Tag Archives: science and society

Biomedical Research and Broken Clocks: All the Parts, but No Instructions

The day-to-day rigors of academic biomedical research are difficult to appreciate, and it is necessary that scientists share their perspective of the knowledge market with politicians and government representatives who are burdened with making difficult decisions on our behalf. Unlike … Continue reading

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Who do universities want to hire – scientists or politicians?

In his article The Vanishing Voter, Harvard professor Thomas Patterson makes a statement about modern political campaigns that made me a little nauseous: Ambition, manipulation, and deception have become as prominent as issues of policy and leadership You might scoff at … Continue reading

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A deeper look into the “80% of PhDs who do not become professors”

In a recent comment left on the site by SubC, a request was made to “look deeper” into the 20% number of PhDs becoming professors.  Specifically, the question was raised as to “how many that wanted an academic career in … Continue reading

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University Affairs commentary on our CSPC panel

On November 30, University Affairs posted two articles  that summarise and discuss the major issues that came up in our session at the 3rd Annual Canadian Science Policy Conference: Is Canada producing too many PhDs? Yes, no and maybe The … Continue reading

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More on Aboriginal Education in Canada

In my last blog posting, I discussed “The State of Aboriginal Learning in Canada” report and promised to talk more about potential solutions to the barriers to education faced by Aboriginal people in Canada. To that end, I have just … Continue reading

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Good news from the Border – Keeping international PhDs in Canada

QUICK REMINDER: For those that missed it, I’ll be chairing a session on the Education and Training of Scientists at this year’s Canadian Science Policy Conference in Ottawa next week.  I posted on the topic a few weeks back and would … Continue reading

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A Quick Review of the 2009 “The State of Aboriginal Learning in Canada” report

I’ve been doing some work with the Aboriginal Health Program at my day job and it has reminded me of something that I’ve been meaning to blog about here: the rates of Aboriginal people in post-secondary education. Back when Dave … Continue reading

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What to do with all the Scientists… find out at the 2011 Canadian Science Policy Conference

In a break from normal lab routine, I’ll be dabbling in the black arts of science policy this November and running a session at the 3rd annual Canadian Science Policy Conference.  The conference runs from Nov 16th-18th and features an … Continue reading

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A Quick Thanksgiving Post on Bad Graphs

I’m full of Thanksgiving dinner, so today’s posting is going to be a quick one! A friend of mine recently passed along this paper to me, as she thought it might be a useful tool in teaching research methods/statistics: Graphs … Continue reading

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Quarterly Summary: Guest Bloggers are Great!

This summer featured our second summer series.  Last year’s “So you want to be a…” was followed up this year by “Notches in the STIC” which navigated through the key points of the Science and Technology Innovation Council’s recent report … Continue reading

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