First & Foremost?

An interesting question that arrived by email involves the issue of being the very first graduate student of someone who has never before advised a student. What are the advantages and disadvantages?

Probably in most cases the adviser has not yet advised a student because he/she is a new professor, but there are other possibilities, such as a research professor who can advise students but who chooses not to until a particularly enticing candidate comes along.

I was my adviser's gazillionth student, so I don't have personal experience with being someone's first advisee.

When I was a new professor, my very first graduate advisee left after a year to follow her husband (a postdoc in another field) when he got a position in a faraway place. This was very bad for me. Students of new advisers may be taking a risk by signing on with someone inexperienced (who may or may not get tenure), but new advisers are also vulnerable to the vagaries of students whose priorities change and whose abilities and motivation may or may not match expectations.

But I digress. Back to the student point of view: there are some general advantage and disadvantages of working with an assistant professor who has never advised students before:

ADVANTAGE: New professors may be very energetic and are likely to be working on new and interesting research in emerging fields. It can be a good career-launching move to work with an early-career professor and be part of their first projects as a professor.

DISADVANTAGE: How do you know which new professors are on track to succeed and get tenure and acquire fame that will rub off on you vs. those professors who will not get tenure and who will therefore not be much help to you when you need letters of reference and a good reputation for being an excellent researcher?

Answers to questions about the advantages/disadvantages of a new adviser also depend a lot on the specific personality and advising style of the adviser in question. For example, consider the following possibilities associated with working with an early-career adviser:

ADVANTAGE: A lot of interaction with someone who is very interested in helping you succeed.

DISADVANTAGE: A lot of interaction with someone who is very interested in having you help them succeed.

Again, how would a student know in advance which situation was more likely?

A potential danger in a lab-based science is working with a new PI who has funding and projects but who is in the process of building a lab using a lot of student labor. Is it an advantage for a student to learn how to build a lab and be part of something innovative or is it a huge time-sink that detracts from their ability to get their own research done?

A possible way to maximize your chances of having at least one nice, sane adviser is to have co-advisers, although being co-advised has its own issues and perils.

I think that unless you have specific reasons based on specific information that leads you to be anxious about the advising skills and motivation of a particular professor, the advantages of working with a new professor outweigh the possible disadvantages. And if you're worried about the they-might-not-get-tenure issue, you could get to know some of the senior faculty as well so that there will be someone around to support your career should your adviser take a hike.

Time to Teach

In yesterday's post, I explained why I like a flexible system of assigning teaching loads. The balance between research : teaching is an important factor, but so is the time required to teach a course. If I am teaching a new course, I can do a better job if I am not teaching another course in the same term. This is not always possible to arrange, but sometimes it is, and it's good to have that option.

Imagine a professor who is reasonably conscientious about teaching: not someone who devotes themselves entirely to teaching but also not someone who just phones it in and might as well be standing in front of the class reading the textbook aloud. This is a person who is going to spend time organizing the course, preparing each lecture, being accessible for help outside the class time, and providing timely feedback to students.

Imagine that this professor is you or someone you know fairly well. Place the items, currently listed in no particular order below, into an order from TAKES THE MOST TIME (top of list) to TAKES THE LEAST TIME (bottom of list) for teaching, considering time for all teaching-related activities within and beyond the classroom. With apologies to colleagues who teach classes + labs, this list is mostly geared towards a university setting in which faculty are unlikely to teach labs but are more likely to teach giga-classes with hundreds of students. Feel free to add course formats that are missing but relevant to you:

• graduate seminar in your field of expertise
• graduate seminar in a field you want to learn about (so you teach a class on it)
• graduate or senior-level course (lecture format)
• small freshman seminar type course
• large intro non-majors survey-style course
• medium-sized course for majors in your field of expertise (TA teaches lab)
• medium-sized course for majors, topic not in your field of expertise (TA teaches lab)
  

In your list, assume that you have taught all of the courses before. Then consider which of the above would take the most time to teach as an entirely new course. Would the order of your list change?

And then let's throw team-teaching into the mix. It might seem that team-teaching reduces the time required to teach a course, and this is generally true. However, I recently team-taught a new course, and the newness of it dominated the team-taughtness of it. Teaching the course took an order of magnitude more time than a similar sized, non-team-taught course I'd taught before. Other team-teaching time factors are the work habits and sanity level of your teaching colleagues. Team-taught classes are a mixed bag (for faculty and students).

I have found that the emotional energy required to teach some classes is also an important factor. Perhaps the prep time for a large intro course is about the same as for a smaller course for majors, but the emotional energy necessary to teach an intro class, including dealing with a large number of students with complex lives, is definitely a factor in the overall equation of the "effort" required to teach a class. And as we all know, effort and time are very different things.

45 : 45 : 10

A visiting colleague and I recently discussed a perennial topic of obsession among some academics: how our departments/universities assign teaching loads.

Some departments (either by choice or by requirement from an external source) have rigid teaching loads that are the same for all faculty. Some departments assign different teaching loads to different faculty as a function of seniority; in recent years, I have seen some departments assign less teaching to assistant professors and more to associate and full professors, but in days of yore, it was the other way around (and may still be in some departments). Some departments assign different teaching loads to different faculty as a function of faculty research activity.

Even if the ratio of research : teaching : service (for example: 45 : 45 : 10) is specified, there is still quite a lot of room for variability in the required or expected teaching load, and there is variability in how courses are counted, as not all courses require the same number of student contact hours.

Both types of system, rigid and flexible, seem to result in resentment about how teaching loads are apportioned.

I've touched on this topic before and am not going to repeat previous posts, but I will give an updated view of my opinion of teaching load distribution methods at universities and colleges that have both research and teaching expectations of faculty.

It was interesting talking to my colleague because his department has recently evolved from a rigid system in which everyone taught the same amount to a more flexible system in which teaching load varies with research activity level. In the past, faculty with grants and grad students taught the same number and level of courses as faculty with no activity other than teaching and service, resulting in some resentment among colleagues. More recently, my colleague's department, in response to both internal and external forces, has moved to a system in which those with active research programs teach 1-2 courses less each year than those who don't have active research programs. This system can also result in resentment depending on how research "activity" is quantified and what the consequences are for low research activity.

If the research-active faculty teach less, the question is whether the research-inactive faculty will teach more or whether new faculty/instructors are hired to teach the courses that were formerly taught by the research active-faculty. I suppose the best answer to this question for each department is related to the expectations of the department/university for the ratio of research : teaching : service .

If there has been a research expectation all along and it was not being met by some faculty, I think is fair to expect them to teach more than faculty who are fulfilling the research expectation. Furthermore, graduate advising is a hybrid teaching/research activity, and should be considered in the research : teaching equation for those who advise grad students.

If the focus is on teaching, however, then it is not fair to add to the work load of those who are already fulfilling their job expectations with their present teaching load.

I have always preferred a flexible system because it gives faculty the option of negotiating the best arrangement of teaching : research : service for any particular academic year. For me, each year is a bit different in terms of number of graduate students, how many are new vs. more senior, whether I will teach a graduate seminar in addition to my undergraduate courses, whether I am writing an unusual number of proposals or need to do an unusual amount of travel (e.g., as a traveling lecturer), and many other factors. I would rather teach more in a non-insane term or year and less in an insane term or year, and a flexible system at least allows this as an option.

It is not always possible to work out an optimal arrangement because of course each individual professor is one of many faculty, each of whom may have complicated professional lives and urgent deadlines. It works out often enough, however, that averaged over time, my research : teaching : service load balances out to what it is supposed to be.

In a typical academic year, the optimal teaching load that best allows me to focus on teaching my classes well; to have sufficient time to advise my grad students, postdocs, and undergrad research students; to do a decent level of research and writing (papers, proposals); to participate in a moderate/high level of department, university, and professional service; and of course to spend some time with my family is: 2 regular undergraduate courses per year + 1 graduate seminar or other specialized course.

Ideally, one or two of those classes will be team-taught, and I will teach 2.5 courses in an academic year.

Some years I teach more than that, some years I teach less than that, but an average of 2.5 courses in a year -- including a mix of big/small and non-majors/majors/grad courses -- allows me to do as well as I can with my various responsibilities.

On Kidlessness

Yesterday's post contains some interesting data that the author of the survey will no doubt have fun contemplating and interpreting, keeping in mind of course the limitations of such surveys and the inferred demographics of this particular blog's readership. I will not summarize the data -- though I hope we will get a summary eventually! -- but I will note that I found it interesting that the majority of respondents are women (not surprising) with no children (perhaps also not surprising, depending on the reason for the lack of children).

There is no information about age of respondent, but would it be safe to assume that many (most?) of my readers -- or at least the survey respondents -- are at an early career stage and are childless now but plan/hope eventually to have children? Or do the data indicate an inclination towards childlessness, at least among this subset of female scientists and engineers?

At the risk of upsetting my ethically inclined bio-colleagues with another survey, I hope that some of the childless respondents from yesterday (female and male), or anyone willing to share their personal data, will leave a comment today that completes this sentence:

I am [female/male] and I do not have children because.. [rest of sentence].

..in which [rest of sentence] might indicate age/relationship status and/or might indicate whether you eventually would like children, whether you would like to but don't feel you can because of career issues, whether you just don't want to have kids (by choice), whether you think it has nothing to do with career issues, or whatever else is relevant to your life.

If I were answering a survey like this at any time before I was in my early 30s, I would have answered that I had no children because I didn't want any. It wasn't because I didn't think I could balance career and family, I just wasn't interested in being a mother. And then I was interested, had a kid, and have always been very happy that I did. Go figure.

High School Senior Thesis Survey - Women in Science Careers

A high school student conducting research on women in science contacted me for assistance with a survey, the results of which will be used in her high school senior thesis. The student wrote:

At my school, students are required to conduct a year-long senior thesis project in which they research a topic of their choice. I chose to research the current status of women in science careers.

Part of my methodology is to distribute a short survey to men and women in science careers to determine their attitudes toward their field and their work.

Perhaps because I am a physical scientist and therefore deeply ignorant about the ethics of surveys, I see no reason not to post this survey on my blog and request that anyone who is interested fill it out and help this student with her thesis project. Also, I am impressed that a high school student would select this topic, so I'd like to help her out.

Survey answers can either be posted as a comment to this blog or sent by email to bursuz@gmail.com.

High School Senior Thesis Survey : Women in Science Careers

Sex:
[ ]Male [ ]Female

Level of Education:
[ ]Undergraduate [ ]Postgraduate [ ]Postdoctoral

Field(s):
[ ]Astronomy [ ]Biology [ ]Chemistry [ ]Engineering [ ]Geology [ ]Physics
Specialization: _______________
Occupation: _________________

Why did you decide to pursue a science-based career? (Check all that apply.)
[ ] Love of science
[ ] Personal ambition
[ ] Interest in monetary gain
[ ] Lack of other options
[ ] Encouragement from others
- Who encouraged you? ____________
[ ] Inspiration from others
- Who inspired you? _______________
[ ] Other reasons
- Please specify: __________________

Have you ever strongly considered leaving your field or career? [ ]Yes [ ]No
- If so, why were you considering to do this? ______________________
- Why did you decide to remain in your field or career? ______________

How accurately do the following statements describe your experiences?
1 means "very inaccurately", while 5 means "very accurately".
- I love my field of science.
1 2 3 4 5
- I am happy with my career.
1 2 3 4 5
- My career can be overwhelming at times.
1 2 3 4 5
- I have loved science since high school or younger.
1 2 3 4 5
- It has been easy for me to balance career and family responsibilities.
1 2 3 4 5
- How many children do you have?____

On Neatfreakiness

When I was in college, one of my science professors had very extreme requirements about the organization of the homework we turned in. The problem sets had to be completed on a certain type of graph paper, and all writing had to be in block capital letters written with a particular type/hardness of mechanical pencil. The pieces of paper had to be stapled in the upper left corner. There were restrictions on the amount of visible erasure allowed, and crossed out items were strictly prohibited. Answers had to be surrounded by a rectangle (not a circle). We all thought this professor was a total controlling neat freak and that this might be a sign of derangement.

And then I became a professor and understood how he came to be like that.

Last weekend I spent considerable time grading assignments and exams for two classes. I am requiring e-assignments as much as possible, but some assignments and exams are more practical with a handwritten component. The parts that are submitted as spreadsheets and graphs are mostly fine (though some students create horrendous spreadsheets of unnecessary complexity and with bizarre or no labeling of cells and columns), but the parts that are written by hand and turned in on paper are, in some cases, even more painful and impossible to read.

Some students do not staple the pages and do not write their name on every page. The first thing I have to do when confronted with a pile of homework assignments is to do the stapling for some students or else the pages might get scattered. I am considering requiring a staple (in the upper left corner).

Some students use scrap paper for their assignments; this is environmentally commendable, but it is hard for me to read the real assignment between the lines or in the margins of the non-assignment text. Others tear out pages from a spiral bound notebook, leaving little hanging pieces of paper to get caught in things and scatter around my office and home and cats. I am considering requiring a certain type of graph paper.

Some students use black or red or green permanent marker that runs through the paper and leaves marks on other pages, making everything hard to read. The number of crossed out areas and convoluted arrows and hard-to-find answers is considerable for some students. I am considering requiring neatly printed letter in pencil and prohibiting crossed out answers and hard-to-find answers.

Actually, I'm not really going to do any of those things. The emotional and physical energy required to create and enforce such instructions probably exceeds the emotional and physical energy required to deal with messy homework by students in my small classes this term. Such requirements would make me unhappy and it would make my students unhappy.

Furthermore, we professors expect (hope) that our students will put up with a bit of disorganization in our teaching, so ideally we will all be a bit patient with each other.

But still.. one recent assignment was so difficult to read that I discussed it with the student. I said "You teach labs. You know what it's like to grade a messy assignment. It would have taken you 10 minutes to redo this neatly so that I could read it easily. Why not do that?". The student smiled and shrugged.

My new plan is to attempt to figure out the student's method and answer, but not to try too hard. If I can't figure it out without great time and effort (and guessing), I will take off a lot of points, scribble (semi-legibly) a note saying I can't follow their answer, and let the student come to me and show me what they did.

Bias Bingo!

This is so cool.

Instead of playing Gender Bias Bingo alone on my computer, however, it would be much more fun to have a bingo card and bingo chips to bring with me to faculty and committee meetings, or to carry around with me in the halls to use as the need arises. There are even occasions when it would be useful to have in my office, on airplanes, at conferences, and during visits with my family.

One of the goals of Gender Bias Bingo is to teach women and men how to recognize bias in their own experiences, but a portable GBB might also help bias perpetrators be more self-aware. Perhaps some people need help learning that they shouldn't criticize women for being assertive and admire men for being aggressive, question whether a woman's idea is her own, ask a father who takes care of his kids when his wife is traveling etc. etc. etc. If someone yells BINGO! after an incident, and clicks down a bingo chip onto a portable GBB board, this might inspire a conversation, or even some quiet reflection.

Portable GBB bingo is not my idea. It is something that my friends and I (and, I think, some commenters to this blog) have occasionally expressed a wish to have during particularly fraught meetings or conversations. It would certainly make a useful gift for that special academic in your life, and would be equally appropriate, though perhaps not equally appreciated, by that not-so-special academic in your life.