The 2013 Biomedical Career Development Workshop was held on June 28th, 2013 and hosted by the University of Toronto's Departments of Biochemistry and Immunology. Videos for each of the Workshop's plenaries and sessionals are linked below.
For a complete listing of the workshop's events and sponsors, see the workshop agenda.
Success in Academia: Navigating through competitive academia, lab management, collaborations, grants, teaching, and administration. How would you optimize your chances of achieving a successful academic position? What are some of the grants available to you after graduation? How did these successful academics achieve their appointments? What are their secrets?
Optimizing Your Scientific Career: How to cultivate essential skills during graduate school and throughout their careers, such as problem-solving, project management, communications, leadership, multi-tasking, collaborations, perseverance, analytics, and initiative. How would to identify your weaknesses and strengthen these skills. Why are you in graduate school? What do you hope to achieve during your training? Which skills would you like to develop? How do you think you can cultivate these skills during graduate school? How do you find your career aspirations? How do you keep developing these skills?
Success Outside Academia: Nonacademic pathways available, how to find the hidden job market, how to land the job and how to succeed as a nonacademic scientist. How would you shift a postdoctoral fellowship geared towards a nonacademic career? What is the hidden job market? How would you find out more about nonacademic jobs?
Career Transitions Throughout Life: Skills to develop for career transitions throughout life’s changes such as the effects of relationships, finances, marriage, children, aging parents, re-entry after childrearing, company restructuring, grant losses, and retirement. If money was not an issue, what would you research on and why? How did you transition with childrearing or other family responsibilities? If you decided to be a full-time caregiver, how would you stay connected to science? What are some of the career issues facing PDFs and scientists today?
Research Ethics and Intellectual Property: What ethical issues do you see arising from any part of your research? (as a student or PDF) What kind of international standard should a researcher be aware of? What issues arise from intellectual property, copyright, patents, publications, and collaborations? What should the industry scientist be aware of on a daily basis (good notebook keeping, data storage) to use the data for patent or IP issues in the future?
The Importance of Mentorship: Importance of mentorship, impact of mentorship in future career, mentorship programs. Importance of the PI/student or PI/postdoctoral fellow relationship, how to find a mentor, training the future mentor/PI. If you were a PI/mentor, how would you help your student with a career plan if they wanted to pursue a) academia or b) outside academia? How could students find mentors outside the department?
Choosing the Best PDF and Preparing for the Job After: Special PDF training alternatives, what a PI looks for, what a current PDF plans are. How would you shift from an academic PDF to apply for nonacademic job after? What are the differences between the nonacademic and academic job search? How do you prepare the CV/resume accordingly?
Keynote Address: Vice President of Life Sciences Ontario (LSO), Matt Buist discusses the Biotechnology sector in Ontario.
Opening Remarks
Dr. Reinhart Reithmeier, PhD – Professor, former Chair of Dept of
Biochemistry at University of Toronto
Reinhart Reithmeier is a Professor in the Department of Biochemistry at
the University of Toronto, where he was Chair from 2002-13. An
award-winning lecturer, Dr. Reithmeier is also known internationally
for
his research on the role of membrane proteins in health and disease,
with a focus on anion transporters. Evolving graduate education to meet
the needs and career aspirations of today's students is one of his top
priorities.
Dr. Avrum Gotlieb - MDCM,
FRCPC, Interim Vice Dean, Graduate and Life Sciences Education, Senior
Academic Advisor to the Dean, University of Toronto Professor
Avrum I Gotlieb, founding Chair of the Department of Laboratory
Medicine and Pathobiology (LMP), Faculty of Medicine, University of
Toronto, (1997-2008) is currently Interim Vice Dean, Graduate and Life
Sciences Education and Senior Academic Advisor to the Dean. He is a
former President of the American Society for Investigative Pathology
and served as Vice-President for Science Policy for the Federation of
American Societies of Experimental Biology (FASEB). As Chair he
initiated an innovative and unique undergraduate arts and science
Specialist Program in Pathobiology. Over the years student mentorship
has been an important part of his activities. He has presented career
talks at several national and international scientific meetings and
venues. Professor Gotlieb's research interests include
atherosclerosis and valvular heart disease. He is the past co-Editor of
Cardiovascular Pathology, and serves on the Editorial Board of The
American Journal of Pathology (AJP) and Laboratory Investigation.
Dr. Justin Nodwell, PhD – Professor,
Chair of the Dept of
Biochemistry, University of Toronto
I first became interested in biology as a teenager when, by chance, I
watched a stop-action film of dividing plant cells on television: it
was a moment that changed my life. The idea that there is such
incredible order to life at the microscopic level was (and still is)
something I find incredibly fascinating and it's what drove me to
consider a career as a scientist. As an undergraduate, I studied
genetics and biochemistry which lead to
a PhD at the University of Toronto where I investigated a mechanism of
gene regulation in bacteriophage lambda. As a postdoctoral fellow at
Harvard University, I became interested in the streptomycetes bacteria
where I investigated a mechanism of cell-cell signaling involved in
sporulation.
Closing Remarks
Dr. J.C. Zúñiga-Pflücker, PhD – Professor and Chair Department of Immunology, University of
Toronto Canada Research Chair in Developmental
Immunology Senior Scientist Biological Sciences, Sunnybrook
Research Institute Juan Carlos Zúñiga-Pflücker received his B.Sc. in 1987 from
the University of Maryland, and continued with his PhD
studies in genetics and immunology at George Washington University. He is a
senior scientist in biological sciences in the Odette Cancer Research Program
at Sunnybrook Research Institute, as well as the chair and professor in the
department of immunology at The University of Toronto.
Dr. Nana Lee, PhD –
Coordinator of Graduate Professional
Development, Dept of Biochemistry at the University of
Toronto, former Director of Application Science, DNA Software
Inc.
Dr. Nana Lee holds a PhD in Biochemistry from the University
of Toronto, a Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of
Michigan and was a Visiting Scholar at Whitehead (Broad) Institute for
Biomedical Research, MIT with the world's leading group of the International
Human Genome Project. Her roles in the biotechnology industry include Senior
Research Scientist for Ellipsis Biotherapeutics Inc. and Senior Research
Scientist, Product Manager and Director of Application Science for DNA
Software Inc. She brings her valuable expertise as an industry scientist and
mother of three back into academia as she is currently pioneering the addition
of professional development in biomedical graduate education. Along with Dr.
Reinhart Reithmeier, she developed and implemented the innovative Graduate
Professional Development (GPD) course in the fall of 2012 for the Department
of Biochemistry, University of Toronto. Future courses and programs are
planned for 2014 while she currently coordinates and leads other GPD
activities during her maternity year. She resides with her husband and three
daughters in Toronto.
