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Dear Norm and all PaleoNet readers, You asked, >There is the International Paleontological Association, but what does it >see its role as being in all this? The role of IPA is to facilitate communication and to represent the world paleontological community in other contexts as opportunity arises. Because of its slender resources and the global character of this mission, the IPA tends to respond to requests brought to it rather than to initiate programs. If relatively few such requests are received, this may be another symptom of the alleged decline of the discipline. There are many issues of concern to all of us in the recent thread: education and training of professional paleontologists, future employment opportunities in academia, the value of a paleontological component in geosciences education. At least two possibilities for action suggest themselves: the gathering of up-to-date data, and discussion of these issues at thematic sessions at regional or international geoscientific conferences, or perhaps IPC 2006. Perhaps someone will be inspired to make more specific plans along one of these lines, and to that person I would say the following: Whatever your proposal, if you would like to seek co-sponsorship by the IPA, please do bring it to the attention of IPA President Richard Aldridge or any IPA officer. Best wishes, Rosalie F. Maddocks Secretary-General International Palaeontological Association http://ipa.geo.ukans.edu/index2.html At 11:43 AM 2/21/2004, N. MacLeod wrote: >I agree with Martin's cautious approach to interpretation of the AGI >report. It may be that by some measures academic paleontology positions >have not declined in some ways. However, here in the UK it's hard to >escape the feeling that things aren't going well. We see a lot of good >BSc/MSc students that aren't getting PhD studentships and PhD's that >aren't getting good jobs. We also see academic training programmes closing >(e.g., palynology at Sheffield, all of geology at Aberystwyth), university >programmes divesting themselves of their paleo. collections (e.g., >Imperial College's now defunct Royal School of Mines), and so forth. >Interestingly, an increasing number of UK post-graduate students are >completing their education in the US. > >Two things occurred to me immediately upon reading the AGI report (which >is indeed old news, but which I hadn't seen discussed on any public forum >over the last 18 months). Perhaps it would be a good idea to know >accurately what's happening to academic (and industrial?) palaeo. >positions worldwide? The AGI study is a crude tool, partly because of the >inherent complexity of the task and partly because it was trying to look >at all geoscience. One of the first steps in tackling any problem is to >first gain a good idea of whether it exists and, if so, its scope, areas >of concentration, etc. AGI undertook their study in accord with their >remit as a spokesorganization for the geosciences and to fulfill their >task of advising students. I should think the major palaeo. professional >organizations would have a similar interest-and maybe the resources to >fund?-a study that focuses specifically on our science. Karl's study is >known to many and sometimes cited. But we're coming up on 10 years from >its upper cutoff. A lot can happen in 10 years. Maybe it's time for a revisit. > >Second, the thing that really bothers me about the AGI study is that, >according to their data, numbers of MSc and PhD geoscience degrees have >recently started to fall. If this is true for geosciences in general and >paleontology in particular, it is an ominous development. Undergraduate >enrollments are already very low and we've heard before how paleontology >is no longer considered a required body of knowledge that needs to be >assimilated by all holders of geoscience degrees. Those enrollments are >unlikely to pick up in the short or medium term. If MSc and PhD >enrollments now fall, what is going to be the rationale for retaining >academic paleo. training programmes in any form? Here at the NHM we're >getting an increasing number of requests to teach courses in palaeontology >for local geology departments. This is good for us on the revenue side, >but in effect means that university departments would rather fold its >paleo. instruction into a set of outsourced short courses than spend a >faculty position on a paleontologist. That can't be a good sign. > >I also agree with Rich that external perception accompanied by an internal >lack of community are parts of the problem. I don't think there's much >dispute about this. I don't see much being done about it, but would be >happy to learn this is a false impression. Is it? Yes, I'm aware of the >paleobiology database project and CHRONOS. These are good initiatives. But >they're not galvanizing the whole community and are little known within >(and almost completely unknown outside of) it. These are also US >initiatives and, as well all know, the paleo. community is global. >Effective community action is going to need to be global as well. What is >the state of connections/collaborations between the major US societies and >their counterparts in the UK and Europe? And what about Europe? Who speaks >for paleontology in Europe? There is the International >Paleontological Association, but what does it see its role as being in >all this? > >In the end I suppose I'm going to end up agreeing with Xavier Panades I >Blas as well, though perhaps not in the sense he meant. Paleontologists >seem to lack a kind of basic political common sense. We all love to gossip >and run each other down (e.g., we're great, the guys next door are OK, but >all those 'others' are just hopeless). We find it easy to see ourselves as >individuals waging a lonely war against all comers. But we find it but >much more difficult to see ourselves members as a community whose >individual fates are tied to the larger group. When Scott says 'we >disguise ourselves as paleobiologists, paleoceanographers or >paleoclimatologists', there is another way to look at it. Maybe there >isn't any such thing as paleontology per se any more. Maybe we're not >disguising ourselves. Could it be that paleontology has already fragmented >(speciated?). Maybe these new quasi-paleontological proto-communities >really don't have enough in common with each other to form a viable, >larger entity.Perhaps each will have to look out for itself in future? > >Is this the sort of future we want? If not it is all down to some form of >community-centered action. As Ben Franklin said, 'We must hang together, >gentlemen...else, we shall most assuredly hang separately.' > >Norm MacLeod >-- > > >___________________________________________________________________ > >Dr. Norman MacLeod >Keeper of Palaeontology >The Natural History Museum, >Cromwell Road, London, SW7 5BD > > >(0)20-7942-5204 (Office) >(0)20-7942-5546 (Fax) >http://www.nhm.ac.uk/palaeontology/a&ss/nm.html (Web Page) > >___________________________________________________________________ * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Dr. Rosalie F. Maddocks Department of Geosciences Room 312 Science & Research Bldg. 1 University of Houston Houston, TX 77204-5007 U.S.A. 713-743-3429 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
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