2007 Career Opportunities in Physiology Committee Report
Career Symposia at Experimental Biology
The 2006 APS Careers Symposium was entitled, “Navigating the Interview:
How to Make it Work for You.” The session was designed to provide potential
interviewees with information about what to expect in the interview, the
etiquette of interviewing, and possible pitfalls to be aware of in the
interview process. The program focused on how to prepare for an interview,
the similarities and differences between industrial and academic hiring
processes, and the skill sets desired by industrial and academic employers.
With support from the APS staff, the Committee developed the symposium
presentations into a set of online resources that can be used by trainees
and more senior physiologists on demand. These include a Macromedia flash
version of the presentation, a downloadable PowerPoint file, and the
corresponding article from The Physiologist.
In 2007 the Career Opportunities in Physiology, Trainee Advisory, and
Women in Physiology Committees again coordinated the topics of their
sessions to provide a complimentary set of career advancement sessions for
early career physiologists. Committee members Douglas Johns of
GlaxoSmithKline and Catherine Uyehara of Tripler Army Medical Center chaired
the session, “Guide for successful collaboration: From the handshake to the
collaborative research agreement.” The symposium was well attended, with
about 100 attending, and the majority staying for the entire symposium. As
expected, the workshop drew a diverse group of attendees.
For 2008, the Committee will focus its EB symposium on the career
development of more senior physiologists. The session is being organized by
Committee member Rolando Rumbaut of the Baylor College of Medicine and is
entitled, “Mid-Career Transitions: Choices and Challenges.” It will feature
speakers with experience in government, academia, and industry. Again, the
Committee is coordinating with the Trainee Advisory and the Women in
Physiology Committees to create sessions that complement each other.
Career Presentations at APS Conferences
For the 2007 APS Conference, “Sex and Gender in Cardiovascular-Renal
Physiology and Pathophysiology,” the Career Opportunities Committee
presented two two-hour workshops using the materials from the Professional
Skills Courses. The first workshop, “Making a great impression at a
scientific meeting: Presenting your poster, presenting yourself,” focused on
how to effectively present a poster and how to introduce oneself at a
scientific meeting. The second workshop, “Writing your first papers: The
“ins” and “outs” of authorship,” focused on how authorship on manuscripts is
determined and will engage participants in an authorship case study.
Presenters also shared an overview of the career development resources
offered by the APS, including the new Professional Skills Courses.
Undergraduate Summer Research Fellowship Program
The APS Undergraduate Summer Research Fellowship Program supports 24
full-time undergraduate students annually to work in the laboratories of
established investigators. The goal of the program is to excite and
encourage undergraduate students worldwide to pursue a career as a basic
research scientist. The program has measurable objectives to evaluate the
program’s impacts. Specifically, students participating in the program will:
-
learn to develop a hypothesis-driven research project, collect and
analyze data, and write up the experimental results;
-
present at least one poster or oral presentation on their experimental
results at a scientific meeting;
-
attend a national multi-society scientific meeting and interact with
fellow undergraduate awardees;
-
express a strengthened commitment to a research career as a result of
the summer program; and
-
enroll in a graduate or combined graduate/professional program to pursue
a career in basic biomedical research.
The Committee continues to balance the selection criteria for the program
so that a diverse group of outstanding applicants receive awards—from both
four-year colleges and research universities, from diverse parts of the
country, from minority and majority applicants, and from applicants with
varying degrees of previous lab experience.
Careers Poster
Each fall a new copy of the poster is distributed to all US and Canadian
undergraduate colleges and life sciences departments. The poster prominently
displays the URL for the APS Web site, which is how most undergraduates seek
information.
Career Outreach PowerPoint Presentation Package
This project provides downloadable PowerPoint files for use at the
elementary, middle, and high school levels, as well as lower and upper
undergraduate levels. Since the initiation of this project, these PowerPoint
presentations have become important tools not only for use by APS members
individually, but in both undergraduate and K-12 outreach programs,
especially Physiology Understanding (PhUn) Week.
APS Careers Web Site
The APS Careers Web Site was developed by the Careers Committee in 2002
and launched in March 2003. It provides extensive resources for two major
purposes: 1) to assist students and new and experienced physiologists
in the development of their careers; and 2) to help the general
public gain a better understanding of the work that physiologists do. The
site includes separate sections and resources for elementary, middle/high
school, undergraduate, graduate/professional, postdoctoral fellows, new
investigators, established investigators, and the general public. Within
each section, the user finds resource categories customized to their needs.
Links for this site of more than 1,500 pages are checked on an annual
basis to assure that the resources can be easily accessed. A new addition to
the resources is hyperlinks associated with each skill listed in the
APS-ACDP List of Professional Skills. In addition, the audio/visual
presentation captured during the EB Careers Symposium, Trainee Advisory
Symposium, and Women in Physiology Committee workshop are available through
the Careers Web.
Science Fair Outreach
Currently the APS provides monetary awards to outstanding student
projects at the International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF). These
awards recognize the “best of the best”…projects that have won awards at
local, regional, and state science fair to make it to the international
competition. This is a highly successful program that not only serves to
recognize outstanding student research, but also to raise awareness among
the many ISEF participants of both physiology and the APS.
There are many local and regional fairs that feed into the ISEF. The ISEF
network of affiliated fairs (those that include at least five high schools)
includes more than 450 fairs in the United States. Many APS members
participate in these fairs as judges. The APS Education Office receives
several requests annually for APS to provide awards for local and regional
fairs. However, the cost of providing monetary awards for these fairs would
be prohibitive. In 2006, the Education Office responded to two requests from
APS members to help support their local science fairs.
Ideas under Development
The Committee has a number of other initiatives under development, such
as the undergraduate research programs. The APS has had great success with
its UGSRF program. The Committee believes that the APS can act as a catalyst
to both strengthen and expand other undergraduate research programs,
especially those managed by other FASEB societies.
The Committee would like students to be able to come to the APS Career
Web, provide information on their interests on an interactive webpage, and
get information that will help them identify potential physiology-related
careers that match their interests. This could be a simple pull down menu or
might develop into an interactive checklist and an algorithm.
Nansie Anne McHugh, Chair
Career Opportunities in Physiology Committee
-
Council approved the initiation of an APS Science Fair Outreach Program
and approved the necessary funding for up to 100 local awards per year.
-
Council approved the initiation of an EB Undergraduate Orientation
Session and approved funds for up to $1,000 for refreshments and
audio-visual charges per year for three years.
|
