AIP Reports Analyze Education, Workplace Issues for Physicists

AIP’s Education and Employment Statistics Division tracks, analyzes, and reports on various aspects of physics training and employment opportunities. Two reports were released last month, one inquiring whether physics postdoctorates feel they are underemployed, and another looking at the employment of people who received undergraduate education in physics and terminated their education with a master’s degree, either in physics or another field.

The first report, “Underemployment Among Postdoctorates” (AIP Pub. No. R-399.1), summarizes a 1994 survey of members of the ten AIP Member Societies who are working in postdoctoral positions. Highlights of the report include:

- A majority of respondents who received their PhD within the previous year hold postdoctoral appointments.

- Most postdocs are working in their field, and the vast majority find their work professionally challenging and feel it requires a doctoral education.

- For respondents within of their PhD, those in postdoctoral positions are less likely to consider themselves underemployed than those in other positions.

- Of those in their first year of a postdoctoral appointment, over one-third had sought permanent positions, but fewer than five percent consider themselves underemployed.

- The longer a postdoctoral position lasts, the more likely the postdoc is to feel underemployed.

For additional information on this report, contact Raymond Chu at rchu@aip.acp.org or 301-209-3069.

The second report, “What are Masters Doing?” (AIP Pub. No. R-398.1), surveyed a sample of members of AIP’s Sigma Pi Sigma Undergraduate Honor Society and analyzes employment data on those with undergraduate training in physics who terminated their education with a master’s degree (not necessarily in physics.) Among the report’s findings about such master’s degree recipients are the following:

- Although they work within all sectors of the economy, the largest employer is the private/industrial sector (ranging from large firms to self-employment), followed by government and education.

- Approximately three-fifths received their master’s degree in a field other than physics. After physics, the next most popular fields for a master’s were engineering, administration, computer sciences/mathematics, and education.

- Those with a master’s degree in physics experience a wide range of career options, while those with master’s in engineering, administration, and computer sciences or mathematics find fewer options.

- Substantial majorities agree that their undergraduate education in physics provided a solid background for whatever career they chose, regardless of their employment sector or field of master’s degree.

- Even within specific occupations, recipients of a master’s degree in physics report a wider range of employment opportunities than those with a master’s in other fields.

- Those in both management and engineering praise their physics education and its effect on their careers.

Both reports are available from the Education and Employment Statistics Division, AIP, One Physics Ellipse, College Park, Maryland 20740, 301-209-3070. A single copy of the first report cited is $15; a single copy of the second report is free.