A survey says that UK postdocs need more pastoral care and career advice.
UK postdoctoral researchers need better career advice, finds a survey of 776 postdocs by the Royal Society of Chemistry and the Institute of Physics, both in London. Mapping the Future: Physics and Chemistry Postdoctoral Researchers' Experiences and Career Intentions, released on 14 April, says that less than half have regular appraisals, and impartial advice about non-academic careers is scarce. Female chemists were most likely to have doubts about staying in academia, and male physicists spent the most time as postdocs: an average of 3–4 years, compared with 1–2 years for women. The problems should be tackled by universities, funding bodies and the Concordat Strategy Group, a UK postdoc-support organization, says the report.
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Postdocs need support. Nature 473, 245 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/nj7346-245c
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nj7346-245c