Question: if you could, what is the one thing you would change about science, and why? what is the one thing you love most and dislike the most about your job and why?

Lisa Baddeley answered on 12 Mar 2018:

Hi Isla, That is a good question. I wouldn’t change anything about science itself, I think that will always be interesting, but I would change the way we go about doing science research. To do research, scientists have to apply for money. They generally do this to the government of whatever country they work in or sometimes big companies will fund research. The money has to pay for salaries for the scientists and any equipment they use and is generally given for a fixed number of years (about 4 years). This means that science jobs (particularly for researchers who are below 30 years old) are often only for 4 years and then you either have to apply for more money or find a new job at a different research institute or University. It’s a problem because people don’t want to have to potentially change jobs every 4 years so quite a few people leave research.

The one thing I love the most is when I am out at the radar site (you can see the radar site in my pictures on my profile) when the aurora is dancing overhead. It’s even better when I have students with me who are seeing the aurora for the first time as they get quite excited.

The one thing I dislike is when my computer code doesn’t work. A lot of what we do involves writing computer programs to analyze our data. I was never very good at programming so I don’t find it easy to write the codes I need!!

I hope that answers your questions. 🙂