"Historically, many major discoveries and inventions have been made by young people. Young people are the most creative and have the greatest potential for innovation." In the first "Ministerial Channel" of this year's National Two Sessions, the Ministry of Science and Technology Minister Yin Hejun said in response to reporters' questions that special actions to reduce burdens must be continued to ensure sufficient scientific research time for young scientific and technological talents.
During the National Two Sessions, the Social Survey Center of China Youth Newspaper and the Questionnaire Network (wenjuan.com) conducted a special survey on "Reducing the Burden of Young Science and Technology Workers" during the Two Sessions, with a total of 2,000 people participating.
Among them, more than half of the respondents (56.1%) are young scientific and technological workers.
The survey results show that heavy burden of administrative work, limited access to scientific research funding, and high pressure of evaluation and assessment are cited as the three major problems faced by young scientific and technological workers.
92.5% of young science and technology workers surveyed said that being burdened with complicated non-scientific research work is the main reason that limits the release of innovation potential and vitality.
58.1% of the respondents believe that the scientific research project management process should be streamlined and optimized.
Heavy workload of routine work is the main problem
Hou Jia is 35 years old and works as an associate researcher at a university. She has been under great pressure in the past two years.
At work, she spends 70% of her time dealing with trivial matters that have nothing to do with scientific research. Sometimes she has to stay up late to finish the work. However, it is always difficult to advance important scientific research. “I am now a little confused about my future scientific research direction. I’m not sure if I can still accomplish my original goal.”
Guaranteeing time can ensure innovation capabilities.
Nearly 40% of the respondents feel that young scientific and technological workers currently do not have enough time to invest in scientific research.
What are the main problems faced by young scientific researchers today?
The survey shows that heavy burden of administrative work (66.3%) ranks first.
Hou Jia said frankly that because he did not have enough time to concentrate on scientific research, he also faced a lot of assessment pressure.
"When I'm stressed, I can't sleep all night long. And I'm getting older, so I have to consider fertility issues." She is worried about her future development prospects.
Zhang Xiao, a master's degree graduate, has worked in a public institution for 6 years. Her PhD brother, who graduated in the same year as her, has been engaged in scientific research. "When we met this year, he was more worried about project application. The process is very time-consuming and energy-consuming, but because his qualifications are still high, The results are often unsatisfactory and it is difficult to obtain key R&D projects.”
Other difficulties include: limited access to scientific research funding (54.4%), high pressure in evaluation and assessment (53.5%), few opportunities to take leadership roles (50.7%), narrow growth channels (29.5%), etc.
Being burdened by non-scientific research work restricts the release of innovative potential and vitality
Hou Jia briefly introduced her daily schedule to reporters, which was basically filled with various non-scientific research tasks.
"If one or two more temporary things come in, you may not be able to finish all these by the time you get off work, and you will have to work overtime at night." Hou Jia said: "I am exhausted after doing all this work every day, how can I still have enough energy? Use it for scientific research?”
Being burdened by complicated non-scientific research work, 80% of the respondents believe that this is the main reason that restricts young scientific and technological workers from unleashing their innovative potential and vitality.
It is worth noting that among the young science and technology workers interviewed, this proportion is as high as 92.5%, and among other interviewed groups, this proportion is 65.6%.
"In recent years, although some actions have been carried out to reduce the burden of young scientific researchers, the effect is not significant enough. I hope that the promotion will be stronger and more thorough." Hou Jia is very concerned about the news about reducing the burden of young scientific researchers at this year's National Two Sessions. , "I am particularly happy that these difficulties of young scientific and technological personnel can be seen, and I hope they will be gradually solved."
93.4% of the respondents clearly expressed support for the continued promotion of burden reduction actions for young science and technology workers.
Interaction analysis found that the proportion of young science and technology workers was 96.3%, which was higher than other surveyed groups (89.6%).
58.1% of respondents hope to streamline and optimize scientific research project management processes
Hou Jia feels that being entangled in routine work is a problem faced by many young science and technology workers around him.
"It may seem like a small matter, but it is very time-consuming and troublesome to deal with each one." She especially hopes to do a good job in "subtraction" in this area to reduce the unreasonable burden on everyone's shoulders.
“Project application, reimbursement and other processes should be as simple as possible, avoid repetitive and unnecessary work, and use more time on the cutting edge.”
Zhang Xiao believes that young scientific and technological workers are at a stage where they are energetic and full of ideas and creativity. They should be provided with more opportunities to express themselves and should not be constrained by their qualifications and titles.
Important projects and important positions in projects can be considered to be tilted towards young talents with ability and potential.
At the same time, she believes that attention should be paid to improving the salary and benefits of young scientific and technological workers. "They face financial pressures in family life, children's education and other aspects. Reducing these concerns will allow them to calm down and engage in scientific research."
What are the expectations for young researchers to reduce stress and solve problems and stimulate creativity?
58.1% of the respondents believe that the scientific research project management process should be streamlined and optimized, 58.1% of the respondents suggest increasing scientific research funding support for young scientific researchers, 53.3% of the respondents hope to ensure the implementation of scientific research time for young full-time scientific researchers, 52.3 % of the respondents expect to push scientific research institutions to reduce the frequency of assessments for young scientific researchers. 47.4% of the young people surveyed suggested that they should follow up on the burden reduction process at any time to prevent new "variants" of "unreasonable burdens". 22.9% of the young people surveyed hope to form "Teaching and mentoring" system.
(At the request of the interviewees, Hou Jia and Zhang Xiao are pseudonyms in the article)
China Youth Daily·China Youth Daily reporter Du Yuanchun Source: China Youth Daily