Latest News

• The OCI Postdoctoral Seminar Series will begin in January!  This bi-weekly seminar series, starting January 21st at 12:30 in PMH 7-605, will offer the chance to present your work, and free pizza will be provided by the department.  Please visit this page to indicate whether you will be attending this series, so we can gauge attendance for logistical purposes.  You can also indicate if you wish to present on that page. Please consider signing up for presenting, and attending these new seminars.
• Update!  The University of Toronto Postdoctoral Association website is now up.   That website will contain information on U of Toronto-wide initiatives in such areas as career development, tax advocacy, and benefits advocacy.  This website is currently "dormant" until we can find a new webmaster to maintain it, in the meantime please report any dead links or incorrect information to ocipda at gmail dot com.
  
• The University-wide Postdoctoral Town Hall Meeting held October 30th was well attended, and has stimulated interest in tackling a number of important issues relevant to postdocs.  Univeristy-wide working groups have been assembled to tackle these issues individually.  As such, this UHN postdoctoral association website will soon be re-formatted to address these changes.  

Introduction  

Dear OCI Postdocs,

    Postdoctoral positions offer a chance to extend your professional training and receive additional mentorship beyond your graduate studies.  However, many of the benefits of being a student are lost with the transition to a postdoctoral position.  Additionally, postdocs at the OCI don't currently have many means to get to know others outside of our immediate labs.  Opportunities to present and discuss our research outside of conferences are also limited.

    With this in mind, the OCI PDA plans to assist postdoc trainees with the following broad goals:  Career Assistance, Scientific Guidance, Social Interaction, and Advocacy.  Some specific goals we plan to address: 

Career Assistance 

• Career Development Series: Academic (preparing to become a professor /negotiations for startups / grant preparation and writing) or alternate career paths (Patent Law, Biotech, Consulting...)
• Teaching opportunities

Scientific Guidance

• Postdoc Seminar Series (similar to grad student seminars)

• Guidelines on Postdoc training for PI's (clarifying goals at start, length of tenure, reviews and feedback)

Social Interaction 

• International Orientation 
•  Social events
  

Advocacy

• Postdoc benefits / taxes  (new information)

•  University Status (library / athletics / intramural sports)

 With enough interest, we can get a lot done to further the cause of both current and future postdocs at the OCI - the UHN and University administration are very receptive to good ideas and enthusiasm.  Please let us know of any other topics of importance to postdocs we may have missed, and we hope to see you at future postdoctoral association meetings.

Useful Links

Recent publications on PubMed from the University Health Network: