They're not called stereotypes for nothing - Under the Radar Kid

I don't want my blog to become this place where I share horror stories about my students or where all I do is complain about my students or lament how difficult teaching is because of my students. Instead, I would like to (try very hard) to use my experiences in the classroom as learning experiences for me - because let's face it, that's what they are. I can't tell you how many times this semester I've had this reaction in my head immediately after I've dealt with some situation - "oh, ugh, you shouldn't have said/done/agreed to that - live and learn but never do that again."

Anyone who has been through a class - whether as a teacher or as a student - is well aware that students fill niches - or stereotypes. I've know this for a long time - I began to recognize the stereotypes when I sat through 40 classes in college. The difference is, back then I was one of the stereotypes. I didn't have to deal with the other attitudes in the class - for me, it was just me and the professor. Now, I'm not one of the student stereotypes and I have to stand up in front of 17 students twice a week and deal with all of their learning styles, personalities and stereotypes all at once. Yikes. Of course this is my first semester and while each semester will present its own new challenges, the stereotypes will still be there and the more familiar I become with them now, the better it will be down the road.

In order to tell you a bit about my semester up until this point, I thought I would approach it in this way - I'll write a series of blogs in which I tell you "The story of the _________" (fill in the blank with the personality du jour).

Because I've already written half a blog here, I'll keep the first story pretty simple and talk about the "Under the Radar Kid." You know who I mean. The under the radar kid is a good student who always shows up to every class and when he does miss one makes you wonder if he's dead on the side of the road because he's so consistently there. He does 99.9% of his homework and does it well. He gets at least a 90 on every quiz and does great on the exams too. He's the kid you don't have to think about at all......and sometimes you realize that you don't think about this kid at all.

It's not that I don't realize he's there it's just that he causes absolutely no waves in class at all. He's there on time at the beginning of class and is back early from the break - if he leaves at all. But I can count on one hand the number of times he's spoken to me (I think it's twice). He's a great student - he doesn't really need to talk to me. But the reverse is not true - I do need to talk to him. I need to make sure he doesn't feel like I have absolutely no idea he's there just because I don't worry about his grade. It's difficult. I don't know the under the radar kid nearly as well as I know the more verbal students or as well as the students who are really struggling. I can give you the excuse that it's because those two groups I just mentioned take up just about all of my time and my energy - but it would be just that, an excuse.

Ironically, under the radar kid is a difficult situation for me - I'm pretty shy and just randomly saying "Hey, how's it going today." is bizarrely hard for me. And so he provides me with experience in dealing with ALL of my students - even the really good ones that I could go an entire semester without speaking personally to.

Update

Bad blogger - that's me. Because of that I plan on having 2 posts today. First, I want to give you the "career update."

I'm very near the halfway point in my first semester of teaching - and I'm surviving, although it's taking up a lot of my time, despite the fact that I've only got one class. In my last post I hinted at how my approach to lecturing at the beginning of the semester wasn't working. Since then, I've taken a lot more time with each chapter - reading it, figuring out exactly the best order in which to present the material (I don't always agree with the book's order) and finding extra figures and information to present the material in a variety of ways. Very time consuming, but I think it's paying off.

Even though there's half a semester left it's time to think about courses for next semester. Registration for some of the students has begun already. I had kind of assumed that as a part-time I instructor that each semester would go kind of like it did back in August when I was hired - the associate dean (AD) looked at courses being taught and just kind of asked us if we could teach this or that and the holes got filled.

No. Not so much - of course nothing is that simple. Turns out that there's a process......the part time instructors got a sheet of paper last week with a list of the evening courses being offered next semester. We were to rank the courses we were interested in teaching. Happily, there was also an option to try and teach a day course as well if they were available. I really like the time of day that I teach (3-5:30) and very much would prefer a day course. On the other hand, I would rather teach a class than no class at all even if that means an evening course. As coherently as possible I filled out my form with a note on the bottom to that effect. Currently the AD is working with the full-time faculty and letting them take the courses that they want. He won't start dealing with scheduling the part-time faculty until a week or two from now, so I've got a bit of a wait before I know what and when I'll be teaching.

In the meantime I've been looking at the job postings again. It's definitely that time of year in which the faculty jobs start getting posted. I'm going to be applying for another adjunct position at a college more like what I want to end up at. It's to teach a 400 level cell and molecular biology course which is exactly what I got my Ph.D. in, so it's a good fit. I'll be sending my stuff along by early next week. I think it would be a good progression from one course to two, but still remaining part time for a bit as I continue to adjust to life as a teacher. We'll see what comes of it.

So there's the update about the job and career. I'll be back soon with a post about my current class.

I hope I get to teach this course next semester

Apologies for the lack of updates. I have honestly been buried underneath Powerpoint presentation, quizzes and homework assignments.

These first few weeks haven't been easy. Because I have never handled a class from A to Z before I'm on an extremely steep learning curve and it's been difficult to catch my breath until now. I view my class/dealing with my class in two major categories: the material and the students.

I thought that the material would be the easy part since I know the subject well. Yeah, not so much. Problem #1 - I know the subject well. I often assume people know much more than they really do and I forget how long I've been studying science. Problem #2 - Even though I know the subject well, it's been a long time since I took General Biology and have had to think about things in this way. Subsequently, preparing for each lecture (printing off my Powerpoint slides and making lots of notes) is taking me a very long time - at least a full day, if not two. Problem #3 - Speaking of Powerpoint......I've used it forever and I got good during graduate school at making presentations that weren't word-heavy. Mostly I use pictures and do all of the talking based around those images and it's been successful. Well, at the beginning of this class I decided to use the Ppts. given to instructors by the editors of the book rather than Ppts. designed by me. There were two reasons for this: 1 - it was easier. Because I was taking so much time "re-learning" the material it was a huge time saver for me just to use these pre-canned slides. 2 - I didn't want my students taking too much time scrambling to write down every word I say. I would prefer that they have 95% of what they need in front of them, can pay more attention to me as I guide them along the slides and only have to write a few notes here and there for themselves.

And so, what was supposed to be the "easy" part of teaching has turned out to be an area of readjustment. I'm constantly reminding myself now that not everyone has studied science for 12 years if at all. I've slowed down my lectures accordingly and take more time explaining and drawing things out. I'm still going over every chapter in excruciating detail for myself but I'm getting more efficient at it. And I discovered that the book's Ppt. presentations were doing everyone more harm than good. The students were bored since it appeared as though I was reading off of the slides - they saw it as me being superfluous to the slides rather than the way I had intended - as a way for them just to pay attention and not have to take notes. And I wasn't confident and comfortable with the presentations. I just didn't know them well enough to sound great lecturing from them. Now, I'm using those as a starting point. I go through each chapter and rearrange the order of slides. I'm deleting most of the word slides. I'm adding extra images to get harder points through. It's taking up a TON of time and up until this last weekend I was barely finishing in time to get to class but I can tell that I'm lecturing much better and the students are clearly responding better. And that was the easy part to adjust to........

Dealing with students is, well, interesting. My associate dean was most worried about my ability to manage the classroom since I look much younger than I really am. This hasn't been too much of an issue. I'm assertive when I start the class or when I call them back from a break/in-class work. Until last Thursday's class, students who are a little slow to stop talking when I start quiet down after I say a sentence or two loudly. I finally had a group just not stop talking and joking and laughing and my talking louder wasn't working. Survival "if I don't handle them right now then they'll handle me for the rest of the semester" instinct kicked in and before I really had a chance to think about it I was saying something to the effect of "You can leave if you'd like to talk. This is an adult education class, you all are free to come and go as you like, but if you're going to be in here then I would ask that you not talk when I lecture." You could have heard the proverbial pin drop. But it worked - and with the exception of 1 out of 4 (she faced the back wall of the classroom, arms crossed for the remainder of the class - because we're 5), they didn't seem to care that I had to be "mean" for a minute. I've had to deal with hearing students complain loudly about me in the hallways because I don't give enough examples in class before giving homework. Of course they don't understand that homework is a lot less effective if I explain it all to them before letting them try on their own. And, I've had to deal with a student look me right in the eye and tell me that I'm not very good - 10 minutes before class. Thanks to very supportive co-workers, family and friends I've managed to put that in perspective, but it was tough at the time.

Don't get me wrong - 95% of my students are great. Some are getting A's, some aren't. But with the exception of those few, they are comfortable coming up to me and asking questions. They'll raise their hands in class to ask for clarification. They do their work and they do it on time. That they don't all love me or biology can be difficult, but it certainly doesn't deter me from wanting to teach. In fact, it really only makes me want to teach more.

I Should be Writing a Quiz

Really. I need to write a 5 question quiz for Tuesday's class and I can't quite do it. Every time I try I either can't think of any questions or feel like I've made them too hard/too easy. At the moment, just one class into my first semester of teaching, I feel that way towards just about everything class-related. I'm fairly certain that I'm just suffering new teacher pains and this will all get easier with every class or quiz. Let's hope........

It has been a bit of a whirlwind 3 weeks. The course I'm teaching is only in its second semester at the tech and last spring only 10 students took the course. A full time instructor took on the burden of designing the course at the last minute and did his best with the time he was given. Until 2 months ago, it seemed like there would only be a need for 1 section of the course and then there was a sudden increase in interest and they had to hire a second instructor. Until 3 weeks ago it seemed like that would work out - and then there was a need for a third instructor - that's me and that's why I got hired a mere 20 days before the start of the semester.

This wasn't as difficult to deal with as you might imagine. The basic idea is that even though there are 3 sections each with a different instructor we will work together and make the General Biology course as a whole as cohesive as possible. The three of us met and decided what chapters to cover, what labs to do, that we will give daily quizzes and that there will be 6 exams, all covering the same chapters and all given within a day of the other sections. (I will mention here that this meeting took place the day before the class started) It wasn't as if suddenly I had 3 weeks to totally build up a course that was all mine. Someday I would like that chance, but I have to admit that for my first adventure into teaching a course I wasn't about to complain about being handed a syllabus and being told to use it word for word.

At the moment I can tell you honestly that I'm enjoying the experience. But.....I've only taught one class. Half of that was devoted to the syllabus. The kids (and some of them not kids) seemed fine and more than I expected participated. I'm sure the rapport will change and things will become more interesting/difficult/eye-opening when I start giving quizzes and test and suddenly grades become involved.

One very nice aspect to my new job is the new group of people I've met and who are now my co-workers. The first two people I met were the department secretary (like most secretaries, she knows the answers to every single question/problem you could possibly have and she loves helping people out) and the associate dean. The AD is very friendly, laid-back and super accessible. The full time instructor in charge of my course is a very smart, energetic ex-chiropractor who gets so excited about the course and the students that it's contagious. He has been so helpful to me and patient with all of my questions and concerns. In fact, my favorite moment of this experience so far took place while I was delivering my first lecture on Thursday. I happened to glance out towards the hallway and there he was - standing with a big grin of his face, jumping up and down and giving me the thumbs up. And all the faculty are like that. Every single person I've been has been friendly, excited and supportive. It seems like a fantastic environment and I'm excited to be a part of it.

I've also learned a lot more about working in an academic setting. Because it's a technical college, most of us were hired because we knew our fields but not necessarily how to teach. In fact, they came right out and told us at an orientation in-service (so many in-services to go to.....) that they assume we can't teach. For that reason we're required to maintain certification by attending 2-credit courses here and there along the way where we will learn how to become more effective educators. And we'll get the paperwork to prove it. Not a bad deal. Interestingly, by joining the technical college staff I automatically joined a union - something which I had never been a part of before. My involvement can range from paying my dues (probably what will happen) to being an active member (probably not - lest I hear more shouting from my husband of "You can't be in a union! I can't be married to a union member! There will be no unions in this house! I'm management, you can't be union!)

I have absorbed - or not - a ton of information over the past few weeks. The learning curve is steep at the moment, but that's good. And this whole thing is keeping me busy. (Speaking of busy - I am now officially going to be an instructor for the 9th/10th grade confirmation class at my church as well - a new endeavor which starts in about 2 weeks - but more on that in a separate post and when I know more about it myself) And now I really do have to write that quiz.........

RIP: My Time as a Postdoc

Well, it's official. I won't be returning to my former lab as a postdoc. The road here has gone something like this:

February 11 - find out I can't be re-hired

June 12 - last day of work

July 23 - phone call from the old boss saying he had money and would I like to come back. My response: I need to wait just a few more weeks to hear about a full time teaching position, but my chances aren't great - yes, I'll come back.

July 29 - I'm back visiting my old college and in chatting with my old advisor get the impression that research isn't what I should be focusing on - I need more teaching experience. I have a little panic here, considering that right now I'm more likely to end up back as a postdoc than with a teaching position.

July 30 - an e-mail from the associate dean of the local technical college (via a student who worked in the lab across from me) wondering if I'd be available to teach a General Biology class as a part-time instructor. Yay! Teaching experience - and it was part-time, so I could do both the postdoc and this class. I still haven't heard from the potential full time college though and so I send out a few feeler e-mails of "I know you can't tell me much, but is there a timeline - I've been offered another position."

August 4 - am officially hired to teach at the tech - I accept that job even w/o hearing from the full time teaching position because I can't refuse any form of teaching experience. Also, I'm still leaning towards going back to the postdoc as well - in fact, I've had a rather sudden panic attack about not having done enough of a postdoc to have my own little project to take with me someday. I call the old boss to let him know I've taken the one-course job and have pretty much decided on the lab over the full time teaching position. He tells me that he's not sure what the final numbers are for the grant, he's still thinking about hiring a technician (sort of a different story than what I got during his original phone call), he's going on vacation the following week and he's not making any decisions until after he gets back.

August 6 - I get summoned into the lab by the ex-boss to help the grad student find a reagent I had gotten from my grad lab. Turns out I didn't save it - very bad move, but in my defense, I wasn't totally into the lab during the last few months. My boss was not too nice to me that day and I didn't have the sense that I really wanted to go back. I find out the true story behind his funding - not only does he not know exactly how much money he's getting, he's not completely sure that his institution isn't going to treat it as a loan repayment. I also discover that he thought he could demand that I come into the lab because "she's just sitting at home. She can come in here." And, best of all, I find out that he's talked to the grad student who set me up with the part-time job trying to figure out exactly how much time I'd have to spend teaching/preparing for class. He also discusses with her how he doesn't believe I ever produced very much data. I decide, taking all of this into consideration, as well as the fact that he never quite valued my opinions as a scientist (ie - when he had questions about phosphorylation he'd visit everyone else in the department but never talk to me.....his own postdoc who spent 6 years of graduate school working on phosphorylation and who has connections to a major phosphorylation expert) that I no longer wish to return to his lab. Of course this causes me to have a few new worries. First, I've told him that I really want to come back and second, what do I do about getting my own research. I solved that second problem by calling my graduate mentor who was thrilled to help me and will give me whatever piece of research I want when the time comes. I decide to deal with the other problem when I hear from postdoc advisor. (August 6th was a mentally taxing day)

August 7 - August 26 - I prepare to start teaching - I will blog much more on getting that up and running and how my first class went etc. I also hear from the potential full time college - they've hired someone else and I didn't even get an interview. I was a bit mystified how I could have been a final candidate for a much longer-term job and not even get an interview for a one-year position, but if I've learned anything during the past 6 months it's that virtually zero rules apply in the world of hiring and firing. I come to appreciate my position - I still get to keep up with my house and the errands and all the books I want to read, but I get some people contact and teaching experience at the same time. Not a bad deal.

August 27 - I find an e-mail in my in-box from postdoc advisor entitled "Laboratory position." Well, I'm not stupid - it's got a formal title and it's an e-mail. He explains that based on the final numbers from the NSF he's decided to hire a technician. Unfortunately I find out that the tech he hired is not brand new - and therefore she's not an inexpensive hire. She probably costs at least exactly what I would have cost, but I can see why he tried to use that as a decent excuse to make me feel better about not being hired back. This has made my life easier - however (and this is a big however) he gets to feel all smug with himself since he was able to reject me. I desperately want him to know that I decided long ago not to return to his lab, I want him to know that my graduate advisor has come to my rescue since I knew postdoc advisor never would and I really want him to know that my decision is largely based on his behavior. Pride is a terrible thing.

And so, in one of those weird twists of fate that only our universe can conjure up, today is both the official end to my life as a postdoc and the official start to my life in education.

A Giant Sigh of Relief

In an earlier post I alluded to a recent concern of mine - that I lack a research niche to take with me when I apply for a permanent position at a small, liberal arts college. That concern transformed from something that just briefly crossed my mine into something that really worried me with regards to my chances to achieve a position. Yes, I need more teaching experience, but yes, these small colleges are expecting their professors to be able to provide the students with some access to real, live, hands on, at the bench research experience. All of a sudden, the need to get my postdoc position back seemed maybe more important than getting the year-long teaching position. And yesterday, once I knew that I'd have at least one class at the technical college per semester the idea of passing on a teaching position for a postdoc made even more sense. These were suspicions confirmed by my former college advisor, who has been invaluable lately with advice on what I need to be doing now in order to get where I want to go in a few years.

I was prompted to get in touch with my postdoc advisor, just to let him know that taking a postdoc was a little bit more of a priority now. I thought he'd be happy to hear that - but while he certainly wasn't disappointed, he clearly wasn't doing vocal cartwheels either. He told me that he's still waiting to hear about exactly how big his grant will be, he's going on vacation next week and isn't going to even begin to think about making any decisions until after. Great, more people putting me on hold. But as of last night I was still crossing my fingers that he'd decide in my favor in a few weeks' time.

Coincidentally, the grad student from that lab contacted me yesterday asking for help finding a plasmid (little DNA construct) that I had gotten from my grad lab. I called her and gave her all the directions I could think of....she couldn't find it in the stocks. This morning I had to send my postdoc mentor a form to fill out with regards to my new position at the technical college. I got a reply telling me that he'd sent the form and that S was having trouble finding this plasmid and basically ordering me into the lab to help her. By the time I returned home 4 hours later I had discovered that I never froze down this plasmid (big giant oops and not in my favor as far as getting re-hired), had eaten a lovely lunch with all the girls I used to eat with daily, and had learned a bit more about my post-doc mentors potential funding situation. I left not loving my odds - I also left not really wanting to return to that atmosphere. Big problem there.

And so I came home, screwed up my courage and called "the big gun" aka my graduate mentor. First, I apologized for being an idiot and asked if she'd re-send that plasmid to my other lab. This was not a problem. Then I very carefully explained what worried me about getting the job of my dreams someday and started hinting/asking what she thought of sharing reagents and projects with a former graduate student who would never be her competitor and would always want to work with her. To which I heard (in a tone of voice clearly suggesting that I'm a ridiculous person for sounding so nervous for asking about this) "No problem, C. What do you want to work on? I can think of at least a million projects that you could take. Seriously, no problem. You probably need more teaching experience. The research part is taken care of."

I nearly cried with relief. I thanked her profusely and sheepishly added that I was in fact asking about this nearly 2 years in advance. She laughed, but understood when I explained that I needed to know this now so that, should I be lucky enough to have a choice about job within the next few weeks, I can make a better decision that I would have been able to this morning.

What do I have them call me?

This and a whole host of other questions are now filling up most of the space in my head......

I'm officially teaching in the fall! I went in and met with the Assistant Dean of the division this morning and by the time I walked out I was officially a part-time instructor.

I knew walking in that something very strange would have to happen for me not to be offered the class, but I was still overwhelmed when it became official. I'm finally going to have my very own class - complete with 24 students and a textbook and all the other things that come along with a class - and I start in 3 weeks. This is not quite as bad as it sounds. Because it's a technical college the curriculum is statewide and therefore the overall progression of the subject has been set for a number of year - I walked out with a "syllabus" detailing the order in which I'll be teaching the various aspects of biology. So, while it's up to me to decide exactly how I'll split up those topics and where I'll put a lab section instead of lecture I won't be starting from zero as far as curriculum. Additionally, I'm instructing just one of three sections of this particular class. One lecturer is also part time and the 3rd is actually a full time instructor and is in charge of the course as a whole. I'll be meeting/communicating with these two instructors frequently in the weeks leading up to the course and then as the semester progresses. Basically, I'm not just being thrown in and I'll never feel alone as I begin the teaching portion of my career.

Ironically, it's not planning the lectures or the labs or remembering all my basic biology that worries me the most. Instead it's issues like the question I posed in the title of this blog. How will I remember all of their names? What do I do if someone ignores my "all cell phones will be turned off during my class" rule? The Assistant Dean came right out and said that one of the biggest problems that new, part-time staff face is that students view us as not having much status - ie, we have the substitute teacher problem. He asked me if I had any experience managing students in a classroom and then brought up an issue that had vaguely entered my mind at some point but was quickly shoved to the back......."You look like you're about 16 years old." Yes, I look young - but I don't dress like a 16 year old, I'm married, have a Ph.D., don't act like a 16 year old and can shoot someone a dirty look like no one's business........I'm pretty sure that if I walk in there on my first day and act confident and in charge then this will not be an issue - but I'll keep you all posted on that.

I have about 2 more days of peace before all lesson planning hell breaks loose. I was sent home today with paperwork to fill out and a new appointment for Thursday morning where I'll get more of the details of working there and about the curriculum. After that, it'll be time to settle into the lessons and lectures.

Here goes nothing........

Further confusion, but forward progress

When I last left you my postdoc mentor had contacted me to let me know he had money and that I could very likely have my position back. I was left a bit conflicted as to what I most wished to happen - go back to the postdoc or get the teaching position - and I was worried about having to commit to one before hearing about the other.

Of course things have gotten a bit murkier since then.

At the end of last week I was offered a chance to teach one course at a local technical college and while I do have to go in tomorrow to meet with the dean of the Health Sciences Division at that college it's pretty much a sure thing that I would get the class if it works with my schedule. When I first found out about this opportunity I panicked. Essentially, I felt that agreeing to a part-time position meant that I couldn't take the full time position should I be offered that at some point. In the end, I realized that I cannot pass up a sure thing for a possibility and have accepted that I could do either the postdoc or the full time teaching job too, even though that would equal one miserable semester.

Having this extra option did prompt me to e-mail those people in charge of the visiting instructor search just to see if they could give me a bit of a timeline. I don't know much, but did manage to find out that the committee will be offering interviews to candidates within the week followed by a quick decision. I've heard that before, but hopefully they really do stick to this timeline. If I could know about that job within 2-ish weeks, I think that would be early enough to not really lead to me having to decide about returning to the postdoc before I know all my options.

But now I have a bit of a new dilemma. While I've been proceeding for a long time thinking that a teaching position is the best way to go I realized that I'd been distracted from the importance of having a bit of research that I can call my own, even to get hired at a smaller, liberal arts school. This has been a natural side effect of applying for a job that was teaching only. However, a visit to my own alma mater over the past week reminded me that I would be expected to provide my students with some sort of research program in virtually every other position I might apply for. I never quite got that far in my postdoc. Of course I had a project - but it wasn't the one my boss was going to let me take with me some day, many years down the road. More to think about while I wait to hear back from both the university and/or my postdoc mentor.

I have to say that I'm considerably calmer now that I know that I'll be teaching one way or the other this fall. It has taken a while, but things are beginning to come together. Now all I have to do is wait a few more weeks to figure out what my full time work will be - and whether I have a decision to make about it or not.......

It's Never Simple

Visits to the eye doctor provide us with simple choices......A or B, C or D.......and we just tell her which one makes our eyes happier and then we're on the way out with the right prescription and the ability to see.

Life in general never presents us with such clear cut options.

For a while now I've progressed day to day thinking that I would have no choice regarding working or not working. If I'm offered the visiting professor position I would of course take it......for what I eventually want to accomplish in life there would be no option for me to turn down a teaching position, even if it is for only one year. Alternately, if I'm not the candidate for that job then I continue with my nice quiet life at home.

And then this morning I got the call from my old boss that I never in a million years thought I'd be getting. He just found out that he's getting funding from the NSF (yay NSF!) and that it would be enough to support a postdoc for 2 years and do I want to come back. I suppose I should have been thrilled - now, one way or the other I can have a job. But I wasn't entirely thrilled. Now, I'm going to be presented with a choice and it's not really one I was prepared to think about.

He was honest with me - he knew that for what I want to do with my career that signing up for 2 more years of a postdoc may not be first on my list. And I was honest with him about how I've reapplied for the teaching position and I would need to hear about that before I agreed to go back to his lab. He was quite understanding and it's not like there's a giant rush. Generally, finding out you have the funding occurs 3-4 months before the funding actually kicks in so it's not like I'd go back to work next week - there's time for me to find out about the teaching job first. And, should I go back to work for him I think we'd sit down for a chat first and I would pretty firmly mention that I'm happy to sign up for 2 years as long as he's ok with me seeking adjunct teaching positions as well - and right away. It could work.

But do I want to go back to the bench? I've been kind of bored for the past 6 weeks but I've been happy and well rested. I've enjoyed keeping up with my house and the errands and having my weekends as weekends and not as 2 days in which to fit all the errands, laundry and housekeeping I can possibly fit. I would certainly like working again though. I liked being up at a certain time and having a place to go where I was productive and made an impact on something (small though that impact may be).

I kind of feel like going back to work in the lab would be for health insurance benefits and for a second salary and to keep from going stir crazy maybe more than it would be to go do science. That's not necessarily bad, but it's not great either. If I'm not going back for the right reasons, maybe I shouldn't go back at all. On the other hand - even though a postdoc is not the ideal path toward my ultimate goal I think it's more likely to get me there eventually than a hiatus at home and that certainly is an excellent reason to go back. And then of course there would be the guilt. Months ago my boss took me aside and told me he'd hire me back in a second if he managed to get funding - would I come back? And I said yes, of course. But I really thought he had a snowball's chance of getting funding (don't take this the wrong way - he's very smart, a great scientist and mentor and deserving of funding - but generally once you've lost money you'll never get funded again. In short, his getting money after all that's happened is pretty miraculous) and I didn't think I'd be as content as I am puttering around the house every day.

To make matters a bit more confusing - the money he's getting will cover a postdoc OR a tech for 2 years. He told me that there's a senior tech in the department looking for a job and he's wavering a bit between wanting a tech vs a postdoc. I'm pretty sure I'd win the battle if it came down to that because a postdoc is a stronger path to publication, but I'm worried that if I show even the smallest sign of disinterest he'll just take the tech. Either that, or I won't know about the teaching position before he needs to decide between the two of us.

For the moment though - there is still no decision for me to make since I don't know about the teaching position. That is my number one option. And I can of course make myself ill and keep myself up nights worrying and planning out every possible scenario but at the moment it's not worth it. So for now I'll keep myself busy by crossing my fingers for the teaching position.

I suppose if all decisions were easy life wouldn't be any fun, would it?

Girls Night

Last night was a girls night. Dinner and a movie with the girls I worked with and ate lunch with most often. I was excited. I miss them a lot, I miss our conversations a lot and frankly, I needed to leave my house for longer than the time it takes to run a few errands. I wasn't worried about awkwardness - no one blames me for having lost my position and I didn't leave angry.

I envisioned a nice dinner where we took our turns talking about whatever ails us. I would talk about going a little stir crazy and waiting to hear about my new job application. One girl (C) would tell us about waiting to hear if she gets to keep her job. The student from across the hall(T) would tell us about how her qualifying exam proposal is going and about how her boys are doing. And the student from my old lab(S) would tell me about her project and how the boss is driving her crazy and maybe she'd let me know a little bit more about what happened to my protein**

Of course nothing ever goes like you envision it. Don't get me wrong, the evening was very nice, just not exactly what I pictured.

The main "problem" (and I hesitate to call her a problem, she was very very nice) was the girl that I wasn't expecting to be there. She's a brand new addition to the department - her first day as a student was my last as a postdoc - and she was new to our girls nights. That's great. I like new people. The problem was that she's a talker - and by talker I mean went a hundred miles a minute and rarely took a breath. If one of us managed to get a sentence in she would latch on to that new topic and start again at a hundred miles a minute. And again, I hate to call her a problem because I think she had no idea that we weren't really having a conversation and she was just so excited about everything she was saying. Meanwhile, we did get to hear a bit about T's kids and C did tell us about how she'll find out this afternoon whether or not she gets to come into work tomorrow. They asked me about the new job application but as soon as I said I've reapplied we were being seated and by the time we got to the table new girl started talking about something else. And, a little bit disconcertingly S barely said 3 sentences all night. She never said hello to me and didn't really look and me and was quiet in general. She's generally very loud and the first to be complaining about work and the boss so I took this as a sign that her life in the lab isn't great at the moment and never asked what was going on in there and she never volunteered.

And then the conversation took the inevitable turn towards hard core science. Most gatherings of people all within the same field of work usually turn towards work. It's what everyone has in common and when you spend more of your time with the people you work with than with your friends and family the problem gets even worse. I knew it would happen and I wasn't worried about feeling excluded since I know everyone they're talking about and I know science, it would have been easy to participate. But I didn't. As they got deeper and deeper into how many experiments do you have left before working on a paper and don't take that class at the same time as preparing for your mock and EM gets sent away and someone else does it and this person shouldn't be training you on the scope because they can't focus and during lab meeting..............I just sat back and listened. I had a fantastic moment of realizing how nice it is to not be in that environment anymore. I almost felt a little embarrassed for all of them for this to be so important that it's all they could talk about even away from work at dinner with someone they hadn't seen in a month.

And I realize that just one month ago that was me too - but it's amazing what looking in from the outside does to perspective. I've been having a pretty tough time feeling ok with myself - that what I'm most qualified to do I refuse to do anymore. But after last night's dinner I was certainly well on my way back to remembering why I chose to stay home for a while.

**The saga of my protein is a blog for another time - and it's one of those that will probably never be written because I'd have to include far to much science and I will end up having a rant of exaggerated proportions which is never a good idea.   

Home Improvement(s)

I'm taking today off. You'll be able to find me on my living room couch enjoying the Harry Potter marathon that's going on and reading. That's partially because I went to sleep at midnight last night and woke up at 4:30 to get S to the airport. It's also partially because it's Sunday and I've always liked to keep Sundays for myself. It's mostly so that I can prepare myself for the bigger projects around the house that await me.

Up until now, I've spent my time at home doing a thorough spring cleaning and while it took a long time and the house is much better looking because of it it really wasn't that taxing. I didn't have to spend money on supplies and I couldn't really mess up. Well, the spring cleaning is done and that means that the bigger projects remain. Starting tomorrow I become a regular at the local Ace Hardware and Home Depot. Instead of a rag, dust polish and a vacuum cleaner my tools will become paint brushes, drop clothes, an electric sander, spackle and a putty knife.

I think I'm prepared. My father spend an extraordinary amount of energy while making sure that I was useful. I spent all my summer throughout high school and college around the house doing things like sanding and staining/repainting stairs and storage sheds, mowing and triming the lawn, washing and waxing the cars and even pouring cement steps.

I'm a little nervous now though. This time the supplies are on me - if I waste or buy the wrong things then it's our money down the drain. I won't be able to just yell around the corner to Dad to see if I'm doing something correctly (although the cell phone will be handy). Of course the motivation to do my projects and do them well the first time is huge. There's the aforementioned problem of the supplies no longer coming from the magical parental bank account. There's also (and more importantly) the fact that I'm working on our own house. Everything I do to make it look nicer will make our time in it more pleasant and will help somewhere down the line when we try to sell this place.

And so the two major projects for this particular week are:

1) To fix the paint trim around the ceilings (and in some cases the ceiling paint itself) where we got a little tired last summer when we first moved in. In our defense we did all of our painting in about 3 days and it was hot and we had just moved and well, we just got tired and after a while that blue tape (that didn't really work all that well to begin with) just seemed like superfluous effort. I've gotten pretty used to the ragged trim in our rooms and even those occasional splotches of brown or blue that we managed to get on the ceiling.....but......it's not the prettiest........and now I have the time to go around and fix it.

2) To strip (with my brand new electric sander - yay!) and then paint the deck railing. I'm not sure if it's because the paint that's on there now was cheap, wasn't waterproofed, or this amount of peeling and fading is typical after suffering through a winter but it's not at all a pretty site out there. So I'll be taking my little chip of paint to Home Depot and requesting a gallon of the same stuff. Someone remind me to pay attention to the weather forecast before I decide to tackle that one.......

I'll let you know how it goes.

A Husband-less Week

Tomorrow morning at 5 AM I'll be on my way to the airport with S who'll be in NY until next Friday for a training session with "The Company." Yes, 5 AM - so early that I'll have more than enough time to get to the airport and back and still be in more than enough time to shower and make it to the usual 8 AM mass. I wont' complain, however, considering that in 2 weeks when it's S's turn to get me to the airport we'll have to leave 30 minutes earlier (early flights = cheap flights). And once I'm done with the teary goodbye at the curb (because I can't drop anyone off or be dropped off at the airport without crying - it's a problem) I'm on my own for 6 entire days.

When I had a job and S was away I worked crazier hours than when he was around. Now that I'm home these 6 days won't seem quite as different as they once did. But I'm sure I'll get up to some of my old tricks. Mostly my old tricks revolve around food. First, I don't eat on a regular schedule - I eat when I get hungry and that's very unpredictable. Also I don't eat meat when S isn't around - just lots of Boca "chicken" patties, salads, baked potatoes, fruit, crackers, hummus and popcorn. When I go grocery shopping tomorrow I won't be armed with my usual list of here are all the meals we're having this week and here's what I need for that to happen, but instead with a mental list of things I tend to snack on.

My S-less week will also mean that the house stays cleaner for longer - I might have to run the dishwasher once. I might have one load of laundry to do. Things will stay where they belong. Now, don't get me wrong - I can be a tornado in my own house and undoubtedly S will tell you that the same is true of the cleanliness when I'm the one missing for a week, but it is truly amazing what one less person can do to a house.

I will be in sole control of our TV and TiVO. I can watch the All Star game on Tuesday night without hearing cries of "You will not watch that filth on my TV." I can sleep diagonally on the bed as I'm known to do when I have the whole thing to myself (that is once I fall asleep, which I don't do very well when I'm by myself.) The cats will reclaim their "half" of the bed which I'm pretty sure they're still bitter about losing even though it's been a number of years.

And of course I will miss S very much and will look forward to Friday night at 10 PM (we're really not good about having flights that leave and land at nice pleasant hours) when I get him back.

Here We Go Again (plus a side story)

The college has re-posted that position - visiting (September 1st to May 31st) as promised. It was posted on Monday morning while I was on vacation in Toronto and so there wasn't too much I could do about it other than see that it was up and be happy that all my documents are ready to go. I'm back home now but I'm tired from the hours on the road and so I'll wait until tomorrow morning to send along my e-mail just so I'm sure that I haven't made some silly typo. And then the process officially starts again.

In the meantime I will regale you with an adventure from our Toronto excursion........**

Not really ones to plan too much in advance, we decided on Monday afternoon that we wanted to go to Tuesday night's Blue Jays game. I got on-line, clicked on tickets and a short discussion of how much we were willing to spend later we had two tickets. Turns out that these tickets were in the 100 level section on the left field side. Basically, there was a direct line from home base to first base to us - as we sat I vaguely thought that we were in great position to catch a ball. Plus we were in the 1st row of that section which turned out to be immediately over the visiting (Tampa Bay, yesterday) bullpen. I thought it was kind of neat to be watching the pitchers warm up down there.

We got there in the 3rd inning when the score was 1-1. Great, fine - I was preoccupied with my hot dog. Then it was the top of the 4th inning - some guy from Tampa Bay at bat (sorry, I'm not particularly up on my TB roster). I was done with my hot dog and required water so I was kind of looking at home plate while trying to open my Dasani.

CRACK - very well hit ball. I keep opening my water.

Geez - that ball is heading in our direction. I keep opening my water.

No seriously - but I have really really bad spatial skills and so if I think it's headed right at me and might have a chance of reaching me it's really going to land well in front of me and the left fielder will make the out. I keep opening my water.

Oh s**t - I spill my water all over me.

Saved from a massive concussion and broken nose only by my husband's left hand (which is still sore and swollen by the way) which he stuck in front of my face just in time for the ball to bounce there instead of on me. In true comedic fashion the ball bounced out of his hand and into the hand of the chick next to us who didn't seem to care at all that I had just escaped certain doom. And, despite her being a "Blue Jays fan" she did not throw the ball back like a true fan should/would have.

In the end I have no souvenir from that game - not a ball, not a broken nose. I think I'm ok with that........

**Caity gave me a shout out in her blog which has significantly increased my traffic (thank you, I really do appreciate it) and has also resulted in me feeling the need to continue writing with some regularity - even if I'm just relating ridiculous stories about my cat nearly killing me at 3 AM or almost being hit by a home run.

One Step Forward - Ten Steps Back

I didn't get the position. But.......neither did anyone else. Seriously. 3 months and an entire, full scale faculty search later they didn't hire anyone.

I got an e-mail this morning informing me that they had closed the search BUT will be re-opening the search as a "visiting" position to be filled for one year only and I am invited to apply for that when it gets posted. I must admit that I feel much better knowing that no one got the job (schaudenfreude, anyone?).

I'm stubborn - I have every intention of re-applying as soon as I see that position posted. If I made it to the finals for a full-time position I can make it that far for a limited-time offer, right? Plus, I have absolutely nothing to lose. I've already got all my documents ready to go and they already have my transcripts and all my recommendation letters. Not to mention the fact that they've already interviewed me.......seems easy to me (although this seemed easy to me from the beginning). I can only wait and see.......again.

Retirement Update

I'm not a fan of not working and that has been my greatest fear about not having a job. I knew that it wasn't working in a lab that I'd miss but working in general. Because of that I have this drive to be as productive as possible around the house. And I have to say that there are some advantages to being home during the day......

I am now able to deal with the dishes on a regular basis - no more piles in the sink and no more overstuffed dishwasher.

Gone are the weekends of 5 loads of laundry - instead I find myself doing a modest-sized load about every other day. And I find myself folding and ironing immediately instead of having to spend 2 hours folding every bit of clothing that we own. We've stopped taking S's shirts to the cleaners just so that they can be starched - I have time to do that now too.

My roses and petunias aren't dying of thirst anymore. I can go outside every day and water them and remove the dead buds. I can also spray the weeds, anthills and water the lawn regularly and not decide to skip it because I'm so tired. Large portions of the weekend don't have to be devoted to the lawn because I can mow it in the middle of the week. It's also convenient to be home in the middle of the day in the middle of the week when the pull cord to start the lawn mower breaks off and I need to get to the repair shop. This happened just this morning which is why I have the time to blog rather than being outside mowing like I had planned. Oops.

I can devote an entire day to "spring" cleaning a room - so far I've done my entire first floor. And by spring cleaning I mean I'm removing everything from every drawer, closet and cabinet to clean. I'm also washing the walls and all the light fixtures.

In addition to all the ridiculous cleaning and organizing I'm now compelled to do I still have time to sit with my coffee and oatmeal in the mornings. I've read about 6 books so far too, sent e-mails and called my mother about 60 times. I have avoided watching the TV too much and I'm exercising still - although I no longer have to be up at 6 AM to do it.

Luckily my to do list extends beyond just spring cleaning the house. Once that's done I will be venturing out into the real of do-it-yourself projects (like painting the back deck and staining some of the doors in the house) so that will be interesting for all involved including my unsuspecting father who will be receiving about 10 "how do I do this or that" calls a day.

Now I just have to hope that my optimism about this situation and all the things I can accomplish at home lasts longer than the week and a half that I've been at it so far........

The Second Friday in June

Is apparently not a good one for me. It was my last day of work last year too. Last year I was sad though - I was leaving behind 6 years of hard work and a boss that I was close to and tons of friends and memories. I was leaving behind the place where I was lucky enough to find my husband. And while I was looking forward to the adventure of moving and finding my footing in a new lab it was certainly bittersweet.

This year - I'm not sad. In fact, I'm kind of excited that tomorrow is my last day doing science in this particular incarnation. I haven't had a bad year as a postdoc at all. And, if tomorrow weren't my last day, I would certainly not be terribly upset by remaining here. But I'm not sad. I'm looking forward to having some time off. S and I hope to head off on vacation in two weeks (although the current price for plane tickets to our chosen destination my foil that plan). I'm going to take a week and go back and hang out with the family and friends that I don't get to see nearly enough of. And, my to do list around our house is a mile long and grows constantly......I like to work - I give myself two days of laziness and then I'll begin to go crazy - therefore the very long list of things to keep me occupied. I think it will be nice.

Whether or not this time off extends past the summer is still up in the air - yes, still. Although I did get an e-mail yesterday containing a giant apology, and explanation for all the delay and a time frame.......the entire committee will finally be able to all be in the same room at the same time next week. My wait is almost over. So too, is near blog silence.   

The 4:30 AM Bathroom Incident

(I promise that this has little to do with the bathroom other than that was the room I was in)

I (tried) to go to the bathroom this morning around 4:30. My cat had other plans for me.

(I should mention here that Max feels the need to escort me to the bathroom regardless of what time of day it is or how soundly napping he was just moments before. I've told him numerous times that I can make it all on my own, but he doesn't seem to be taking it to heart.)

(The following takes place in the span of about 30 seconds)

So, there we were at 4:30 AM, cat and human, half asleep in the dark bathroom. Instead of heading to his normal perch on the sink next to the toilet, Max stayed on the floor. And I, in my haze, nearly stepped on his tail. I was at least awake enough to feel the fur beneath my foot and to try and correct where I was heading. Unfortunately, the cat also sensed the impending danger and also tried to correct where he was heading.

We "corrected" in the same direction.........

Once again cat and human realized how tangled up we were about to be and we both tried to move out of each other's way again - and we ended up more tangled than before. As I fumbled in the dark, still half asleep, but aware enough to be scared that I was about to severely damage Max I lost my balance.........and landed on my back in our bathtub.

Seriously. I had backed into the rim of the tub which comes right to knee-level on me which caused my knees to buckle and put me into an about-to-sit position and a backward arc. My fall was slowed and my sitting position was maintained by my shower curtain/rod set-up which (here is where I praise my shower curtain) had enough tension to save me from a concussion but was weak enough to come down thus preventing any tearing of either the curtain or the liner.

At about the point that I fully woke up and realized that yes, I was in fact sitting in the tub amidst a curtain rod, a shower curtain and lots of little metal hooks......at 4:30 in the morning........because of my cat. Also at about that point my husband rushed into the bathroom in a panic after having been woken up by all the commotion (I would like to pretend that I did this gracefully and without noise, but that isn't so much the case). He made sure I was alright and I could tell by the look on his face that he was deep in thought trying to figure out how this situation was possible. Then he started to laugh at me. At the time, I didn't laugh.......now at least it brings a smile to my face.

As for Max.......when I went into the bathroom this morning to shower he ran as fast as he could down the stairs and hid under the guest bed. I'm fairly certain it will be some time before he feels the need to escort me to the bathroom again.

Timeline

I'm still here. And I'm still waiting, therefore there's not all that much to report. Here's the basic timeline of what's happened though:

Early March: I submit my application materials.

April 10th: I receive a phone call from the search committee chairman telling me that I'm one of about 10 people that they've narrowed the field down to and would like to have a phone interview with.

April 13th: My phone interview.

April 19th: I find out that I'm one of the final 3 and am invited for the all-day on-campus interview. I'm told that it will be as early as the 23rd of the month, but definitely by the 30th.

April 28th: My on-campus interview. I am told I will hear something in 3-4 days.

May 1st: I get an e-mail from the search committee chairman telling me that he can't give me any details on the search other than that it's still "in progress" since the site visit of the 3rd candidate had to be rescheduled/rearranged.

May 17th: I e-mail just to make sure I haven't missed a phone call or an e-mail somewhere along the way.

And that brings us to today. I'll keep you posted. In the meantime I'll write another post detailing a story (completely non-science) worth of being written about.

Waiting - and Lab Updates

Well, it's all over but the waiting - and that's really not something I'm good at. Again, since I'm technically still under review as far as this potential job is concerned I won't be getting into any details. I'm sorry to keep so secret like this, but the wait is almost over. I'm supposed to hear back from the school in the next 2-3 days. Such a short time but it's dragging on for me.......

I will tell you a bit more about things that have been going on around the lab. Our technician interviewed for two different positions over the course of April and after her excruciating waiting period found out yesterday that she was the first choice for both. When it rains it pours, right? She had already done quite a bit of thinking about where she'd feel the best if she found herself with this choice and so yesterday was actually pretty easy for her. She'll be staying within our department in the lab of a relatively new PI. She's incredibly relieved about having a job, but now she's getting a bit nervous about the upcoming change.

Her first day is actually going to be on June 1st. That's 2 weeks earlier than she technically had to leave our lab and so we have just one month left with J. I makes me sad that she'll be gone a bit earlier than we thought, but at the same time I'll have just two weeks left at that point. Our boss had been encouraging her to find a job and to feel free to take it as soon as she could - that she should not feel obliged to stay here until the literal last day of employment. However, when that became a reality yesterday it was pretty obvious that he's not having an easy time as the end of J's job in the lab gets nearer and is now much more real than it was even two days ago. Hopefully this last month won't become too emotional and awkward.......I'm usually ok with somewhat depressing situations unless I see other people become emotional.....then it's a different story.

(Speaking of emotional.........ask me what I thought of the new Disney movie, "Earth.")

That's all for now. Hopefully a job update one way or the other before too long.

I'm still here

I promise. Just taking it a little easy on the blogging as I work my way through the interview process and my lab work all at the same time. Updates soon.

Pretty Big Update

Friday was a day of big ups and downs.

First, we had lab drama over sudden cutting of our already limited monthly budget. That was definitely depressing - I saw what few experiments I could still get done go flying out the window.

Then, our boss appeared about 2 hours later and said we had X amount of money, he'd found some in the budget. It's not a lot, but it was still better and so I was happy again.

I left the lab and headed home a bit early and swung by the mail box. In the mail was a rejection letter from the community college saying "Thanks for all the time and effort you put in to applying. We're no longer considering you for this job." Ugh. And this was the job that I thought I was perfect for. I was sad again. But I did try to make the best of it - I figured that now I could get back in touch with my contact there and start talking about part-time work again.

Not even 30 minutes later my cell phone rang. It was a professor from the local liberal arts university that I had applied to around the same time I sent in my application for the community college. I never had a strong feeling that I fit the job description as much as they might like, but I tried anyway. I had made it past HR into the first round of interviews. I went into shock - I've been doing this for 2 months now with either nothing or a rejection waiting for me. I tried very hard not to let the relief of a desperate person creep into my voice as I thanked this particular person for allowing me the chance to be considered further. We set up my phone interview for 9:30 on Monday and that was that**.

I am one of a "manageable number" of people who were granted the phone interview and from this pool the search committee will select the final 4 candidates to present to the dean of the program when he returns from vacation a week from today. In other words, I'll know by Friday if I've made it to the final round. I'm beyond excited and beyond terrified at the same time. This is so encouraging - even if I don't get this particular position, this has made me realize that while some search committees or HR departments will not see me as ideal, others will. On the other hand, this is the closest I've been to the career I really want and it will certainly hurt more to lose it now than it would have should I have never made it past HR.

As you can see from the timing of this post, I've already had my interview. I will not go into detail in this post. Nor will I go into detail until I know whether or not I'm in the final round. I'm a bit superstitious about giving too many details too soon. Suffice it to say that the interview happened, I survived and I feel as good about it as possible considering that I now have to sit here and somehow make it through this week all the while waiting to hear if I'm still under consideration. Sitting around waiting is not high on my list of skills, but for this, the wait is worth it.

I thought I was done studying

Yesterday morning my boss was rambling about how he's worried about his daughter's chances of getting into the colleges that she's aiming for. She's a smart kid, but apparently taking standardized tests isn't quite her thing - especially the verbal half of those tests. I found myself very nearly offering my services up to tutor her for these exams since I did very well on the verbal parts. That in turn reminded me of how my husband spent about a year teaching for one of the major exam prep companies and how they're generally always in need of new instructors. (Picture the giant light bulb of the appropriate brand lighting up over my head.)

I talked to my husband last night about what I need to do to apply. It's fairly simple. I have to fill out an on-line resume and then I have to take mini "qualifying" tests in whichever subjects I would like to teach. If I score high enough, then they will contact me for the next steps in hiring. At the moment I plan to try and qualify to teach both SAT verbal and MCAT biology. What this particular company will generally do is see that I've scored well on SAT level verbal and so they will suggest that I also attempt the GRE verbal qualifying test. Likewise, if I score well on MCAT biology, then they'll suggest that I try to qualify for GRE-level biology. And suddenly they have an instructor capable of teaching 4 topics.

The verbal exam doesn't scare me. One person has attributed my verbal ability to both genetics (my mother the english professor and grammar nut) and my Catholic school education (where we started learning grammar in the 4th grade and could fully diagram sentences by the 5th). Whatever it is, this is one area where it kind of comes naturally.

Biology, ironically, did not come naturally. I always had to work hard during my classes and labs and had to study a lot for my exams. And so, taking this biology qualifying test is kind of scaring me. Yes, I know a lot about science, but it's been a very long time since I've had to sit down and take an exam about this stuff. For the past 6ish years, all I've had to do if I didn't know something was look it up or ask the person at the next bench. I'm not quite sure what tiny details have sieved out of my brain over that time that will suddenly be needed to prove that I'm qualified to teach this subject at this level.

Which is why I'm taking the next two days to "study." My husband has handed over the MCAT prep book for me to take a look at. I really am not going to go crazy over this. It's all in my head.......somewhere. I just plan to use this time and this book to move this knowledge around in my brain from somewhere to a little closer to the front.

I'll sit down over the weekend and take the two exams and see where this leads. In the meantime, it's back to the books for me.

With a little help from our PI's

It was to my great dismay that I was once again summoned into my PI's office this morning with that ever-ominous "come here finger gesture." I couldn't imagine what he was going to tell me this time.......your last day will actually be April 30th, perhaps? Seriously, nothing good has yet come of one of these secretive meetings.

Which is why I was shocked and thrilled when he started the conversation with "Where/what resources have you been using for your job search?" I should add that I was also a little confused. We're very close to the 2 month mark since finding out we needed new jobs and this is the first question that has been remotely aimed and how I'm doing finding a job. I proceeded to list what sites I search regularly and he seemed to think that I was using the right tools.

I was further thrilled when he continued our conversation with "well, if you tell me what kinds of jobs you're looking at then I can use some of my resources and keep an eye out for you too." Yikes. Really? This is obviously not a definite path to getting a new job, but I'm sure that my chances were significantly increased when the boss decided to help me out. I'm sure he knows of more websites to be checking. Add that to the local contacts at other institutions he's made during his 10-ish years in the area on top of whatever networking he can do through people here and this is a pretty good thing to have him helping out my cause.

So it took him a little while to get to the point where he could be proactive about the situation. I'm not complaining. This is certainly a case of better late than never. And, as cheesy as this sounds, even if I still don't get a job, or even if it still takes longer than I'd like, I feel just a little bit more ok knowing my boss is working to support me as I keep going down this road.

A field that drives people away

Because I got my Ph.D. in a large lab I overlapped with many people during my time there. In fact, 10 people left the lab before I did. This morning I found myself thinking about these people, graduate students and postdocs, who went before me and what they have ended up doing since leaving the lab.

Postdocs:

1) Left after a 6 year tenure in the lab to take a position at a government-run institution in the same state as our lab. She is one of the heads of a microscopy core there. She does not run her own lab and does not do much bench work in this position. She took this job because it was both conducive to a family and in the same city where her then boyfriend, now husband lived and worked.

2) Left after a 3 year tenure in the lab and enrolled in a 1 year teacher-training program in his home country. Is now a high school science teacher. Chosen because he felt his calling was in education and because he wanted to live closer to his parents and siblings.

3) Left after 5 years in the lab. Got a faculty position as mid-sized university where teaching and research responsibilities were split about 50/50. At the last update he was very unhappy because the teaching was taking up most of his time and he was making nearly zero progress with his research. Chosen because it was the best position he was able to get.

4) Left after 2 years in the lab. Went back to school and got his MBA, is now in a marketing program with really big corporation. Chosen because it was more in-line with his career goals and because the timing of the MBA program was right with the amount of time it would take his wife to finish her Ph.D. (This is my husband, by the way).

5) Left after 4 years in the lab. Got a faculty position at small-ish university in her home state. Chosen because teaching is the primary responsibility with a little bit of opportunity for research, but there isn't a lot of pressure on that aspect of the career. Also chosen so that she and her husband and son would be closer to both of their families.

Graduate Students:

1) Left the lab and attended business school. Currently lives in California with his wife and son and works for mid-sized accounting/consulting firm. Chosen because he has always been very interested in money - and he wasn't going to make much of it in science.

2) Left the lab and went to a postdoctoral fellowship at the NIH. Not sure what she's doing currently.

3) Left the lab to do a postdoc at the same institution where he was for grad school. Is now the head of the antibody core at our school.

4) Left the lab and worked with another PI at our institution on AIDS-related studies in Haiti. Her passion is public health, not basic science research and she is currently trying to get into a masters of public health program.

5) Left the lab to do a postdoc at a large, prestigious lab in a major city. Looking into city planning jobs.

6) Left the lab and tried a postdoc but was in such a bad environment that he left after just a few months. Is now the head of the microscopy core at that same institution.

Sensing the trend? Most of the grad students at least try a postdoc and then move on to something that makes them happier. The postdocs have mostly left academia or haven't found themselves quite as successful as they envisioned. It's pretty clear that something about science needs to change. All of these people I worked with were incredibly smart and could produce nice data at the bench. So why are we all leaving the traditional research career path? And more importantly, when are the people who run science going to realize that some very smart people are running away? And what are they going to do about it? When will it no longer be taboo to get a Ph.D. in science and NOT want to run your own lab? When will the resources for people like me and those others I worked with who are good at science but might be more suited for non-academic science careers be stronger?

I certainly hope that people are trying to find answers to these questions and that they do it quickly, before basic science research suffers any more than it already has.

Crossing my fingers this week

From Friday until last night I was away enjoying the sun of Mexico while I attended my sister-in-law's wedding. It was a pleasant break from both the seemingly endless gray skies and cold of winter and from my lab/thinking about a new job.

But I'm back to reality now and I'm kind of nervous this week. As of tomorrow it will be exactly two weeks beyond the closing date of the Life Sciences Instructor position that I'm very interested in. HR suggested that I'd hear from them (presuming I end up a candidate of interest) "approximately two weeks after the position closing date." So here I am - waiting - not so patiently, for a call or e-mail that may or may not happen (crossed fingers). And this is kind of the end of the line for the moment.

This time of year is typically the end of the hiring season for faculty positions and this is the last application I have out right now. I'm hopeful that I would at least get an interview for this position, but I'm also trying to mentally prepare myself to shift my focus towards what I plan to do with my time should I be hanging out at home for a while.

Meanwhile, it's time to get back into the swing of things here in the lab. Discovering my mistake early last week meant that all the work I had planned was for nothing and so I did very little in here. That was actually pretty good timing, considering that I slowly get more and more lazy and unmotivated the closer I am to a break. It's also good to have one slow day when returning to the lab as well, but starting tomorrow my motivation will be back and I'll be busy again for the near future as long as things work out as planned (crossed fingers).

Oh, and a little progress on a different front. Back in November I attended a talk here by a woman who teaches at a liberal arts college and described to us the experience and some of the ways we can get there - if that's what we're driven to do. One of the many things she does is to connect postdocs and graduate students to mentors in the area who already teach at smaller, liberal arts schools. I had e-mailed her to see if she could help me find a mentor and over the past couple of months we've been sharing sporadic e-mails to get the process going. As of last week, she had e-mailed a number of professors at a nearby college, explaining to them my area of interest and my background and as soon as one of them agrees to help me out then I'll have a mentor!

This is kind of exciting for me. It's certainly not as exciting as a paying job would be, but it's certainly a step in the right direction. This person could help me market the teaching experience that I do have to my best advantage. He/She would likely be more aware of a range of teaching jobs that I might be able to become involved with and I'm hoping that this relationship between me and my mentor may lead to something like an adjunct position at their school (crossed fingers). Any step forward is a good one right now.

Don't Burn Down the Lab

And now for a much lighter post.......

Two things you need to know about my boss:

a) He's very particular about where things are in lab, knowing exactly how many or how much of something is in the lab, what gets turned off/stays on at the end of the day etc. (We actually have a theory that when he comes in each morning, he does a tour of the lab to check everything out).

b) He's prone to reacting first, thinking and noticing (sometimes) later.

For example, one morning the three of us were greeted with "We have 8 ice buckets and I only counted 7. Where is that other ice bucket? If one of you left it somewhere you'd better get it back. We need all of our ice buckets." and on and on and on. In fact, the ice bucket was in the hood in our lab, where I had left it overnight while the dry ice/ethanol bath evaporated. If he'd been even the slightest bit observant he would have seen it (kind of one of those if it had been a bear moments........) and could have saved us all this rant. Incidents like this happen at least once a week and we're to the point now where we just sigh, point to where the 8th ice bucket (or whatever he happens to think we've lost that day) is and then roll our eyes at each other when he leaves.

With that in mind.........

Incident 1) One morning about 2 weeks ago he came in and was all in a snit because one of our heat blocks had been left on at 95 degrees* overnight and he was raving about how we almost burned the lab down. We do try to turn them off each night, but every so often we forget. Of course it's not great to leave these things on unattended, but for this heat block to cause the fire that would destroy the lab is a significant leap.

Incident 2) We have a water bath that is normally at 42 degrees, but is often used to incubate a particular solution for a particular experiment that both the boss and the grad student have been doing lately. They turn it up to 68 degrees when needed and then back to 42 degrees when they're done. No big deal. The other day, the grad student got a huge lecture from the boss about making sure that the water level in the bath is kept high when she's using it at 68 degrees since it evaporates quickly at that temperature and we don't want to burn the lab down (either he has an irrational fear of the lab burning down or he secretly wishes that's what would happen).

This morning our lab was filled with the smell of melted plastic because our boss cranked the water bath up to 68 degrees last night and didn't check the water level. This morning when he got here the water bath was completely dry and sizzling and the plastic rack that he'd left in there had completely melted and was burning. Imagine the delight of our technician this morning when she was greeted by the boss telling her that he nearly burned the lab down. Ironic, no?

*All temperatures are centigrade

Loopholes

I got my official termination letter yesterday. Toward the end of the day, my boss popped in the lab and placed a single piece of paper on my desk with a "That's for you." He turned around and nearly made it all the way out of the lab but then turned back around and asked me to go to his office for a few minutes to talk.

He wanted to know if I would come back to work for him should his grant get funded. He would know in July and the money would kick in around November, leaving me with a short window of unemployment. I assured him that I would be happy to come back, provided I didn't have a different, full-time job. He kind of laughed and told me that he was right there with me when I explained that I would be happy to come back to THIS postdoc, it's just that I can't face the prospect of having to start the whole process from scratch. We also chatted for a bit about how long S and I plan to be in this area of the country and what factors might change that. It was a nice change from his earlier "I don't want to care about this at all" attitude.

While I was in there I asked what my termination was being considered. Yes, I am not being renewed because the department cannot afford me and yes, I am being asked to stop working before my contract is officially up (to me, that's being laid off). But, I was only give a letter of termination. I didn't get any of the other paperwork that J had received about COBRA, how to start collecting unemployment, etc. I had a suspicion that my institution was going to cheat a little bit as far as my unemployment was concerned and chalk it up to the fact that I did not hold up my end of the bargain - I didn't get external funding and so this isn't a matter of being laid off, it's a matter of just not renewing my 1 year contract (even though I'm not working until the final day of that one year contract). My boss confirmed my suspicions with lots of reassurance that this was not his decision and he realizes that it's a horrible situation. I guess it's a good thing that my contract was up naturally within one week of the end of the fiscal year - otherwise the institution really would have had to claim responsibility.

To top it off my termination letter was worded kind of like this:

Dear C,

Last year you were given a 1 year contract blah blah blah. Continued training in my laboratory was contingent on you receiving outside funding - unfortunately I haven't been able to secure this funding and so I have determined the need to eliminate your position.

Your position at Institution X will be eliminated as of June 30, 2009 and therefore your last day of work at Institution X will be June 30, 2009. You insurance coverage will cease on June 30, 2009 as well. Your contribution to Institution X is greatly appreciated.

Sincerely,The Boss

My poor boss had to word that so that it came across as solely his decision and responsibility for my elimination. I felt horrible upon reading it. Needless to say, my opinion of where I work has declined significantly the more I find out about how they are handling this situation. This would not happen if I ran science.........

Mulligan, please

And by mulligan, I mean can I go back about 3 months in time?

I have been struggling to find a good way to purify my protein out of cells in order to study it further. I will spare you the details, but for a number of reasons this has been very difficult. And finally, after months of frustration, I found (or so I thought) a way to do it that didn't destroy the function of my protein. Go me.

And then this morning as I sat doing a bit of troubleshooting I had one of those giant light bulb moments. My strategy wasn't going to work - and for the most incredibly obvious reason - one that I should have thought of about 3 months ago. All the work that I was going to do this week and most of the work that I've done for the past 3 months......all for nothing. To say that I was unhappy would be an understatement. I wasn't angry, but very sad - disappointed with my skills. Why did it take me this long to have this revelation?

I had to tell my boss, there was no way to escape that. Happily, he took it very well and that helped a bit.

What makes this worse was that I had already planned on having an "I'm being kind of slow and I need your help" moment with my boss today. I find it's ok to have these moments, and in fact the PI's kind of like them since they feel needed, as long as you spread them out a bit.

Basically, I need to find a reagent in a published manuscript. My boss told me what reagent and told me the senior author's name and said "Go, fetch." I tried, I really did. I searched through all the manuscripts that came from the particular lab that I could find. There was no mention of this anywhere, but my boss was convinced, so I was convinced that I just wasn't looking the right way. Finally, I realized I really did need some help and had planned on talking to the boss about it today. And then stupid moment number one happened and I decided to postpone talking to my boss about stupid thing number 2 until tomorrow.

Sadly, he didn't get the memo and managed to ask me about that on his own. Ugh. In the end though, I was redeemed - at least for this. Turns out that what he had sent me searching for wasn't actually in any published manuscript. He was remembering a conversation in passing with one particular PI....clearly I wasn't going to be finding that on-line. As soon as this dawned on him, my boss said that he would go e-mail the other PI and see what they could come up with and he'd get back to me. (Insert sigh of relief)

In the end, I don't feel quite as ridiculous as I did this morning. I was only a little slow about one thing, not two and I've already taken the first steps to correcting that mistake. Really, these things do happen and all you can do is (to borrow one of my dad's favorite quotes, from the movie "Heartbreak Ridge.") "improvise, adapt and overcome."

Monday Blahs

Today wasn't the greatest of days as far as feeling upbeat about this whole situation.

I sat through a postdoc seminar at noon and spent most of it thinking about the fact that I was supposed to give one of these seminars in just 3 weeks. I started out sad and thinking about how I would miss the people in that room and then I moved into extremely angry about all the effort I've put in over the past 7 years only to end up here and then into even angrier that I can't get a job.......correction, that I can't even get an interview for a job..........and then I moved into extreme depression about not being good enough to cut it in my chosen line of work. Probably the fact that my boss was sitting right in front of me and spent the whole seminar staring quite pathetically out the window in a pensive sort of way did not help my mood.

Later that afternoon, the boss appeared in the doorway, pointed at J and then did that come here finger thing that he does when something not good is going to follow. J returned 5 minutes later with "the packet." Our boss had to hand her this thing in front of the department's budget secretary detailing her termination date and a few other official things. She said it was amazingly awkward. And then the 3 of us had to think about the reality of the situation again - mostly we try to avoid that. My turn to the "the packet" will probably happen later this week. I'm not sure if I can handle that. I'm not sure if I can look at my boss in the eye as he goes through the official motions of termination. I got a little teary just thinking about J going through it, but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.

(Yes, I realize I was very melodramatic today, but once in a while you just have to indulge)

On a much more annoying note, J noticed while looking through her summary of benefits etc. that she would have her un-taken vacation days paid out......postdocs, however, would not have their vacation days compensated for. WHAT?? I was super annoyed. I need one vacation day this coming Friday and then I had no plans to take my other 5. That adds up to a fairly significant amount of money, especially when facing unemployment. I don't understand what makes postdocs not important enough to not be compensated for extra vacation days, but I'll just add this to the list of reasons that this life in science is not the way to go. And while I was a little mad about the money that I'll lose, I did decide right there that I'll either a) take a week off when the weather gets nice and have some time to myself or b) take 3 days weekend for the entire month of June. One way or the other, those days are mine.

Which one would you do - a whole week off or lots of 4 days weeks?

Updates

Since the initial shock wore off last month we've been able to get basically back to normal. Four and a half months is a long time, and so we're back with our noses to the grindstone with a little job searching on the side. I haven't been really sad about the situation in quite a while, but then this morning there was a little bit of a new reality check.

J told me that our boss talked to her this morning and she now only has until June 12, rather than the 30th, or the actual end of the fiscal year. Now, she's not under a contract, so technically she can be terminated at any time, but it's difficult to see the benefit of just 2 weeks. She was ok with it, there's not much she can do about it, but suddenly we were talking about the end again. And now it's closer. She's told me that she is kind of scared to come in each morning because she has this sense that one day our boss will tell her that this is her last day - and while only two weeks were shaved off, that kind of came true.

Then J told me that our secretary in charge of all things financial explained to her that we'd be getting our "termination packages" next week. Basically this is all the paperwork and information we need to prepare for being laid off and potential unemployment. It will explain Cobra insurance and how to sign up for it. It will detail how we'll have the vacation time we never took compensated for in our final paycheck. It will tell us how to sign up for unemployment and what we might be eligible for.

It wasn't until J mentioned collecting unemployment that I really got sad. I just don't feel like that person. But for a while again this morning we had to think about the inevitable again and I don't think we liked it very much.

In other news - I'm a little worried about the data upon which our graduate student has built her research. I'll spare you the details, but it seems like effects she's seeing may just be an artifact (that's when any differences in your gene/protein of interest are caused indirectly by the tools your using to study it or the environment/biochemistry you're using). Basically, it's a very bad thing. I worry because she hasn't got too much other data from other projects and if this main project falls through, it will be extraordinarily difficult for her to come up with enough data for a new paper (you need a 1st authored manuscript to graduate) within the very limited time frame she's got left. I'm trying to very subtly light fires under her, but it's difficult. That won't stop me though - I love a challenge, and I would hate to see her not end up with her Ph.D. after this effort.

And in other, other news - we're having our first "real" (with all due respect to our mothers) company at the house tomorrow night. We're starting out small - a guy S works with plus his wife and 3 year old for pizza, beer and basketball. If that's a success we can work on a larger gathering. The highlight of the night promises to be my cats' reactions to a human who isn't much bigger than they are. I suspect that my uber-brave felines will take one look at mini-human and go hide under the bed - if that's not the case, I foresee a lot of hissing and bottle brush tails - lets hope they go with the first option.

If I were the one trimming the budget

Lunch discussion today veered towards the budget trimming that it currently going on at our institution and it's fairly clear that we all (there were three departments represented) think that there are many many places that departmental spending could be fixed. Of course the following will not provide enough money for me and J to keep our jobs, but still we might be able to accept our fate with a little more grace if we knew these things weren't going on:

1) When graduate students defend the department buys cake and champagne for the whole department to celebrate with. That's cake and champagne for 50 people about 5 times a year. In one of the other departments represented, the department provides the defendee's lab with $250 with which they can go out and buy supplies for the after-defense party. Now, I'm not suggesting that defending your thesis isn't a huge deal that doesn't deserve celebration. But perhaps the defendee's lab should be responsible for the finances of the post-party. That's how we did it where I got my degree and not one lab complained about this. They all spent what they could afford. Alternately, the office staff in charge of the cake and champagne should perhaps keep a closer eye on how much cake is actually needed. Without fail, each morning after a defense in this department there appears left-over slices of cake, usually about 1/3 of the cake. Perhaps the department could start buying smaller (and less expensive) cakes?

2) Outside speakers. When a speaker from another institution visits their schedule is typically this: arrive at airport the night before, a car is hired to get them from airport to hotel (maybe a PI or students could volunteer instead) where they will have dinner (on the department). The next morning their first PI appointment of the day will pick them up and get them over to the institution where they meet a few other PI's before giving their seminar in the late morning. Those attending the seminar are treated to breakfast pastries (also on the department - I don't think we really need food, especially in the late morning, timed such that as soon as the seminar is done it's lunchtime). Following the seminar the speaker has lunch with about 15-25 students and postdocs - lunch is provided for all. I suggest that the lunches be kept to 4-5 students with the closest interests to what the PI does, that will significantly reduce the amount of food required. The afternoon is then spent shuffling around more PI's and finally the day ends with a huge dinner at the finest restaurants in the city (the $50 per person is on the low side restaurants where they all drink a bunch too). The department foots that bill (18 times a year). Throw in 18 2-night stays at a nice area hotel plus 18 round-trip airline tickets to here and back a year. Of course we have to have guest speakers and they have to be treated nicely, but there must be ways to trim here.

3) The front office staff. And I know this isn't the case only in my department at this institution. There are 5 (yes, 5) front office staff for our department of 15 faculty. One is the overall administrator, she is the most senior and runs all the details of department personnel and she works very closely with the department chair on the budget. She is very important and very busy. We can keep her. One is the purchasing secretary - any time any lab must order something we fill out our purchase order, have our boss sign it and bring it down to her. It's her job to forward that PO onto the main purchasing office. She's ok at her job but it doesn't keep her busy enough all day long - forgotten orders are common. She's often found on the phone or wandering the hallways chatting and gossiping. I like her, but I'm not sure we need a whole position devoted to transferring purchases from this department to purchasing. Next there is the assistant to the department chair. We can also keep her - she works very hard and our department chair is a very busy person. Keeping all of her work-life in order is a daunting task. And finally, my personal favorite, is the "face of the department." She's the gateway between the world out there and us. She answers all the phone calls, she sends out seminar notices she greets visitors and she is absolutely useless. I know I sound harsh, but spend one day with me in here and you will feel this way too. A phone call that should last 20 seconds will last 5 minutes because she cannot articulate what she is saying. A person that has visited the department 15 times must still be given the 3rd degree as to why they are here. And the list goes on.

I vote to combine her job with that of the purchasing secretary and I vote to give that job to someone who will keep busy all day, to someone who will seek out extra things to do when the official work for the day is done, rather than roam around chatting. That clears up an entire salary.

This post makes me sound harsh. I'm not. But I am realistic. Because of upcoming changes in my and S's lifestyle I've become hyper-aware of those places in our lives in where there is superfluous spending. The departmental budget (minus about $750,000 from last year) was due on Monday. I will never see it. I will never know who and what has been cut (besides me and J), but I do hope that they have done their best to trim out the little things as well.

Timing is Everything

Today's post has little to do with my job search - other than maybe serving as a reminder of the greater picture.

I had one of those "If I'd been here 5 minutes earlier....." moments while driving to work today.

There was a fairly severe 3-car accident on the exit ramp that I use each morning. This exit ramp ends at a stoplight where you can turn either left or right onto the secondary road. From what I could see, it appeared as though a minivan traveling north on the secondary road wanted to turn onto the ramp that would lead back onto the highway. This on-ramp begins immediately next to where the off ramp stops at the light. The minivan from the secondary road as well as a second car which had to be traveling on the secondary road as well had hit the first car waiting at that off-ramp light head on.

Either the minivan just mis-read which lane was actually the on-ramp or the second car somehow tried to occupy the same space as that minivan trying to get to the on-ramp forcing the van to shift over enough to aim right into the off-ramp. I have no way of knowing the specifics.

There was an ambulance and fire truck present, but based on the damage to the cars, any injuries were not likely to have been too severe, thankfully. Regardless, the scene shook me up. I'm often the first or second car in that line. It easily could have been me. And, this morning it very nearly was.

As S and I got ready to go our separate ways he mentioned something about having to move the dry cleaning out of my car into his so that he could drop it off on his way to work. I told him not to bother. When I get to work is more flexible, I have the shorter commute at the moment and the weather was bad, so who knew what kind of traffic he'd run into. The time it took me to drop the clothes off and get back to my normal morning was probably somewhere between 5 and 10 minutes. Just enough time to ensure that I was not at the front of that line when that accident occurred.

And yes, I realize that if I'd gotten on the highway when I normally do, instead of 5-10 minutes later then I would have traveled with a whole different set of cars in a completely different traffic pattern and who knows if that accident would have happened at all. But it still makes me sit back and think, just a tiny bit.