tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8890204.post767977239087238846..comments2024-03-10T05:26:42.148-04:00Comments on My Biased Coin: CS Family ValuesMichael Mitzenmacherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06738274256402616703noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8890204.post-76413429025807556672008-06-18T14:36:00.000-04:002008-06-18T14:36:00.000-04:00Two observations on this. The first and most impor...Two observations on this. The first and most important thing is that this is as much a money issue as a time-to-do-research issue, because money translates into time. My wife pushed to finish her PhD (in the humanities) just before our first child was born, so I can vouch for the focus factor. But it sure was nice having her gainfully employed 4 months later, in a job that gave her on-campus housing, while I was still 3 years from a tenure decision. As an extra added benefit, my commute was nil and we had an endless supply of intelligent, responsible, inexpensive babysitters. Don't under-estimate the significance of material factors in thinking about this. Computer scientists who have consulting incomes can probably turn those into time too, and that may be related to any observed child-friendliness in our field.<BR/>The other general observation is that being a young professor with children can cause the perfectionist mentality we have about our research papers (gotta get it just right, or it won't get published, and then I won't get tenure) to get carried over to our parenting. Big mistake. Get used to the idea that little children are incredibly resilient, and providing them a few unintended opportunities to see life at its less than ideal will do them more good than harm in the long run, guilty as it may make you feel in the short run! Not to mention the good effect on everyone's mental health, the partner's and the children's as well as your own, of just being a little more relaxed.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8890204.post-68955118958937814922008-06-18T09:15:00.000-04:002008-06-18T09:15:00.000-04:00Congratulations! Best of luck in your new endeavor...Congratulations! Best of luck in your new endeavor!<BR/><BR/>For most of my time in graduate school, the norm seemed to be to wait. But, that's been changing over the past few years, with a lot of new arrivals.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8890204.post-19422198447723633782008-06-18T03:46:00.000-04:002008-06-18T03:46:00.000-04:00At least at this point, the majority of the theory...At least at this point, the <I>majority</I> of the theory faculty at Berkeley have kids.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8890204.post-65438928802114891832008-06-18T03:14:00.000-04:002008-06-18T03:14:00.000-04:00Randy Pausch had something to say on this (The Las...Randy Pausch had something to say on this (The Last Lecture). He says that (based on experience at Brown/Virginia/CMU) people with kids were graduating at least as fast as those without - partly because they forced themselves to be more focussed.<BR/><BR/>I can confirm the focus bit as someone with first hand experience - our daughter arrived a year and half before I graduated. However, what is left unsaid is the stress of being focussed and time-aware all the time... and this is something I still think about as a young faculty member.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8890204.post-32297301905054476472008-06-18T00:38:00.000-04:002008-06-18T00:38:00.000-04:00Congrats!As for your opening remark about Berkeley...Congrats!<BR/><BR/>As for your opening remark about Berkeley, having gone from MIT to Berkeley to Columbia, with stop-overs at Tsinghua, IBM and IPAM, it is my experience that it's primarily indeed a Berkeley thing :)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8890204.post-50998386458212676412008-06-18T00:28:00.000-04:002008-06-18T00:28:00.000-04:00congratulations ! Here at Utah, there are grad stu...congratulations ! Here at Utah, there are grad students with more kids than I have :)Suresh Venkatasubramanianhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15898357513326041822noreply@blogger.com