• Question: Why do you think your job sound boring to students/other people?

    Asked by bones to Jamie, Kat, Mark on 24 Mar 2011 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Jamie Pringle

      Jamie Pringle answered on 24 Mar 2011:

      Hello again bones, nice to hear from you!

      Being a scientist you mean? I guess people think you just wear a lab coat all day and play with liquids in test tubes. As you probably now realise, scientists jobs are highly varied and you could be doing all sorts of different activities, that are interesting and hopefully make a big difference to peoples lives, although vastly under-paid compared to someone kicking a ball about!

      As you can read from the scientists involved in both this zone and the other zones, we all do vastly different jobs, have different research interests and all contribute in some way to knowledge and the wider society as a whole.

    • Photo: Katherine Davies

      Katherine Davies answered on 24 Mar 2011:

      Hi

      I think the biggest problem with my job is that people dont understand how important it is, thus it appears boring. Even some police forces (naming no names) under-appreciate the value of entomological evidence. To some people, dissecting insects and estimating their age may appear gruesome, boring and pointless at first glance, but when they realise insect evidence can be as important as DNA collected from the scene, they usually think again.

      I firmly believe nothing in science is boring, its about how it is explain and understood by people. Many common ‘boring’ science topics are only perceived that way because they are not applied to real life well.

    • Photo: Mark Hill

      Mark Hill answered on 24 Mar 2011:

      Hi bones, I think it may be because people aren’t really sure of the scope of my job, what it involves and where it leads. I am lucky enough to have so many facets in my role, from, court appearances, vehicle mechanics, forensic science disciplines across the entire spectrum, diagnostic science, application of ‘dry maths’ and the school science subjects.

      In applying these to a sadly everyday heard of incident, such as a road traffic collision, then, misery aside, I really believe that my role is fantastic. I get to operate within physical sciences and also look into the world of other disciplines, such as those of Kat, Jamie, Niamh and Jodie. I seem to get the best of all worlds, but my job title sounds so dull.

      Mark.

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