Posted on by mamothena

PhD and the millennial…

I just watched a very engaging TED talk about millennials and all the things that are supposedly wrong with my generation, those born between 1980 and 2000. Apparently there are characteristics that we possess that are so different from the generations before, which affect how we live and work. People have started consultancies specialising in training companies on employing and getting the most out of millennials. Really, how special could a generation be? But all of this noise about millennials made me wonder how my “PhD personality” could be affected by the fact that I fall into this generation.

Apparently there isn’t much difference among millennials around the world.  “Each country’s millennials are different, but because of globalisation, social media, the exporting of Western culture and the speed of change, millennials worldwide are more similar to one another than to older generations within their nations”. And, looking at socioeconomics, “…these aren’t just rich-kid problems: poor millennials have even higher rates of narcissism, materialism and technology addiction in their ghetto-fabulous lives”. This is according to this very, very detailed Time article based on existing academic research on the millennial generation.

You’ve already had a little foreshadowing with that Time quote. Narcissism.  Materialism. Technology Addiction. There’s also laziness, entitlement and desire for instant gratification and recognition…If these things are real, I should recognise them and deal with the problem head on.

Take instant gratification and recognition for instance. If the need for constant gratification and recognition of one’s efforts is deeply entrenched in the millennial, then it might be problematic for our PhD completion journey. What we work for takes a few years to complete.  And along the way are research tasks that often take longer than we planned, challenging analysis, the frustrating writing process and so on. This leaves very little room for instant gratification. Which can very quickly lead to de-motivation.  But there are things which give us little wins along the way, depending on how you define that for yourself.  I experienced a huge boost in motivation when I published my first article from my first stream of data.  And every time I attend a conference, writing seminar or networking event I feel energised. They are little boosts along the way that make me stop and appreciate what I have already achieved, and look forward to more.

One of the positives that stand out to me is the collaborative spirit of millennials. It means that the future of science is in good hands then, with researchers that thrive in team work – joint grants, publications etc. And if millennials are really more liberal, open-minded and accepting of others it means we may expect and foster non-discriminative work environments and collaborations where all voices matter. I value diversity in my friendships, I like adding my voice to politicised public health issues (mostly through my Twitter, but it’s okay). Millennials are involved in decolonisation conversations not just about education but practice and power relations in public health/ science collaboration. There is a call to be exactly this type of millennial PhD. Our idealism and need to be seen makes us ideal candidates to bring visibility and traction to causes.

I was thinking the other day of how a simple thing like a community garden project actually contributes to the continuum of care, which is what my research is based on. This is a need I observe in my township and have read about similar projects elsewhere. Projects such as Siyakhana tie academic research to community projects that improve food security and social development. This is just one example; many more abound across the country and are just a Google search away. These projects address the poverty and malnutrition that lead to poor health among our people.  So it is important for us to be present, whether it is making an issue trend on social media or grass roots initiatives with big societal impact. Millennials are the ones for the job.

So here’s to millennials, may our optimism help us pick ourselves up when the PhD journey gets too hard. May our oversharing help us cope with life’s problems and change cultures for the better. May our fear of missing out keep us connected to important issues, and not just entertainment. And may we learn how to keep at it, and be a little bit patient. We need it. Especially for the PhD.

Posted on by Mbuyi Shadrack · 2 Comments

We need to start…right now.

Earlier this year I was having a conversation with a colleague around the advances and progress that has been made in the scientific world over the years. As the conversation evolved, we became curious about more than the science from textbooks and laboratories that’s never actually applied in the real world where Mr and Mrs Civilian would benefit from it. As we looked into the application of research in the real world, I was in awe at what Asians have been able to accomplish over the years and how much advanced they are already in terms of science and technology. This amazement ended there in that office on that day; until I started to prepare the literature review for my own research a couple of weeks ago.

A snapshot of the research that is being done in AsiaAsian countries – China, Japan, even Korea, Taiwan and India – appear to dominate ecotoxicology. I am on the internet everyday compiling papers and it seems every time I get a relevant published study to my work, it has been done in China or Japan. I am not sure if it is because of a national love for the environment, their technological advancements or if pollution is simply so excessive in Asia that researchers HAVE to try to fix the problem. But the top ten most polluted countries are not only in Asia. Some African countries have made it to the list, yet there is hardly anything in literature about their work. Which begs the question, are we scientifically ignorant, or are we just pretending that we do not care about the environment?

I don’t mean this in a judgmental way – it was just so difficult to find traces of African research in my field. But I kept on looking. There seems to be quite extensive work done raising awareness through conferences and weekly blogs that focus on the environmental work in Africa. Some prominent scientific work has also been done in countries like Nigeria and Kenya as well. Much to my amazement, Eastern Cape universities such as Rhodes University have played a prominent role in the assessment of the aquatic systems and ecotoxicological work through their Unilever Centre for Environmental Science. The CSIR has also had quite a field time especially in the assessment of the wastewater works. And I was excited to read an article on Environmental Science and Pollution Research by a colleague of mine. It really is amazing how far we have come in the past decade.

A recently published article by Winnie-Kate Nyoka - A terrestrial ecotoxicology masters major at our department
A recently published article by Winnie-Kate Nyoka – A terrestrial ecotoxicology masters major at our department

My argument, however, is that we still have a long way to go in establishing our footprint in the field of ecotoxicology. Yes, perhaps Asian countries have better technology, easily accessible funding and resources. However, at the moment there are hefty amounts of money being funnelled into the development of the African research. The few that I am personally aware of include the International Foundation for Science (IFS), REACH, IDRC, BRICS grant and DFG. As South Africans and Africans in general, we can use these opportunities to establish our footprint in the research that will benefit us and future generations. And then, we still have a long way to go in not only doing research but also in communicating our results to the general public and actually implementing the solutions that we find in the lab.