Enhancing the Postdoctoral Experience for Scientists and Engineers A Guide for Postdoctoral Scholars, Advisers, Institutions, Funding Organizations, and Disciplinary Societies (2000) / Chapter Skim
Currently Skimming:
The Postdoc and the Institution
The Postdoc and the Institution
Pages 70-87
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From page 70... ...
The university's administration may have only an approximate picture of the postdoctoral population and provide few mechanisms to standardize benefits or institutional status. Postdocs may be regarded as benefiting a particular investigator rather than the institution as a whole.
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From page 71... ...
(~ ~24~ 71 In its 1998 study of the postdoctoral experience, the AAU committee wrote that "...the lack of institutional oversight of postdoctoral appointments, coupled with the evolution of postdoctoral education in a number of disciplines into a virtual requirement for a tenure-track faculty appointment, creates an unacceptable degree of variability and instability in this aspect of the academic enterprise."i Through its meetings with postdocs and advisers, COSEPUP has found that uncertain status, low pay and benefits, and lack of professional recognition {AAU, 1998. Cited above.
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From page 72... ...
Postdocs may be categorized as research associates, research assistant professors, contract employees, adjunct professors, laboratory instructors, research fellows, and so on, according to local custom (see Box)
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From page 73... ...
For example, postdoctoral researchers paid from the grants of advisers are usually considered temporary employees and qualify for employee health plans, parking facilities, vacations, and other benefits. Postdoctoral fellows, however, who have received their own funding directly, may be considered neither students nor employees and thus may or may not receive health benefits from (or through)
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From page 74... ...
The Council of Graduate Deans' Report on Postdoctoral Education recommended that "Postdoctoral scholars should be constituted as a distinct group of individuals ... clearly separate from students, other academic employees, staff employees, and resident and house staff..." Although they did not indicate their reason for this decision, it was presumably because the nature of research funding determined the classification of postdocs.
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From page 75... ...
One goal of postdoc offices is to ensure consistent application of policies. The University of California at San Francisco, for example, now requires a formal hiring letter, jointly signed by the faculty mentor and department chair or other university official, along with a statement of goals, policies, and responsibilities applicable to postdoctoral education.
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From page 76... ...
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From page 77... ...
While advisers are often best positioned to contact and suggest potential employers in their own field, a postdoctoral office can offer job counseling for other fields or sectors, coordinate and publicize recruiter visits, maintain contacts with former postdocs, post job openings, and hold workshops on employment trends. A career office can also assist with the basic mechanics of job seeking: how to write a CV, prepare a cover letter, organize slides for a talk, and so on.
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From page 78... ...
Some of the most gifted postdocs come with fellowships, both from US and foreign sources, and yet they are often disadvantaged in terms of employment benefits. The institution has the responsibility either to provide equitable health insurance and other benefits or to require individual laboratories or departments to provide them.
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From page 79... ...
Mentoring is the specific responsibility of the adviser. Institutions can help promote better mentoring practices that enhance the postdoctoral experience and reduce the chance of neglect or abuse.
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From page 80... ...
Some institutions are experimenting with the use of formal and informal mentoring committees, selected by the postdoc, that meet every six or twelve months. The purpose of such a committee is not to alter the primary role of the adviser, but to provide additional perspective and guidance, as well as help in building a professional network.
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From page 81... ...
A desire for a grievance procedure is commonly reported by postdoc surveys, and the AAU recommends that each institution's core policies should provide mechanisms to resolve grievances. The University of California system, for example, recommends that campuses establish a standard grievance procedure for postdocs that is written, protects due process, contains clear time lines, and requires a clear statement of alleged grievance and requested remedy.6 The COSEPUP survey shows that institutions handle grievances through a variety of mechanisms (see Box)
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From page 82... ...
Postdocs on temporary visas comprise approximately half of all postdocs in the US. Many need help, both before and after they arrive, in resolving visa questions, finding housing, meeting other postdocs, and arranging bank accounts, credit cards, driver's licenses, and Social Security numbers.
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From page 83... ...
. The UCSF Postdoctoral Scholars Association, formed in 1995, has worked with the university to formalize a grievance process, bring postdoc representatives to committees that set postdoctoral policy, establish an annual orientation for postdocs, and offer access to group health insurance.
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From page 84... ...
As the NRC Trends report stated, investigators and training-program directors accept large numbers of students in part to meet their faculties' need for instructors and laboratory workers.8 That committee urged life-science faculties 80ffice of Scientific and Engineering Personnel, National Research Council, Trends in the Early Careers of Life Scientists, Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 1998.
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From page 86... ...
If adequate compensation is not provided by the funding organization, the institution would then appoint the postdoc only if supplementary funding is made available. Some early predictions that postdoctoral associations would become adversarial or union-like organizations have not materialized.
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