ECFA stands for European Committee for Future Accelerators. The committee visits institutes in its member countries to assess the current status of accelerator physics and make suggestions on how things can be improved. I was invited to give a talk at a recent Restricted-ECFA meeting that was held at Imperial. They wanted to get an idea about what PhDs in particle physics are really like, so gave a talk about what I had done during my PhD, why I did one in the first place and what my future plans are. It was a lot of fun to stand up and give a talk that was all based on opinion (so I couldn’t technically get anything wrong!). I told them that I thought the atmosphere at CERN was great and that everyone who works there is really enthusiastic. I also said I thought the funding for PhD students was set a quite a reasonable level, sorry to anyone who thinks I should have used the opportunity to campaign for more cash. I had a few complaints, mainly about PPARC admin department (all PhD students have a story or two to back this up) and GSEPS (transferable skills courses) which are generally a waste of time. In the main I think I am lucky to be working in such an interesting and diverse field, especially at such an important time, so that’s what I told them.
Many people gave talks concerning the state of physics in schools, funding for research and general overviews of experiments and institutes. The committee returned a very positive verdict about the status of physics in the UK and made some constructive suggestions. They commented on the small proportion of women in the field but accepted that redressing this balance is a complicated, long term process.
skip to main |
skip to sidebar
Undergraduate and Postgraduate students, Research Associates and Staff at the Imperial College London High Energy Physics Group. (everyone is invited to add comments!)
Recent Comments
Subscribe to this Blog
Subscribe via Email
Subscribe to Feeds
Contributors
Postings to this blog by HEP group members are being made as individuals and are not intended to be representative of the group as a whole, experimental collaborations, or any other entity.
6 comments:
I didn't manage to attend the meeting, was anything mentioned about the funding situation for Post Docs in the next few years?
Plus, silly question, what does GSEPS have to do with the direction for Europe's future accelerators ... ?
I mentioned in my talk that one of the reasons PhD students were discouraged for carrying on in the field to do a post doc was finances. Because PhD funding has got so much better over the last few years going from being a student on LTA to a post doc in London could possibly mean you are worse off! The only thing i could do was draw attention to this.
I think ECFA has a broader scope now than when it started, for example, talks about the state of physics teaching in schools were given, so I think what they wanted was a general overview. I was asked to tell them about everything I had done during my PhD and comment on what was rewarding and what was frustrating so that's how GSEPS came into it.
Did anyone from the funding agency or senior members of staff comment on this? Would have been very interesting to hear their responses to your comments.
On a related note, does this mean you're tempted to apply for a CERN fellowship?
http://humanresources.web.cern.ch/HumanResources/external/recruitment/fellows/fellows.asp
People did comment on this and from talking to people it seems that it is mainly a UK problem, so I guess you could always get a postdoc with, for example, an American institution but based at CERN. There are ways around it. But think of it another way, if postdocs were as well paid as some of the competing jobs in industry, then ~ everyone would want to stay on. There are 2 main problems with this:
1. There aren't enough postdoc places
2. Industry wouldn't be getting any people with PhDs and in turn the Government wouldn't be able to fund as many.
I haven't looked at what Postdocs pay in the states but I don't think it's just a UK problem. They seem to be pretty much in-line with the rest of Europe and talking to some of the Italian students it seems that the pay there is much less there than it is here in the UK.
I think it tends to be the comparison to what you could earn in the 'City' that makes the pay look bad, e.g. several of the students in my year as an undergraduate started on £30k+ 3 years ago ...
ok, so i've been "encouraged" to express my views on the funding situation for international students like myself.
i guess you have to be careful not to generalise the funding situation to all UK PhD students. many international students, as myself, are not eligible for PPARC funding and so don't have the luxury to say we have sufficient funding - but then is any amount "sufficient"? i personally think this is something that will have to change in the UK if it is to become well and truly competitive within scientific research community. i'm sure there are valid political arguments against making UK funding available to all post-graduate students and i'm not about to debate them here... immigrants != bad.
it's actually the department that acknowledges this shortfall effectively and allocates a sum of money to supplement my time whilst being a Phd student. perhaps giving individual departments more freedom on where to spend the money rather than having their hands tied by inefficient centralised organisations is the answer - just an opinion!
this is not so much of a critique as it is me sharing my situation and personal views on the topic. i know Tassos is another exception to the rule so persuade him to post his views for an even deeper understanding of the state of UK PhD funding.
Post a Comment