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Career Development

Career development programs at CSHL include courses, workshops, lectures, and seminars that provide opportunities for scientific enrichment and professional development for CSHL students, postdocs, faculty, and staff. The programs are organized and supported via joint efforts from a number of divisions and centers on campus including Research, the School of Biological Sciences, Office of Postdoctoral Programs, and the CSHL Cancer Center.

In addition, CSHL supports a number of trainee-led affinity groups that organize career exploration and professional development events. The Bioscience Enterprise Club runs events designed to explore a variety of careers outside of academia, and to show researchers how they can cultivate and leverage their cross-disciplinary skills to transition smoothly into those careers if they choose. The Diversity Initiative for the Advancement of STEM (DIAS) also holds a series of events that are meant to help trainees from a wide-array of backgrounds and academic career stages to expand and hone their presentation and teaching skills. The Women in Science & Engineering group runs a number of professional development programs each year focused on topics of particular interest to women in science.

CSHL’s scientific enrichment programs provide technical support for research involving shared resources or computational analyses.

Core Knowledge

A seminar series hosted by CSHL Core Facility managers that highlights emerging technologies or delves into the technology behind existing capabilities.

Biostatistics

A recurring workshop on Biostatistics in Cancer Research featuring topics such as biomarker identification, analysis of variance among samples, and power calculations for sample size. In addition, weekly office hours are available to discuss statistical questions related to ongoing research projects.

Coding & Computation Support

CSHL scientific staff can take advantage of weekly office hours with computational biologists from the CSHL Bioinformatics Shared Resource and Simons Center for Quantitative Biology. Topics covered in these consultations include:

  • Bioinformatics pipelines (genomics, gene expression, etc.)
  • Computational neuroscience programming in MATLAB and Python
  • General assistance with MATLAB, Python, R, and Java
  • Single cell biology
  • Phylogenetic analysis

Responsible Conduct of Research

Training in the Responsible Conduct of Research, as mandated by NIH guidelines for NRSA and training grant recipients, is offered annually for CSHL graduate students and postdoctoral fellows.

CSHL Meetings & Courses Program

All students, faculty, and staff on campus have easy access to events run by the CSHL Meetings & Courses Program.

Professional development programs at CSHL provide space to explore career options and develop communication skills.

Career Directions

This regular series of seminars features scientists in a variety of careers, many of whom are alumni of CSHL training programs.

Coffee Chats with a PI

This semi-annual group conversation allows junior scientists at CSHL to chat informally with a CSHL faculty member about their career trajectory and life in science.

Academic Job Search Series

This annual, multi-part workshop covers all aspects of the faculty job search, from application preparation to interviewing to negotiating an offer.

Writing Resource Center

CSHL scientific staff can take advantage of weekly office hours with professional science writers and editors to help with science communication projects such as:

  • Manuscripts
  • Grant and fellowship proposals
  • Job and award applications
  • Abstracts, talks, presentations, and posters
  • CVs and resumes

Science Writing Course

This six-week intensive course covers all aspects of the science writing process, from organizing and structuring a new manuscript or grant to a detailed discussion of word choice and grammar. It combines lectures, peer review, and one-on-one feedback for maximum benefit.

CV Workshop

This workshop provides an overview of what should and shouldn’t be in a curriculum vitae (CV), how it should be organized, and how it can be modified and restructured for different contexts.

New York Academy of Sciences

All CSHL scientific staff are eligible for sponsored memberships in the New York Academy of Sciences (NYAS) through CSHL’s institutional affiliation. In particular, they can take advantage of programs through the NYAS Science Alliance, which brings scientific, career development, social, and cultural events to students and postdocs in the greater New York metropolitan area.