Back in August, the first copies of Mark Vellend’s book The Theory of Ecological Communities were released. I got one of them and found out from the publisher and from the Twitter-sphere that the books were in high demand. A couple people on Twitter suggested forming a book club, and being a compulsive organizer, I …
Category Archive: Explainer
Permanent link to this article: https://ecologybits.com/index.php/2016/11/30/how-to-run-an-online-academic-book-club/
Making science products Open: an informal guide to copyright and licensing
I grew up a hacker (in the original sense) and thus a True Believer in open knowledge. And so, when it came time to start publishing science, I figured I’d make all my products Open. But it turns out that there’s a bewildering array of things to think about if you want to do so. …
Permanent link to this article: https://ecologybits.com/index.php/2016/10/19/making-science-products-open-an-informal-guide-to-copyright-and-licensing/
Avoid using the words “student” and “school” outside of academia
Many, if not most, ecology PhD graduates will go on to jobs outside of academia. One particular area needing improvement in most (all?) graduate departments is on teaching trainees how to market themselves outside of academia. CVs are non-starters outside of academia and resumes are very different beasts. In crafting a resume, you need to …
Permanent link to this article: https://ecologybits.com/index.php/2016/09/21/avoid-using-the-words-student-and-school-outside-of-academia/
The postdoc pay cut
One beneficial thing about working out in the “real world” before starting a PhD is that you have the perspective of academia within the larger world, rather than academia as the only thing you’ve ever known. If you’ve gone from grade school to college directly on to grad school, you may not realize what a …
Permanent link to this article: https://ecologybits.com/index.php/2016/07/20/the-postdoc-pay-cut/
Beware this scary thing Excel can do to your data!
[1] Heh, heh. I’ve always wanted to write a clickbait title. That was fun. Excel. Love it. Hate it. Most ecologists I know use it at least a little, including me. Now I know there are plenty of people who abhor the idea of using Excel for science. But Excel is a tool, just like any …
Permanent link to this article: https://ecologybits.com/index.php/2016/07/06/beware-this-scary-thing-excel-can-do-to-your-data/
How and when to tell your advisor you’re pregnant (or your partner is)
I have had the experience of telling three advisors I’m having a kid — two as a grad student and one as a postdoc. And probably because I’m a bit noisy, I’ve had others ask me for advice on how to tell their advisors that they’re about to become parents. Below is my suggested game …
Permanent link to this article: https://ecologybits.com/index.php/2016/06/22/how-and-when-to-tell-your-advisor-youre-pregnant-or-your-partner-is/
Scheduled Sanity Days
One of the challenges of academia is learning to work for yourself. Before my science life, I worked for a large bureaucracy, a small family business, and a medium-sized non-profit. And in all cases, someone else was telling me what to do. At the small business, my work was dictated to me on an hour-to-hour …
Permanent link to this article: https://ecologybits.com/index.php/2016/04/27/scheduled-sanity-days/
Fancy Footnotes for the Fearless
Back in February, I implored you to stop using unlinked footnotes in your blog posts. The intrepid Stephen Heard [1] of Scientist Sees Squirrel fame, not the 18th century governor of Georgia pointed out that that linking is a little kludgy. The return anchor can only be at the beginning of a paragraph, so it’s …
Permanent link to this article: https://ecologybits.com/index.php/2016/04/20/fancy-footnotes-for-the-fearless/
The hidden financial costs and risks of graduate and postdoctoral fellowships and grants in the U.S.
Congratulations! Your proposal was successful! You’ve been awarded a fellowship or grant! These are great words to read, and overall it’s a good thing to get a fellowship or grant as an early career researcher. But there are hidden costs to these awards, both in terms of your immediate finances and the risks you take …
Permanent link to this article: https://ecologybits.com/index.php/2016/04/14/the-hidden-financial-costs-and-risks-of-graduate-and-postdoctoral-fellowships-and-grants-in-the-u-s/
Postdoc Land: the Wild West
What is a postdoc anyway? Grad students are fairly well-defined: If you are enrolled at an accredited university, working towards a Masters or Doctorate degree, you are a grad student. If you are told someone is faculty somewhere, or a lecturer, then you might have some questions about exactly what type of position the person …
Permanent link to this article: https://ecologybits.com/index.php/2016/01/27/postdoc-land-the-wild-west/
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