Say it with us: Vay…cay…shin

Circle the word that doesn’t fit: Notebook, Bacteria, Spreader, Transform, Vacation.

If you selected “Vacation”, you’d be…

WRONG.

The answer is “Transform” since it’s the only word that isn’t spelled with eight letters.

The fact that the concept of a vacation, particularly in the academic environment, doesn’t seem to fit into a life of research is a real injustice.  Vacations offer an essential part of the scientific process: the “battery recharge.”  This often leads to the “fresh perspective,” which has helped many struggling scientists move their projects forward.

Of all professions, research offers a highly flexible schedule that’s ideal for booking a vacation.  Of course, it’s often not just time that determines the number or frequency of vacation days taken, but also the cost.  As a result, tacking a few days onto the end of a conference is a great way to explore a city you’re traveling to anyway.  You might as well see what else the city has to offer besides 25,000 posters.

But the reality is that vacations are often hard to come by for a number of reasons (cost, time, boss, deadlines, guilt, desire to graduate, etc.).  We want to know how many vacation days, on average, you take each year, excluding major holidays.

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