time delay
Long pause. Such is life, particularly with new endeavours. So, as I've made it fairly clear, I went 'on the market' this year with a freshly-minted, freshly-printed PhD. Such a dreadful phrase, that, redolent of the meat-market that academic hiring is. Which is a different rant. The point being, there are some obvious steps to take to change the result in the next round, namely publish more and teach more.
Coming, however, from a UK institution that's just beginning to realise that 1) it's unethical to over-admit, and thereby over-produce, graduate students, 2) is dogmatically, defiantly anti-professionalisation for its students, 3) offers nothing in the way of post-completion resources, as it is wholly devoid of a sense of obligation to its grads, I find myself in a bit of a quandary. As the solutions to the problem of not 'making it' in a hiring round typically require the time and resources provided by institutional affiliation. Alternately, as a friend of mine who is recently tenured at a large second-tier state university on the West Coast with a 4/4 teaching load must confront, he simply doesn't have the time to accomplish the work of which he's capable. Admittedly, his income, as paltry as it may be, derives from teaching, whereas mine comes from a combination of ever more improbable and ever less satisfying sources. Beyond that, though, the differences are peculiarly minimal.
The teaching question, for me, at least, is more problematic. I'd love to teach. I'd teach for food+benefits at an institution of any size or quality. But my degrees are from Big Research Universities, and it seems almost impossible to convince Small 4-Year College that they're what I've been dreaming of - even for a terminal adjunct position. It's one thing for a tenure track job, but perhaps the whole 'adjunct' dead-end track might be a place where hiring to the cookie-cutter mold is less than brilliant. I and many others like me can bring passion and talent and effort to a wide range of institutions, yet aren't given the chance for looking 'wrong' on paper.
Again, trying to steer clear of sour grapes, but the advice is nearly unanimous: publish more, teach more, wait more - most folks don't get jobs straight out. True, but most Big Research Universities have bolt-holes for their grads to linger in for that extra year or two, or encourage non-completion until there's a position in hand, or simply have adjunct-ships and lectureships to offer to tide their own over. And, as I'm not anybody's 'own' over here, well, how to crack the nut, break the cycle, stop writing in trite cliches?
Coming, however, from a UK institution that's just beginning to realise that 1) it's unethical to over-admit, and thereby over-produce, graduate students, 2) is dogmatically, defiantly anti-professionalisation for its students, 3) offers nothing in the way of post-completion resources, as it is wholly devoid of a sense of obligation to its grads, I find myself in a bit of a quandary. As the solutions to the problem of not 'making it' in a hiring round typically require the time and resources provided by institutional affiliation. Alternately, as a friend of mine who is recently tenured at a large second-tier state university on the West Coast with a 4/4 teaching load must confront, he simply doesn't have the time to accomplish the work of which he's capable. Admittedly, his income, as paltry as it may be, derives from teaching, whereas mine comes from a combination of ever more improbable and ever less satisfying sources. Beyond that, though, the differences are peculiarly minimal.
The teaching question, for me, at least, is more problematic. I'd love to teach. I'd teach for food+benefits at an institution of any size or quality. But my degrees are from Big Research Universities, and it seems almost impossible to convince Small 4-Year College that they're what I've been dreaming of - even for a terminal adjunct position. It's one thing for a tenure track job, but perhaps the whole 'adjunct' dead-end track might be a place where hiring to the cookie-cutter mold is less than brilliant. I and many others like me can bring passion and talent and effort to a wide range of institutions, yet aren't given the chance for looking 'wrong' on paper.
Again, trying to steer clear of sour grapes, but the advice is nearly unanimous: publish more, teach more, wait more - most folks don't get jobs straight out. True, but most Big Research Universities have bolt-holes for their grads to linger in for that extra year or two, or encourage non-completion until there's a position in hand, or simply have adjunct-ships and lectureships to offer to tide their own over. And, as I'm not anybody's 'own' over here, well, how to crack the nut, break the cycle, stop writing in trite cliches?
posted by itinerarium at 4:04 PM
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