Career satisfaction in an uncertain world? Dream on
“Please do not cut off a fountain of inspiration for the next generation of UK scientists and engineers,” wrote 200 celebrities in an open letter to new Prime Minister Andy Burnham last week. They urged him to save the Jodrell Bank radio telescope, where many children had experienced what they called a “spark moment” that ignited their interest in science.
I sipped from that fountain. Jodrell Bank’s huge steerable dish stands incongruously on the Cheshire Plain a few miles from where I grew up. When I was about 11, I had a birthday party there.
The spark did not catch. I faintly remember coming away with a pocket full of indecipherable ticker tape from one of the visitor centre’s machines and shivering outside watching the dish slowly alter position on its circular rails. That was it. You may have noticed that I am neither an astronaut nor an astrophysicist.
Even had my visit kindled that dream, I would have been hard-pressed to realise it, given the tiny number of vacancies in those fields. As parents, we like to hear our children voice their cute career wishes, but at a certain point it becomes clear to them that they won’t lead a mission to Mars and might have to settle for more earthbound job opportunities.
