Yes, science and engineering are HARD. OF COURSE, IT'S HARD...Science is fascinating in the abstract - but "doing science" is never easy. If it were easy we would have cures for cancer, heart disease, obesity and all infectious disease coming out of our ears. We'd have a shuttle to Mars where people would take vacations and someone would be working on a Warp engine to go faster than the speed of light by now. I know its hard because I have a Ph.D. from a highly regarded medical school and was a molecular biologist by trade for over 15 years.
However, you don't need that many scientists. The percentage of people that we need in this country to be actively engaged in R&D is relatively small. That the early classes weed out a large number of students is not a tragedy...though I agree that there needs to be a vast improvement in pedagogy in order to keep students engaged. But the bottom line is that in that lecture hall of 200 students - the world only needs roughly 10 of them to move on to the doctoral level.
The problem isn't at the undergraduate level. It's at the graduate level and post-doctoral level. It extends into the industry itself and path that those 10 successful students in that lecture hall are forced to walk to pursue their careers.
STEM Careers at the doctoral level - Let's talk about the process:
Graduate School:
Those who make those initial cuts at the undergraduate level - are shuffled into a literally BRUTAL graduate system. It's a hazing process of long hours and abuse. Many are teaching assistants that provide a cheap form of labor for the university. All end up in laboratories where they choose a mentor for their graduate careers. "Mentors" may or may not be exploitive - but more often than not - they are. In almost all programs - working outside of the university to make ends meet is NOT ALLOWED. During that time the student gets paid a stipend that is barely subsistence. Labor laws? What's that? The "mentor" gets a cheap source of labor and is often reluctant to let a good candidate graduate. They then lose that pair of hands that are producing publications and grant money for them. Thus, the "education" required to acquire the Ph.D. can drag on for 7-8 years of full-time study.
The Post-Doctoral Logjam:
Ok - You've got your degree and you have earned the privilege of being called "doctor." Wipe that grin off your face, because now you are entering the post-doctoral logjam. This is where many potentially great minds fall out of the pipeline. The postdoctoral period used to be a temporary situation that lasted 2-3 years. It allowed the newly minted Ph.D. to expand and hone their skills so that they can start their own labs or become a staff scientist in industry. In the heyday of biotech of the late '80s and '90s- a newly minted Ph.D. could earn a decent salary completing a post-doc in an industrial setting.
Those opportunities are looooong gone. The increase in monies to the NIH (National Institute of Health) and NSF (National Science Foundation) under Clinton lead to a FLOOD of foreign students and post-docs into US academia. This led to record graduations between about 2003-2006 - just when Bush was cutting the budget to ribbons. Hence the post-doctoral logjam grew to monumental proportions. One post-doc wasn't enough. Now people were doing two, three, four or more. I saw a brilliant mind stuck in that "holding pen" for 10 years or longer. If you are doing the math - that's 7-8 years to the doctoral degree and another 7-10 years to a JOB....14 -18 YEARS. Postdocs are poorly paid (well under $40k in large cities where the cost of living is high) and some don't even have basic benefits like medical. Most work between 60-80 hours a week.
Once again - this is a cheap source of labor. Labor laws??? Again - WHAT labor laws? It is pure exploitation.
The JOB:
When you finally get to a "real job" - there is no security at all. If you are in industry you are at the mercy of the suits with MBA's who know NOTHING about science, are paid about three times as much as any of the scientists under them and who can eliminate whole departments almost on a whim. For academia - the pay is once again - terrible and the budding scientist is competing for an ever-decreasing slice of the grant money pie. By this time the newly minted "scientist" is often in their mid-forties with NO NEST EGG and no security.
What caused the deterioration of STEM opportunities?
There is plenty of blame to go around...The trouble here is that the powers that be in both academe and business got greedy. The scientist became a commodity who was not valued.
In-sourcing of talent from abroad created a perfect storm. Over-supply made jobs scarce. The presence of so many foreign nationals who knew nothing about "labor rights" exacerbated the situation. Labs are nothing more than high-tech sweatshops that should be a national disgrace.
Those who had made their livelihoods in academia for years were stressed by the decreasing flow of grant monies. They applied pressure to those in the trenches (graduate students and post-docs) to keep their labs open and running. Desperation creates abuse. It was always abusive, but this just made matters worse.
The Bush administration nixed the unionization of teaching assistants and post-docs. Institutions that had unionized had made strides to stem the abusiveness of the system. Working conditions, while far from cushy, improved. But once that was gone - so was all restraint.
The myth that Americans "can't do" science was perpetuated. Congress was pressured to allow even more students, post-docs and H1-B's into the country - exacerbating the glut. Industry and academia won because they could crack the "green card" whips and get an outrageous amount of work out of vulnerable people for ludicrous wages.
We have the critical mass of scientists that we need in this country. The trouble is that there are no opportunities - which is why I, along with many other American nationals left the field without looking back.
NOTE: For those who can access it - the comment thread for the article is excellent. Quite a few scientists piled on board. If you want an earful on the reality of this situation - try this link.
© 2011 - RMGHicks - http://www.thebodypoliticusa.com - All rights reserved.
Again, you made a wonderful point. This is why people are in the streets, they have done the work, and can't get any rewards for their labor.
ReplyDeleteHi Motivated - It is NOT limited to people with "limited skills" or a limited education. You could actually make an ironic argument that the education itself creates or exacerbates the employment issues. If you are educated in an area that has what I call HARD skills, an inherent problem exists if your "hard skills" are no longer needed. The years, time and money that that education scarfed up were years in which you were not earning good money - or in my case ANY money save a $23k stipend in NYC. After years of grinding poverty the payoff is a secure job with a decent salary and BENEFITS including retirement. IF that stuff isn't there, someone who invested in a long education like a doctorate will find themselves middle aged and in deep doo doo. Not the greatest way to treat the best and the brightest. At least the person who took the lower skilled job has 15 years of work under their belts. They didn't forgo that paycheck for the education for all those years. These people are middle aged, hard-working and have NOTHING - literally NOTHING socked away.
ReplyDeleteBut the other issue here is that WE DON'T NEED THAT MANY SCIENTISTS. Our educational system is a wrecking ball at the lower level, but we are still the envy of the world at the upper levels. We need a population that is literate in science and a small group of AMERICANS that are capable of R&D. Because of COURSE its HARD! Only about 5-10% of those with an initial interest can deal with that type of work. You can be smart enough and fascinated by science but DOING science requires infinite patience and diligence. I was good, but I was not Noble Prize material. I liked it but didn't love it enough to deal with the poverty. What I do resent is the notion that we need tons of imported scientists. We don't. The core population you need is here, is ready, is qualified. You could have had me and people like me - but most of us bailed because it was a race to the bottom.
ReplyDeleteRuthmarie, I will re-print this. You address this issue better than anyone ut here and it is so vitally important that as many people as possible should consider your words.
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