I know this isn’t supposed to be “political” but I read these stories and see everyone’s examples and experiences and I want to do something to dissent. I want someone–many someones–to stand up for science, education and everything we are losing right now. I feel powerless and I hate it.
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Someone asked to post this article about US scientists
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One quick comment:
SIL is hiring 3 new faculty for his research institute.
He said the quality of the applicants he’s seen resumés for is astonishingly high. People he normally would have expected to be snapped up immediately by Princeton or CalTech. While this is good for him and his program, it also means that bigger name, more establish programs aren’t hiring–which is concerning. His interviewees are mentioning that they’re also applying to Canada, Australia and Europe for jobs because the US science research market is so poor right now.
The US could be losing a whole generation of young researchers.
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How hard it is for a scientist to move outside the US may depend upon the particular individual. There are a significant number of scientists in the US who have dual citizenship, and even a significant number who are permanent residents in the US with citizenship somewhere else. This might not be a majority, but it is not all that rare. Also, some scientific specialties may be rare enough that another country will make it at least possible for a person to immigrate there.
To me this seems like a larger risk for relatively younger scientists. Most of these might not be well known yet, but over time… The most famous and/or successful scientists 20 or 30 years from now are presumably people who are young now.
One major impediment for a scientist to move to outside the US is the necessity to continue to file US taxes. This is complex enough if you live in the US, but can be more complex if you live outside the US. This might be a motivation for older people to stay in the US, and for younger people to at least consider whether or not they want to move outside the US, obtain citizenship elsewhere as quickly as possible (unless they already have it), and renounce US citizenship (or give up US permanent residence).
The other large impediment would be finding an appropriate job or PhD program outside the US.
I would expect to be a very slow process. It is a huge disruption to one’s life to emigrate (I went through this many years ago). However once gone the person is likely gone for good.
Another issue would be a reluctance of top potential scientists from other countries to move to the US. This of course can hit us right away (many high tech companies already have facilities outside the US and can just hire people to work at a site in a different country).
I would expect this to be rather slow and gradual, but a significant risk over time.
I think you are correct.
Many years ago I was told that the total inability to speak Dutch would not be a problem if I wanted to work in Holland.
Some very good engineers who I know who come from India and who have English as a second or third language have told me that there is only one language that they all speak, and it is English. Many of them also speak Hindi but they at least told me that many of them don’t speak Hindi.
The obvious question is whether jobs will be available outside the US. I do not know the answer to this and it might depend upon the specialty.
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SIL used to be on faculty of major research institute in another country. He’s also been a visiting guest professor in France, Canada and the UK. He has postdocs living in Saudi Arabia, Singapore, China, Norway, Scotland, Australia, and Italy.
The language of science everywhere is English because it’s the one common language scientists from many different countries all speak.
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Yes English is the common language of science, but you don’t live at work. You need to live in the community, and if you don’t speak the local language, even if many do speak English, it can be a very socially isolating experience. There’s a reason why many new immigrants choose to live in areas where there are many others from their culture and who speak their native language. Your success in finding an ex-pat community will vary greatly depending on where you relocate to. It’s probably easiest in cities with universities but I have read countless reports of English-only speaking PhD students attending programs in non-English speaking countries who complain how everybody in their lab speaks their native tongue when not speaking to them directly, especially when socializing. Just because people will speak English when communicating directly with you, doesn’t mean that they will when they’re not. The various European countries also vary quite a bit on how welcoming they are to non-native language speakers (with France especially being reportedly not very friendly at all and the new Netherlands government cracking down on university programs offered in English). Additionally for academics specifically, there may be a requirement to be able to lecture in the national language as it’s less common for undergraduate programs to be offered in English. That’s typically more reserved for graduate programs.
I’m not saying it’s impossible, just that sometimes people underestimate the difficulties involved in moving to a foreign country where you don’t speak the local language. It’s just a consideration in the calculus of whether or not to move. Of course if you can secure a position in an English speaking country, that makes things considerably easier.
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Child of refugee here. None of this is new, except for Americans who have always assumed that we can go anywhere whenever we want.
The US absorbed mathematicians from the Soviet Union, physicists from Nazi Germany, medical professionals from Uganda, Chemists from Viet Nam, and scientists of all persuasions from Cuba. Their English language skills ranged from sophisticated to very, very rudimentary.
Anybody contemplating emigrating is going to have to adjust to being a “non-American”. Having a doctorate (or any degree for that matter) doesn’t insulate you from the culture shock.
The local hospital in my area still has refugees working as housekeepers and food service workers while they learn enough English to requalify as physicians. I’ll bet yours does as well. There is something very sad about a surgeon mopping floors. I hope people who use the terrible rhetoric about immigrants to the US and how awful they are for our country realize who they are talking about.
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Like I said upthread, it often takes a great impetus to make people voluntarily leave the country in which they were raised for unknown pastures. Asylum seekers and refugees are in a far different category than researchers worried about funding. I’m not convinced that the current Trump administration is enough of a existential threat to most researchers to want to up sticks and start anew in a foreign land. Most of the immigrants to the US come from places with much worse standards of living and/or safety issues.
In any case, if anyone does know of some early career medical researchers who are seriously considering relocating, UofT is recruiting.
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Fearing paper on evolution might get them deported, scientists withdrew it
A few days before they were to submit a scientific paper together, an evolutionary biologist in Europe received an unexpected request from two co-authors in the United States.
After much thought, the co-authors said they preferred not to risk publishing at this time. One had just lost a job because of a canceled government grant; the other feared a similar fate if they went ahead with the paper. Although both were legally in the U.S., they worried they might lose their residency if their names appeared on a potentially controversial article.
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In what world is evolution controversial?
No, don’t answer that.
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https://www.science.org/content/article/nsf-slashes-graduate-fellowship-program
The National Science Foundation (NSF) has cut in half the number of graduate students receiving its prestigious research fellowship program for the upcoming academic year. NSF is not saying why, but the agency is facing a constrained budget.
This year the NSF awarded 1000 graduate fellowships; last year there were 2037 awarded and 2555 in 2023.
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But they were so kind to increase the number of students commended as “Honorable Mention”.
SIL reports one of his friends and colleagues at Cornell lost all his funding last week (he’s in physics/quantum computing, not biomedicine, BTW). The prof says not only is he not accepting any new students, all his current grad students will be graduating this year, ready or not, since he can no longer support them.
The prof is closing his research lab and he’s encouraging his students to look overseas for jobs.
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This concerns us as our son will be reaching out to CS/E and AI research programs later this summer to find sponsorship for his PhD. Even the Army can’t win this battle for him if the programs aren’t there. Drastic civilian cuts at all of the service academies are forcing the branches to dig deep into their respective military pockets for PhDs to maintain faculty and ABET accreditation at the same time it’s getting harder to mint replacements. Who could imagine a time when the country’s first engineering school is pressed to ensure it can maintain its standards? 
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Slightly off-topic, Canadian universities reopen doors for U.S. grad students
https://vancouversun.com/news/bc-universities-reopen-doors-us-grads-amid-educational-uncertainty
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More than 300 research scientists have applied to a French university after majors cuts to US research funding
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The health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has said he wants to prosecute medical journals, accusing them of lying to the public and colluding with pharmaceutical companies.
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I shouldn’t be surprised anymore, but I am for sure angry when reading this.
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I look forward to the DOJ/HHS being ripped apart in court when they try to do this.
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