Does Scaling The Academic Ladder Always Mean Abandoning Research?

Some university scientists willingly forsake their lab investigations; others strive to maintain a balance between research and administration Geologist Franli H.T. Rhodes knew the time had come when he had no idea where the time had gone. Now president of Cornell University, Rhodes was vice president for academic affairs at the University of Michigan when he reluctantly decided to stop conducting laboratory research. Research isn't the only activity that academic scientists abandon when they become administrators. Most also find themselves spending little or no time in the classroom. "There isn't any way I could hope to be in one place on Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 9 A.M.--or even at 10 at night," says geologist Gordon P. Eaton, the president of Iowa State University, who is leaving his post in November to become the director of Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Geological Observatory. For theoretical physicist Agnar Pytte, president of Case Western Reserve University, not being able to teach is a major drawback of his present job. "Most of us go into university life because we like students," he says. "I have weekly office hours, and I see students at social functions, but it's not the same thing as having contact in the classroom." Some university presidents manage to get into a classroom occasionally, but they acknowledge that it's not the same as when they were professors. "I don't think I could teach a senior-level course; that clearly would be biting off more than I could chew," says James L. Powell, a geochemist and president of Reed College in Portland, Oreg. Instead, Powell has begun to teach an introductory geology course, something he hopes to do every other year. For geologist Frank H.T. Rhodes, president of Cornell University, teaching consists primarily of "giving talks in other people's courses." James H. Zumberge, president of the University of Southern California and another geologist, plans to devote his time to teaching at USC after he retires from his current post. "During my presidency I've stressed the teaching of undergraduates, and I thought I would set an example," says Zumberge. But physicist William Parker, who holds associate vice chancellor and executive vice chancellor positions at the University of California, Irvine, says that it's possible to maintain a teaching schedule while serving as an administrator. "You just put it on your calendar, like everything " he says. "It's just like another meeting--except you can't rearrange it." --B.S. "I couldn't control my own calendar," Rhodes recalls. Administrative responsibilities were constantly keeping him away from the lab and preventing him from leading his own research team. l felt I wasn't being fair to the graduate students," he says. Gordon P. Eaton, president of Iowa State University, puts it another way. "The higher you rise, you lose more and more and more of your ability to control your own time," says Eaton, also a geologist. A desire to regain some control over his scientific activities is one reason Eaton is leaving Iowa State in November to become head of Columbia University's Lamong-Doherty Geological Observatory. For biologist Evelyn E. Handler, who will step down next spring as president of Brandeis University in Waltham, Mass., there was never any question of remaining an active scientist. "Research is a totally confining, all-consuming activity," she says. As president, "I have enough trouble setting aside time for living," says Handler, who gave up her lab in 1977, when she became dean of the Division of Sciences and Mathematics at Hunter College. As universities nationwide gear up for the start of another academic year, many faculty researchers are pondering the relative merits of pursuing an administrative path versus continuing on as laboratory investigators. In one celebrated instance last winter, cancer researcher Phillip A. Sharp turned down the presidency of the Massachusetts Institute of . Technology one week after accepting the job because he couldn't bear l to give up his work in the lab. Some scientists try to juggle two careers. "Science is a major commitment in my life; I'm willing to put in the hours so that everything gets, done," says David Baltimore, president of Rockefeller University and former director of MlT's Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research. But his attitude appears rare among those who lead the nation's major research institutions. Their administrative duties, they say, have forced them to put science on the back burner. "Research is no longer as urgent a matter in my life as it used to be. I' ve already proved that I can get grants," says geologist James H. Zumberge, who intends to retire from his position as president of the University of Southern California when his successor is chosen. Still, Zumberge and others find it hard to remove themselves completely from science. He is coauthor (along with Robert H. Rutford, the president of the University of Texas, Dallas) of a textbook, Laboratory Manual for Physical Geology. The eighth edition of the text, published by William C. Brown of Dubuque, Iowa, is now in press. "Preparing for that kept me up with the field," Zumberge says. Not every academic scientist wants to go from professor to department chair to dean to vice president to president. Many science professors prefer to make their contribution to scholarship through their research, and have withdrawn their names from candidacy for promotions in order to maintain their labs. "The job of professor is the best job in the universe, and everybody knows that," says Ronald Breslow, Samuel Latham Mitchill Professor of Chemistry at Columbia University. "There seems to be no reason to give it up. The only reason would be if things were going badly [in the lab]. But things are going well for us." Breslow recently became the third U.S. scientist to win the Swiss Chemical Society's 49-year-old Paracelsus Prize (The Scientist, May 14, 1990, page 28). Over the years, Breslow says he's been considered for "all sorts of administrative positions at Columbia, including provost," as well as for two college presidencies. And he says he has no regrets about saying no. "You can do that kind of stuff without devoting yourself full-time to it," he says. His service on various advisory committees, he says, has enabled him to "push the institution [Columbia] quite a bit in the directions I think it should be going." For some, the decision to remain a professor involves recognizing one's strengths. Katja Lindenberg, professor of chemistry and associate director of the for Nonlinear Science at the University of California, San Diego, says that she declined opportunities for a promotion on three or four occasions because "I'm much better at research." Moreover, she says, taking on such a job may well have meant leaving the lab for good. "Once you take an administrative position, you've probably made a major career change," she says. Sheldon Schultz, professor of physics at UC-San Diego, says he opted out of administration because he was unwilling to deal with the political aspects of the job. In administration, he points out, "problems are solved by conciliation, and I don't think I would be willing to make the sacrifice you have to make to be a conciliator." Although he speculates that he sacrificed a considerable increase in salary by turning down an administrative position, Thomas Eisner, professor of biology at Cornell University, says that financial considerations were not a major factor in his decision. "The whole household that I'm part of isn't money-oriented," says Eisner, who last spring was a corecipient of the Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement. "We're better off than I ever dreamed was possible being a professor." Over the years, Eisner has been asked to apply for some "very tempting" positions, but says he declined out of "pure selfishness." The biologist explains, "I could have done significant things [as an administrator], but on a personal level, I wouldn't have been as happy doing them. "Research to me is such a glorious activity that I just couldn't see giving it up. It's not a job; it's a permanent vacation." --B.S. Rhodes also tries to keep his hand in activities related to his former life as a scientist. Among them are an annual summertime trip to Cambridge, England, for a three-week period of study and writing, and a field trip every winter to locations such as eastern Africa and the Galapagos Islands. I still publish a bit, in areas where I don't have to do much lab work or fieldwork," Rhodes says, citing as an example his recent research on the early work of Charles Darwin. Reducing or abandoning one's research results in other sacrifices, says Harold K. Ticho, who recently retired as vice chancellor of academic affairs at the University of California, San Diego. "As a scientist, you build up a network of professional contacts, beginning when you are a graduate student," he says. When one begins to devote more time to administration, "some of these contacts tend to be attenuated. That's a part I really didn't think about" before accepting an administrative position, Ticho says. Those who successfully manage flle juggling act have had to be assertive about setting aside time for laboratory work. "It was the condition under which I took the job," says 1989 Nobel Prize winner Sidney Altman, whose four-year term as dean of Yale University's Yale College ended last year. Altman, now a professor of biology at Yale, says he tried to arrange his schedule to allow as much time in the lab as possible, a feat that was often difficult to accomplish because "you could spend 10- or 12-hour days just being the dean." Altman would go to the lab at 7:30 A.M. and stay until his first meeting of the day. "Because I parked my car near the lab, I would return to the lab at the end of the day," he says. " if I had lunch free, I'd have lunch with my lab group." In addition, he says, he worked a portion of every weekend. For Baltimore, the secret lies in including others. "Delegating those things that can be done just as well or better by others . . . frees me, and it gives them an important sense of their own ability," he says. At the Whitehead Institute he moved his administrative office inside his lab, giving him a chance to "run into the lab and ask a few questions" about the experiments if he found some spare time between meetings. A talented and understanding research group is essential to fulfilling the dual responsibilities of a researcher-administrator, says geneticist Leon E. Rosenberg, dean of Yale's School of Medicine. Rosenberg has three senior colleagues who have worked with him for more than a decade. "The day-to-day supervision comes from them," he says, "and the participation still comes from me." "He's not here every day," says Gratias Isaya, a. postdoc; in Rosenberg's lab. "But we know that if we need him badly, we can call his office, and he will show up" as soon as he can. Isaya says the team meets for three hours every Wednesday morning to show him results, discuss data, and plan for new experiments. But nobody expects the boss to do any experiments himself, Isaya explains. "he is not supposed to do this" she says. "He's the Pl [principal investigator]. He's the guy who is supposed to have ideas and guide young people." Biochemist Barry S. Cooperman, vice provost for research at the University of Pennsylvania, has maintained an active research group since he assumed his administrative post in 1982 (see story on page 7). "I've really just rebudgeted my time," he says. "When I was not doing administration, I was spending more time on national [activities]." For example, he no longer serves on a grant review panel for the National Institutes of Health and has cut back attendance at professional meetings, he says. C. Barry Raleigh, a geophysicist who is dean of the brand-new School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, says his philosophy of balancing research and a deanship is to "work on those things that really demand immediate attention." RaIeigh, who currently is not working with any grad students but is trying to "snatch a little time" to work on two theoretical papers while setting up the new graduate school says "When I work on my research, I sort of let [administrative tasks] pile up for a while." But, he notes, a drawback to this policy is that eventually "the system begins to fall apart—so, conscience or no conscience, you're driven back to the administrative job." Can a scientist who has given up research for administration return to the lab after resigning an executive post? Donald Kennedy, a biologist who is president of Stanford University, doesn't think so. "It may be possible in disciplines where the instrumentation and technical requirements are low, and the field is developing more slbwly," he says. "You may be able to go back and do [research] of a thoughtful and retrospective nature—something of a review." but he doubts that he could resume life in his lab. I was in a pretty active sector of neurobiology," he says. "There's no way I'm going to get back on that horse again ." Kennedy's decision to enter administration was no surprise to those who worked with him as professor, chairman of the department of biological sciences, and chairman of the program in human biology at Stanford in the 1960s and 1970s. "He was a good scientist," says Craig Heller, professor of biology at Stanford. "He could do beautiful recordings from single cells—and he enjoyed it. But he thought he could do more for science by using his talents as a leader. Barry S. Cooperman has maintained an active biochemistry lab while serving as vice provost for research at the University of Pennsylvania, a post he assumed in 1982, at the age of 40. "I've been publishing at essentially the same rate since I've been vice provost as before--in fact, maybe even a little higher," he says. Not only more, but maybe even better. The June issue of the Philadelphia-based Institute for Scientific Information newsletter, Science Watch, identified a paper cowritten by Cooperman (Journal of Chromatography, 459:1-23, Dec. 28, 1988) as the ninth most cited chemistry article in the period March-April 1990. Cooperman's duties as vice provost are diverse. He is responsible for supervising the university's environmental health and safety, radiation safety, and laboratory animal care programs, administering university-wide grants, and overseeing government- and corporate-sponsored research. He says he makes a conscious effort "to try and take the researcher's point of view when I'm dealing with my colleagues in the provost's office. On the other hand, I have to play the opposite game when I'm dealing with the research community. I think it's an inherently Janus-faced position." The game isn't a new one. All of his predecessors, he notes, also have been active researchers. Cooperman maintains two offices: one in College Hall, Penn's administration building, and one in the chemistry building. He considers his vice provost position to be "part-time," although it is not always possible for him to divorce himself from his administrative duties while working in the lab. Cooperman acknowledges that it's unusual for someone to hold a vice provost's position for eight years. "You either go up or get out," he explains. But he says he's not sure that he wants to move any higher up the organizational ladder: "I wouldn't want to be spending my time sitting with the unions, making sure that the personnel benefits are up to snuff. They're important issues. But it's not what I want to spend my time on." Cooperman says that if he had to choose between the two parts of his dual career, "I probably would not do administration. My key for myself has always been that if I can't support my own research group, then I'd have to rethink my position. If it should come to the point where I'm not competitive nationally, then I think I'd just have to give it up." --B.S. "It's a matter of leveraging your efforts. As a teacher, you can influence a classroom full of students. But if you can create a wonderful research environment, you've done a lot for science." Adams Stanford's Albert Hastorf, Benjamin Scott Crocker Professor of Human Biology, emeritus, who knew Kennedy as a professor and who served under him as provost from 1980 to 1984, "some people sort of exude the capacity to do great things administratively. These are hard people to come by." One way to do both jobs is to plan ahead for the day when you can return full-time to the lab. "I had been able to get some private grants, which I stored up so I would have a growing bank account. That sustained me" says chemist John D. Roberts who served as provost vice president and dean of the faculty at the California Institute of Technology from 1980 to 1983. But Roberts who recently was selected as a cowinner of the Welch Award for lifetime achievement in chemical research (The Scientist, Aug. 20 1990 page 26) acknowledges that "it's a major job to get going again. The students don't know you so well. Postdocs don't come knocking at your door." R. Bruce Partridge an astronomer who recently became provost of Haverford College, Haverford, PA, thinks it should be possible for a scientist to do both research and administration. But he admits that it's not easy "If you make a conscious decision to be a full-time administrator], fine; but I think the job ought not to force you to do that," says Partridge who plans to continue his research while serving in his new post. "It seems to me institutions would be best served by defining administrative positions in such a way that they don't kill off the scholarship of the people in them." [Editor 's note: This is the first of a two-part series. In the next issue, The Scientist will examine the factors that motivate scientists to become full time administrators].

Does Scaling The Academic Ladder Always Mean Abandoning Research?

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