Philosophy of this course: AST 185C is a professional development seminar for incoming graduate students
in the UT Astronomy Ph.D. program. It consists of informal sessions with a variety of guest speakers - mostly
local, but sometimes outside visitors as well - consisting of information, advice, and discussion. The idea is to
try to address issues that are important to surviving and succeeding in our graduate program and in astronomy
as a profession, but often don't come up in conventional courses. Ast 185C is a little bit different each time it
happens.
Topics: In the typical year, most of the "first-year" students in our graduate program are
new to UT. Therefore I usually spend close to half the semester giving overviews of the activities of the different
research groups, as well as introducing McDonald Observatory and other departmental resources. Since these
things aren't necessary this year, I would like to focus more on other things: the culture of astronomy and how
to navigate it; key organizations and resources, what is expected of you at various stages of your career; how
to optimize your chances of success - as well as the nature of the job market and strategies for eventually finding
the jobs you want. In some ways the job market in astronomy is constantly evolving, and it is useful to be aware
of these trends. For example, there are fashions in research fields (cosmology; extrasolar planets); there are new
kinds of professional niches ("firm" funding, as opposed to "hard" and "soft" money positions); and many postdoc
applications these days are essentially grant proposals.
