Is the Chief Scientist out of touch with what PhDs want?
Loren Smith, Campus Review
Were Finkel’s comments productive, glib, or something in-between? Was he sincere about PhDs wanting to choose their own academic or non-academic paths, or was this a distraction from the fact that the academic job market is evaporating?
[…]
Natasha Abrahams offered a different view. The National President of the Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations (CAPA) thinks that whatever career path post-PhDs select, it doesn’t really matter – at least on a societal level. ‘People undertake doctoral study for a diversity of reasons,’ she said.
‘Regardless of what a PhD student plans for after their graduation, their doctoral research contributes to the national research output.’
Yet she suggested a reason for why some PhD graduates choose to leave academia: money, or, more accurately, a lack thereof.
Read more: https://www.campusreview.com.au/2018/04/is-the-chief-scientist-out-of-touch-with-what-phds-want/
