When people ask me to tell them a little bit about the URBEST program, it’s difficult to know where to start. The first attempt is breaking down the acronym: University of Rochester’s Broadening Experiences in Scientific Training. To tell you the truth, I don’t think very many people remember what the acronym stands for, but they do manage to take away the golden nugget. With the help of the , the program exists to try to train the BEST scientists possible.

Many URBEST graduate students are interested in pursuing a career in industry. URBEST trainee Chris Farrar, is one of them. As he explored his options, Chris noticed that one of his major skill gaps fell within the realm of project management. When the chance to apply to the URBEST/CPD sponsored Project Management Institute fellowship arose, Chris decided to apply – and was selected.

I recently had a chance to discuss with him his experience in the course and which management concepts are applicable to the graduate school experience. 

As part of his visit to the University of Rochester on April 15^th, 2016, Dr. Lawrence Tabak’s only request was that he would get to meet with students and post-docs to have a discussion about the ethical issues surrounding biomedical research. As the Deputy Director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), he particularly enjoys hearing the perspective of trainees in the field. He was granted his wish with an hour-long Q&A session prior to his talk, “The Reproducibility of Biomedical Research.”  His Q&A session and talk were both well attended by scientists at all stages. According to Dr. Tabak, current issues of biomedical research have been garnering widespread interest among the scientific community as well as the general population.

This blog post is all about how I ended up in Faculty Development. As I reflect on my pathway to this point, I am amused at just how non-linear it has been. In fact, if you had told me 20 years ago that I would be teaching big, scary professors how to improve their teaching, I’m pretty certain that I would have gone into voluntary exile in Siberia. Naked. My natural shyness and introversion would have made sure of that!