Why am I still in academia?

[Geonz]

Its funny to read this because I want to get my PhD. If and when I get it though I always planned on working in the industry and as adjunct faculty. I just love to teach. Do you still have to write your own grants in that kind of a position?

Um... if you love to teach... it can be hard to find a U where that's at all valued.

(Trying not to let my community college biases get too obvious here )

I also recall Herr McNabb, in my freshman year, who did *not* like it when people slipped and called him Dr. McNabb. Mr. was fine - but he considered it an honor to have gotten a teaching position without a PhD.

[Melalvai]

I had a difficult meeting with my boss today. To recap:
When I told him I was not going to North Dakota with him, he all but threatened to sabatoge my career. I believe he got carried away and went further than he intended with what he was saying, but I wasn't sure exactly what he meant.

When I asked to continue the current study, he flat out said "I will not give any money to MU after I leave". Which meant the research program I had worked so hard to develop and which I intended to use as the basis of job applications for the future was dead.

I thought that was the end, but another prof suggested I talk to the dept. I didn't tell my boss I was doing that because I wasn't sure if his refusal was a stab at my career, a stab at MU, or some other reason. If the dept was a potential source of bridge funding, why hadn't my boss suggested it? Why the flat-out refusal and no effort to work with me to find another solution?

Today I got an initial favorable response from the dept, followed up with instructions to talk to my boss. I thought it was likely he would be angry that I'd gone behind his back. I was angry too. It was a difficult meeting, I like to say an animated discussion (a bit of an understatement), but we cleared the air. He was upset and believed I had acted unprofessionally although he was willing to consider that perhaps I was in survival mode. I had a whole lot of accusations about his behavior which I flung right back at him and...

amazingly, he apologized. He explained why it wasn't possible for him to fund my rats even if he wanted to, and that he didn't make an effort to find another solution because he didn't think it through.

[r900]

Oh, what's wrong with North Dakota? It's not as bad as you may think.:-) We have a dandy bike tour called Candisc that is a weeklong ,450 mile tour of the west/central part of the state. Why be so close-minded? Would it hurt to check it out for a couple of days?

[Melalvai]

Oh, what's wrong with North Dakota? It's not as bad as you may think.:-) We have a dandy bike tour called Candisc that is a weeklong ,450 mile tour of the west/central part of the state. Why be so close-minded? Would it hurt to check it out for a couple of days?

Nothing is wrong with ND, and in fact Grand Forks is the type of place I want to live in. (Midwest college town. No big cities or coastal cities for us.) What is wrong is uprooting my family for yet another postdoc position. I won't do it no matter where the postdoc position is or even how much it pays.

[Pax]

I was telling my friend about your predicament and he was royally pissed for you...he said he's seen that sort of thing happen more than one and feels your pain. Since he decided to bail on academia a couple of months ago he's gotten offers from two big pharm companies...he said he can't figure out why he waited so long to get the hell out of academia!

[Possegal]

I remember when I finished my PhD, much the worse for the wear. My brother who is a viet nam vet told the family I was the only one that could understand what he'd been through, as I too had just come home from war. Kidding of course, but seriously, it felt like hell. When I called my mother after my defense to tell her that yes, I was dr. (insert last name) she congratulated me and then said the best line "I'm going to go call your brothers and sisters and tell them, then I'm going to bed because these have been the longest 5 yrs of my life". I cracked up! I spent many many hours on the phone crying to my mother about quitting, calling her at 5AM as she was waking up, calling at lunch at work. When she passed about 7 years later, her coworkers came up to me at the funeral home and said "we feel like we went through graduate school with you". I said "I put my mother through hell those years". Now, you would think all things considered, they would have said "oh no you didn't". But the one looked at me with this rather sad smile and said "Yeah you did, but she sure was proud of you". And that still makes me cry.

Now, back on track, I do really feel your pain. I had hoped to go into acedemia but it just didn't work out that way for me. I ended up as a government scientist and I'm not sorry for the choices I made, it worked out for me quite well. I was lucky enough to have my phd advisor be like a second dad to me and though I've encountered some pieces of work in my career, none seem to compare to your soon to be former boss. I'm sorry that you are going through all of this, after all you have done to get where you are already!