink things, and don't hesitate to aim for things that look interesting, even if you don't feel particularly suited for the job. Self-censorship is your worse enemy! | 0 | 3,528 | 6.142857 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmmevk | fsmgsnw | 1,591,100,105 | 1,591,095,369 | 26 | 7 | I’m not in the STEM field but I’m also doing my postdoc. I personally feel the world outside of us is changing very quickly and nobody really knows how or in what direction it’s going to change. It’s an exciting time to be doing research but also very uncomfortable because you are inevitably part of the change you want to study. I’m wondering if losing interest in research comes from the instability you feel in the world? If that’s the case then I don’t think much will change by changing your career. It sounds like you have a wonderful family and a partner so perhaps it’s time to look within and do some soul searching? Meditate? Go hiking? Go diving? Write a diary? I think you are already on your path by simply posting this question. I believe you will find your way one step at a time! Good luck! | Upvoting so more people see and maybe someone has good advice. Brain machine interface stuff is going to go big though. Your MD would really help some tech companies here in the US | 1 | 4,736 | 3.714286 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmqvq0 | fsmgsnw | 1,591,103,203 | 1,591,095,369 | 20 | 7 | Therapy. I was stuck in the post-doc from hell, and needed clarity. A few sessions with a therapist helped me clarify my life goals and career goals and chart a path forward. I ended up sort of where I had set my goal, although as per my usual, my timing was poor and I did not manage relationships well, but that’s a me thing. Also, job markets and economic factors affecting them are part of the the timing issue, but not much to be done about it. It is helpful to get counseling to push through to what you value. Good luck! You have a lot to offer, either path. For me, I value the academy over industry, even though it too is a business. | Upvoting so more people see and maybe someone has good advice. Brain machine interface stuff is going to go big though. Your MD would really help some tech companies here in the US | 1 | 7,834 | 2.857143 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmgsnw | fsmnvxo | 1,591,095,369 | 1,591,101,178 | 7 | 22 | Upvoting so more people see and maybe someone has good advice. Brain machine interface stuff is going to go big though. Your MD would really help some tech companies here in the US | Upvoting for visibility. I will be in almost exactly the same boat very soon (similar skillset buy without MD), also I'll be in my mid-30s by the time I get my PhD. Doubting about a future for me in academia as well. To OP: I have no solution but still offer my wholehearted support. You have an amazing skillset, and statistically speaking chances are good that you will find something enjoyable to do. A suggestion: If you enjoy 3D modeling, have you considered getting involved with a medical/neurological 3D printing startup/department? From what I understand, larger hospitals are starting their own 3d print/design facilities for e.g. implants printed from titanium, and there are interesting startups in this direction, also in Europe. | 0 | 5,809 | 3.142857 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmrli8 | fsmzzw8 | 1,591,103,654 | 1,591,108,401 | 10 | 16 | I'm the same age, and have been feeling the same way. Make your transition smooth. I'm working on mine right now - and I'm a professor. I've only been a professor for one year and I already feel like its not for me anymore. I'm only holding out now because I have job security in the middle of the COVID crisis. When we're on the other side of this, I'm jumping ship. | Honestly, I felt the same way when I was about to leave Academia. I wasn't in a science field. I did humanities. But it was really scary, and I just didn't know what else I would do. For me it wasn't that I didn't love Academia, it was just that there were literally no options in my field and I was tired of being treated like garbage. My only other option would have been to stay and become an adjunct or else to take on temporary roles. Leaving was terrifying, but I don't regret it for a minute. It's like pulling a Band-Aid off, it hurts for a bit but then you're glad you did it. In terms of what you will end up doing with your life, I would say keep an open mind. Try to meet as many interesting people as you can and ask them about what they do, that's what helped me to find my way into working for a think tank, then public policy, then Consulting. It's been a heck of an adventure, and I meet phds all the time who are definitely not sorry that they left Academia. They are making more money, having more impact, and way happier. I wrote a post about leaving academia here https://roostervane.com/regret/ . Good luck on the journey! You'll be surprised at how great it can be on the other side, if you decide to take the jump. | 0 | 4,747 | 1.6 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmztot | fsmzzw8 | 1,591,108,312 | 1,591,108,401 | 9 | 16 | You have an MD and PhD, correct? You don't want to work in academia and want to try something different, see how it feels. Have you considered joining you country's center for disease control/health department? You certainly sound qualified and it's relevant to your work experience. The government's health department has many different jobs with different focuses, you'll probably find something you like. | Honestly, I felt the same way when I was about to leave Academia. I wasn't in a science field. I did humanities. But it was really scary, and I just didn't know what else I would do. For me it wasn't that I didn't love Academia, it was just that there were literally no options in my field and I was tired of being treated like garbage. My only other option would have been to stay and become an adjunct or else to take on temporary roles. Leaving was terrifying, but I don't regret it for a minute. It's like pulling a Band-Aid off, it hurts for a bit but then you're glad you did it. In terms of what you will end up doing with your life, I would say keep an open mind. Try to meet as many interesting people as you can and ask them about what they do, that's what helped me to find my way into working for a think tank, then public policy, then Consulting. It's been a heck of an adventure, and I meet phds all the time who are definitely not sorry that they left Academia. They are making more money, having more impact, and way happier. I wrote a post about leaving academia here https://roostervane.com/regret/ . Good luck on the journey! You'll be surprised at how great it can be on the other side, if you decide to take the jump. | 0 | 89 | 1.777778 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmgsnw | fsmzzw8 | 1,591,095,369 | 1,591,108,401 | 7 | 16 | Upvoting so more people see and maybe someone has good advice. Brain machine interface stuff is going to go big though. Your MD would really help some tech companies here in the US | Honestly, I felt the same way when I was about to leave Academia. I wasn't in a science field. I did humanities. But it was really scary, and I just didn't know what else I would do. For me it wasn't that I didn't love Academia, it was just that there were literally no options in my field and I was tired of being treated like garbage. My only other option would have been to stay and become an adjunct or else to take on temporary roles. Leaving was terrifying, but I don't regret it for a minute. It's like pulling a Band-Aid off, it hurts for a bit but then you're glad you did it. In terms of what you will end up doing with your life, I would say keep an open mind. Try to meet as many interesting people as you can and ask them about what they do, that's what helped me to find my way into working for a think tank, then public policy, then Consulting. It's been a heck of an adventure, and I meet phds all the time who are definitely not sorry that they left Academia. They are making more money, having more impact, and way happier. I wrote a post about leaving academia here https://roostervane.com/regret/ . Good luck on the journey! You'll be surprised at how great it can be on the other side, if you decide to take the jump. | 0 | 13,032 | 2.285714 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmzzw8 | fsmtdah | 1,591,108,401 | 1,591,104,727 | 16 | 7 | Honestly, I felt the same way when I was about to leave Academia. I wasn't in a science field. I did humanities. But it was really scary, and I just didn't know what else I would do. For me it wasn't that I didn't love Academia, it was just that there were literally no options in my field and I was tired of being treated like garbage. My only other option would have been to stay and become an adjunct or else to take on temporary roles. Leaving was terrifying, but I don't regret it for a minute. It's like pulling a Band-Aid off, it hurts for a bit but then you're glad you did it. In terms of what you will end up doing with your life, I would say keep an open mind. Try to meet as many interesting people as you can and ask them about what they do, that's what helped me to find my way into working for a think tank, then public policy, then Consulting. It's been a heck of an adventure, and I meet phds all the time who are definitely not sorry that they left Academia. They are making more money, having more impact, and way happier. I wrote a post about leaving academia here https://roostervane.com/regret/ . Good luck on the journey! You'll be surprised at how great it can be on the other side, if you decide to take the jump. | The three options that you present are fairly different. You also discuss programming skills, which hints at a fourth option. I would clarify what you actually want to do first. Otherwise, you'll just end up feeling the same way in a new position. | 1 | 3,674 | 2.285714 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmyhio | fsmzzw8 | 1,591,107,611 | 1,591,108,401 | 5 | 16 | Academia, like other jobs, can be hard. I wish I could give you a different perspective — I did other jobs before academia but I have been fighting so hard to be in academia because I love research, that sometimes I think I wouldn’t know what to do if I didn’t have it. However, the truth, like someone else wrote to you, you have multiple skills and you will be fine either way. Decisions leed you to different path but there are no good/bad decisions (unless you are doing terribly wrong). I wish you find your answers. You could elaborate more what are the problems you are having. You do know that out of 7 billion people on this earth, there are not that many that have phd and me combined with some added programming knowledge. | Honestly, I felt the same way when I was about to leave Academia. I wasn't in a science field. I did humanities. But it was really scary, and I just didn't know what else I would do. For me it wasn't that I didn't love Academia, it was just that there were literally no options in my field and I was tired of being treated like garbage. My only other option would have been to stay and become an adjunct or else to take on temporary roles. Leaving was terrifying, but I don't regret it for a minute. It's like pulling a Band-Aid off, it hurts for a bit but then you're glad you did it. In terms of what you will end up doing with your life, I would say keep an open mind. Try to meet as many interesting people as you can and ask them about what they do, that's what helped me to find my way into working for a think tank, then public policy, then Consulting. It's been a heck of an adventure, and I meet phds all the time who are definitely not sorry that they left Academia. They are making more money, having more impact, and way happier. I wrote a post about leaving academia here https://roostervane.com/regret/ . Good luck on the journey! You'll be surprised at how great it can be on the other side, if you decide to take the jump. | 0 | 790 | 3.2 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmrli8 | fsn0uhj | 1,591,103,654 | 1,591,108,839 | 10 | 13 | I'm the same age, and have been feeling the same way. Make your transition smooth. I'm working on mine right now - and I'm a professor. I've only been a professor for one year and I already feel like its not for me anymore. I'm only holding out now because I have job security in the middle of the COVID crisis. When we're on the other side of this, I'm jumping ship. | Hey there. I'm a science PhD about 30, and I recently pondered a similar life change. I currently work at a national lab in the US. It's somewhere between academia and industry, which has been perfect for me. I also looked at finance, and applied for, and got, a position at a big tech company. I'm not sure if my story is helpful to you, but you're welcome to read it here. A big takeaway for me was that I didn't really know where I wanted to end up until I was actually forced to make a decision, which only happened because I reached out and took some chances. So that's what I'd recommend. Submit applications online, talk to industry reps. Go through the process of pursuing opportunities, even if that's not the path you end up taking. It's kind of fun. And you'll learn a lot, both about the opportunity and yourself. | 0 | 5,185 | 1.3 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsn0uhj | fsmztot | 1,591,108,839 | 1,591,108,312 | 13 | 9 | Hey there. I'm a science PhD about 30, and I recently pondered a similar life change. I currently work at a national lab in the US. It's somewhere between academia and industry, which has been perfect for me. I also looked at finance, and applied for, and got, a position at a big tech company. I'm not sure if my story is helpful to you, but you're welcome to read it here. A big takeaway for me was that I didn't really know where I wanted to end up until I was actually forced to make a decision, which only happened because I reached out and took some chances. So that's what I'd recommend. Submit applications online, talk to industry reps. Go through the process of pursuing opportunities, even if that's not the path you end up taking. It's kind of fun. And you'll learn a lot, both about the opportunity and yourself. | You have an MD and PhD, correct? You don't want to work in academia and want to try something different, see how it feels. Have you considered joining you country's center for disease control/health department? You certainly sound qualified and it's relevant to your work experience. The government's health department has many different jobs with different focuses, you'll probably find something you like. | 1 | 527 | 1.444444 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmgsnw | fsn0uhj | 1,591,095,369 | 1,591,108,839 | 7 | 13 | Upvoting so more people see and maybe someone has good advice. Brain machine interface stuff is going to go big though. Your MD would really help some tech companies here in the US | Hey there. I'm a science PhD about 30, and I recently pondered a similar life change. I currently work at a national lab in the US. It's somewhere between academia and industry, which has been perfect for me. I also looked at finance, and applied for, and got, a position at a big tech company. I'm not sure if my story is helpful to you, but you're welcome to read it here. A big takeaway for me was that I didn't really know where I wanted to end up until I was actually forced to make a decision, which only happened because I reached out and took some chances. So that's what I'd recommend. Submit applications online, talk to industry reps. Go through the process of pursuing opportunities, even if that's not the path you end up taking. It's kind of fun. And you'll learn a lot, both about the opportunity and yourself. | 0 | 13,470 | 1.857143 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsn0uhj | fsmtdah | 1,591,108,839 | 1,591,104,727 | 13 | 7 | Hey there. I'm a science PhD about 30, and I recently pondered a similar life change. I currently work at a national lab in the US. It's somewhere between academia and industry, which has been perfect for me. I also looked at finance, and applied for, and got, a position at a big tech company. I'm not sure if my story is helpful to you, but you're welcome to read it here. A big takeaway for me was that I didn't really know where I wanted to end up until I was actually forced to make a decision, which only happened because I reached out and took some chances. So that's what I'd recommend. Submit applications online, talk to industry reps. Go through the process of pursuing opportunities, even if that's not the path you end up taking. It's kind of fun. And you'll learn a lot, both about the opportunity and yourself. | The three options that you present are fairly different. You also discuss programming skills, which hints at a fourth option. I would clarify what you actually want to do first. Otherwise, you'll just end up feeling the same way in a new position. | 1 | 4,112 | 1.857143 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsn0uhj | fsmyhio | 1,591,108,839 | 1,591,107,611 | 13 | 5 | Hey there. I'm a science PhD about 30, and I recently pondered a similar life change. I currently work at a national lab in the US. It's somewhere between academia and industry, which has been perfect for me. I also looked at finance, and applied for, and got, a position at a big tech company. I'm not sure if my story is helpful to you, but you're welcome to read it here. A big takeaway for me was that I didn't really know where I wanted to end up until I was actually forced to make a decision, which only happened because I reached out and took some chances. So that's what I'd recommend. Submit applications online, talk to industry reps. Go through the process of pursuing opportunities, even if that's not the path you end up taking. It's kind of fun. And you'll learn a lot, both about the opportunity and yourself. | Academia, like other jobs, can be hard. I wish I could give you a different perspective — I did other jobs before academia but I have been fighting so hard to be in academia because I love research, that sometimes I think I wouldn’t know what to do if I didn’t have it. However, the truth, like someone else wrote to you, you have multiple skills and you will be fine either way. Decisions leed you to different path but there are no good/bad decisions (unless you are doing terribly wrong). I wish you find your answers. You could elaborate more what are the problems you are having. You do know that out of 7 billion people on this earth, there are not that many that have phd and me combined with some added programming knowledge. | 1 | 1,228 | 2.6 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmgsnw | fsmrli8 | 1,591,095,369 | 1,591,103,654 | 7 | 10 | Upvoting so more people see and maybe someone has good advice. Brain machine interface stuff is going to go big though. Your MD would really help some tech companies here in the US | I'm the same age, and have been feeling the same way. Make your transition smooth. I'm working on mine right now - and I'm a professor. I've only been a professor for one year and I already feel like its not for me anymore. I'm only holding out now because I have job security in the middle of the COVID crisis. When we're on the other side of this, I'm jumping ship. | 0 | 8,285 | 1.428571 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmgsnw | fsmztot | 1,591,095,369 | 1,591,108,312 | 7 | 9 | Upvoting so more people see and maybe someone has good advice. Brain machine interface stuff is going to go big though. Your MD would really help some tech companies here in the US | You have an MD and PhD, correct? You don't want to work in academia and want to try something different, see how it feels. Have you considered joining you country's center for disease control/health department? You certainly sound qualified and it's relevant to your work experience. The government's health department has many different jobs with different focuses, you'll probably find something you like. | 0 | 12,943 | 1.285714 |
gv4rm3 | askacademia_train | 0.97 | Leave Academia at 30? Hi all, I am writing here because I feel confused and I am currently searching for some advice. I am 30 years old, I live in europe and I graduated as a medical doctor and got a PhD in Neuroscience. During these years I've been focusing on the physiology of memory and Alzheimer's Disease. I had the opportunity to learn a lot focusing on various electrophysiological techniques (recording of neuronal activity), 3D design and modelling, python, and various research techniques. I also spent some time abroad (1 year) in an Ivy league university in the US. I've got a good record of publications, got some prices, and had the chance to share my results in many international meetings. Right now, I'm doing my post-doc, but I feel that this is not my path. I am gradually loosing my interest toward research also due to some personal bad experiences. My year in US was inconclusive and had a really bad experience with my boss there. People keep telling me that at this age I can do whatever I want, but the truth is that I feel like I have to get out of my comfort zone and try something new, but I really don't know how to proceed. I like science and technology, and I think that I could do more, but at the moment I feel like it is impossible to get out of Academia (and at the same time staying in it). I have been looking for various job opportunities, but I have the feeling that I am useless out of my field or sometimes overqualified to certain positions. To make some context I am trying to consider jobs that are reasonably close to what I have done until now. What I feel i could try to do is: * going back to MD path and get a residency in Neurology/psychiatry or public health (I have some experience in handling data and it seems reasonable) * move out from my country and try other research paths * try to get into industry business. I am not so convinced about pharmaceutical companies because I fear that I will end up doing exactly the same stuff I do now and feel miserable again. Therefore, I have looked into emerging companies that are specialized in brain machine interfaces etc. My problem is that whatever I think to approach gives me the feeling that I could not do it. I have about one year of contract and I am trying to improve my programming skills and keep myself updated on medicine (this works fine because among my duties I have to teach physiology to MD students and that helps me being up to date). But the truth is that I feel I am lost and have no idea how to proceed. I am afraid of making wrong life choices and feel unable to really commit and hold into something. I don't know if any of you have a similar feeling or have been in a similar situation, but all kinds of feedback are welcome. Whoever read this, thank you for your time in reading my story. | fsmztot | fsmtdah | 1,591,108,312 | 1,591,104,727 | 9 | 7 | You have an MD and PhD, correct? You don't want to work in academia and want to try something different, see how it feels. Have you considered joining you country's center for disease control/health department? You certainly sound qualified and it's relevant to your work experience. The government's health department has many different jobs with different focuses, you'll probably find something you like. | The three options that you present are fairly different. You also discuss programming skills, which hints at a fourth option. I would clarify what you actually want to do first. Otherwise, you'll just end up feeling the same way in a new position. | 1 | 3,585 | 1.285714 |
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