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"I am always looking for that sense of discovery, that constant feeling of exploration and the opportunity to be outside in environments that are new and challenging," says Darlene Lim, a biogeologist postdoc at NASA's Ames Research Center.

"Even if you are not doing science when you are an advisor, you definitely bring your training as a scientist to the table – and this can be of great benefit," says Nancy Kingsbury, Science Advisor at Natural Resources Canada.

Lewis, who trained as a geoscientist to doctoral level, describes her work at Dstl as 'research, but a different kind of research.'

"Even if being back at a postdoc position was quite difficult," says Valentina Emiliani, "this was a necessary step."

“We are looking for people who have a history of publishing and presenting. If the résumé doesn’t have those two key elements, they’ll be at a competitive disadvantage.” - Ron Webb, Procter and Gamble

The purpose of MS PHD'S is to increase the participation of underrepresented minorities in earth-system sciences.

Once they are in, young employees often state how surprised they are at how high tech, innovative, and environmentally-friendly today's steel industry is.

“Our goal is to begin to influence the new crop of African academics that can then engage with colleagues here to develop long-lived collaborative relationships.”—Michael Adewumi

"They can be very good computer scientists, but they will not be hired if they don’t fit in the company culture" of Google, says new employee Oliver Heckmann.

Although "the researcher is free to do whatever he wants," says Marché, "I will be working in a team, so I will necessarily get interested in their field of research."

Columbus Superconductors shows that a few opportunities can be made or grabbed by those who remain determined and keep the faith in the technology's potential.

Early-Stage Training fellowships offer Ph.D. researchers the opportunity to pursue specialised training for a period of 3 months to 3 years as part of their doctoral training.

In Spain, "Most people integrate into an existing and functioning lab," which gives them less freedom," says de Nalda Minguez.

A survey of the top 50 ranked physics departments in 2002 shows that of 1998 physics faculty members, there were 12 of identifiable African heritage.

When the funding belt tightens and astronomers have to work on shoestring budgets, resourcefulness and innovation are the order of the day.

"The long-term goal is to prepare [underrepresented minorities] to become those critical staff scientists that we need for the future workforce, hopefully here [at ORNL]." –Debbie McCoy, RAMS Program Administrator.

The first step to realizing this vision, says Ridgway, is for students to take a basic geology class and find out what geologists actually do.