ASSOCIATION OF NEUROSCIENCE DEPARTMENTS AND PROGRAMS
SPRING MEETING SUMMARY
Hyatt Regency Bethesda
Bethesda, MD
MAY 3-4, 2003

     The 2003 Spring of the ANDP was held at the Bethesda Hyatt Regency Hotel, on May 3 and May 4. The meeting provided opportunities to learn about new needs and directions in neuroscience education, as well as opportunities to interact informally with representatives from undergraduate, graduate, and postdoctoral programs in the neurosciences and from agencies that fund research and education in the neurosciences. Please see the full program agenda for titles of presentations, and note that many of the names below are linked to the PowerPoint slides these speakers used at the meeting; just click on their names to view their full PowerPoint presentations.

     The meeting began on May 3 with a presentation by Dr. Alan Gittis, Professor at Westminster College and a past president of the Faculty for Undergraduate Neuroscience (FUN), who described the activities of FUN and the outlined the important components of graduate preparation for teaching in the environment of a small college. He proposed a novel program in which interested graduate or postdoctoral trainees could obtain suitable teaching experience and training at a small college before seeking faculty positions. 

     Dr. Huda Akil, Professor at the University of Michigan and President of the Society for Neuroscience, stimulated meeting participants to consider the renewed need for an appreciation of "discovery science," research aimed at generating the knowledge that is needed as the basis for "hypothesis-driven" research. Using examples from her own research program, she noted that genome projects and microarray technology have underscored the need for approaches that do not "conceptually frame," and thus limit, the analysis of data. Although training students in this area exclusively would be, in her view, a dangerous gamble, it is not unreasonable to give students some exposure through involvement in a "discovery" project. Beyond that, there is a need for neuroscientists to educate peer reviewers in appreciation of the need for a balance between hypothesis-driven and discovery science, if we are to ensure that both types of neuroscience are valued and pursued.

     Dr. Akil was followed by Dr. Joanne Berger-Sweeney, Associate Professor at Wellesley College, Member of the Society for Neuroscience Council, and Co-Chair of the SFN's Working Group on Professional Development. Dr. Berger-Sweeney described various activities aimed at improving professional development at many career levels in the neurosciences, and set the stage for a panel discussion about ways in which the SfN and the ANDP can work together to enhance professional development (including educational) opportunities, especially at the annual SfN meeting. The panel comprised Drs. George Rebec (Indiana University, president-elect of ANDP), Barbara Goldman (Senior Director of Scientific Programs at the SfN), and Ed Stricker (University of Pittsburgh, past president of ANDP). Suggestions that emerged from the discussion included mounting an ANDP Forum for Trainees (or series of forums) on "How to Find a Job in Area X," and creating a speakers' bureau for topics ranging from different types of neuroscience-related jobs (bioindustry, public policy, others) to neuroethics.

     Dr. Gwen Jacobs, Professor at Montana State University and Director of its Graduate Program in Complex Biological Systems, described the increasing need to educate students in computational approaches to neuroscience, and the difficulties encountered in doing so. Her program and other similarly successful graduate programs emphasize an approach in which common coursework is embedded in a flexible curriculum, and mathematicians get bench research experience while biologists learn and obtain experience using math. MSU also is embarking on an innovative undergraduate curriculum, in which quantitative techniques will be infused early in the biology sequence.

     Following an evening banquet, Dr. Jon Miller, from Northwestern University, made a passionate plea for increased advocacy for biomedical policy. He presented striking statistics the reinforce the notion that effective advocacy has certain requirements. For instance, one is much more likely to be effective urging a specific action than promoting global approaches or actions.

     On May 4, Dr. Ed Stricker, Professor at the University of Pittsburgh and a past president of ANDP, presented the results of the 2002 ANDP Survey f Neuroscience Graduate, Postdoctoral, & Undergraduate Programs. The full survey report written by Dr. Stricker is available on the ANDP web site. Dr. Stricker issued a plea for more extensive participation by ANDP program representatives in the next ANDP survey.

     Postdoctoral issues were introduced by Dr. Alison Hall, Associate Professor at Case Western Reserve University and a councilor of the ANDP. She and Dr. Carol Manahan, postdoctoral fellow at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and President of the National Postdoctoral Association, reminded meeting participants of the many specific problems faced by postdoctoral trainees, who generally are not regarded as university employees. They presented numerous examples of policies at specific institutions that are beginning to address these problems and that might serve as models for other institutions. Dr. Manahan also distributed a list of useful websites and publications that, among other things, describe "best practices" in solving specific problems. Dr. Barry Kaplan, Senior Investigator and Section Chief in the Laboratory of Molecular Biology at the NIMH and Director of Fellowship Training of the NIMH's Division of Intramural Research, described NIMH and other NIH policies regarding postdoctoral training. The NIH has 3300 intramural postdoctoral and clinical fellows, so is a huge provider of postdoctoral training.

     The meeting concluded with the traditional session focused on the latest policy decisions affecting neuroscience education and research. This year, meeting participants heard from representatives from five institutes of the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Dr. Wally Schaffer, Director of Training for the NIH, Dr. Henry Khachaturian, Training Officer at NINDS, Dr. Walter Goldschmidts, Training Officer at NIMH, Dr. Mark Swieter, in Training and Career Development at NIDA, Dr. Christopher Platt, Program Director for Sensory Systems and for Computational Neuroscience at the NSF, and Dr. Peter Bruns, Vice President for Grants and Special Programs at HHMI, described current programs offered through their institutions and provided glimpses of future plans that will impact the types and levels of training support available. Especially noteworthy were announcements that the NIH is gradually raising stipends toward a goal of $25,000 for predoctoral trainees and $45,000 for postdoctoral trainees in five years, the NSF level has risen to $27,000 for predoctoral fellows, and the HHMI has just eliminated its individual predoctoral training fellowships. Numerous specialized award mechanisms, for instance for minority trainees and for trainees in specific areas of need, were describe

Leslie P. Tolbert, Ph.D.
President, ANDP