Quote Originally Posted by Melalvai View Post
It's really starting to irritate me to hear "Don't worry about your lack of teaching experience, no one gives a darn about your teaching ability."

I want to do research. If I have to choose between research and teaching, I'll choose research. If I'm going to do both, I want to do a good job at both.

It is intriguing that your heart tells you want to focus 100% on research, yet your self-expression and your course idea on Scientific Contro. for Voters, was a creative teaching idea reflection of you. You seem to have natural drive and enthusiasm to teach.. then maybe you might teach on the side in life later on, something which has absolutely nothing to do with science/your degree.

While it is undoubtedly helpful that person is well -versed on their subject matter to even begin to teach on within that subject area, I am not in total agreement that in-depth PhD level knowledge confers a person with a high probability of good teaching skills/potential.

The rest test would be : could all PhD graduates teach science full-time to senior high school students and maintain most of the students' attention?