Employment in Astronomy: Present & Future

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Mercy Whitehead
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1 Employment in Astronomy: Present & Future AAS Employment Committee Session Panelists: Beryl Benderly, Rachel Ivie, Jim Ulvestad, Steve Beckwith, ( Dana Lehr) Organizers: Anil Seth (Harvard-Smithsonian CfA) Marcos Huerta (AIP Congressional Fellow)

2 Motivation: With ambitious future instrumentation plans, who is needed to make these successful and what will their impact be on astronomy employment. Purpose: 1. Examine current astronomy employment demographics and trends and what drives them. 2. Discuss what the future looks like and what we d like it to look like. Format: Each panelist will make a short presentation followed by a question and answer session.

3 Data from Metcalfe 2008 (AAS job register, NST+NASA budget) Steady increase in Federal budget Huge increase in postdocs Flat research & support trend

4 Panelists Beryl Benderly, award winning journalist, covering science labor force issues for Science Careers for >6 years. Rachel Ivie, Assistant Director of the Statistical Research Center of the American Institute of Physics. Jim Ulvestad, NRAO, member of the decadal survey demographics panel. Steve Beckwith, Vice- P resident of Research & Graduate Studies, University of California (former director of STScI, MPIA)

5 Panelists Beryl Benderly, award winning journalist, covering science labor force issues for Science Careers for >6 years. Rachel Ivie, Assistant Director of the Statistical Research Center of the American Institute of Physics. Jim Ulvestad, NRAO, member of the decadal survey demographics panel. Steve Beckwith, Vice- P resident of Research & Graduate Studies, University of California (former director of STScI, MPIA)

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16 Jim Ulvestad January 4, 2010

17 Available Faculty Positions AIP Data (see R. Ivie talk) Currently Astro PhDs/yr in US Currently 1700 Astro faculty jobs in US Simple calculation Assume no net influx/outflow of PhD recipients Assume faculty career of 30 years In 30 years, US will produce Astro PhDs for 1700 faculty jobs Oversubscription ratio of 4:1, if you assume every Astro PhD is seeking a faculty position 4 January 2010 EC Session-Ulvestad 2

18 What Fraction of Astronomers are Faculty? AIP data and assessment of AAS full members show that about 40% of US-based astronomers are faculty at PhD-granting institutions, while about 15% are faculty at non-phd institutions This means roughly 45% of self-described astronomers are not faculty 4 January 2010 EC Session-Ulvestad 3

19 Non-Faculty Astronomer Employment NASA science centers (STScI, CXC, SSC, HEASARC) NASA centers (JPL, Goddard, Ames, MSFC, etc.) Beltway bandits (CSC, SAIC, etc.) NSF facilities (NRAO, NOAO, NSO, NAIC, Gemini) Foundation/university observatories (Keck, CARMA, CSO, LBT, SMA, Magellan, Carnegie, SAO, Kavli, etc.) Industry (Ball Aerospace, Northrop-Grumman, etc.) Museums (AMNH, Hayden, Griffith, etc.) Research institutes (SwRI, SSI, etc.) Other teaching/support/software positions) 4 January 2010 EC Session-Ulvestad 4

20 Future Trends in Astro Research! Consolidation of national funding into fewer, more expensive telescopes?! E.g., ALMA, GSMT, IXO, JDEM, JWST, LISA, LSST, SIM, SKA! Borders between astronomy and physics will be increasingly blurred! Increasing reliance on large surveys and public data sets, rather than individual observations! More time-domain astronomy! Guidance from Astro2010? 4 January 2010 EC Session-Ulvestad 5

21 Some Other National Trends! Increased emphasis on STEM literacy and relation to economic development! Teaching skills will be more important! Astro PhD increase might not be accompanied by increased number of faculty positions! Need to work with large data sets will be common across scientific disciplines! Data management! Automatic and parallel processing! Visualization 4 January 2010 EC Session-Ulvestad 6

22 Astro2010 White Papers! Some interesting suggestions from community for changing training of astronomers! Broader training in areas such as science policy, teaching, data-handling, instrumentation, program management! Minors or areas of emphasis for each department?! Cross-disciplinary degree programs (e.g., astro + computer science)! Professional Masters programs 4 January 2010 EC Session-Ulvestad 7

24 The University of California

25 Projected Student Population Today Source: Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education: Knocking at the College Door

26 UC Student Enrollments 2.5% annual (last decade) 1.3% annual

27 UC Faculty Hiring Annual appointments of ladder-rank faculty, UC system, 1984/5 2004/5 100 Astronomy faculty ~13% total (50 PS => 7.5 Astro)

28 Which Regions are Growing?

29 Astrophysics Division! Astrophysics: Budget forward look Assumed operating missions beyond 2016 include JWST, SOFIA HST De-orbit mission development ramps up ~2020 1

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Employment & Funding in Astronomy

1 Employment & Funding in Astronomy Anil Seth (CfA, AAS Employment Committee), Marcel Agüeros (Columbia), Kevin Covey (CfA), Rolf Danner (Northrup Grumman, AAS Employment Committee), Hannah Jang-Condell