this gotta be another wall of text.....




i graduated from a very good university in london, with a master degree in neuroscience and with good results

however, i am now semi-unemployed for nearly six months, all i got is some part time teaching and part time research job

i enter uni with the ambition to bring something to the world in terms of technology advancement, i wanted to leave something behind me

and so i graduated with full bag of knowledge, and the urge to fulfill my ambition,

but then there was the financial crisis, which at first i thought it wasnt going to affect academic research,

and i was obviously wrong, there is major cut in funding for many universities, professors and lecturers losing their job etc

I even received an rejection email saying that there were 35 PhDs and 400 Masters competing for one of the research assistant post i was applying to

well then, i tried applying some other jobs that can earn me a living, yet, for those jobs, my full bag of knowledge are considered as "useless"

and i often heard interviewers saying that "you dont effffing know what you want, you got a MSc in neuro, and you apply to here?"....

the fuck?

i certainly know what i wanted, which is to contribute to the society, but the situation wont allow me to,

so for the time being, i want to earn a living..... (of coz i wouldnt say this during interviews...)

i remembered when i enter uni to study that nerdy subject called neuroscience...my relatives stares at me with the look of "what the fuck were you thinking?"

yea.....right.....the only "proper" subjects in their point of view are accounting, business, law, marketing, finance etc.

now i got a taste of being unemployed, and found that they got a point....in some ways

but, i do not regret taking neuroscience, i am proud of the things i know, and i am proud of the scientific papers i published

i do not blame the society either, i expected job hunting to be hard when i decide to do science, just didnt expected to be THAT hard.

so.....this thread is just to share my exp, dont do pure science if you are not prepared for an intense competition with other nerds

full thread of QQ i know









and yea....i know this is jsp, i am prepared to get flamed





edit:

this might also be one of the reason for my current situation

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This post was edited by hk_nobody on Nov 2 2010 03:10am

Maybe you could try to find a work in a foreign country ?

maybe you're looking for the wrong positions?

this, its probably your best bet...

i didnt read much of what u wrote but if u live in europe apply all over europe. if u dont live in europe, apply all over europe and move there.

Yes, it suck for all the hard work you have done, your not gettin appreciated for it. It's not just you, alot of college graduates are having this issues, not just in science but in all sorts of field in general. Give it time, you'll have your dream job. You've done most people haven't, finish college. Be proud of that.

Science has been a basic way of life now. I think even with studying pure science, you can have awesome job.

my uncle did neuroscience for about 20 years. only recently he decided to give it up (maybe he got laid off as you described) and become a plumber.

I cant remember exactly why he gave up the science, i only see him at christmas.

This is also true here in Canada.

I mean, even the PhD students in my lab (well we're in microbiology though), don't even know what to do next, and they're finishing this year.

But with a Master degree you can't expect too much though. I mean you can find jobs in a company if you're lucky enough, work as a research assistant in someone's lab, or even try applying to become a representative of a company to sell some equipment in labs. You could teach in pre-university schools, but I guess you're limited to that. And tbh PhDs are not even giving you much advantage, all you can get more is some position in a lab, like being responsible of a certain project for some years. So some people end up doing a post-doc seeing that phds doesn't give you much compared to a masters. And anyways, you need a post-doc to have your own lab and to teach at a university you need to prove yourself through your lab work for a couple of years.

Yeah. Shit's crazy.
That's why I'm fleeing after my doc to another country.

This post was edited by Haitham on Nov 3 2010 10:52am

This is so unfortunate. We have to resort our hardworking studies in other countries. This makes many of our fellow student stop attending college and just assuming positions that provide our basic lifestyle needs.

Only a part time researching position and a part time teaching position?

Exactly what the hell were you hoping for? That sounds like quite a freaking success to me.