I’m over at the other place now. If you are too, give me a follow: @harmitmalik.bsky.social
Also if anyone has good experience with a cross posting app please let me know.
Dear colleagues in academia, if you’re frustrated about ongoing shutdowns and productivity loss in your lab this year (and next year), do me a favor: write it all down. Then look at these notes every time you review a grant or tenure case for a junior colleague for the next 3 yrs
Reviewed a few grant proposals from Sweden these past few weeks. The science was 😎 but I was more impressed that every CV had a section about professional breaks for paternal/maternal leave between 5 to 7 months. I was struck by how rarely I see this in USA CVs/ biosketches.
If a junior colleague challenges my scientific conclusions and all I can do is point out the fact that I’ve published more papers than them ergo I must be right, then I’ve already lost my argument. And my scientific grace.
To my friends who will be evaluating grad school applicants for your programs: a less than perfect but still very good GPA achieved while working full time during college may in fact be more impressive than most perfect GPAs from folks who didn’t have to.
Almost everyone I know is struggling right now. I don’t say this to be a huge downer but instead to argue that we should try to be kind as much as possible. Don’t assume that things are okay because they look ok from the outside.
What I don't get about academia is the chronic lack of celebration. It is hard to get & maintain grant funding, hard to get papers accepted without Faustian bargains, hard to be a great mentor, & hard to maximize trainee success. All of it is hard. We should celebrate everything.
I am sorry
That your request
Arrived in my inbox
This week.
It may have been
A review
Or a promotion letter
I cannot recall.
Either way
I must decline
Respectfully and
Regretfully.
I am presently
Preoccupied with Existential crises
And I am no good
To you
Or anyone.
Encountered yet another case of a US-based PI holding a threat of not renewing immigration status as a power move over international postdocs. You would think that the pandemic would make folks behave better but in fact it’s the opposite. Please... don’t be this PI; be better
Me: I have so much due in the next 2weeks, it will be a miracle if I do it all. Once I’m done, I’m definitely taking a few days off.
Me 2 weeks later: I have so much due in the next 2weeks, it will be a miracle if I do it all. Once I’m done, I’m definitely taking a few days off.
A reminder: the scientific accomplishments of serial sexual harassers do not make up for the grievous injury caused to science & young scientists over generations (even if this were a simple math argument which... WTF!). This 'genius myth' protects such folks in the first place.