The National Institutes of Health (NIH) recently issued a request for information (RFI) soliciting feedback on three recommendations developed by the Advisory Committee to the Director (ACD) Working Group on Re-envisioning NIH-Supported Postdoctoral Training. FABBS responded to this request, which is part of ongoing efforts to improve the biomedical workforce. In December 2022, NIH Principal Deputy Director Dr. Lawrence Tabak charged the Working Group with the following tasks:
- Evaluate whether there is evidence to support the perceived decline and shortage in PhDs seeking U.S. postdocs.
- Assess and consider the factors influencing the scope and persistence of the issue.
- Review and compare other approaches to postdoctoral training.
- Consider ways to support postdocs’ quality-of-life and work-life balance concerns, and to increase retention.
- Engage key internal and external parties.
Throughout 2023, the Working Group reviewed available data, gathered community feedback via public listening sessions and an RFI, and developed guiding principles. In December 2023, the Working Group issued its initial report, outlining six high-level recommendations to improve the postdoctoral experience by optimizing the effectiveness of professional development and training provided to postdoctoral scholars:
- Increase pay and benefits for all NIH-supported postdoctoral scholars.
- Create and expand mechanisms to support the full talent pool of postdoctoral scholars.
- Facilitate the transition of postdoctoral scholars into their next career stage, including roles beyond academic faculty.
- Promote training and professional development of postdoctoral scholars and their mentors.
- Support safe and diverse perspectives and research environments within institutional research programs.
- Improve means to measure and share postdoctoral scholars’ career progression.
In the most recent RFI, NIH asked stakeholders for feedback on specific aspects of three of these recommendations. With input from FABBS leadership, we submitted a response on October 23rd, highlighting several important issues and making recommendations for improvement.
Recommendation 1.3 – Limit the total number of years a person can be supported by NIH funds in a postdoctoral position to no more than 5 years.
- FABBS agreed with this recommendation but highlighted potential unintended consequences that must be addressed. We offered examples of circumstances under which a postdoctoral scholar might need more than five years of training and encouraged NIH to allow researchers the flexibility needed to properly advance their careers.
- We emphasized that the proposed five-year limit may not successfully accelerate the transition of postdoctoral scholars into permanent positions if there continues to be a lack of such positions available, especially in academia. FABBS recommended that NIH consider how to incentivize universities and other institutions to establish more permanent positions, including tenure-track jobs.
Recommendation 2.2 – Revise the K99/R00 mechanism to focus on ideas and creativity over productivity. Limit the K99/R00 eligibility window to the first 2 years of postdoctoral experience.
- FABBS encouraged NIH to consider how certain research areas and methods (e.g., interdisciplinary, longitudinal, and community-engaged research) take longer to produce results than others. As a result, certain postdoctoral scholars will not be sufficiently competitive for these awards in just two years. We recommended that NIH educate reviewers to account for how productivity rates vary across research areas, as well as consider sorting applications by method so that applications are compared against suitable others.
Recommendation 4 – Promote training and professional development of postdoctoral scholars and their mentors.
- FABBS supports this recommendation, and we noted that an NIH mandate for professional development and mentorship training can help ease the training disparities across universities and within departments.
- We also encouraged NIH to look to the behavioral and social sciences – including education research – to understand what successful mentoring entails and which strategies lead to the best outcomes for mentees. We offered examples of scholarship on the science of mentorship that can be applied to the development of universal mentoring training programs.
FABBS will continue to monitor the Working Group’s activities and any resulting policy changes.
[See FABBS Response to RFI on Re-envisioning NIH Postdoctoral Training]
