Advice from the Careers in Botany Luncheon

We are excited to engage students to be active in the BSA community throughout the year!

Reach us by email or Twitter: Imeña (imenavaldes2020@u.northwestern.edu, @ imenarv) and Ioana (studentrep1@botany. org, @ioana_anghel).

We had an incredible panel of professionals and a great group of students join us for our luncheon, so we wanted to know what piece of advice the professionals would give to all students to help them succeed and to know what the students learned. We can’t thank the participants enough and hope to see some new and familiar faces next year!

PROFESSIONALS

Dr. Carla Maldonado

Herbario Nacional de Bolivia, Instituto de Ecología, Universidad Mayor de San Andrés

“Risking getting out of your comfort zone is the key to getting ahead.” “Taking a break between undergraduate and graduate school to gain work or research experience in the eld you think you're interested in can be a useful strategy for maximizing your future education/training/career!”

Dr. Jessamine Finch

Native Plant Trust

“As an introvert, it was a huge breakthrough for me when I realized that ‘networking’ can be as simple as becoming friends with the people you interact with at school and in your research. People graduate, move, get new jobs, and pretty soon you have a diverse network of people who have pursued di erent careers and live all over the world.”

Dr. Vera Velasco University of Toronto

"You need a supportive personal (parents, siblings, friends) community as much as you need an excellent academic community (supervisors, fellow grad students) to help you succeed in graduate school.”

Jocelyn Pender Atlantic Canada Conservation Data Centre

“Build a community around you! Building community means joining learning groups, communities of practice, lab groups and attending events in your eld to connect with professionals and fellow students. is is hard to do online and through virtual events, but isn't impossible! For me, my network has been my greatest asset in my career. Further, the communities I’m involved with have provided support and wisdom (e.g., student councils, data science learning groups, women in STEM leadership groups). Additionally, I mentioned to all the students I encountered that if they are considering a career pivot, the data eld is an exciting place to be! e data eld is new, growing and requires very little for entry, other than a STEM degree.” “Start today! Start now!”

STUDENTS

Matthew Sheik

George Mason University

“ e 2021 Careers in Botany Luncheon allowed me to connect with Herbarium curators in order to learn the skills needed to successfully curate a collection. ese include the following: 1. ability to secure funding, 2. capability of managing people, 3. understanding best digitization practices. I’ll be able to focus on the last year of Graduate School making sure I can practice and gain experience in those three areas to become a more attractive candidate to one day curate a collection.”

“When writing grants you wanna show some preliminary data, show that you have done some of the methods that you are going to apply, but also try something new, meld both old and new knowledge together to achieve a goal.”

David Hainlen

North Dakota State University

“Network Network Network!!"