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," te 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:
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learn to develop a hypothesis-driven research project, collect and analyze data, and write up the experimental results;
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present at least one poster or oral presentation on their experimental results at a scientific meeting;
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attend a national multi-society scientific meeting and interact with fellow undergraduate awardees;
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express a strengthened commitment to a research career as a result of the summer program; and
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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
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Council approved the initiation of an APS Science Fair Outreach Program and approved the necessary funding for up to 100 local awards per year.
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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.