Quarterly summary – haven’t had a guest post in a while…

This year we’re looking to catch all of those early career researchers who made a New Year’s resolution to start something new (the new thing in this case being to build up a writing portfolio or to try and drive an opinion change on an issue that affects early career researchers).  In fact, the Black Hole had its first year ever without a guest post – perhaps this was due to Jonathan and I getting increasingly busy (new jobs and babies!) and not reaching out to colleagues as much or perhaps people feel that their issue gets adequate coverage on the web – either way, it was noticeable! I therefore sat down and tried to drum up a few issues that we do not have experience in that we would love to hear from people on – please do get in touch.  Also, if you know of non-Black Hole resources/articles on these issues, feel free to in**@pl****************.com“>email or poke us on Facebook/Twitter to get some additional coverage.

Quick hit issues of interest:

1. The situation in other fields (both Jonathan and I are in medical sciences and often the blog is biased toward those experiences)
2. How to leave the academy from those who have done so before (in the wake of the postdoc survey that highlighted mental health issues, we’d be keen to hear from people who have seen some dark days in academic labs and finally broke out)
3. How to stay in academic science without becoming a group leader (job types, life decisions, etc)
4. How new scientific research reaches policymakers, industry leaders, healthcare professionals, secondary school educators, etc – we’d love to hear from people with experience here.
5. The smoke and mirrors of university administration – how does change get enacted?  What are the overall missions of senior administrators (aside from a high Maclean’s ranking!)

The list could go on and on and we do not want to limit this site to what we think is important, so please do get in touch.  As some inspiration, I’ve compiled a list of the top 5 most read guest blog posts that we’ve had over the past eight years:

• Really scraping the bottom… can’t we at least get parental leave during a postdoc?  (Dr. Jenn and Dr. Erika, academic moms)
• Reject the status quo – assess the research not the journal (Dr. Brianne Kent)
• The trouble with the entrepreneurial mindset (Dr. Kelly Holloway)
• Brain Gain:  Keeping international scientists in Canada, part II (Ms. Sonja B, doctor to be)
• Too much talent?  SSHRC’s “solution” to the postdoc boom (Dr. Eddy Kent)

Last quarter Jonathan focused on career choices in (and out of) academia and I focused on my recent parental leave and some broader national issues.

Jonathan

• How to find a job that leverages what you love
• Science careers outside of academe
• Academe and industry are not your only career choices as a life sciences scholar
• Go ahead and jump: from academic to scientist entrepreneur
• The faculty recruitment process is complex, competitive and crazy

Dave

• Attracting academic talent in the age of Brexit and Trump
• Despite improved wages, troubling trends emerge from postdoc survey
• Reflections from a male scientist on parental leave
• Parental leave: the poor man’s sabbatical

We wish our readers a very happy and productive 2017!

Dave and Jonathan