quitting

[Quantum Buckyball]

A lot of people have been quitting my program this year, very odd. 

Edited December 20, 2015 by Quantum Buckyball

[ChemEnthusiast]

29 minutes ago, Quantum Buckyball said:

A lot of people have been quitting my program this year, very odd. 

which program is that, may I ask? 

 

[Orgo for days]

37 minutes ago, Quantum Buckyball said:

A lot of people have been quitting my program this year, very odd. 

A few graduate students have quit my program as well, and depression rate for my lab was at 70% until the new first years joined. Terrifying at the very least. You've managed to get this far, so props to you, although its probably getting even more difficult.

[Quantum Buckyball]

The lab next to me is doing real bad, there is going to be only 1 grad student and a lab manager next semester, all the grad students and postdocs have left or leaving. crazy town....

The lab upstair from us is doing pretty bad as well, people are leaving with a Masters degree and a postdoc left...and a couple of grad students are leaving without any pubs. 

The lab below us is doing pretty bad too....no pubs for about 4 years now and a girl just decided to leave the program a week before Fall start...and a couple of grad students are also graduating with no pubs...

 

crazy town x 3

I'm in chemistry

Edited December 21, 2015 by Quantum Buckyball

[ChemEnthusiast]

That is just crazy. My professor told me that grad school is going to be crazy but I cannot imagine it is this difficult. Probably a good thing to be mentally prepared for this kind of challenge.

[Quantum Buckyball]

46 minutes ago, Organic for days said:

A few graduate students have quit my program as well, and depression rate for my lab was at 70% until the new first years joined. Terrifying at the very least. You've managed to get this far, so props to you, although its probably getting even more difficult.

Most people in my lab are on anti-depression meds right now. I've been taking them daily as well, a lab mate thought about suicide last year, a colleague downstair thought about suicide this year...crazy town x 4. 

[rising_star]

@Quantum Buckyball, that sounds way, way worse than most labs or PhD programs that I know of. Are there broader structural issues with the department/program which are contributing to this?

[Eigen]

That actually, sadly, doesn't sound that far out of the norm for me. Attrition rate is pretty consistently 50%+ in Chemistry PhD programs, and lots of people get in thinking its going to be quite a bit different than it is. 

And in this state of funding, a program outside the top 25? Having no pubs for 3-4 years isn't that far out of the ordinary, sadly. Especially if grad student turnover is high, and it's a department without a lot of post-docs. 

One of the big drivers of attrition, too, is that with a BS, you can make about 2x a grad stipend and employment rates are pretty high. And after a year or two of a program, leaving with an MS and getting 2-3x the salary.... Starts sounding better and better. 

[Quantum Buckyball]

10 hours ago, rising_star said:

@Quantum Buckyball, that sounds way, way worse than most labs or PhD programs that I know of. Are there broader structural issues with the department/program which are contributing to this?

My program expanded by about 25% in the past 5 years and we had a lot of new recruits, but very few additional fundings coming in so now you have lots of students in their 4th, 5th and 6th year teaching every semester. It's not that people don't want to publish but if you spend >40 hrs/week on teaching related activities and that limits your time in the lab significantly. They've also been expanding the undergrad chemistry program by a lot and also introduced a new undergrad program two years ago.

My R1 school is more like a PUI right now

[Quantum Buckyball]

9 hours ago, Eigen said:

That actually, sadly, doesn't sound that far out of the norm for me. Attrition rate is pretty consistently 50%+ in Chemistry PhD programs, and lots of people get in thinking its going to be quite a bit different than it is. 

And in this state of funding, a program outside the top 25? Having no pubs for 3-4 years isn't that far out of the ordinary, sadly. Especially if grad student turnover is high, and it's a department without a lot of post-docs. 

One of the big drivers of attrition, too, is that with a BS, you can make about 2x a grad stipend and employment rates are pretty high. And after a year or two of a program, leaving with an MS and getting 2-3x the salary.... Starts sounding better and better. 

A couple of PhDs graduated last year ended up being a high school teacher after an unsuccessful job search. A friend of mine who is about to graduate next semester is going to become a high school teacher as well despite having three first author pubs in J. Phys. Chem. C. because the techniques she learned during her Ph.D. years aren't being employed in the industry, and she doesn't want to do a postdoc, I applause her for that.

Another friend graduated from my program with a Ph.D. last year was a volunteer in our program for about nine months while seeking for employment elsewhere, because his old lab couldn't afford to hire him as a temp. postdoc due to lack of funding. 

Of course, we don't tell any new incomers or prospective students this kind of stuff because it's depressing so we only tell them the "good ole' days" when the funding wasn't a problem and how PhDs make >80k per start out.

[rising_star]

4 hours ago, Quantum Buckyball said:

My program expanded by about 25% in the past 5 years and we had a lot of new recruits, but very few additional fundings coming in so now you have lots of students in their 4th, 5th and 6th year teaching every semester. It's not that people don't want to publish but if you spend >40 hrs/week on teaching related activities and that limits your time in the lab significantly. They've also been expanding the undergrad chemistry program by a lot and also introduced a new undergrad program two years ago.

In other words, yes, there are structural problems. It sounds similar to my PhD program actually. The number of incoming grad students is the same year after year, even though there's fewer TA opportunities, fewer major grants for people to be funded on (though in theory that could change), and thus more pressure for students to find assistantships through other departments or units on campus. All of this will likely increase time to degree and decrease publications for students. In fact, current PhD students asked the dept head whether a slight reduction in the number of new students admitted this year was possible and were immediately shut down on that.

4 hours ago, Quantum Buckyball said:

Of course, we don't tell any new incomers or prospective students this kind of stuff because it's depressing so we only tell them the "good ole' days" when the funding wasn't a problem and how PhDs make >80k per start out.

It's unfortunate that you all don't tell prospective students this. There was a period of time when I didn't but, by my last two years in the program, I got over that. Basically, I'd invite a prospective student out for a one-on-one coffee meeting and then give them the real dish about funding, time to degree, etc. They would usually thank me for it and tell me that no one else had told them those things. 

[Eigen]

4 hours ago, Quantum Buckyball said:

A couple of PhDs graduated last year ended up being a high school teacher after an unsuccessful job search. A friend of mine who is about to graduate next semester is going to become a high school teacher as well despite having three first author pubs in J. Phys. Chem. C. because the techniques she learned during her Ph.D. years aren't being employed in the industry, and she doesn't want to do a postdoc, I applause her for that.

Another friend graduated from my program with a Ph.D. last year was a volunteer in our program for about nine months while seeking for employment elsewhere, because his old lab couldn't afford to hire him as a temp. postdoc due to lack of funding. 

Of course, we don't tell any new incomers or prospective students this kind of stuff because it's depressing so we only tell them the "good ole' days" when the funding wasn't a problem and how PhDs make >80k per start out.

This is also definitely not normal. High attrition is an issue, but I don't know anyone who hasn't landed a decent job/post-doc coming out of our program, and we're a pretty low tier R1. Even people just straight up leaving or leaving with an MS have gotten jobs pretty fast. 

Faculty jobs are a longer search, but so far everyone that wanted one of those has gotten one as well- I'm currently the only person on the market with no job, but it's likely I'll move to a post-doc next year anyway and apply from there. 

Most of our graduates go to industry or government labs, and have pretty high placement rates. 

I'd say there's definitely something wrong if that many people can't find jobs. That said, high school teaching can pay pretty well- I know people that have left other positions to teach HS Chemistry. 

I also echo the sentiment that it's too bad you're not being honest with incoming students, I think that's pretty important. I give all relevant data to visiting and new students, including placement rates from various labs. 

[aberrant]

OP is in a very competitive program (if I recall correctly, it is notoriously difficult). So I'm not surprised of hearing what you said, from your program.

I think budget has something to do with it. And, wasn't couple years ago there was a wave of people applying to graduate school due to poor job market? I wonder if the same group of people are leaving for non-health issues/reasons.

Ours is a small program, and we have one or two folks left in their first or second year. I think it is mostly because of the incompatibility of research interests, however. Yet, so far, those who graduated from our program were able to get a job in industry, or getting a post-doc position in academia/industry. Haven't heard anyone do anything else thus far.

[St Andrews Lynx]

21 hours ago, Quantum Buckyball said:

Most people in my lab are on anti-depression meds right now. I've been taking them daily as well, a lab mate thought about suicide last year, a colleague downstair thought about suicide this year...crazy town x 4. 

Take care of yourself, OP! No PhD is worth wrecking yourself over.

I think there's a chain-reaction effect going on with quitting. If you're miserable in a program but none of your coworkers have walked out, you probably think to yourself "Oh, everybody else is coping much better than me, I should just tough it out." But then when a coworker quits you suddenly realise "Hey, this person who I thought was coping great was in fact struggling as much as me. Maybe it would be sensible for me to quit, too." Which is probably compounded when more people quit and you're suddenly faced with the prospect of being on your own in a lab without funding or coworkers. 

 

[Quantum Buckyball]

On 12/21/2015 at 5:15 PM, St Andrews Lynx said:

Take care of yourself, OP! No PhD is worth wrecking yourself over.

I think there's a chain-reaction effect going on with quitting. If you're miserable in a program but none of your coworkers have walked out, you probably think to yourself "Oh, everybody else is coping much better than me, I should just tough it out." But then when a coworker quits you suddenly realise "Hey, this person who I thought was coping great was in fact struggling as much as me. Maybe it would be sensible for me to quit, too." Which is probably compounded when more people quit and you're suddenly faced with the prospect of being on your own in a lab without funding or coworkers. 

 

I considered myself the lucky one because most my projects are working out as planned, and led to publishable results.

My PI has this "teaching for all or teaching for none" type of mentality because he doesn't want it to get awkward in the lab if only a couple of people are teaching (the ones that have not made any progress since year 1). 

So the PI of the lab next to us is importing additional postdocs from oversea because she couldn't retain domestic grad students here. 

[Eigen]

Ugh, teaching for all or teaching for none sounds horrible. 

In my department, TA vs RA is the carrot/stick. If you're productive, you stay on RA. If not, you go on TA for a semester/year. 

Then you get another semester on RA to see if you can be more productive. 

My PI uses the metric of "you should have material ready to put into a paper after a year on RA", else people go back on TA. It's not always the case, but it gives people a goal to work to. He also explains it in terms of getting new grants- if people aren't productive enough to progress the aims of the grant, he doesn't feel right funding them off of that grant. 

[St Andrews Lynx]

In our lab it is done based mostly on seniority. You're a TA for the first half of your PhD, then in your final years you will be on an RA. 

Fortunately the TA loads in my Dept aren't enough to damage research productivity, so even when you do teach it isn't too bad...

[Quantum Buckyball]

14 hours ago, St Andrews Lynx said:

In our lab it is done based mostly on seniority. You're a TA for the first half of your PhD, then in your final years you will be on an RA. 

Fortunately the TA loads in my Dept aren't enough to damage research productivity, so even when you do teach it isn't too bad...

He made it very clear that he doesn't want to do it based on seniority rather than productivity which is completely fair, and that undergrad and grad students are equal in his lab, meaning they all have their independent projects (which is awesome for undergrad research experience).

We have max lab space (desk space) for 6 people and now have 11 people in the lab with only two instruments ...  

[SymmetryOfImperfection]

My lab: teaching for all only. lol. I have a massive teaching workload (12 hours per week are spent in the classroom alone) and have to work on research, writing and oral exams. Apparently this is the norm around here since the department recently lost some huge funding in the physical chemistry program because alot of professors worked on a similar topic that then got axed by the DOE.

[Quantum Buckyball]

On 1/9/2016 at 6:26 PM, SymmetryOfImperfection said:

My lab: teaching for all only. lol. I have a massive teaching workload (12 hours per week are spent in the classroom alone) and have to work on research, writing and oral exams. Apparently this is the norm around here since the department recently lost some huge funding in the physical chemistry program because alot of professors worked on a similar topic that then got axed by the DOE.

My friends in an environmental chemistry lab have been teaching every semester because of EPA budge cut. I also have a couple of friends in a lab that is doing cancer diagnostic been teaching every semester as well due to grant funding hardship. 

I was talking to a buddy from another group who is about to finish his 5th year and he got so depressed and angry that none of his projects are leading to publications and his PI wants him to graduate this semester...another friend who's working on instrument development is graduating this semester without any pubs as well.

it's pretty crazy in my program  

The group I'm in isn't doing all that bad, even though is teaching for all, the projects everyone's working on are making a decent progress with publishable results, that's the only thing that really matters in the end.  

[Eigen]

About 50-70% of the grad students in my department TA.

They're divided up a little strangely- for the lower level labs, some people teach (3 sections) some people grade, some people prep/clean the labs. Usually depending on seniority and how good they are actually dealing with students. 

But it works out to a ~20 hour week teaching on top of research/classes.

[onceinalifetime]

So in general, why do so many people get depressed and drop out? This is really alarming what i'm reading here. I just got my first acceptance to a PhD last week. So I rode that wave of happiness for about a week and now I'm seeing this and getting worried again already lol. And this isn't the only thread/article I've seen with this tone. I've seen many.

[Eigen]

It's hard, the pay is low, and when you graduate you can look forward (likely) to another protracted period of hard work and low pay. 

On top of that, research is an inherently frustrating field. There are lot of amazing parts of being on the cutting edge of science, but it also means there's literally no one to turn to when stuff doesn't work. If people already knew why what you were working on did or didn't work, you probably wouldn't be doing it. 

To be honest, I don't think the stresses are much different from any other job I've had, but the hours are longer, and the breaks are fewer. And the pay is a lot lower. 

Even all that said, it's not a decision I regret at all. I've learned a phenomenal amount during my PhD, even if I never land a job in academia (or even in Chemistry) I'm still glad for the time I spent in grad school. But retiring to open a farm somewhere seems really appealing sometimes.

[St Andrews Lynx]

I think that with a 9-5 job it is easier to leave your stress & unhappiness at the office. I've found that a PhD is more than a job - it takes up a large portion of your personal identity. Especially in the sciences when you (i) have long hours (ii) have to spend those hours physically in the lab rather than working remotely. It can also be more complicated than having one boss telling you what to do - you need to spend time being a researcher, being a teacher, being a student. All of which conflict with each other at some point. That makes everything more intense, on top of what Eigen says.

My advice is: you'll either suit the PhD program or you won't. There's nothing wrong with starting a PhD and realising that it isn't for you - in fact it's a very wise and brave decision to make. It's something that only you can suss out, and is often hard to figure out before you begin.

 

[SymmetryOfImperfection]

On 1/16/2016 at 9:25 PM, onceinalifetime said:

So in general, why do so many people get depressed and drop out? This is really alarming what i'm reading here. I just got my first acceptance to a PhD last week. So I rode that wave of happiness for about a week and now I'm seeing this and getting worried again already lol. And this isn't the only thread/article I've seen with this tone. I've seen many.

1. it's hard work with low pay and long hours.

2. Sometimes you have to do what your professor wants you to do with little independence.

3. Your advisor might not be that interested in your work unless it's exactly what they were thinking of.