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The Mismatch Between Neuroscience Graduate Training and Professional Skill Sets

S. Shah, View ORCID ProfileA.L. Juavinett
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.08.09.455678
S. Shah
1Division of Biological Sciences, Neurobiology Section, UC San Diego
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A.L. Juavinett
1Division of Biological Sciences, Neurobiology Section, UC San Diego
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  • For correspondence: ajuavine@ucsd.edu
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Abstract

Understanding the skill sets required for career paths is a prerequisite for preparing students for those careers. Neuroscience career paths are rapidly changing as the field expands and increasingly overlaps with computational and data-heavy job sectors. With the steady growth in neuroscience trainees and the diversification of jobs for those trainees, it is important to assess whether or not our training is matching the skill sets required in the workforce. Here, we surveyed hundreds of neuroscience professionals and graduate students to assess their use and valuation of a range of skills, from bench skills to communication and management. We find that professionals with neuroscience degrees can be clustered into three main groups based on their skill sets: academic research, industry research and technical work, and non-research. Further, we find that while graduate students do not use or highly value management and communication skills, almost all neuroscience professionals report strongly needing those skills. Finally, coding and data analysis skills are widely used in academic and industry research and predict higher salaries. Our findings can help trainees assess their own skill sets as well as encourage educational leaders to offer training in management and communication–skills which may help catapult trainees into the next stages of their careers.

Competing Interest Statement

The authors have declared no competing interest.

Copyright 
The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY-NC 4.0 International license.
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Posted August 10, 2021.
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The Mismatch Between Neuroscience Graduate Training and Professional Skill Sets
S. Shah, A.L. Juavinett
bioRxiv 2021.08.09.455678; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.08.09.455678
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The Mismatch Between Neuroscience Graduate Training and Professional Skill Sets
S. Shah, A.L. Juavinett
bioRxiv 2021.08.09.455678; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.08.09.455678

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