Proteintech Introduces Podcast “The Incubator”
Exploring life and career as a Biology Graduate Student
Written by Chempetitive Group for Proteintech Group, Inc.
CHICAGO – June 23, 2016 – There is an imbalance in the ivory towers. The number of STEM Ph.Ds. continues to rise, but the number of available tenure-track positions has not been keeping up. In fact, only a quarter of Ph.D. recipients move into tenure-track positions, and overall unemployment among Ph.Ds. has begun to rise. How do graduate students and postdocs prepare for a vast and evolving job market?
Proteintech, the benchmark in antibodies, is examining that question with its new podcast, The Incubator, which launches today. Conceived by host and scientific officer Will Olds, Ph.D., The Incubator follows career paths in academia, industry and the less conventional spaces in between, as told by individuals who have traveled those roads through the common experience of graduate school.
“Graduate school is a formative period in one’s life,” said Olds. “The intense demands can feel unrelenting and discouraging, but the experience is rewarding and can lead to a tremendous variety of opportunities.”
The inaugural episode features Beth Luoma, Ph.D., who discovered a community of like-minded “teaching nerds” and who now advises postdoctoral fellows on integrating active learning, inclusive instruction and effective assessments into science education as director of the Helmsley STEM Education Program at the Yale Center for Teaching and Learning. Upcoming episodes will feature Jonathan Cornett, Ph.D., a genetics professor at Lee University, and Sean Landrette, Ph.D., a research scientist at drug discovery start-up LAM Therapeutics.
“Developing a career in science is really a science itself because you need lots of data. We call it, half tongue-in-cheek, ‘biology job-ology’” said Olds. “But most students actually get very little information about careers outside of their mentor’s experience. We’ve interviewed individuals who have taken their degrees to a broad range of professions, and we asked them: How did you get here?”
Listen to The Incubator on http://theincubator.libsyn.com, or on iTunes.
