That is the question. This has been on my mind for quite some time now and was recently renewed after reading
Ms. PhD's post. Honestly, she doesn't make it sound all to appealing to be a post doc. I especially like the one last piece of advice -
don't do one if you can figure out a way to avoid it. My guess is that if there was an easy way to avoid it more people would opt out of the post doc process. Unfortunately I have yet to find a way to opt out. Despite the mini anxiety attack I have every time I think about the fact that I haven't found a place to do a post doc yet I honestly really haven't been looking into it. I suppose I'm just hoping I'll find that "something else" before I commit to a post doc and then I can avoid that whole process altogether.
I guess the real question is academia or not since really the chance of getting an academic position without a post doc is like winning the lottery. I'm still on the fence on the issue of being an academic as well. Man, the indecisiveness is so aggravating! I think the problem is that I would be happy either way - academia or not - so I'm really not set on either. I suppose my decision would be easier if I had a clear cut goal of wanting to work at such and such university studying such and such but that isn't the case. Oh decisions, decisions. I'm beginning to think that it isn't the actual PhD that is difficult but figuring out what to do after you get that PhD is where the difficulty lies.
2 comments:
Nooooooo I don't want to hear that the hardest part is actually figuring out what to do with the PhD -- I'm having a hard enough time just making it through the first year alive (although I do hear from everyone in my program that fall semester first year is the worst by far and it just gets easier). Not sure if Hanukkah Harry will be bringing me that A on the biochemistry final tomorrow morning, but if he can't even manage to pull that off, I'm not sure that Santa can manage an entire PhD. Although it sounds like a PhD itself isn't particularly useful if you don't have any idea where to go/what to do with it!
Well, that's one less decision to have to make as a humanities PhD student. In English post docs are the exception rather than the rule. Most people go directly onto the job market, which sucks in a way. I'd love to work for a while in Europe on a post doc but I could never give up a good tenure-track job -- they're not easy to come by in my field.
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