[Ifeffit] writing beam time proposals

[Scott Calvin]

At 10:15 AM 9/23/2005 -0500, you wrote:
>
>You are right, it does not matter.  The judgement of the quality of the 
>proposal is not, in my experience, based on the author's reputation.
>
>Carlo
>
>
FWIW, this is one of the reviews I got for a beam time proposal:

>The PI proposes to study monodisperced nanoparticle size using XAFS and
compare it against TEM and DLS. The PI has proven in recent years to carry
out careful and well planned experiments. Previous studies have resulted in
several high quality publications in letter and archievel literature. The
PI also has been active in the integration of undergraduate students in his
synchrotron research. I highly recommend user time.  

For this reviewer, it appears that "reputation" was a factor. My guess,
however, is that reputation of this sort is transferable to the whole
research group; as long as the more senior adviser is mentioned somewhere
in the proposal, it should be just as likely to get approved as if the
senior member is the PI. For the other reasons that people have suggested,
I agree that having the student as PI is desirable. Also, of course, having
the student as PI is good for their career in the long run, as they can
build on the experience when they establish their own program...

--Scott Calvin
Sarah Lawrence College
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