Tag: postdoc

UC to Stop Funding Systemwide Postdoc Program

To date, the system has spent $162 million on fellows’ salaries, averaging about $7.36 million per year.

Juliana Yamada/Los Angeles Times/Getty Images

Starting next fall, the University of California system office will no longer pay for the UC President’s Postdoctoral Fellowship Program, a fellowship established in 1984 to encourage more women and minority Ph.D.s to pursue academic careers.

The fellowship program, available at all 10 UC campuses and three national laboratories, has inspired numerous copycats at other state universities, including at the University of Maryland, the University of Minnesota–Twin Cities, the University of Michigan and Pennsylvania State University. But its focus on recruiting diverse candidates has also been criticized by conservatives who claim it’s a pipeline for young hires with radical leftist politics.

The UC system office will stop providing financial support for the program beginning with fellows hired after summer 2025, a system spokesperson told Inside Higher Ed. Since 2003, the UC system office has paid the $85,000 salaries of PPFP fellows for their first five years on the faculty; then the UC campus where they are employed takes over. To date, the system has spent $162 million on PPFP faculty salaries, averaging about $7.36 million per year.

“Due to the severe budget constraints currently facing UC, the PPFP faculty hiring incentive is sunsetting as of fall 2025,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “While the University will continue to provide five years of salary support to PPFP fellows hired by summer 2025 and in earlier years, no new incentives will be provided going forward. Campuses will still be able to hire PPFP fellows as part of their normal search and hiring processes, but the additional financial contribution from the incentive program will no longer be available.”

The University of California system is facing a decline in state funding and pressure from the Trump administration to implement a number of changes that weaken or abolish diversity, equity and inclusion practices. In March, former system president Michael Drake announced a systemwide hiring freeze and other cost-saving measures. At the same time, the system board prohibited campus officials from asking job candidates to submit a diversity statement as part of the hiring process. In August, the Trump administration demanded that the University of California, Los Angeles, pay a $1.2 billion fine for allegedly failing to address antisemitism on campus, as well as overhaul numerous policies related to admissions, hiring, athletics, scholarships, gender identity and discrimination.

In a thread posted to Bluesky, Sarah Roberts, a professor of information studies, gender studies and labor studies at UCLA, called the PPFP program a “jewel in the crown for faculty development and recruitment at the University of California.”

“To my mind, not only is this a direct attack by a UC central admin content to capitulate and emulate the federal position that arrived via extortion letter, it is part of a much larger plan, congruent with UC central admin, of weakening and eliminating faculty governance and power,” Roberts wrote about the decision to end funding for the program.

Despite its origins, the PPFP no longer explicitly seeks women and minority candidates and instead considers applicants “whose life experiences and educational background would help to broaden the perspectives represented in the faculty of the University of California,” according to the website.

This is a recent change; in 2024, the PPFP webpage included the tagline “advancing excellence through faculty diversity.” The criteria also stated that “faculty reviewers will evaluate candidates according to their academic accomplishments, the strength of their research proposal, and their potential for faculty careers that will contribute to diversity and equal opportunity through their teaching, research and service. Faculty reviewers also may consider the mentor’s potential to work productively with the candidate and commitment to equity and diversity in higher education.”

The PPFP, and fellow-to-faculty programs at large, have drawn criticism from conservatives including John D. Sailer, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute who has written extensively on the programs. He believes they allow universities to recruit scholars who “embrace positions on the fringes of leftist politics.”

“Ideological screening has downstream consequences for our sensemaking institutions,” Sailer wrote in a February article. “Ultimately, the fellow-to-faculty model pushes conformity across once-distinct academic fields. As the UC professor put it, ‘it erodes disciplinary boundaries,’ flattening all forms of inquiry into a discussion of race and oppression.”

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November 5, 2025
Why Write About Grad, Postdoc Career Development? (opinion)

As a higher education professional with a background in writing and rhetoric, I frame my work in career and professional development in terms of communication, such as helping trainees translate their skills to the language of employers, convey complex research to audiences beyond their fields and forge professional selves through the written and digital texts they produce. By training, I often think about how texts produce effects on readers and the design choices writers make to engage those audiences.

At a time when higher education faces great adversity, I find myself reflecting on the value of writing about career and professional development work in a venue such as “Carpe Careers”: Why write about graduate and postdoc career and professional development? How does this writing translate the impact of our work to different audiences? In this piece, I outline what we do when we write about graduate and postdoc career and professional development and why we should keep writing about this work.

Writing to Empower Graduate and Postdoctoral Scholars

As career and professional development leaders, we sometimes feel frustrated that the impact of our work seems limited to one institution or program. For example, we might be the office of one at our institution and concerned about the scalability of advising appointments or low attendance at workshops. Writing about best practices for career and professional development can expand the reach of our advice to online audiences worldwide.

For example, “Carpe Careers” writers have penned more than 400 pieces that address key career exploration skills like job search strategies, building an authentic personal brand and identifying transferable skills. In addition to equipping graduate and postdoctoral trainees with strategies for landing fulfilling jobs, we present essential advice for navigating academia, such as how to communicate with faculty mentors, deliver effective presentations and cultivate professional references.

These essential topics continue to be necessary and relevant to new generations of graduate and postdoctoral readers because they make visible the hidden curriculum of academia and the world of work. Our work gives learners the tools to navigate these spaces with confidence, supplementing the efforts of mentors, coaches and instructional workshops. Likewise, when we write about professional development, we attend to the holistic flourishing of graduate and postdoctoral scholars by centering topics such as mental well-being on the job search, coping with the culture shock of career transitions or the power of rest. We not only give learners practical advice for the next steps in their careers but also cultivate virtual community and belonging for graduate and postdoctoral trainees facing common challenges and pursuing similar goals.

Writing to Support Fellow Practitioners

When we write about career and professional development, we put our own spin on old chestnut topics by drawing on our backgrounds, identities and experiences. For example, this recent piece reframes professional networking as a form of evidence-gathering and scientific research, leveraging the authors’ training in science. Putting our own spins on standard topics of career transitions and exploration can help us create a distinct personal professional brand as practitioners: How have we synthesized our own stories and the wisdom of others to support current graduate and postdoc trainees? What do we want to be known for as graduate and postdoc career development leaders?

Beyond enriching individual professional identities, when we write about graduate and postdoc career and professional development, we also reflect on how our work with graduate and postdoctoral trainees is changing and identify opportunities for innovation, from the pros and cons of using generative AI tools for career-related activities to advice for supporting international job seekers. We likewise showcase innovative approaches to implementing career and professional development for graduate and postdoctoral learners, such as how to tailor experiential learning, alumni mentoring and badging programs to these populations.

By reflecting on our practice and how we have adapted to challenges, this writing becomes a form of professional development for us, as it enriches the dynamic fields of graduate and postdoc career and professional development and extends our conversations from professional organizations and conferences to wider, virtual communities of practitioners. For instance, recent “Carpe Careers” pieces have highlighted administrative postdoc and “meta” postdoc roles as entry points to career development and related academic administrative work, defining new positions through the perspectives of those who hold these inaugural roles and shaping the futures of work in our fields. When we address practitioners as an audience, writing about career and professional development creates a virtual community of practice where we highlight emerging trends and offer support for one another’s professional growth.

Writing to Engage Stakeholders

Writing for fellow graduate and postdoc career practitioners elevates our work and sets the stage to convey its value to stakeholders, such as faculty and senior administrators whose support is crucial for campus career and professional development initiatives. The external recognition from a piece in a venue such as “Carpe Careers” can lead to greater internal recognition for our programs and offices. For example, when I wrote a “Carpe Careers” post on professional thank-you notes for Thanksgiving week 2024, a University of Pittsburgh newswire service highlighted it in a newsletter, and a vice provost invited me to present on writing thank-yous at a faculty retreat.

Beyond our campuses, when we write about graduate and postdoctoral career development, we communicate the value of our efforts to stakeholders outside higher education, such as employers, policymakers and the public. As Celia Whitchurch observed, graduate and postdoc career and professional development work occupies a third space in higher education amid academic, student affairs and administrative functions, so it is often overlooked and less understood than more conventional academic or student life initiatives.

Writing about our work situates it—and by extension the experiences of graduate and postdoctoral scholars—in the wider ecosystems of higher education and the workforce. This writing can educate stakeholders who are less familiar with the work of career and professional development, highlighting our contributions to graduate and postdoctoral learners’ success, and thereby helping us advocate for greater visibility and resources. When we write about graduate and postdoc career and professional development, we underscore the value of our work and its impacts on trainees, higher education and the wider society.

Writing for and as Change

Writing about graduate and postdoc career and professional development positions us as change agents, championing trainees’ holistic success and envisioning what our field could be. In this writing, we hold space for courageous conversations in difficult times, such as supporting learners through recent disruptions, reflecting on activism as a form of professional development and highlighting the entrepreneurial potential of our trainees amid economic uncertainty. Whether we address learners, fellow practitioners or broader stakeholders, when we write about career and professional development, we let ourselves dream about our careers and those of trainees, not only advocating for change but also modeling what change looks like through our advice, our programmatic innovations and our support for the broader enterprise of higher education.

In short, writing about graduate and postdoc career and professional development is an affirmation of advanced degrees, higher education and the work of practitioners who support these learners’ long-term professional flourishing. This writing can be rewarding, as it scales up the impact of our advice, enriches professional communities and elevates the profile of career and professional development work. It can be bold, as it envisions and embodies positive change in our areas of practice. For “Carpe Careers” readers who are writers, why do you write about graduate and postdoc career and professional development? For “Carpe” readers who are considering writing about their work, when will you start?

Katie Homar is the assistant director of the Office of Academic Career Development, Health Sciences, at the University of Pittsburgh. She is a member of the Graduate Career Consortium—an organization providing an international voice for graduate-level career and professional development leaders.

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August 11, 2025
Cultivating a Postdoc Community (opinion)
What happens when postdoctoral researchers feel like they truly belong? It is not just a feel-good moment—it is the foundation for success. A strong sense of community in the postdoctoral workplace can transform isolation into inclusion, stress into resilience and short-term survival into long-term thriving. It can help postdocs form the right mindset to face challenges such as career uncertainty, heavy workloads and relocation away from familiar support systems.

For postdocs, community combats a unique kind of professional isolation. Whether someone is fresh out of graduate school or pivoting from one career path to another, postdoctoral training is a time of both intense focus and high ambiguity. Demanding workloads, career uncertainty, immigration concerns and financial insecurity can weigh heavily on postdocs and increase their levels of stress and feelings of outsiderness, especially for those from historically underrepresented backgrounds. Because of this, for career practitioners, faculty and mentors, focusing solely on the professional development of postdocs no longer seems to be enough.

Why Community Matters

Looking to expand our support for postdocs beyond their professional development, we at the Office of Postdoctoral Affairs at Washington University in St. Louis embraced the need to prioritize postdoc well-being and the creation of an inclusive, engaged community. We believe postdocs who feel a sense of belonging to a supportive environment are more likely to:
- Maintain a healthier work-life integration, leading to better research outcomes, productivity and professional growth.
- Reflect on their career paths, plan their future goals and make informed decisions about their careers.
- Develop transferable skills such as communication, teamwork and leadership, which are crucial for career success.
- Stay at their institutions, avoiding disruptions in research projects or the research group’s morale.
With these objectives in mind, the skill-development side of the postdoctoral experience needs to be complemented with considerations about postdoc well-being, sense of belonging and identification with the institution.

Initiatives to Cultivate Community

Building a strong postdoc community and a strong sense of belonging has to be intentional. At WashU, partnerships and a little imagination helped us develop creative, low-cost initiatives to cultivate community, initiatives that any institution could tailor to fit the needs of their postdocs.

Our community-building work centers on three main strategies: programming, fun giveaways and improved communication methods.

Programming: Moments that Matter

From our fall holiday pop-up to year-round celebrations of cultural heritage and history months, we have hosted events that offer postdocs essential touch points for connection outside their academic research and scholarship. We have reached out to internal and local partners (such as libraries and cultural organizations) and found they are often enthusiastic about collaborating with programs that align with their educational and service missions.

For example, we connected with campus health and wellness programs to offer existing services (like CPR certification, health screenings or nutrition workshops) branded as postdoc-only events. Likewise, during LGBT History Month, we hosted Walk with Pride, a walking tour highlighting a local neighborhood’s LGBT history, in collaboration with the local history museum, which donated items for a raffle. With low investment, these events provide postdocs with opportunities to engage with diverse communities and cultures, enriching their personal and professional lives.

Fun Giveaways: Small Tokens, Big Meaning

We regularly ask our on-campus partners for fliers and branded stationery, which we include in a welcome kit we give away during orientation. A welcome kit is a small bag containing a collection of practical campus resources and promotional merchandise from the Office of Postdoctoral Affairs and our partners. We found that elements like stickers and branded lanyards not only boosted morale but also became a way for postdocs to visibly identify other postdocs across campus, sparking lighthearted and spontaneous conversation. We have learned to not underestimate the power of a sticker that says, “I’m a WashU Postdoc. I got this.” These small tokens help postdocs feel valued and connected.

Communication: Making Sure No One Misses Out

To ensure postdocs actually know about our programming and services, we leveled up our communications strategy with calendar invites, personalized welcome emails and festive event announcements tied to specific holidays or cultural celebrations. A successful strategy for us has been to share our announcements with the administrative staff in the academic units—they replicate our event invites in their internal departmental communications and thus create another avenue for the information to reach postdocs. Partnerships for proactive, clear communication go a long way in making sure everyone feels included.

Call for Action

There is still so much more we are excited to build at WashU. We are developing a postdoc parent network, a postdoc alumni network and a mentor network. We are planning more cultural events that connect postdocs with their identities and local history. We are finding ways to better support postdocs’ financial well-being.

Community building is essential. We believe every postdoc deserves to feel like they belong, not just as researchers, but as people. And through practical initiatives like the ones we’ve shared, postdocs can develop a wide range of career skills that will serve them well in their future endeavors.

There is no need for huge budgets or massive teams if we rely on curiosity, willingness to listen and partnerships across the campus and community. Talk to your postdocs. Then try something small, fun and heartfelt. It could be a sticker or a bake-off. Maybe it could be just a well-timed welcome email that says, “We are glad you are here.”

The difference between isolation and engagement can start with a single gesture. That is a difference worth making. A supportive, connected postdoc community is not just a nice-to-have—it is a must-have for professional growth.

Elizabeth Eikmann is currently the assistant director of curricular innovation in the College of Arts and Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis and previously served as program coordinator in WashU’s Office of Postdoctoral Affairs. Paola Cépeda is the assistant vice chancellor for postdoctoral affairs at WashU. They are both members of the Graduate Career Consortium—an organization providing an international voice for graduate-level career and professional development leaders. This article represents their views alone.
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May 5, 2025
How to prepare proactively for a postdoc (opinion)
During my five years working in postdoctoral affairs at two higher education institutions, current postdoctoral associates have often shared their frustrations with me.

Some feel they aren’t getting the credit they deserve in their research group. Others share they feel pressured to work long hours. And in terms of relationships with their mentors, some sense a lack of feedback and support from their faculty supervisor, while others feel they are micromanaged and lack autonomy.

When I hear these things, it strengthens my belief that many of the problems that emerge during the postdoctoral experience could be reduced by more proactive communication prior to an individual accepting a position. Talking through personality, leadership and communication styles can help both postdocs and mentors better understand the relational dynamics, as well as the expectations and needs each bring to the partnership.

So, while earlier “Carpe Careers” pieces have focused on the pragmatics of a postdoc job search and discovering postdoc opportunities, including those outside the traditional academic postdoc, I want to share the thought process late-stage Ph.D. students should be working their way through prior to and during a postdoc search, as well as advice on navigating the start of a postdoc position. My hope is that by carefully considering their own values and needs, graduate students can better understand if a postdoc position is the best career path for them, and if so, which postdoc position might be the right fit.

The Right People and the Right Questions

The first piece of advice I would give any prospective postdoc is that you must take ownership of your postdoc search. This includes talking to the right people and asking the right questions, which begins with asking yourself the most critical one: Why am I considering a postdoc position?

People pursue postdocs for a variety of reasons. None are necessarily more appropriate than others, but your motivations for engaging in a postdoc should be clear to you. Some motivations might include:
- To gain training and increase metrics of scholarly productivity in order to be a more competitive candidate for positions at research-intensive universities.
- To learn new skills or techniques that will increase marketability, perhaps outside academia.
- For international trainees, a postdoc path may allow for continued work in the United States while pursuing a green card and citizenship.
- To increase time to think about career paths.
- To explore a geographic location that might seem ideal for one’s career prospects.
There is nothing wrong with any of these reasons, but understanding your reason will help you find the postdoc position that best fits your academic and professional journeys.

Understanding Expectations

Even if your goal is not to pursue an academic career and you don’t believe you will be in a postdoc position longer than a year, it is critical to take the postdoc experience seriously as professional experience, and accept and understand its responsibilities and deliverables.

I fully acknowledge that the postdoc role can be nuanced and, ideally, it is some hybrid of employment, extended training and apprenticeship under a more senior faculty member. In nearly all cases, however, an individual is hired into a postdoc role to help make progress on a funded research project. This may involve funding from federal agencies such as the National Institutes of Health or National Science Foundation, a nonprofit foundation, or the institution itself. Regardless, a postdoc is hired to help deliver important outputs associated with a project that’s being paid for. From this perspective, the postdoc’s job is to help move the project forward and ultimately produce data and findings for further dissemination. Successful postdocs understand what these deliverables are and their importance to their faculty mentor.

Of course, this does not mean postdocs should devote 100 percent of their time to producing research products. In fact, many years ago, the Office of Management and Budget made clear to federally funded U.S. agencies supporting graduate students and postdocs that such roles have dual functions of employee and trainee. The notice specifically states that postdocs “are expected to be actively engaged in their training and career development under their research appointments.” Additionally, the NIH is seeking to explicitly specify the percentage of time a postdoc should be devoting to their career and professional development through recommendations from a Working Group on Re-envisioning NIH-Supported Postdoctoral Training. In a report published in December 2023, the group suggests postdocs should have a minimum of 10 percent of their effort devoted to career and professional development activities.

It’s clear that the job of a postdoc is to both deliver on research products and invest in one’s own training and professional development. Given the need to effectively balance these two activities, it is critical that prospective postdocs seek to understand how the group they might work in, or the faculty member they might work with, understands the position. And likewise, it is important for the candidate to convey their expectations to the same parties.

A proactive conversation can be intimidating for some, but the Institute for Broadening Participation has created a list of questions taken from a National Academies report on enhancing the postdoc experience to get you started.

Exploring the Landscape

Potential postdocs should also consider speaking to current and/or past postdocs with experiences in groups and with people with whom they are interested in working. Past postdocs can often more freely enlighten others as to faculty members’ working and communications styles and their willingness to provide support.

Another important factor prospective postdocs should consider is the support and resources institutions provide. This can range from employee benefits and postdoc compensation to career and professional development opportunities.

A critical resource to help you understand the current institutional landscape for postdoc support in the United States is the National Postdoctoral Association’s Institutional Policy Report and Database. You can leverage this data by benchmarking the benefits of institutions you are considering for your postdoc. For example, in the most recently published report from 2023, 52 percent of responding U.S. institutions reported offering matching retirement benefits to their employee postdocs.

Considering the entire package around a postdoc position is yet another important step in evaluating if a potential position aligns with your academic, professional and personal goals.

Putting Together a Plan

Once you have decided to accept a postdoc position, I advise communicating proactively with your new faculty supervisor to ensure all expectations are aligned. A great document to help with framing your potential responsibilities is the Compact Between Postdoctoral Appointees and Their Mentors from the Association of American Medical Colleges.

Finally, I highly encourage any new postdoc to create an individual development plan to outline their project completion, skill development and career advancement goals. This can be shared with the supervisor to ensure both parties’ project completion goals match and the postdoc’s other goals will be supported. If faculty supervisors could benefit from additional resources that stress the importance of IDPs, I suggest this piece published in Molecular Cell and this Inside Higher Ed essay.

Deciding whether to pursue a postdoc position, and how to pursue one proactively, is important to maximize your future prospects as a Ph.D. holder. Leveraging this advice, plus that of other online resources— such as the Strategic Postdoc online course from the Science Communication Lab and the Postdoc Academy’s Succeeding as a Postdoc online course and mentoring resources—will help you to choose a position with intention and engage in deliberate discussions prior to accepting it. This will increase the likelihood that your postdoc experience will align with your needs and help successfully launch the next stage in your career.

Chris Smith is Virginia Tech’s postdoctoral affairs program administrator. He serves on the National Postdoctoral Association’s Board of Directors and is a member of the Graduate Career Consortium—an organization providing a national voice for graduate-level career and professional development leaders.
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February 3, 2025