The Evil Monkey has a Ph.D. in Neuroscience from a southeastern U.S. university. After a postdoctoral nightmare of Inquisitorial proportions, he is currently working in a laboratory and an adjunct assistant professor at a nearby state university.
Scicurious is a graduate student wrestling with a PhD in Physiology at a southern institution. She is a nerd, a geek, and also a dork. And yes, that really is her brain.
NotoriousLTP is an MD-PhD student in New York City. After finishing (hopefully soon) his PhD in behavioral neuroscience, he will re-enter the fun vortex that is medical education.
Some of us survive this crappy job market by working as research assistants and adjuncting on the side. It pays the bills and allows us to expand our professional skills. Usually, though, it's hard to find a lot of satisfaction in your work because it's not really your work. It's your boss's research plan and you have to follow it, especially if grant renewals are dependent upon you. Often the teaching side isn't much better since adjuncts aren't given a whole lot of leeway until they prove themselves. But today, at least......
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Whooohooo! I got my course evals for my Brain & Behavior class. An evening course one night a week for over 3 hours means it's tough to hold attention spans, but I somehow managed to keep 90% attendance going. The best part is... my marks were great! I averaged over 5 out of 6 (6 being the best score) on every single item, except for slightly under 5 when asked whether my exams fairly tested knowledge of the material. I expected that would be the case even though I had 60% of the class score a B- or better as their final grade; my tests aren't meant to be a cake walk but you can still succeed if you do well on assignments and such.
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Bottom line: ya gotta keep yer chin up and celebrate the successes when they come. Now, at least, I should be guaranteed to teach this summer and next semester, and with it the opportunity to make a little extra money until something better comes along.
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Great job Evil!
Posted by: DrugMonkey | May 31, 2009 1:09 AM