<p>question: will it be easier for those applying to graduate school (in the sciences, specifically biological sciences) to become tenured professors at approximately the end of the decade?</p>
<p>hypothetical situation: i (we) get in to grad school this fall. i take ~5 years to finish my phd in the biosciences. i postdoc once, maybe twice (i hope not). the year is ~2017-2019. i apply for positions as a tenure track assistant professor. </p>
<p>given that many of the baby boomer / older professors will be retiring by the time i have applied for tenure track positions, will it be any easier for me to become a tenured professor in the coming decades (as opposed to say, the 80s, 90s, and 00s)? or is this assumption incorrect?</p>
<p>wow man… you really are looking at the BIG picture :)</p>
<p>btw I just met this postdoc at Harvard med doing some bio/mol-gen related field, he told me postdoc in his field usually last 4-5 years. Something you might wanna know.</p>
<p>On the first look, may sound reasonable.
However, you should notice that now the biomedical science field is somewhat maintained stable and even saturated, which means our circle won’t expand too much as opposed to the big leap in 1990s with the ongoing of Human Genome Project.
And, for these currently tenured professors, in their student time, biomedical science is still cold, and not many would choose this as major; while today, we’ve got many more attentions and naturally more applicants willing to participate in biomedical science.</p>
<p>Positions are approaching full but applicants growing, so I bet the faculty road would be even harder…</p>
<p>lol, i like looking at the big picture. plus i’d like to know if i’ll have a job when i’m about 30.</p>
<p>gerrybio, a couple of clarifications:</p>
<p>i’m going into quantitative biology, not your run of the mill protein biochem blah. my department at a well known school hired i would say about 10 new faculty members and tenured 4 existing faculty members in the last semester, but this is all in quantitative biology. there are definitely plans for expansion. the actual biology department is rather stagnant in terms of new hires. </p>
<p>and zoo:</p>
<p>i didn’t know postdocs were that long. perhaps again in the experimental sciences? computational postdocs in my lab usually stick around for a couple of years. depends on the position, i guess.</p>
<p>just by attending departmental seminars and a couple of conferences, i’ve seen a lot of young guys (and women too, but let’s be honest mainly guys) being hired into assistant professor roles recently. but i think this is because systems biology is just starting to become huge. any more thoughts?</p>
<p>lots of postdocs are doing 5+ years of postdocs. seems that there is a queue for k awards and you’re supposed to wait in a holding pattern…gerrybio is correct about it getting saturated.</p>
<p>dont know much about quantitative bio but if they’re filling positions now, there might not be many openings 7-10 years from now - and there won’t be many retiring professors to open up new spots in that field.</p>
<p>in my field (engineering) 2 years postdoc is typical, but I know in bio- related fields it could be significantly longer</p>
<p>There are up and downs to be in arising fields, just don’t have the assumption it **will **become “hot”. Go with your heart if you like the subject, don’t count it becoming the mainstream, it’s only good to go with the traditional fields if you wanna play safe.</p>
<p>Personally I haven’t heard of “systems biology”, but of course there are tons of field’s I haven’t heard of, they are all trying to grow to be a bigger part of the science family, look back – some failed, some succeed.</p>
<p>the issue of time in post-doctoral positions is one highly appropriate to discuss.<br>
Also, to the OP and responders, it is NOT too soon to be looking at whether you are on a viable career path.</p>
<p>Biomedical research science is very much a pyramid scheme (but one that is highly rewarding at all levels-the issue is what level do you plateau out at.). There are many graduate student and many post-doc positions. There are few leadership positions in academia or industry. Therefore, by definition those that obtain these valued leadership positions (tenured professorhips or group leader postions in industry) are not the average. They were goal oriented and did not do the “average” extended post-doc. Post-doctoral positions should not exceed a total of 5 years. It is notable that NIH and many fellowship foundations deem 5-years post-PhD award as the deadline for fellowship eligibility. In an ideal world, an individual should only a have a single post-doc that lasts for no more than 3 years. Obviously this means that if you are to be competitive for tenure track position at the end of 3 years, you worked incredibly hard and were highly focused during these 3 years!</p>
<p>This is the advice that I give all my students and fellows in my lab. Research isn’t difficult-staying focused is!</p>
<p>thanks for the advice paralum. you’re right…its all about focus and dedication. what do you think about the academic job market in the next decade, specifically relating to my original question?</p>
<p>You’ll be fine if you stay focused. You will not-if you don’t. No matter what the state of the job market is. Being a top-ranked tenured prof requires continual dedication. That is why this is NOT a career path to consider if research in your specific area of interest is NOT a passion for you.</p>
<p>Given the fact that only 1 out of 5 postdocs gets a tenure track position in the biomedical sciences, I wouldn’t be too optimistic about that career route unless you already have shown signs of being in the top fifth of graduate students eg. high test scores, many articles, lots of attention from faculty etc. However, 80 percent of postdocs don’t fail in their careers because they don’t end up in a tenure track position; some move into industry where their salaries can be quite impressive, some move into non tenure track positions in academia that can offer substantial stability without the headache of managing a lab or constantly worrying about grants, some go into public health or government research, some move into a different field entirely eg. patent law, scientific publishing, science consulting, some get another degree. Our career path isn’t the all or nothing mission that previous generations of grad students faced.</p>
<p>to be fair, the career path has never been all or none. As evidenced by the many career paths that PhD’s have followed over the last 40 years. Lets face it, a PhD degree teaches an individual to think-hopefully outside the box! There are many careers beyond academia or industry. To succeed, an understanding of one’s own work ethic and motivation is required. </p>
<p>I do caution that a good position in industry is as difficult to obtain (and maintain) as a tenured professorship in academia. One thing that has changed over the last 20 years, is the ability to move between career choices (for example, from academia to advocacy to industry and back again).</p>