Scientific integrity

Throughout our time in academia, isn't scientific integrity one of the key things we learn? Behind the facts and the theories and the procedures, isn't scientific integrity one of the major underlying lessons?

I just lost a job as a researcher in industry because I wouldn't compromise my scientific integrity. That last job of the many jobs I've posted about. The one where they poached me from an okay-but-imperfect job, because they were so impressed by my statistical analysis skills.

I walked in there and did my nerdy little thing, analyzing data the only way I know how, with statistical methods. The results were really, really bad -- bad enough to crush the company. I presented my findings scientifically and objectively, but apparently I scared them and they didn't want to let me get my hands on one more dataset. So, they let me go.

Here I am, a full year after leaving academia, and unemployed again. Making a go of it outside of academia has proven to be really, really hard.

I don't regret analyzing the data the only way I know how. To produce results that would support that company would require turning my back on science and quite literally fudging the results. It would mean screwing the companies that come to this firm for help. The firm has other Ph.D.s who are either lacking the skills to find what I easily did, or lacking the scientific integrity to say it like it is.

I don't regret presenting the numbers as they are, but what's next for me now?

Academic positions are near impossible to get if you want to be in the city you're in, and I do want to be in this city. Industry jobs -- do they all require sacrificing your integrity? It has been suggested to me that this is par for the course. So, maybe industry is out.

So where does that leave me? I could scrub my resume clean of the last decade of my life and pretend I was off work raising my children (I don't have any), and maybe get a job making coffees. Okay, so maybe I'm catastrophizing a bit, but just a bit. After the rollercoaster of a year, I truly don't know what's next for me. Is there no way to maintain my integrity, use my skills, and be gainfully employed?

Post-academic crash

I dunno. Did I make the right decision? Shitville was not the place for me. But could I have made it work? Or was I headed down this same path regardless of The Decision.

This blog is still super-anonymous, right? Can I say this stuff here? The two or three real-life people who know who I am (*wave*)... they're okay. I think they all are. Have I shared this with anyone who's not safe? This post might not stay up for long.

So, post-academic crash. That's what I'm in.

A year in review? I was "miserable" in shitville, but I was working, I was engaged, I was busy, I was functional. I made that gut-wrenching decision to move back to sparkling-shiny-city-I-love, and I was on the top of the world. For three weeks. Then I crashed.

No job. No prospects. No life.

Then came the job I got. It's a job. It pays the bills, when I go to it. I'm over-educated and under-qualified. Before taking the job, I believed in what they did. Now that I've seen the inside workings of this organization, I'm aghast that they get the public funding that they do. They don't deserve it. It's a fucking train wreck.

So, what did this job do to my post-academic crash? It sent me spinning out of control.

***edited out***

That, my friend(s), is what happened when I left academia.

I don't know where I'm going from here. I have absolutely, positively no fucking clue where I'm headed from here.

Who am I kidding?  Academia was all I had in my life that worked. And I left it. So here I am, a non-academic, and the bottom has dropped out of my world.

I have a job.

I have a job and I start tomorrow.

It's not my dream job, but it's a job, and it's in my academic area, if not my skill set.

Honestly, I'm over-educated and underqualified for this job. I don't have the experience required to do some of the tasks -- a LOT of the tasks, I fear, and my research skills will not be utilized. God, am I going to miss research.

It's something, though. It's something to try. It can help me gain experience in something that's more marketable than the academic stuff. And, who knows, maybe I'll like it.

My goal when I quit my adjunct position was to move home (check), get a job (check), buy a condo, and develop a life outside of work. It hasn't been the easiest road in the past few months, but objectively speaking, I am on track.

And the adventure continues....