Hei,
Pretty much everything about teaching is said, what I also though, so I just comment this latest mail...
On Thu, 15 May 2008, Lloyd Ruddock wrote:
Someone already mentioned that the job/salary situation makes some students quite insecure and worried. I can't exactly point out where this comes from, but it's very hard to avoid hearing at least some depressing comments about the unemployement etc. It's actually quite hard to exactly point out where this comes from because there have been these events where people outside the university come to talk about their careers (maybe it's has not been convincing enough?). Also I think at least some older students tend to talk about the matter, so that can be one source too.
According to my knowledge job/salary situation is not extremely terrible in Finland, but most of the available positions, especially around Oulu are periodic university positions. To get a normal job in Oulu is difficult. We should not lie about this fact. However, If you are ready to move, you probably don´t have to be ever unemployed, if you don´t want to. Check for example naturejobs.com...
So in my opinion ot would do a lot of good to get the new students more confident about the work employement/salary situation. Though I can't come up with any new ideas which haven't been tried already. I
To be a honest, salary for young biochemist is not very competive at the moment, if you compare it to other academic positions. With same "work-load" you can earn more in somewhere else, as I have discussed with my friends from other fields (most doing programming, which is extremely boring in my mind). However, I think we are still in better situation than e.g. librarians :)...
So, after all it is just about the values you have in your life. If you just want to earn lot of money, you might be happier in some other field than in biochemistry.
br, Antti Rivinoja
ps: Combination of degrees in biochemistry and medicine is not the worst combination.
---------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Antti Rivinoja, M.Sc. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Oulun yliopisto, University of Oulu, Biokemian laitos Department of Biochemistry PL 3000, PL 3000, 90014 OULUN YLIOPISTO 90014 OULUN YLIOPISTO Finland
fax 08-5531141 fax 08-5531141 puh.toimisto 08-5531148 tel. office 08-5531148 puh.labra 08-5531157 tel. lab 08-5531157 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ----------------------------------------------------------------------