This is the inaugural post of Theodoni letters. It was written on March 21, 2021, during the NYU writing workshop. I thank Brooke Borel, the instructor of the workshop, for her comments. It was based on a series of tweets. It is followed by updates.
September 24th was National Postdoc Appreciation week. What a bad joke or a sadist's idea. We know that postdocs —post-doctoral researchers— are the workhorses of science, especially in the life sciences. But at what cost?
Let me, an almost 7 years postdoc, tell you something about it. To start with, it doesn’t make sense to have a specific working category for something that is so generic. Anyone who has finished their doctorate is technically a postdoc. Professors are postdocs. Associate Professors are postdocs. Yet, here they are, the postdoctoral researchers who are just postdocs. Why?
The poor working conditions for postdocs has long been an open secret, but the Covid era brought it to the surface. Article after article has pointed out the pressure postdocs face due to their bad working conditions. A 2020 survey in Nature confirmed it. To be fair, for some postdocs it works out well, but not for everybody; exactly not for the 90% of them. That’s right, only 10% of postdocs survive the Academic arena.
First and foremost, it is the uncertainty. Postdocs only get contracts for a year or two — usually in another country or even continent, because mobility is good for the CV. Postdocs enter the elastic middle between a Ph.D. and a faculty position until they are frustrated or drained enough to leave. Also, just a few years of postdoc are considered too few, yet many years too much. You need to find the sweet spot to get a faculty position before you are considered expired.
Then there is the low pay, especially in comparison to industry; the lack of benefits, such as child-care, and parental leave; the indignation due to biases that only accumulates as years pass; the fierce competition; the power imbalance; and the under-appreciation and being treated as a trainee.
Why postdocs are called trainees, I still don’t understand. Postdocs are doing the research; bringing ideas for new projects; teaching classes; mentoring students; writing grants. Meanwhile, their bosses, the heads of the lab, or else the principal investigators (PIs), do little more than management. The PIs get most of the credit and build their careers on the shoulders of their consumable trainees. Yes, of course, postdocs learn a lot. But one always learns, and they could be learning while they have a secure independent job — like as a PI.
Postdocs must end. How?
If graduate students stop applying for a postdoc position, PIs stop hiring them, grants and especially Faculty positions stop requiring them. PhD students can instead apply for jobs as faculty, independent researchers, or for a grant of their own. At the same time, we must stop building empires around a PI but instead create cooperative working environments where peers do research together and learn from each other.
Of course, this shouldn’t prevent students from doing a Ph.D. Doing a Ph.D evolves oneself and benefits society. It cultivates critical thinking and produces high-skilled specialized community members. But why go on to waste the most creative and motivating years of your life only to be disappointed and end up doing something that you could be doing much earlier while being mentally healthy?
So next year in September please do not appreciate the postdocs. Do something to end them.