You can take the girl out of academia....

Last week I paid a visit to my mom and pop.  They are considering downsizing, so I had to go through quite a few boxes from my schoolhouse days.

I enjoyed spending time with my parents, particularly since it got me away from work for a few days.  Work has been a little hectic lately, and I've been doing a lot of writing-- especially with collaborators.  One of my collaborators doesn't appear to believe in such silly conventions as grammatical rules.  And so I edit.  And edit.  And edit.

I decided I wasn't going to work when I visited my parents.  As I picked through a box labeled "Unreaction--elementary school", I came upon a poem my ten-year-old self had written to my mother.  I frowned, noting a grammatical error.

Sigh.  I guess I just can't help playing the editor... even if the writer is myself.  Twenty years ago.

Science resolutions at a PUI

Happy last day of 2010!

Some of you might be super happy to see it go, while others had a fabulous year (hmm...I smell a blog roundup/carnival?).

Now is the time when we make our resolutions for the upcoming year.  My life is split up into three main categories, Teaching, Research, and Life.  (I'll save how they each make up my day for a later post...I don't want to freak out any of you considering PUI positions....it is the holidays, after all.)  Because of this, I always make resolutions for each area of my life.

In past years, my teaching resolution has been let's just get through this.  Now that I'm more established, I feel like I can start focusing on specific areas.

For research, I just want some damn publications.  To get publications, you have to just suck it up and write up your stuff.  While this might sound very easy, particularly to those of you at research institutions, I assure you it is not.  Doing research at a PUI brings in many new issues with respect to publishing.*  The pace of research is much, much slower.  Funding is a huge issue.  Just getting your institution to agree to matching funds can be a giant hurdle.  And how are you going to write a grant when you have two new preps?  Something I didn't expect was how intimidating it would be to submit publications under my new institution rather than LargeU.  Call me crazy, but work done at small PUI is viewed differently than work completed at Big Name Research U.

For Life, I usually resolve to keep a better balance between life and work.  Ha.  For 2011, I'm going to keep it more attainable.  I am going to read more (Any!!) non-work books.  I have a number in my head that I'd like to reach by Dec 2011, but I'm going to keep it there, for now.


Have you made any resolutions for 2011?



*while perhaps these issues aren't specific to PUIs, I never encountered them as a grad student.  Maybe this is because I wasn't the PI, but I believe it has more to do with institution reputation and the emphasis on research at R1s.

Happy holidays!

Hope you all have a very merry Christmas or whatever you choose to celebrate!


Did Santa bring you what you wanted? I know I'm hoping for a finished manuscript in my stocking....

We're having a baby...named Tenure

On a recent weekend, I ran into some fellow grad students heading into the building as I was heading out to watch football. They (semi) jokingly chided me for leaving work so early on a Saturday (in our department at LargeU, the average work week is ~65 h/week, but in my particular area it's usually more like 75, getting in the upper 80s during grant time).

I (semi) jokingly replied, "No one in my group has to work weekends anymore, now that we have tenure."

"'We?' So you all get tenure once The Boss does?" They grinned at what they though was my misspoken pronoun.

"Well, yeah, actually. We all got The Boss tenure. So we are all tenured now!"


And don't you think that's only fair? We all stressed, pushed, and bled for The Boss to get the publications out in time for the tenure packet review (culminating in 12 papers submitted in 3 weeks, thank-you-very-much!). I bribed students in a class of The Boss with pixie stix and put in extra office hours to ensure high teaching marks. We all endured three submission rounds of The Biggest Grant ever, requiring 14+ hour days (for two weeks straight) to get data analyzed and figures made in time.

So yes, just like men often say "we're having a baby," I'm going to proudly proclaim, "WE just got tenure."


Unfortunately, I don't think that's something I can list on my CV, huh?

Cheating the system (?)

Early in September, I submitted a short paper, a communication, really. This particular journal typically returns reviews on such communications very quickly, on the order of ~3 weeks.

After 6 weeks, The (newly tenured) Boss sent the editor a brief email inquiring about the status of my manuscript. A week later, we received a response.

Not an apology.

Not my reviews.

No, instead, the email stated that my communication had been accepted as is, and the galley proofs would be arriving in 5-7 days. The reviews weren't part of the email, and they weren't located in the online system, either.

While I should be very happy not to have to do any revisions, I can't help but wonder: is this really peer review?