Dear Snezana,

I thought I will leave a comment instead of writing in the contact form.

A friend of mine says I shall apply because I had a nice career before and after the doctorate same way, lots of scholarships, publications and international recognition.

Well, I reflected about this.

I've got a German doctoral training scholarship back in 2000. This enabled me making a lot of international contacts and also specialisation  a field which was useful for getting scholarships along my life afterwards, namely natural disasters. In April 2004 I submitted my thesis but it was never evaluated. Also in 2004 I submitted my Marie Curie Intra-European fellowship application as I had 4 years of research experience (the postgraduate study plus this one and a research assistant position) and got it. In the meantime I did 3 highly ranked ISI journal publication. During the Marie Curie Intra-European Fellowship I travelled a few times to my doctorate site to try to finish it, but I ended withdrawing it in August 2006 because no evaluation was available yet. However, the Marie Curie Fellowship further launched me to an impressive career: even more networking and some high level books. At the end, I returned to Romania with a Marie Curie reintegration grant. This enabled me getting a permanent position at a Romanian university, and it was only after that that I embarked a doctorate in Romania, on the topic of these two Marie Curie fellowships (and not the topic from Germany). The reintegration grant was deemed promissing and featured by the EC, and I was then invited expert evaluator. I made even more networking and high level books during the doctorate and reintegration grant. Well, after finishing the doctorate, I kept the same permanent position as I had before (and for which a doctorate is not required - I have a colleague who has the same position as me and never candidated to a doctorate, he had also some international fellowships, in Italy 2 years and in Fulbright 1 year by helding this position and not a doctorate), which is not great, but is permanent. I continue doing highly recognised publications (last year I got a prize), being in international networks and travelling a lot, and after the doctorate in addition to this position I got two postdocs, one from European funds and one in Italy like my colleague, on the basis of having an impressive CV. But in reality I have to wait until I do habilitation because only achievements after doctorate count and many of mine are from before the doctorate (like fellowships, publications, international visibility).

After the reflection I came to the conclusion that in fact the real doctorate would have been the German one and after that I had a visible launch in scientific life, but that was, although finished and submitted, not awarded a degree. The Romanian one was formal and did no change.

Please let me know what you think.

thank you and kind regards

Maria

actually career progress is something I am questioning myself also when writing for the role model booklets ...

The reintegration grant allows Maria to have a permanent position at University in Romania after all....and I am sure in the new ebook on Role Models there are several positive hints about experiencing geographical mobility by MCSA...for what concerns career progress my comment is that it is true that mobility does not pay in the short term...but in the long run it will deserve to Maria a higher position such as the ione she deserves....

congrats Snezana on moving things forward! Good luck Maria with your phd defence (suna neplacut experienta ta chiar daca ai multe beneficii pot sa te asigur ca este adevarat ca doar exp postdoctoral conteaza in multe cazuri din pacate...)

I had my PhD defense in 2012 in Romania, but, not in 2004 or even 2006 in Germany as said ...

Actually thinking of it ... 

I withdrew in Germany and did not wait longer because somebody from Hungary I met at a conference promissed that I can submit in Hungary but it may not be in procedure elsewhere ... then found another doctorate candidate. It was the third editor from my first book at Springer where I was main editor because I negotiated the contract - on the basis of the many networking during my Marie Curie Intra-European I had contacts with them. Then, as I was back in Romania with the reintegration grant, he said I shall not register for a doctorate as long as I have this grant and something to live from, I shall instead get a doctoral scholarship when finishing this grant, to have grant after grant. In the hindsight this would have been a mistake, because by the time the reintegration grant ended the number of candidates increased, compared to 2007 when there was a boom and not many architects wanted to do a doctorate.

But there are people who want to live from grant after grant. I cannot tell all, but my colleague of whom I said had these two grants which were accessible without doctorate and is looking afterwards for a doctorate grant, because otherwise he would have had to do the doctorate with tuition fee (like I did in Romania).

I must admit that I thought myself that it is not good to do the doctorate as early as possible because this way at some point one will reach the maximum of years since having had earned the doctorate (for example for the postdoc I have now max. 5 years since doctorate are allowed, but there are some on Marie Curie COFUND with max. 2 years, and the ERC itself has max. 6 years for the starting grant).

I was thinking that all this experience from before the doctorate counts, but, as I applied in 2009 for a cotuttele in Belgium, I had a better CV than the supervisor I applied with (ISI articles and such), and I was told by the commission that this was because I was not so young anymore as the rest of the candidates (still under 35 though), and the supervisor got angry and did not want to reapply, although I scored 5th out of 29 and 4 were awarded the grant.

So it is a question if one should extend this time in which it is possible to apply from grant to grant, as I know people who had to go to industry many years since already, and they are in my age, so with this late doctorate I actually extend the time I can still stay in research.

Hi Maria, sounds very interesting your approach and good luck with all the opportunities you have now. Is true ESR definition counts 8 years after first doctorate and with late graduation you can enjoy some advantages and extend the stay in research field... However i think you are right and some doors get closed after 35 and most of the grants are accessible only to people with a stable link to their institution.. so as you mentioned i do think beeing a fellow for too long is not advantageous for a good career development is just a good alternative for some people. Personally i do prefere stability and i think this shoud start as early as possible and as i am also romanian i understand perfectly the lack of opportunities we have and we need to grab the first option we have available and keep building on top of each step... until you create your own bridge (research pathway).  Hope now you ahve a position that enable you to grow and bring some valuable expertise back to the home contry.

Best wishes, Alina

 

Dear Snezana,

After logiing in, I tried to submit my CV, but I receive this reply: "Access Denied You are not authorized to access this page".

In the meantime, I have sent it to your inbox.

Cordially,

Javier

We have just tested the 'Contact Form' and were unable to observe any problems.

Either this was a temporary issue that has now disappeared, or it might possibly be linked to user hardware/software issues.

Without more technical details, there is not much more we can do.

Simon