Thread by @jjanetzko

Monday will mark 11 years (!) since the @HarvardCCB orientation that marked the beginning of graduate school for me. Inspired by this post by @JSheltzer I wondered what the stats looked like for my cohort. A 🧵

https://twitter.com/JSheltzer/status/1554152381541220352?s=20&t=3AV2KS-F2Ckp5s_1-5VxMw

Here's what they're doing today:

Similar to what @JSheltzer found, more than half of my peers have left academia. 12/39 (30%) are faculty or remain postdocs (presumably because they are planning on an academic career).

https://twitter.com/JSheltzer/status/1554152383315427336?s=20&t=3AV2KS-F2Ckp5s_1-5VxMw

Let's dig in a bit more, shall we? The data I'm looking at is an amalgamation of the Chemistry & Chemical Biology program combined with the Chemical Biology program, yes, they are separate programs at Harvard. Entering gender balance was close to equal.

Of 48 total between the two programs 9 left and 39 graduated. More women were in the group which left the program(s), so the graduating demographic skewed slightly male.

Those who left didn't do badly for themselves. Two went on to get their PhD elsewhere, and all but one (who I couldn't easily track down) seemed to be in good jobs.

Interestingly, it looks like those who are faculty are pretty evenly split with respect to gender, unlike that seen here. But, more M postdocs looking to be faculty than F postdocs, so likely in a few years this will tip the scales ⚖️

https://twitter.com/JSheltzer/status/1554152389694967814?s=20&t=3AV2KS-F2Ckp5s_1-5VxMw

Another key difference was that the 2011 entering class for Harvard CCB seemed to have more entrepreneurial spirit than the 2008 @MITBiology class. Three (vs 0) work at companies they founded (this is just counting those who graduated from CCB).

https://twitter.com/JSheltzer/status/1554152391586586624?s=20&t=3AV2KS-F2Ckp5s_1-5VxMw

Another thing I was curious about was the stats for those who did some form of a post-doctoral fellowship. Everyone who stayed in academia did a postdoc. But beyond that it's a mix, and almost HALF of graduates did NOT do a postdoc.

This thread is brought to you by a red-eye flight to West Palm Beach for a conference, MetBrewer #Kandinsky by @BlakeRobMills and my curiosity. Will be interested to see how these trends are evolving.

A major take-away (for me) is that even for programs regarded as some of the best in the country (as was the case for MIT Biology) the majority students will NOT go on to be faculty. Moreover, even though non-academic careers are kind of an after-thought...

...those who leave academia still do well and find success in other sectors. So what should we take away from this in terms of how to consider changes (if any) to graduate training? Wonder what my major chem idols @jenheemstra @CarolynBertozzi think 🙏 (also CC @AcademicChatter)

@awhspeed since I was just thinking about the reply to your thing - would love to see the results for you guys from previous classes of CCB people. Also interested to hear your take on this in general.