Fighty Squirrel

Screen Name:

Fighty Squirrel

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About Me:

The Fighty Squirrel is very thin pseud for a molecular and cellular neurobiology type who runs a lab studying neurodegeneration. She is mother to a 14yo half child/half honey badger and 16yo half child/half border collie and a Reviewing Editor at Journal of Neuroscience. She also sort of a badass at air hockey. She speaks for herself unless her employer likes it, in which case it's patented.

Academic Institution:

Vanderbilt School of Medicine

Title

The Fastest Typing Squirrel You Know

Department

Nuts and Twigs

Degrees

PhD
Awe.Some.

Connect:

Authored Posts:

• Don't Row, Steer. A Professor's Four Steps to Deep Work
• Thank a Congress Critter! Science Budget is a Win for NIH NSF
• Scientists Help Fund Over $22,000 for Kids STEM with March Madness
• Angry Academics
• MARCH MADNESS: Brackets Benefitting STEM Education. Play with Darwin's Balls!
• A Big Step Forward in Standardizing Rules for Authorship
• Questions for STEM Profs to Ask Before Filing Taxes
• NSF Just Made It A Lot Harder for Universities to Harbor Harassers
• Women: If You Want First Author Publications, Have a Female Boss
• Summer for Academic Parents: Do It Like a Pro by Preparing Now
• Valentine's Day Presents for the STEM Love of Your Life
• Why Aren't More LGBT+ Scientists Out: Student's Question Sparks Debate
• Reality Check: It's Not Your Data
• How to Make Your Team Stand Out When Interviewing Prospective Students
• Multi Year Study Reveals Significant Bias Against Women in Grant Review
• Year 15 as a PI. Spoiler, It's a Still a Challenge
• Quick Like Bunnies, Spend $5 Now for a Better Academic New Year
• TIME Names University Silence Breakers People of the Year
• Gifts Your STEM Buddies + Lab Friends Really Want This Holiday Season
• Brene Brown Offers Academics A Thoughtful Way To Do a Reboot
• Alice Soragni's Hot Takes on Year One of Being a PI
• NIAAA Steps Up with Great Addiction Outreach Tool
• Salvage Your Unfunded Grant with an OnPAR Submission
• Pending Budget Plan Spells Big Trouble for Higher Education
• Harvard Study Shows Bias, Not Behavior, Is Why Women Aren't Advancing
• I'm Not Your Mom and Other News About Females in STEM
• Dear Sen Warren: A Primer on Being a Woman in Science
• NIH Just Stepped Up (a Bit) to Promote Neuroscience Trainee Diversity
• Rolling Out Academic Bling for Edge for Scholars Users
• Handy Guide to Showing PostDoc Appreciation All Year Long
• NIH Wants to Pay Your Student Loans. Here's How to Make It Easier for Them to Do It.
• Academic Epidemic: Rochester Sexual Harassment Case Strikes a Nerve as Student Hunger Strike Begins
• As Rochester's President Digs Deeper in Sexual Harassment Debacle, Students Plan Protests and Hunger Strikes
• Rochester's Neuroscience Harassment Debacle Gives NIH Director a Chance to Tackle Harassment: Will He Take It?
• "Psst....Pass Me Those Aims?" How You Can See Everyone's Full Grant Application.
• Houston Has a Post-Hurricane Science Problem: Here's How You Can Help
• Profs on Drugs: JAMA Highlights Use of Cognitive Enhancers
• Shields Up: Being A Science Leader in Tough Times
• More Bad News on the Greying of NIH PI's
• Point_Mutation Gives a Master Class in Scientists as Wackaloons.
• Nature Suggests UK Follow US Lead on Academic Sexual Harassment. Please Don't.
• Cancel Your Talks: A Way for Academics to Make a Statement Against Hatred
• What Google and Academia Still Don't Understand About Safety
• Scientists! Get Those Amazon Prime Deals Now.
• Radical Candor: Can It Work for Academics?
• Scientists Career Advice: Seeking No Feedback
• Donna Webb: Missing Out on a Genius Lunch Buddy
• Twitter's Scientists Share The Most Awful Sexist Things They Have Experienced
• Females in Basic Sciences Get Seriously Screwed in Startup Packages. Knowledge is Power, So Plan Your Ask Accordingly.
• When Polite Isn't Going to Cut It: Calling Out Everyday Sexism at Conferences
• Google Has a Powerful New Data Playground for PhDs and MDs to Target Patients, Individuals at Risk and Consumer Trends.
• A Quick Fix for Death by Powerpoint
• Vexing Issues for New PIs: Picking Corresponding Author, Potential Reviewers, Blacklisting and Other Angst
• Queer Science Stories Needed 🌈
• NIH to PIs: In Current Funding Climate, Three R01s Is Enough
• Neuroscience Pretenure Boot Camp in Seattle? Yes, Please!
• No Advances in the Last Decade in Closing the STEM Gender Gap
• Advice for My Graduating Students
• Academic Reads: The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck
• Time Management for Profs Who Hate Time Tracking
• Glam Journals Whiff Again with More Bad Mentoring and Career Advice
• Scientists Donate $8,000 to Kids STEM Education With Their March Madness Brackets
• Popular Young Scientist’s Post on Failure to Get Funding Goes Viral
• Nature Conspiracy Theories
• Nature Conspiracy Theories
• Popular Young Scientist's Post on Failure to Get Funding Goes Viral
• Go To SLEEP! The Five Things That Happen When You Don't Call It A Night
• Better Profiles are Coming!
• Darwins' Balls Update!
• Translational Newbies: Awesome FREE Advice
• Sure You're Overcommitted? Here's A Hint...
• The Hustle You Need to Be Showing
• The Olympics of Pain: Tag Me Out
• Tired Reviewer Request: Set Your Models Free!
• Academics! Play with Darwins' Balls to Fund STEM Education
• You ARE an Impostor. Six Life Altering Steps to Fix That.
• Leave Your Island. Career Inspiration from Richard Blanco
• Dr. Stephen Korn on NINDS Workforce Development
• Batman and Robin: Woes and Wins in Picking Collaborators
• Getting Evaluated - Time to Bite the Bullet and Ask If You're a Jerk
• A Peek Inside Study Section: The Riff Raff Edition
• Mensches, Mentors and Badasses: My Science Valentines
• Don't Miss the Deal Breakers: Nine Questions for New Lab Staff Hires
• Go Pee. Academic Management Lessons I Learned from Audie Cornish.
• How to Interview the Hell Out of Academic Job Candidates
• Another Cautionary Tale on "Tailgaiting": Brigham and Women's Interloper Evades Hospital Security
• It's National Science Meeting Time! Nine Protips on Meeting, Greeting and Getting It Done Like a Rockstar
• Is Your CV Making You Look Like a Chump?
• Save Your Sanity the Stanford Way
• Sunday Long Reads: Alternative Science Facts , Health Disparity Fixes and Winners!
• Write Like a Boss: Five Minutes to Better Science Writing
• So You Want to Be On An Editorial Board? Some Protips for That.
• Finally! Data on What Study Section Really Cares About
• Nine New Year's Resolutions for Academics
• Buckle Your Seatbelts, Motherf*$%ers...This is How You Start a Grant
• Academics, Get Yourself These Five Gifts for a Great New Year
• Alarming Statistics Reveal Mental Health Crisis in Our STEM and Medical School Trainees
• Women and URMs, Peer Review Needs You. Here's Why and How to Get On That.
• Friday Fighty Squirrel's Academic Science News: It Ain't Your Money, Kid
• You're Never Going to Bounce Back, So Stop Trying: Academic Version
• Taking Science Personally
• Walk the Dog: How Writing Every Day Can Make a Project Seem Less Daunting
• NIH Director, Time to Bring Science to the People American Ninja Warrior Style
• Community Engagement and the Befuddled Academic
• Susan Lindquist Drops the Mic and Leaves the Room
• Up Your Academic Gift Game - Your Worker Bees Will LOVE This
• Excellent Read for the Optimistic Academic: Give and Take by Adam Grant
• Bad News About Your Right to Privacy, Faculty
• Did You Miss It? Big Research Investing and a Decade of DrugMonkey Blog
• FFS: Faculty Dispairty, Violence and Starvation
• Why Your Favorite Journals Need to Put a Dog in the Ethics Fight*
• Scientific Societies Are Failing Academics: Five Ways to Do Better and Get More
• End of Summer Academic Sanity Saver: Post Undergrad Lab Jobs Now!
• Are Your LGBTQ Trainees Safe: Thoughts on Life Post Orlando
• Take a Quick Peek at Your University's Financial Outlook Here
• If I'm a Minority Recruit, Is It Tacky to Point Out There are No Other Minority Faculty?
• Medical Woo and the Hidden Toxins that Are (Not) Killing You
• Doing Better in Academics in Your 40's: You'll Need an Eye Exam for That
• Titles as a Sign You're Doing It Wrong? A(nother) Weird Conversation via Fighty Squirrel
• Safer Labs for Thea and Sheri: You Need a Lab Safety Reality Check
• Updated! March Madness Brackets for STEM Education
• Microscopes, Butterflies, Owl Puke...And More
• The Rube Goldberg Experiment of Hiring Underrepresented Minorities and Harassment of Women in STEM Must End
• Unexpected Perks of Editing for a Journal
• Stop the Slapfest: Why Scientists Need to Step Up in Support of a Cancer Moonshot
• Nut Up, Faculty
• Calm in the Storm: Finding Your Zen at Work
• Introduction to Medical and Other Ignorance
• I Don't Think Team Means What You Think It Means
• Academic Social Media Tangles: The Evolving Tale of Jennifer Berdahl
• Unicorns-106; Mike Huckabee's DNA Schedule-0
• Making Lemonade: A Retraction Watch Interview
• The Land of Monsters
• I'm Not Saying I'm the Best Mentor Ever, But...
• A Monday Morning Giggle from The Onion
• A Sure Fire Way to Know What Your Boss Thinks About You
• What Folks Want to See on Your Lab Website
• The Trouble With Girls in Lab
• Rock and a Hard Place
• Fraud Busting Bonanza
• Checking Social Media Phobia for Academic Parents: Awesome Teen Eden Lytle Offers Her Help!
• I'm Dying a Slow Academic Death and Travel is the Likely Killer
• Title IX Isn’t Working: Nine Necessary Actions to End Sexual Harassment Culture in STEM