Resources

• BBSP705: “Best Practices for Rigor and Reproducibility in Research” – This introductory class covers topics related to rigor and reproducibility in research. Offered as five 90-minute classes over two weeks in May each year.
• BBSP710: “Introductory Statistics for Laboratory Scientists” – Introduces basic concepts and methods of statistics with an emphasis on applications in the experimental biological sciences. Emphasis is on mastery of basic statistical skills and familiarity with situations in which advanced analytical skills may be needed, and on mastery of graphing and statistical analysis of data sets using GraphPad Prism. Tuesday lectures and Thursday Prism workshops. Fall semester. Course website
• Curriculum in Bioinformatics and Computational Biology – Offers some biostatistics courses. Course schedule
• The Department of Biostatistics offers relevant courses.
• The Department of Statistics and Operations Research offers some biostatistics courses.
• The Big Data to Knowledge training program summarizes useful courses offered by other departments and also offers modules of their own.

 

• NC TraCS Biostatistics offers biostatistical collaboration, short-term consultation, statistical methodology support, assistance with grant and manuscript preparation, and education in various topics relevant to biomedical researchers.
• UNC Statistical Consulting Center: The Department of Statistics and Operations Research offers free statistical consulting services, in the context of a course on statistical consulting, STOR 765. This graduate level course aims to both serve the university community, and to instruct students in the art of consulting. Instructor solicits projects at the start of the fall semester.
• LCCC Biostatistics Core: The BIOS Core provides a full collaborative scientific resource focused on providing UNC Lineberger members support for the design, conduct, analyses, and generation of manuscripts for their research.
• CGBID Biostatistics Core: Starting with consultation, study design, and data management, the Core then assists with the collection, analysis and integration of biological and epidemiological data. It provides assistance with database implementation and maintenance, web applications, validated and secure data capture, quality control, and statistical analysis.

GraphPad Prism software. The “Help” materials in GraphPad Prism are really good. Even if you don’t have the software, there are free resources at the website. You can purchase a Prism license from UNC Software Acquisition for $55/year.

An Introduction to Biostatistics Using R by Grover and Mitchell. A gentle introduction to R for biostatistics.

The Fundamentals of Data Visualization by Claus O. Wilke. Practical resource for quantitative data visualization. Solid overall and available for free online from the author in its entirety.

Biostatistical Analysis by Jerrold Zar

• Pollard DA, Pollard TD, Pollard KS. Empowering statistical methods for cellular and molecular biologists. Mol Biol Cell. 2019; 30(12):1359-68. PMID: 31145670.
• Klaus B. Statistical relevance–relevant statistics, part I. EMBO J. 2015; 34(22):2727-30. PMID: 26392568.
• Klaus B. Statistical relevance-relevant statistics, part II: presenting experimental data. EMBO J. 2016; 35(16):1726-9. PMID: 27436873.
• Richardson BA, Overbaugh J. Basic statistical considerations in virological experiments. J Virol. 2005; 79(2):669-76. PMID: 15613294.

• Leek J, McShane BB, Gelman A, Colquhoun D, Nuijten MB, Goodman SN. Five ways to fix statistics. Nature. 2017; 551(7682):557-9. PMID: 29189798.
• Weissgerber TL, Milic NM, Winham SJ, Garovic VD. Beyond bar and line graphs: time for a new data presentation paradigm. PLoS Biol. 2015; 13(4):e1002128. PMID: 25901488.
• Nuzzo R. Scientific method: statistical errors. Nature. 2014; 506(7487):150-2. PMID: 24522584.
• Furuya Y, Wijesundara DK, Neeman T, Metzger DW. Use and misuse of statistical significance in survival analyses. mBio. 2014; 5(2):e00904-14. PMID: 24595371.

Statquest. Clear explanations for many stats topics from Josh Starmer, a former faculty member at UNC.

Spurious Correlations provides a good reminder that correlation is not the same as causation.

Statistics for Biologists is a collection of articles, columns, and resources published in Nature journals.

University of Michigan Summer Session in Epidemiology

Introduction to Statistical Learning by Hastie & Tibshirani. Fantastic (and free) accompanying lecture series.

Elements of Statistical Learning by Hastie & Tibshirani

Grokking Deep Learning by Trask

We strongly encourage all MCRO students to create and maintain an Individual Development Plan (IDP), using a resource such as https://myidp.sciencecareers.org.  The Medical Scientist Training Program requires M.D./Ph.D. students to have an IDP.  UNC Chapel Hill requires postdoctoral scientists to have an IDP.  Thinking about your career goals and regularly discussing them with your advisor can help you intentionally engage in activities that will lay the foundation for future career success.

All MCRO students are required to discuss their career plans and interests with their thesis committee at every meeting.

The Graduate School (https://gradprofdev.unc.edu/professional-development-guide-2/) offers a framework for thinking about how to develop broadly applicable core competencies in communication, academic development, leadership/professionalism, and career development across early, mid, and late stages of graduate school.  A useful matrix of Core Competencies for Graduate Students is here: Core Competencies for Graduate Students

The Office of Postdoctoral Affairs offers information on core competencies to be developed by postdocs (https://research.unc.edu/postdoctoral-affairs/professional-development/core-competencies/), including discipline-specific conceptual knowledge, research skills, communication, professionalism, leadership & management, and responsible conduct of research.

Eventually you will need at least three letters of recommendation for fellowship and job applications.  The best letters come from people who know you well enough to take the time to write a compelling individual letter.  You can lay the foundation for good letters of recommendation now by building strong relationships with specific faculty members.  Your research advisor is the easiest and most important source.  Your other letters should come from independent sources outside your lab.  Students have natural access to thesis committee members, whereas postdocs will need to make an effort to reach out to faculty.   Avoid the temptation to get a letter from a famous scientist who does not know you well – the superficial quality of such a letter will be obvious to the reader.  If a potential reference says they are happy to sign a letter but are too busy to write it themselves, then get someone else!  Ghostwritten letters have a high probability of being discovered, which will disqualify your candidacy.

Start by building a strong relationship with your research advisor.  In the rare cases when trainees change labs, two avoidable causes are mismatched personalities between trainee and advisor (which hopefully can be figured out before the trainee joins the lab) and mismatched expectations about work conditions (e.g. hours, vacation time, responsiveness to requests, etc.).  There is substantial variation in practices between labs, so explicit conversations between trainees and advisors about mutual expectations can minimize problems.  Some labs use written documents to avoid any misunderstandings.  The Department of Microbiology & Immunology encourages faculty to use documents as they think appropriate for their lab.  Generic examples that could serve as the foundation or inspiration for lab-specific documents include one provided to BBSP students and rotation advisors (BBSP Expectations), as well as sample compacts between research advisors and graduate students (AAMC Student Compact) or postdocs (AAMC Postdoc Compact) provided by the Association of American Medical Colleges.

TIBBS (http://tibbs.unc.edu/unc-impact-program/) offers one-on-one career coaching for graduate students with Beka Layton (rlayton AT med.unc.edu) or Patrick Brandt (pdb AT unc.edu).

University Career Services (https://careers.unc.edu/students/graduate-students) offers free information about exploring careers, networking and social media, job searches, interviewing, cover letters/CVs, etc.  They also offer personal appointments for graduate students with career counselors.

The UNC Office of Postdoctoral Affairs (https://research.unc.edu/postdoctoral-affairs/professional-development/) offers a number of tools for postdoctoral scientists to assess potential careers that match with individual strengths and interests.  They also offer individual meetings with career counselors.

LinkedIn is widely regarded as an appropriate social media platform for professional purposes.  We strongly encourage all trainees to create and regularly update a LinkedIn account as a way to establish and expand your professional network.

We also encourage all trainees to join the UNC Microbiology & Immunology LinkedIn Group (http://www.linkedin.com/groups/4447244/) as a way to keep up with department news and items of interest, now and long after you leave UNC.  Membership in the group (currently ~700) is limited to people with a direct connection to our department, so membership requests must be approved by the group owner/manager.

Membership in professional societies is another useful way to build your professional network.  Your support for professional societies that publish journals is also relevant to the current conflicts over unaffordable commercial journals.  Annual membership dues for students/postdocs in 2020 are relatively inexpensive: American Society for Microbiology (https://www.asm.org/Membership/Membership) is $35/$40, American Society for Virology (https://members.asv.org/membership-application.html) is $15/$30, American Association of Immunologists (https://www.aai.org/Membership/Join#categories) is $64/$85, and American Association for the Advancement of Science (https://www.aaas.org/membership/benefits) is $65/$65.

Regardless of your career path, you will benefit as a scientist by attending scientific conferences to share your results, learn about the latest knowledge in your field, meet potential collaborators or postdoctoral mentors, etc.  This is a routine activity for Microbiology & Immunology trainees.  MCRO students can help extend their lab’s resources by applying for one-time travel awards from our department (contact Student Services Specialist Jamie Desoto, jamie_desoto@unc.edu) or transportation grants (https://gradschool.unc.edu/funding/gradschool/transportationgrant.html) from the UNC Graduate School.  Both will require proof that you are giving a talk or poster presentation.

The Training Initiatives in Biological & Biomedical Sciences (TIBBS) (http://tibbs.unc.edu) program offers a wide variety of professional development opportunities geared to life scientists.  Activities generally open to students and postdocs.

TIBBS career cohort interest groups (http://tibbs.unc.edu/career-cohort/) explore careers in business and consulting, science policy and advocacy, science writing and communication, science education, academic and research intensive careers, and medical science liaisons.  Open to students and postdocs.

TIBBS programs (http://tibbs.unc.edu/programming/) offer career planning workshops, career skills workshops (research, leadership, teaching, industry, science policy, science communication), and career exploration symposia.  Open to students and postdocs.

TIBBS offers funding for 160-hour ImPACT Internships (http://tibbs.unc.edu/unc-impact-program/internships/), which can be in a field of your choice.  The trainee has to identify the internship, with help from TIBBS.  You can also arrange an internship on your own.  MCRO students have done internships in research at local biotechnology companies, teaching at local colleges and universities, science policy, science communication, technology transfer, clinical trials management, life sciences consulting, etc.  Currently only open to students.

The Graduate School has a new competency-based program called CareerWell (https://careerwell.unc.edu) intended to provide holistic preparation for a future in which the work environment faces substantial uncertainties.  Activities generally open to students and postdocs.

The UNC Graduate School (https://gradprofdev.unc.edu) offers professional development opportunities that are more broadly applicable than TIBBS.  Activities generally open to students and postdocs.

The Graduate School offers a series of business courses (https://catalog.unc.edu/courses/grad/) (mostly 1.5 credits) taken by many MCRO students:

GRAD710 Professional Communication – Writing

GRAD711 Professional Communication – Presenting

GRAD712 Leadership for the Workplace

GRAD713 Applied Project Management

GRAD714 Introduction to Financial Accounting

GRAD715 Building Your Leadership Practice

GRAD725 Build Your Professional Brand

GRAD726 Special Topics in Business Fundamentals

GRAD735 Regulatory Toxicology

GRAD750 Innovation to Impact

GRAD751 Advanced Consulting Fundamentals

GRAD755 Technology Commercialization

GRAD770 Introduction to Digital Transformation

and a Certificate in Business Fundamentals (http://gcbf.unc.edu).  Contact the Student Services Specialist (jamie_desoto@unc.edu) to develop a registration strategy that minimizes tuition costs for your advisor.

The Graduate School offers a busy calendar of workshops and other events (https://gradprofdev.unc.edu/events/) covering a wide variety of professional development topics.  Upcoming events are displayed; click on Past Events to get a sense of typical offerings.  You can contact Brian Rybarczyk (brybar AT unc.edu) to sign up for a listserv to be notified of upcoming events.  Open to students and postdocs.

A variety of career services for postdocs offered by the Office of Postdoctoral Affairs (https://research.unc.edu/postdoctoral-affairs/professional-development/) are summarized here.

The Office of Postdoctoral Affairs offers seminars, panels, and workshops (https://research.unc.edu/postdoctoral-affairs/calendar/) on career and professional development.  Use the back button on the calendar to get a sense of the type of events offered in the past.  To subscribe to the OPA listserv and receive notification of upcoming events, send an email message to opa AT unc.edu with “subscribe to listserv” in the subject line.  The listserv is only available to current UNC postdocs.

OPA maintains an extensive listing of career resources for postdocs (https://research.unc.edu/postdoctoral-affairs/professional-development/professional-organizations-sites-of-interest-to-postdocs/) including networking opportunities, professional development activities, and job listings.

There are many opportunities for MCRO students to obtain additional specialized training in scientific areas of particular interest. A complete list is available at BBSP’s Specialized Training Tracks page. Some specific programs of particular interest are listed here:

• Graduate Training Program in Translational Medicine. More MCRO students have participated in the translational medicine program than from any other Ph.D. program.
• Bioinformatics & Computational Biology Certificate.
• Big Data to Knowledge (BD2K) Certificate.

Microbiology & Immunology faculty members lead multiple NIH T32 grants, which can provide one or two years of support for students and/or postdocs, depending on the specific grant. Each program typically involves additional training activities relevant to the particular discipline. Contact the appropriate faculty member for more information about their program and how to apply:

• Basic Immune Mechanisms (Roland Tisch)
• Molecular Biology of Viral Disease (Mark Heise)
• Infectious Disease Pathogenesis Research Training (David Margolis)
• Gasteroenterology Research Training (Balfour Sartor)
• Immunotherapy Training (Jon Serody)
• Infectious Disease Epidemiology (Steve Meshnick)
• Training in Toxicology (Illona Jaspers)
• Trauma Research (Bruce Cairns)

There are many resources to gain more knowledge or become certified in skills relevant to your future career plan. A good place to start looking are professional societies related to your field, which often offer workshops and other training programs, both in person and online.

• UNC has a site license to thousands of free courses through LinkedIn Learning.
• AAAS Career Development online courses (Must be AAAS member).
• Duke University offers a free six-week online Regulatory Affairs Training Program.
• edX offers thousands of online courses, certifications, and degrees at varying cost (some are free).

Many trainees in our department are interested in teaching. Teaching effectiveness is an important aspect of professional development for both teaching-intensive and research-intensive career paths. There are many resources available at UNC to learn how to become a better educator:

• TIBBS offers a career cohort for Future Science Educators (UNC FuSE) to develop job application materials, career exposure, and to build skills/experience relevant to teaching-intensive careers. Open to students and postdocs.
• TIBBS offers an eight-session Summer Teaching Series in alternate summers consisting of pedagogical training for best practices in teaching, including topics such as: Interactive Team Learning, Learning Assessment, Process Oriented Guided Inquiry Learning (POGIL), Teaching Statement, Portfolio, and Application Material Development, Classroom Management, Syllabus Design, Challenges of First Time Teachers, and Active Learning.
• TIBBS offers funding for 160-hour ImPACT Internships, which can be in teaching. The trainee has to identify the internship, with help from TIBBS. MCRO students have taught full courses at Durham Technical Community College, Meredith College, and William Peace University. Currently only open to students.
• The professional development section of the Graduate School offers workshops and events relevant to teaching. All upcoming events are displayed. A search of Past Events using the keyword “Teaching” shows typical offerings: an eight-week summer online course on “An Introduction to Evidence-based Undergraduate STEM Teaching,” a four-hour Course Development Institute for Teaching Assistants, an eight-hour workshop on Effective College Teaching, a one-and-a-half-hour workshop on Writing Effective Teaching Statements, a one-and-a-half-hour workshop on Equity, Diversity, and Inclusive Teaching in the Community College Setting, a one-hour workshop on Energizing the Classroom: Active Learning and Evidence-based Teaching, etc. Open to students and postdocs.
• The Center for the Integration of Research, Teaching, and Learning (CIRTL) is part of a national network of research universities to develop teaching skills in future faculty members. There are three levels of accomplishment/certification (Associate, Practitioner, Scholar) that can be earned through participation in various events, workshops, teaching experiences, reflective statements, etc. Open to students and postdocs.
• There is a graduate-level Certificate of College Science Teaching. They recruit a cohort every other year. The program takes about 2.5 years to complete and includes coursework, a team-taught and jointly designed grad-student led course, and an immersive teaching experience.
• BBSP First Year Groups use volunteer Student Peer Mentors. This is a way to get mentoring experience, which is an important aspect of teaching. Contact Director of BBSP David McDonald (David.McDonald@unc.edu) if interested. Open to students only.
• IMSD provides tutors for individual students needing extra help with class work. This is a way to get non-classroom teaching experience. Contact IMSD Director Ashalla Freeman (ashalla@unc.edu) if you would like to volunteer. Open to students and postdocs.
• An overview of Center for Faculty Excellence teaching resources for students and postdocs.
• IDST890 The American Professoriate is a course co-taught by the UNC Chancellor that discusses current issues in higher education. Students are nominated by their departments and then invited to register. Students only.
• GRAD810/811 Teaching Skills for International Teaching Assistants cover English language skills and understanding American culture. Postdocs can audit if space is available.

TIBBS has records of career placement for more than 1,300 graduates of UNC Ph.D. programs in the life sciences. You can see the job sectors and career types of students from specific Ph.D. programs and time periods.

OPA is starting to collect career outcomes data on UNC postdocs as part of the Coalition for Next Generation Life Sciences. So far the data include ~100 former UNC postdocs.