I have been very busy for the last couple of weeks with the admission procedure at N1. Last year, my only contribution to student admission was to proctor the entrance exams. This year, in addition to that, my responsibilities included counseling students applying here, checking their documents and helping the first years with moving into and settling down on campus. Till a month ago, I was a well meaning but scatter brained prof, who cared about students at N1, but did not have any hard facts about them!
Now, even if you wake me up at midnight, I will be able to rattle off data about the number of students in each program and each year, in which residence each student is staying, the academic performance of the older students and (!!) even the order in which our new students have registered.
I must admit that it is an absolute pleasure to interact with the fresh batch. Since all these students have seen me throughout the whole admission procedure, many of them approach me freely with their questions and concerns. N1 is in a position to offer them many facilities and resources that we could not offer to the students who joined before and I enjoy giving this good news to students and seeing their faces light up with joy. On the other hand, we still cannot offer the facilities that students at old institutions take for granted.
One night, I showed up unannounced in one of the student hostels to check how the new occupants were doing. I was mentally prepared to encounter unhappy, demanding students, staying away from home for the first time, who would complain about N1 not matching their expectations. To my surprise, these students were mostly cheerful and excited. They raised some concerns, which, fortunately, I was in a position to address quickly and to their satisfaction. After that, we had a friendly chat about student life, science and course work. I was surprised to hear first years asking me questions about where I did my PhD from, why I chose that particular university and how I prepared for GRE. These were not the questions I had as a 17 year old staying away from home for the first time!
Nonetheless, there have been crazy moments as well. The craziest days were the four days immediately after the registration. My phone was continuously ringing for all kinds of reasons (some genuine, mostly silly). Recently, I was in touch with a friend to whom I described one such evening of phone calls. She was very amused- so, I thought I would share it on this blog:
5 pm - Call from a student who is lost in the campus and does not know how to get back to her hostel. I had to bike to her location and guide her back.
6 pm - Call from a student who is upset that her room is a few steps away from that of her classmates. She wants to be in the adjacent room!
6.30 pm - Call from a student who has been alloted Hostel A which is next to a boys hostel. Her parents do not want her to live next to a boys hostel. [This girl is in Physics! I told her to convince her parents because she is going to be surrounded by men all her life! Eventually, they got convinced]
7.15 pm - call from the same student that her parents are convinced.
9 pm - call from a student who wants a vehicle the next morning to go to class!
11 pm - earlier in the evening, a student had discovered a lizard in her food. Being a sensible person, instead of calling me, she called up the medical unit and was immediately taken to the hospital. But, the nurse called to tell me about this.
The worst is over now. Now that the classes have started, students are too busy struggling with their course work to call me! I too can now focus on my real jobs, research and teaching, which is what I thought I had signed up for!
Now, even if you wake me up at midnight, I will be able to rattle off data about the number of students in each program and each year, in which residence each student is staying, the academic performance of the older students and (!!) even the order in which our new students have registered.
I must admit that it is an absolute pleasure to interact with the fresh batch. Since all these students have seen me throughout the whole admission procedure, many of them approach me freely with their questions and concerns. N1 is in a position to offer them many facilities and resources that we could not offer to the students who joined before and I enjoy giving this good news to students and seeing their faces light up with joy. On the other hand, we still cannot offer the facilities that students at old institutions take for granted.
One night, I showed up unannounced in one of the student hostels to check how the new occupants were doing. I was mentally prepared to encounter unhappy, demanding students, staying away from home for the first time, who would complain about N1 not matching their expectations. To my surprise, these students were mostly cheerful and excited. They raised some concerns, which, fortunately, I was in a position to address quickly and to their satisfaction. After that, we had a friendly chat about student life, science and course work. I was surprised to hear first years asking me questions about where I did my PhD from, why I chose that particular university and how I prepared for GRE. These were not the questions I had as a 17 year old staying away from home for the first time!
Nonetheless, there have been crazy moments as well. The craziest days were the four days immediately after the registration. My phone was continuously ringing for all kinds of reasons (some genuine, mostly silly). Recently, I was in touch with a friend to whom I described one such evening of phone calls. She was very amused- so, I thought I would share it on this blog:
5 pm - Call from a student who is lost in the campus and does not know how to get back to her hostel. I had to bike to her location and guide her back.
6 pm - Call from a student who is upset that her room is a few steps away from that of her classmates. She wants to be in the adjacent room!
6.30 pm - Call from a student who has been alloted Hostel A which is next to a boys hostel. Her parents do not want her to live next to a boys hostel. [This girl is in Physics! I told her to convince her parents because she is going to be surrounded by men all her life! Eventually, they got convinced]
7.15 pm - call from the same student that her parents are convinced.
9 pm - call from a student who wants a vehicle the next morning to go to class!
11 pm - earlier in the evening, a student had discovered a lizard in her food. Being a sensible person, instead of calling me, she called up the medical unit and was immediately taken to the hospital. But, the nurse called to tell me about this.
The worst is over now. Now that the classes have started, students are too busy struggling with their course work to call me! I too can now focus on my real jobs, research and teaching, which is what I thought I had signed up for!
16 comments:
LOL, this is really amusing. Reminds me of my first year in college.
Hi,
I enjoyed reading your posts and wish you good luck for your career and moreover for keeping the same enthusiasm and eagerness in your position. I made my way in opposite direction than you (I had faculty position in India which I left for uncertainty in north america), but neverthless the perspective you gain from working in different places is invaluable.
Hi Karnak and Rainbow-Scientist,
Karnak, after my recent interaction with students, I can now look back at myself and laugh at the funny demands I made as a 17 year old :)
Rainbow Scientist, thank you for your feedback. I read many entries in your blog and really enjoyed them. I look forward to reading more about your experiences.
Came here via Abi's blog. Good to see another interesting Indian science blog! I am glad that the new institutes are having some success in recruiting faculty like you.
Not sure whether your anonymity is because of nervousness about the reaction, or because you expect to get more provocative -- if the former, I think you'll feel comfortable dropping it soon, and if the latter, I look forward to it :)
Hi,
just spent a long time reading many of your blog posts (thanks to Abi@nanopolitan for the pointer). Thoroughly enjoyed your perceptive and forthright account of your experiences in N1. Even after putting in a lot of effort, it is impossible to get a realistic sense of the complexities associated with a new faculty position. So your thoughtful posts will be a valuable resource in this context. As someone who will be joining an institute like N1 soon, I hope my institute will be as supportive and exciting a place to work as N1 has been for you.
S
Hi Rahul and Anon,
Rahul, I myself do not know in what direction the blog is headed :) Let's see.
I find it very interesting that almost all Indian scientific/academic bloggers have chosen to reveal their identities, unlike their North American counterparts.
Anon, I wish you all the very best for your new job. I hope it will be a great experience for you. I guess, the important thing is to take the positive aspects and build up from there. In case it is N1 that you are joining, we might meet soon :)
Actually, many of the North American bloggers I have read (I don't follow any on a regular basis) do use their real names -- but then they mostly blog on academic matters. Eg: Mark Liberman, Jacques Distler, Terry Tao, and what was arguably one of the first science bloggers ever, John Baez...
I can understand why FSP, say, chooses to be anonymous -- but from what I can make out, she is a fairly senior person (or tenured, anyway), and I think some of her observations would be more valuable if not anonymous. Perhaps she does say some of the same things under her real name (as does the medical blogger, Orac, whose real name is not extremely secret).
I think Abi, for example, has done a tremendous service to Indian science by blogging under his real name: he wouldn't have had the same impact if he had been pseudonymous. Perhaps others in India, who have chosen not to be anonymous, have simply followed his lead.
Perhaps a senior and well established academic blogging under his/her real name can be more influential in changing attitudes by virtue of his/her stature in the community. However, what should matter are good arguments and not where they are coming from. Furthermore, the sociology of academia can be a tricky thing and blogger anonymity can prove to be helpful in addressing issues that need to be raised and debated especially when doing so openly through blogs can create an awkward situation in the workplace. Even the most harmless comment can be easily misinterpreted. However, having said that, I do agree with Rahul that it is often not possible to remain completely anonymous. In any case, I hope NPNI will continue to blog anonymously or otherwise :)
Perhaps a senior and well established academic blogging under his/her real name can be more influential in changing attitudes by virtue of his/her stature in the community. However, what should matter are good arguments and not where they are coming from. Furthermore, the sociology of academia can be a tricky thing and blogger anonymity can prove to be helpful in addressing issues that need to be raised and debated especially when doing so openly through blogs can create an awkward situation in the workplace. Even the most harmless comment can be easily misinterpreted. However, having said that, I do agree with Rahul that it is often not possible to remain completely anonymous. In any case, I hope NPNI will continue to blog anonymously or otherwise :)
By the way, some years ago after writing about a case of fraudulent representation of data, I got several mails commending me on my "bravery". I did not think there was any bravery involved, but from further discussion (and further incidents I read about in the news), it seems that many Indian scientists do need to fear personal repercussions when they speak up. So that is certainly a good reason for anonymity (I very much hope you are not in such a place, but caution is always good at first).
At the time I also got a series of anonymous mails that disturbed me quite a bit. These mails alleged professional and personal misconduct by a very well-known Indian scientist, and seemed to be sent by a recent student in that lab. But none of the allegations were really verifiable. For example, it was said that one particular paper (in a major journal) was made up of entirely fabricated data. But it is very hard to say from the published manuscript. The effect was to throw doubts in my mind about that researcher, without any evidence: for all I know, the sender of those e-mails may have been disgruntled for other reasons. But if, in fact, the mails had contained compelling evidence of misconduct, they would have been important and the anonymity would have been understandable.
There can of course be other reasons for anonymity. For example, FSP may be concerned equally with not revealing the identity of the people she talks about. Maybe that's partly your concern too. (I have no idea who she or you are in real life.)
Somebody left, and deleted, a comment saying that it would be hard to maintain your anonymity. I'd say it depends on how "fictionalised" your posts are and how little they overlap with your real-name posts. I believe Orac, for example, got "busted" because (a) he writes similar stuff under his real name and (b) there are enough people who hate him who were willing to do the detective work, if that's the word. But it hasn't stopped him and, he says, his employers are entirely supportive.
Hello NPNI
Your blogs are quite refreshing and informative in nature for which I must thank you.
I had a quick question: suppose you are an experimentalist, and require tens of various kinds of equipments (plus skilled people/technicians who can maintain those & fix problems in them) for your research. Suppose you join an institute in India, be old or new, and you are given grants to buy one big equipment for your research. Now, if you join an old institute, you have all the other kinds of equipments up & running in shape, with dedicated technicians, so that you can launch your research straight away. However, in a new institute, by the time one can procure the other kinds of equipments (worth a few million dollars in total, for example), set them up, and hire & train people to maintain them, one will have past his/her prime in research. So in this regard, could you please comment if it is not wise to join an institute with some good infra-structure ? It is certainly great to take up challenges in a new institute, and to challenge oneself in excelling things, but I was wondering if it would make more sense to join an already reputed & established institute.
Thanks :-)
@rahul: You probably don't intend to do this, but your comments are coming off as pressuring New Prof into dropping her anonymity.
FWIW New Prof, I've been reading your blog from the beginning and it has been extremely interesting and useful for me. I don't think you need to change anything.
Coming back to the topic on hand, I wonder if this is a failing that Indian universities need to address. It might be a good idea to have dedicated administrators to handle student problems of the type you were resolving.
During my time at IISc, there was a problem with hot water in the hostels and the student organization made a big fuss about this. Nothing seemed to be happening and then somebody wrote an anonymous letter alleging that the administration wasn't doing enough to solve the problem and put it up on all the notice boards.
It turned out that the person "in-charge" of these hostel issues was a young asst. professor in one of the science departments. He took umbrage at these remarks and posted his own response on all the notice boards. The response took a few (unnecessary?) pot-shots at the character of the anonymous person who had written the initial letter, said that he (the AP) "wasn't here to heat our bath water", and claimed that the administration had already been doing everything it could to solve this problem.
Eventually we did get the hot water, but I got the feeling that the episode further damaged the (already fragile) relationship between students and faculty at IISc.
What a great blog! Please continue to write about your experiences (and not make it a science blog) which many of us can relate to! Thanks.
@pramod -- that wasn't my intention (I was perhaps talking to myself a bit, but I was listing good reasons for anonymity that I can think of). But I do think that, in a small community like the Indian academic community, anonymity may be rather hard to maintain after a while. But I wish NPNI lots of fun!
Excellent post yet again, introduced to your blog by Abi's post. Quite funny towards the end, but appreciate the fact that you did attend to the problems. Will definitely follow your blog and see where this goes.
I don't know if it is you personally, or whether times have changed or if it is the fact that you are in a new Instt. but I never heard of profs taking so much trouble over students and caring so much for them. Good for you!
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