CAT 125 Essay - part 4
This post is part of an on-going series on my CAT 125 project.
Check the introductory post here for more details.
(continuing from part 3)
(to be continued...)
Posts from the CAT 125 Series
- Written Abstract
- Visual Abstract
- Essay part 1
- Essay part 2
- Essay part 3
- Essay part 4
- Essay part 5 (end)
Check the introductory post here for more details.
Rise and Fall – The Journey of a Scientist
or where I see myself in 30 years time
or where I see myself in 30 years time
(continuing from part 3)
Life sped by for the next few months. My first taste of real scientific research also opened my eyes to its more tacky side. Prof Q was not the first, nor was he the last to live the ultimate nightmare of a research scientist. In the long, tense relationship between science and federal funding, the amount of funding a scientist manages to secure regularly makes or breaks careers. Federal funding uses a peer review system to judge the quality of the proposal submitted, much like the system used to validate manuscripts before they are published in scientific journals and acknowledged as part of our organized body of knowledge. The peer review system is an anonymous-reviewer system where fellow researchers familiar with the area of research scrutinize proposals submitted to funding agencies for their quality, feasibility and effectiveness, before deciding which one among the thousands of proposals submitted receives a share of the limited funding. In this way, federal funding allocation is just like the science it funds – a completely objective, unbiased approach to gauge, to judge and then to act with no consideration of its impact on egos, fame or careers.
It was this principle that was applied to Prof J, a former Bonner Hall 3rd floor occupant who had moved on to head a big research institute on the UCSD Medical School campus. The grapevine told of two graduate students in her lab who were forced to graduate prematurely because she obtained only three out of the five grants she applied for. Their futures are now uncertain. Prof J was widely considered to be a highly successful female scientist. With no partner or family to saddle her down, she was able to focus her intelligence on solving research problems and micromanaging her lab. Her reputation for efficiency and enterprise had brought her up the career ladder, culminating in multiple high profile roles in the scientific community. But power and fame play no role in the objective allocation of federal research funding. Prof J, like Prof Q and everyone else, had to bite the dust and return to the drawing boards when their grant proposals fail to meet the grade, continuing to seek a better research question that their peers will deem worthy of funding.
Prof F is a biochemistry professor who works on the 3rd floor of Bonner Hall. I had frequent interactions with him when I took an undergraduate tutor (TA) position over the summer for an undergraduate biology class he taught. A former Dean of the Biology Department and recipient of numerous teaching awards, Prof F is an unassuming, white-haired gentleman in his early sixties with eyes that shone with intelligence and a personality that radiates in spite of his soft-spoken words. In short, he fits the stereotypical image of a learned man through and through. Over coffee one morning (at a TA meeting), he unexpectedly announced, without a hint of sadness or regret, that he had lost his funding for the new year (gasp!), and promptly declared his plans for closing his lab, finishing the second edition of a textbook he authored, spending more time with his family, on teaching and with students and wondering where else he should devote his time and energies into. I was slightly surprised, but I soon remembered to close my jaw. Even as the group’s conversation burrowed deep into America’s involvement in Iraq and raged through the skirmish between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, my mind was solely overwhelmed by this new perspective on research funding. In this case, the cut in funding is not the end, but in fact, a new beginning, a new lease of life.
A few weeks later, I found myself wandering around an empty lab, staring at the stained bench tops that had once been cluttered with chemical reagents, DNA samples, bacteria plates, and experimental protocols. My lab manager and I had come to scavenge Prof F’s lab for leftover lab supplies – reagents, glassware, radioactive shields, water baths etc. Everything that was slightly useful would be recycled or reused by the other (surviving) labs. I thought I would feel very sorry for Prof J, and wondered what it feels to have strangers and friends peck the flesh off your baby of 35 years. But I did not think much further than that, because I realized all my thinking was meaningless. By that time, I had understood.
It was this principle that was applied to Prof J, a former Bonner Hall 3rd floor occupant who had moved on to head a big research institute on the UCSD Medical School campus. The grapevine told of two graduate students in her lab who were forced to graduate prematurely because she obtained only three out of the five grants she applied for. Their futures are now uncertain. Prof J was widely considered to be a highly successful female scientist. With no partner or family to saddle her down, she was able to focus her intelligence on solving research problems and micromanaging her lab. Her reputation for efficiency and enterprise had brought her up the career ladder, culminating in multiple high profile roles in the scientific community. But power and fame play no role in the objective allocation of federal research funding. Prof J, like Prof Q and everyone else, had to bite the dust and return to the drawing boards when their grant proposals fail to meet the grade, continuing to seek a better research question that their peers will deem worthy of funding.
*****
Prof F is a biochemistry professor who works on the 3rd floor of Bonner Hall. I had frequent interactions with him when I took an undergraduate tutor (TA) position over the summer for an undergraduate biology class he taught. A former Dean of the Biology Department and recipient of numerous teaching awards, Prof F is an unassuming, white-haired gentleman in his early sixties with eyes that shone with intelligence and a personality that radiates in spite of his soft-spoken words. In short, he fits the stereotypical image of a learned man through and through. Over coffee one morning (at a TA meeting), he unexpectedly announced, without a hint of sadness or regret, that he had lost his funding for the new year (gasp!), and promptly declared his plans for closing his lab, finishing the second edition of a textbook he authored, spending more time with his family, on teaching and with students and wondering where else he should devote his time and energies into. I was slightly surprised, but I soon remembered to close my jaw. Even as the group’s conversation burrowed deep into America’s involvement in Iraq and raged through the skirmish between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, my mind was solely overwhelmed by this new perspective on research funding. In this case, the cut in funding is not the end, but in fact, a new beginning, a new lease of life.
A few weeks later, I found myself wandering around an empty lab, staring at the stained bench tops that had once been cluttered with chemical reagents, DNA samples, bacteria plates, and experimental protocols. My lab manager and I had come to scavenge Prof F’s lab for leftover lab supplies – reagents, glassware, radioactive shields, water baths etc. Everything that was slightly useful would be recycled or reused by the other (surviving) labs. I thought I would feel very sorry for Prof J, and wondered what it feels to have strangers and friends peck the flesh off your baby of 35 years. But I did not think much further than that, because I realized all my thinking was meaningless. By that time, I had understood.
(to be continued...)
Posts from the CAT 125 Series
- Written Abstract
- Visual Abstract
- Essay part 1
- Essay part 2
- Essay part 3
- Essay part 4
- Essay part 5 (end)
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