Editorial - 01 April 2013
To view previous Editorials click here

 

pdf file-available from Australasian Science

 

 

 

www.phdcomics.com

The Changing PhD?

 Earlier this month the Group of Eight released a 60-page discussion paper titled The Changing PhD while the Australian Industry Group (AIG) published its report:

Lifting our Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) skills which elicited the comment from Australia's Chief Scientist, Professor Ian Chubb: "If we are to address this STEM skills shortage, we need to fix the science and maths supply line and build better bridges between our educators and employers."

 

In its section regarding "schooling" the AIG report stipulates that "measures [are needed] to lift teacher quality, capability and qualifications in STEM and related disciplines," which should include "the adoption of a more innovative pedagogy which teaches STEM skills in an engaging and integrated way." And while the report lists several programs it considers to be encouraging initiatives, such as Quantum Victoria and the Re-Engineering Australia Foundation with its F1 in Schools national competition, it noted these are isolated examples.

 

If ever there was a guiding lesson to be learnt from "Turning Reports into Action" you would think this would be it.

 

 

Not until there is bipartisan support amalgamated with appropriate public-private partnerships for primary, secondary and undergraduate education that engages the active interest of the potentially high achievers of our young in science, maths and engineering will Australia move out of its middle ranking among its cohort of nations.

 

________________________________________

 

Specialisation: the PhD and the Postdoc.

 

The argument for the need of producing multidisciplinary-competent graduate students and postdocs has been going on for over half-a-century and shows no sign of abating quite the opposite.

 

Of course the danger is one of producing Jacks of several disciplines and masters of none, i.e. with the exception of a few self-taught polymaths a mediocrity is the result.

 

Useful and important individuals to be sure in what might be called follow-up research, but outstanding multidisciplinary contributions are invariably the result of teams where the individuals are sufficiently knowledgeable in the fields of their colleagues so as to be able to collaborate, but who bring brilliance in their discipline to the table.

 

Outstanding examples of "dynamic duos": Beadle and Tatum (geneticist and organic chemist), Delbrück and Luria (physicist and microbiologist), Watson and Crick (microbial geneticist and physicist).

 

Then there is perhaps the crowning example of Albert Einstein who sought assistance from his friend, mathematician Marcel Grossman, to assist him in utilising the complex mathematical foundations for General Relativity.

 

And make no mistake the individuals in the large research teams who work in advanced particle physics bring their specific areas of expertise to those projects.



Alex Reisner

Editor, The Funneled Web