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Duty Work for PhD Candidates and Postdocs at The Natural History Museum

PhD candidates and postdocs with four-year contracts have 25 percent duty work included in their positions (1695 hours in total). While the composition of the duty work should benefit the museum, it should also be meritorious and of relevance for the PhD candidate's/postdoc's CV, and expand their experiences and competencies beyond what can be expected in a purely research-based position.

Duty work composition

Duty work should include research, teaching and other museum-related work such as outreach and working with the collections. The composition of the duty work should be varied and within the working areas of the museum, though individual competence and interests shall be taken into account. While the original agreement should be specific and detailed as reasonably possible (see section below on The duty work agreement), these agreements are considered ‘living documents’ by the museum and the content can be updated throughout the PhDs/Postdocs position period.

Suggested duty work that can be directly linked to the personal research project of a PhD or postdoc, or that is generally not expected to enhance their skills beyond what is typically expected within a PhD or postdoctoral research period, will not be considered as fulfilling duty work requirements by NHM administration.

Examples of duty work 

Work in the Department of Research and Collections

  • Updating web pages
  • Supporting other research projects through activities including: 
    • lab-/field work
    • analysing data
    • make illustrations, figures or acquiring images
    • contribute in applying for project financing

  • Organise seminars, conferences and journal clubs

Point of contact 

Hugo de Boer 
Research Director and Head of Department of Research and Collections 

Teaching and supervision

Point of contact 

Hugo de Boer 
Research Director and Head of Department of Research and Collections 

Work with the museum's exhibitions, public services and mediation

  • Contribute towards work with the creation of new exhibitions

  • Assist in autumn and winter break events for children at the museum

  • Assist in work with events arranged by UTAD and Klimahuset

  • Update relevant Wikipedia (or other external websites/encyclopaedia services) associated to NHM

  • Write blogs, newspaper articles or other popular science content

  • Contribute with input to teaching events or tours. 

  • Assist in organising events, like e.g. seminar series, conferences, symposiums

  • Contribute with production of content for NHM's Discover more-pages and other relevant web pages. 

Point of contact 

Cecilie Elise Fossum Webb 
Head of Department of Exhibitions and Public Services  

Work in the Botanical garden

  • Curation work in the living exhibitions (registration of materials, species control definition, updating the database etc.)
  • Updating information in the garden database
  • Updating signs and making new ones 

Point of contact 

Anneleen Kool
Head of Botanical Garden

Work with collections and databases

The Department of Technical and Scientific Conservation offers duty work packages.

Point of contact 

Jon Edvard L?nnve
Head of Department of Technical and Scientific Conservation

Participation in Committees

Participation in:

Point of contact 

Geir Arve Rogstad
Director of Administration

The duty work agreement

For PhD candidates, a duty work agreement should be signed within two months after the PhD candidate has started. When the agreement has been completed and signed by both the PhD candidate and the main supervisor, it must be sent to nhm-studiesaker@nhm.uio.no and be approved by the research director. The agreement should be as specific as possible, but may be adjusted later.

Duty work accounting 

PhD candidates and postdocs have a personal responsibility to maintain accounts on hours spent on duty work.

PhD candidates must twice a year report to nhm-studiesaker@nhm.uio.no (in June and December).

For teaching, the hours are written hour by hour, including the hours spent on preparations.

Teaching/assisting in the field (including overnight) counts as 12 hours per day.

Sick leave

In the case of a documented and continuous sick leave of less than two weeks, then 25 per cent of the absence may count as duty work. With documented sick leaves of more than two continuous weeks, PhD candidates and postdocs have the right to an equivalent extension of the contract, inclusive of the duty period. 

Parental leave

PhD candidates on parental leave of 5 months or more get 1 month duty work converted into research time. In these cases, 150 hours of research time may be registered as duty work.  

Do you have a task or project in mind that you would like to advertise to PhD candidates postdocs with available duty work?

If you would like a contribution from a PhD candidate or a postdoc, you may 

Remember that the duty work must be relevant for the PhD candidate or postdoc’s CV. 

 

 

Published Nov. 13, 2015 3:29 PM - Last modified Sep. 23, 2024 3:21 PM
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