Additional Thoughts on the On-campus Interview

As I continue my death-march through the prep-school interview season, I have been amazed by a number of things. First, how badly I have botched my first few interviews. (For ugly details see this post.) Second, how generous the people who have interviewed me have been in offering advice.

I recently found out I am 0-for-3 in on-campus interviews (bad), but got some additional feedback on my interview (good), which I'll share here.

The good news is that I appear to have avoided the rookie mistakes of my first interview. Nobody at the third school came away thinking that I was so desperate to leave my current Uni that I would take any job offered. The bad news is that I did not do a particularly good job articulating why I wanted to teach at that particular school. When the school's head asked me "What kind of school are you looking for?" my answer was about Independent Schools as a whole, not about PP. (In part this is becaurse I felt profoundly ambivalent about PP. I had to swallow my initial answer, which had to do with teaching in a progressive school, which PP ain't.)

In any event, to the advice I received. In a nutshell, Do your research. When I had campus interviews for nationally-known colleges and universities, search committees never wondered why you wanted that particular job. In their thinking, who in their right mind wouldn't want to teach at University of Chicago.

Prep schools are not so full of themselves as this. They wonder why you would want to make this move, not just to independent school teaching but to their school in particular. To do this, be as specific as possible. What is it about the mission statement that speaks to you? Why do you love their approach to education? Why do you want to be a part of that specific community? As one person put it, "They want to hear about themselves."

There are two good ways to make the case for a particular school. Most obviously is in your answers to their questions. When they ask you why you want to get into independent school teaching, don't answer! Tell them why you want to teach at that particular school.

You can also do this by asking school-specific questions. Don't ask generic questions about the curriculum, ask about specific aspects of the department's curriculum. When you meet with senior administrators, refer to the mission statement or strategic plan. They want to know that you know them and that you are taking them seriously.

So as this season winds down, I feel pretty stupid in making so many basic mistakes. I hope I'll do better next time, and I hope that you will too.

Good luck us.

Letting go of the dream

As I sit, staring at the phone, wondering if I will receive The Call from a prep school I visited recenlty, I've had to wrestle (again!) with the prospect of giving up on my dreams. It is not my dream to teach in a prep school, and it never has been. But at the same time, it is not (and has never been) my dream to teach at a third-tier public uni, with a low salary and no money for research.

Now I know that very few people in the world have their dream jobs. As a group, lawyers are an unhappy crowd, and Lord knows my mother never said to herself, "I want to spend twenty-five years administering unincorporated areas of Tuscon!" And my wife has no earthly idea what she wants to do. The problem is that I am lucky enough to know what I want (to teach at a small college), but unlucky enough not to be able to do it.

I think that the hardest part about taking an offer is that as soon as I do, that dream - one which I have held on to for a quarter of my life - is gone.

I also worry that my reluctance to let go of the dream could warp my ability to see prep school jobs for what they are. Am I foolish enough to turn down a good position ("It's not the right fit.") in order to avoid letting go of the dream? That, it seems to me, would be the height of folly.

So let me ask you - how do you balance your lofty dreams and the crushing reality of the academic market?

Rookie Mistakes and Baby Tiger Syndrome

I just wrapped up a really great conversation with the head of the history department that didn't hire me. (For the sake of pseudonymity, I'll keep the school to myself, but to whoever got the job: You got the gold ring, my friend.)

As the chair and I discussed my interview, it became pretty clear that my candidacy was doomed by two things: rookie mistakes and Baby Tiger Syndrome.

Getting my head back in the game

Okay, sorry about that last post, and thanks so much for the supportive comments. I read recently about a piece of software that keeps you from sending emails when drunk. I need one that keeps me from blogging when freshly rejected.


There is an aspect of the secondary search that I have been puzzling over for some months now, but have not written about it, less out of fear of appearing foolish than the fact that I had a question, but no answer. As you, dear reader, have probably figured out, one of the major differences between the academic and secondary markets is the timeline. By this time of year, all but the most tardy and muddled-headed search has wrapped up. (I'm talking to your employer, Eliza!) But secondary schools are just heading into the on-campus phase, and it will be another month before these positions close.


But there is a bigger difference than this, and here is where I become confused. In the world according to my Carney Sandoe rep, the vast majority of teaching positions have been announced. (These positions, it should be noted, are positions that schools have known about for the better part of a year.) To fill these positions, CSA had their big conference last month, and if your ship hasn't come in yet, the odds are very high that you'll be standing at the dock for another year.


But when I ask prep school teachers, I hear something completely different. Every one of them agrees that next month, a second wave of searches will begin. This is because schools are only now offering contracts to faculty for the 2011-12 academic year. Thus it is only now that some faculty will announce their retirement (or that they have taken the job that I had my eye on). As a result of these retirements/moves, there will be another set of openings in April and May (and even June or July). (Unlike colleges and universities, independent schools don't have to wait a year to fill a position. Got a vacancy starting in the fall? Fill it.)


The question then becomes, how do we explain the discrepancy between what Carney says, and what teachers say? If this second wave of jobs is a reality (and I'll keep you posted), why doesn't CSA go after those as well?

All I've got is an educated guess, and I'm happy to hear from anyone who knows better. My thinking is that CSA is powerful, but they work on volume. (Why? For the same reason Willie Sutton robbed banks: "That's where the money is.") They can handle the block of jobs that come out in January and February, and funnel them into their big conferences. These are the low-hanging fruit. But the spring jobs come out in dribs and drabs over three or four months. For a guess, they require more resources to fill, and are thus less profitable.

So both stories are right. Carney's season does end in March, but the rest of the world's does not. The pace slows, to be sure, but that doesn't mean that things are at an end. So even if you are signed up with CSA, keep an eye on the NAIS listings, for there may be jobs there that CSA doesn't handle.

And good luck out there!

Now your sample size is none.

Okay, my half of this blog was going to be about my transition from the tenure track to teaching at prep schools, but it now appears it may be rather less informative and rather more depressing.

I just received the nicest, most apologetic rejection of my career. (And I've recieved over a hundred rejections, so that's saying something.) To make matters worse, I really loved the school, and they really liked me. But they had 200 applicants.

One year ago last month, I recived precisely the same news, also from a dream school. This hurts as much, and raises the very real possibilty that (for this year at least) the prep school market is not one whit better than academia. I mean if you don't get a job, who cares how many interviews you had, right?

So I've got one on-campus interview left at a school I'm having a hard time loving. And after that, I've got fuck-all.

Your Sample Size is One (On campus with Prestigious Prep)

As I noted in my last post about on-campus interviews, I'm completely new to this, so take everything here with a grain of salt. Most of you know more about the collegiate process, so I'll focus on the differences between the two.

The most obvious difference between a prep school and (many) university interviews is that rather than a presentation of your research they will drop you into a classroom full of students and turn you loose. What they want/expect you to do will vary widely depending on the school, as will the amount of guidance you receive. Sometimes you'll receive a specific topic, other times you'll get little or nothing to go on. Some tips to make things go more smoothly:

• Bring a baggie full of large name plates (the ones that fold into tents) and sharpies. As students come in, ask them to write their names. This will make it much easeir to call on students without resorting to, "You, in the blue sweatshirt."
• If you are going to lead a discussion of some sort, make it a self-contained unit. Bring a copies of a short reading, and have them do it in class. (Better yet, have them read aloud.) You could try leading a discussion of the reading assigned by the regular teacher, but you're betting your job that the students did the reading, and if they didn't you'll be out there flapping.
• Treat the class like the first of the semester. (No, don't go over the syllabus.) They don't know you, and don't know your shtick, so explain what you are going to do in class. Also, if you are prone to excessive enthusiasm, tread lightly. (I'm kind of loud and might have scared the 9th graders.) Be 80% of yourself.
• Write on the board. (You might bring your own dry-erase marker for this. You don't want your class torpedoed by an equipment malfunction. Incidentally, what do you call it when a dry-erase marker runs out? They can't dry out, can they?)

A second issue to keep in mind is that department politics in a prep school can be quite different than a college or university. In large part, this is a matter of scale, and the significance of a single hire to a department. From a political perspective, at all but the smallest colleges, your arrival in will probably not be particularly significant. By contrast, at all but the largest prep schools you will be one of four or five people in the department, so your arrival will be tremendously significant.

For example, many prep schools are rethinking their AP offerings in the humanities, and some APs are on the chopping block. While you might not have much sympathy for standardized testing, and hate the idea of teaching to the test, these classes have been around for a long time, and inevitably have strong support among some members of the department. In a small department, your position on this issue will likely determine the future curriculum. As a result, the way you answer a question such as, "What do you think of the AP?" will shape the way different members of the department view your candidacy. My argument here is not that you should avoid answering this sort of question ("Gee, I haven't thought about curricular issues" will get you nowhere), but you should know why people care intensely about your answer.

Beyond this, the prep school interview will feel quite familiar. You'll get a nice dinner, meet a bazillion people, and get a bazillion different versions of the same questions (all focused on teaching).

And don't worry - you'll do great.

Don't Panic! (Er, okay, panic, but don't panic about panicking.)

Okay, just back from my first on-campus interview, and here's what I learned. (Or at least here's what I think I learned. My sample size is pretty small, and the plural of 'anecdote' is not 'data', so the lessons here might not actually apply elsewhere.)


First and foremost, if you are a PhD thinking about jumping to a prep school, it's not unusual for you to panic, and wonder if you are making a horrible mistake. So far I have melted down twice in the last month. "I don't want to teach at a prep school," I complained. "I want to teach at a small, wealthy, liberal arts college, with pre-tenure sabbatical. Iwant to make $65k as an assistant professor, and $80k as an Associate. I want a 3-2 teaching load with no class larger than 20."

The problem, of course, is that I had fallen into the trap of comparing my real-world options with my fantasy-world options. I wrote a version of this elsewhere, but it is stil true:

I think that it is extremely easy to get addicted to being on the market in the way a gambler is addicted to searching for the Big Score. There is the anticipation as the jobs are posted/cards are dealt, the excitement as you mail an application/place a big bet, and the disappointment when you are rejected/lose the hand.

You might always lose, but there is also no reason to leave the job market or get up from the table. Why? Because there's always another hand to play or another year to apply.

The addict's challenge is to realize that while there is some truth to the saying, "You can't win if you don't play," it is almost as true to say, "You can't win if you do play." But the panicky voice in your head is only telling you the first story, and that story is for suckers.

So what to do when you panic? First, do nothing. Don't call your rep, don't email search committees. Just let the panic be. Then, breathe deeply, and remind yourself why you are making this move: You will have better students. You will make more money. You will have a choice where you live. You will be able to send your kids to an excellent school for pennies on the dollar. Repeat.

If you need to, to read this thread: http://chronicle.com/forums/index.php/topic,66956.0.html It was my original cris de coeur when I started down this road, and it might help remind you why you did so as well.

Then, have a drink or two. Get a good night's sleep. See where things stand in the morning. Have any of the things that made you want to leave academia changed? Have any of the attractions of prep school teaching (or whatever other career you have selected) diminished. Probably not. Then carry on.

Countdown to Carney, Pt. 1

According to my Carney representative, the last 48 hours before a hiring conference are the most hectic, so (as events warrant) I've decided to post more regularly over the next couple of days, and then once I arrive in DC.

So far, it's hard to see how things could be going any better. Forgive the bullet points, but I have to break down some numbers.

• My application package has been sent to about a dozen schools across the country.
• Nine of these schools will interview in DC.
• I sent letters of interst to four of these nine.
• Five schools have requested interviews.

So if you are scoring at home (or if you're by yourself) I'm batting 5-for-4, which is as impossible in baseball as academia. (As I said to a friend in the field, "Remember the year you had interviews with your top five schools? No, me neither.")

It's also possible that there are more interviews to come. I received a request to interview for a department chair position. (I declined it due to location and cost of living issues.) And more schools are registering for the conference and posting jobs. (Right now there are about 200 schools registered.)

Now, one reading of this is that I'm totally awesome. But I don't think that's true. I think that the correct reading speaks to the differences between the prep school and academic job markets. For college teaching jobs, a doctorate, publications, and years of teaching experience might not get you in the door. For prep schools, all of these make you stand out from the twenty-somethings who are looking for their first teaching gig. You might not get the interviews, but you will be noticed, and in my case my CV has clearly worked in my favor.

That said, I've been through the academic wringer too many times to think that a job is in the bag. Conference interviews won't necessarily lead to campus interviews, and campus interviews won't necessarily lead to job offers. But they're a start, at least.

When You Know You're in Good Company

Suck on this.

I'm pleased to announce that, according to my blog stats page, a number of readers stumbled across this particular blog after googling the following phrase: "academic job market sucks." It's a sign of the times when a blog about the search for tenure-track academic employment, and various alternate career possibilities, finds fellow wayward and disillusioned PhDs and grad students through search terms involving the word "suck."

This is not something we should dismiss. Oh no, I think it's pretty clear whether or not some of us choose to jump ship now, later, or never, or whether or not we have degrees from Fancy Pants Ivy U or Rural Soul-sucking Backwater U, we're all in agreement about one thing: The academic job market does indeed suck, particularly this year. We may be the most educated people in America, and certainly special with our membership in the PhD club, which represents less than 1% of the country's total population, but when it comes to finding, or not finding, a tenure-track academic position, sucks is still the most appropriate word to spring to mind.

 Speaking of which, Slate did a brief opinion piece five years ago on the word "sucks" that I think is especially relevant to this discussion. "Suck It Up: A defense of the much-maligned word"  [http://www.slate.com/id/2146866/]. 

"Are you offended by the word sucks? Do you loathe the way it's crept into everyday conversation? Do you wish sucks would just fade away, like other faddish colloquialisms that were eventually discarded? Well, sucks to be you. Sucks is here to stay."

Why, what's so great about sucks? Why do we still turn to this word time and time again to express our deepest feelings of disappointment and despair? Because, as Seth Stevenson points out, "Sucks is the most concise, emphatic way we have to say something is no good. As a one-syllable intransitive verb, it offers superb economy." And poor bastards like us need "superb economy" now more than ever, since those of us on the academic job market are so damn impoverished after spending thousands on our education, room and board and other necessities for six plus years, not to mention airfare, lodging and registration fees to attend hiring conferences in our disciplines. (Where we sit in a hotel room with other employed scholars who ask us a string of random questions for 20-40 minutes before unceremoniously shooing us out the door and then, professional task completed, hitting up the bar for some shots and academic gossip.)

So think of it this way: the phrase "academic job market sucks" = "the academic job market is no good." It stinks, it's rotten, it's putrid, it's a raw deal. Sure, it sucks to be us. But at least we know we're in good company when other scholars feel, and speak, about the job market in the same way.

Gearing up for a Carney Conference

One of the factors that can make the transition from the higher education market to prep school stressful (in addition to walking away from a career!) is the murkiness of the job search. Veterans of the academic search will be pleased to know that the prep school hiring process features all the opacity of higher ed, but with enough twists and turns to keep things fresh. (Think of it like the Coen brothers’ reimagining of True Grit rather than Gus Van Sant’s shot-for-shot remake of Psycho.)

First the opacity: As with any search, there is a lot you will never know. Will the school consider candidates with a PhD? Many searches are general – “English Teacher” – will they consider someone with your specialty? While these questions will come to mind, as in the higher ed process, you can’t know the answer, so don’t worry about it. (That said, if a department already has faculty with PhDs, you can at least know they’ll consider your application. Unless they've been disastrous in the classroom.)

Second, the timeline: As with many fields in higher ed, prep school positions trickle out over the course of several months. I received my first referral from Carney Sandoe back in November, but the action doesn’t really get started until February. It’s also worth noting that schools continue to post positions until late spring. Unlike colleges and universities, where hiring a new teacher requires fifteen signatures and an act of God, prep schools can move much more quickly. If a teacher decides to retire in April, they’ll hire a replacement in May of that year.

As with higher ed, the key moment in the process is the huge hiring conferences. These are run by CSA and by the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS). Since I’m working with CSA, I’ll focus on their process.

About a week before the conference, CSA sets up a website where schools and candidates schedule interviews and send messages. While a dearth of interviews a week before the MLA can signal career-death, such is not the case here. According to CSA, most interviews are made in the 48 hours before the conference starts. This can certainly put you on edge as you wait to hear from schools (and wonder if you should check on the refund policy for your plane tickets), but it’s the nature of the beast.

If a school decides to interview you, they have the option of sending you an old-fashioned email, sending you a message through CSA’s site, or they can simply sign up for one of your open time slots. Whatever the case, schools drive the process. They schedule interviews and you say yes or no. (If you get an interview, take it. Even if you’re not sure you want a job, at least talk to the school. It’s good practice, and you never know what you might learn.) Most of the interviews will come from schools to which you’ve applied, but it is also possible that you’ll receive requests out of the blue.

Another difference between the higher ed and prep school markets is that you can apply for jobs at the conference, even if they are not hiring in your field. To someone fresh from the MLA this sounds like advice your mother-in-law would offer (ie. completely insane), but it makes sense because the hiring process is so different. Here’s a notional example:

Boston Preparatory Academy sends their Dean of Faculty to the conference to hire a Spanish teacher. In the back of her mind she knows that there is a good chance that one of her French teachers may leave at the end of the year, but none has made a decision. (Many schools don’t sign contracts until April or May.) While at the conference, the Dean receives a message from a CSA candidate with a PhD in French literature saying, “I’m a French teacher in the midst of a secondary school search, and am particularly interested in teaching at Boston Prep. I will be at the CSA conference in February, and would love the opportunity to learn more about your school.”

Because the Dean knows that a position might open up in the coming months, she goes ahead and schedules the interview. The candidate has a stellar resume, shows initiative, and it’s only half an hour out of her day, so why not? The interview goes swimmingly, and both candidate and Dean walk away feeling that it would be a good match. A few weeks later, old Mr. Smith announces he will retire, and the Dean says, “No problem. I’ve already talked to a candidate, and he’s fabulous.” Granted it’s unlikely to move quite this smoothly, but it does seem to happen.

As the conference gets closer, I’ll continue to blog about my experience, but at this point I’m just waiting for my first interview…

Good luck, me.

The Private School Market I: The More Things Change

"What, you're still a mess?"

As I’ve wandered onto the secondary school market, I’ve been struck by both the similarities between this process and the higher education market. The first point of continuity is that the ritualistic aspects of the application process are virtually the same. I get up in the morning, and check the NAIS website to see if anything has shown up in the wee hours. Once at work, I check email occasionally constantly in hope of receiving an interview invitation. Then I check the job board again, and log onto the Carney Sandoe website to see if there is anything new there. In other words, applying for prep school positions is no less an obstacle to getting real work done than applying for college positions.

As annoying as this similarity is, even worse is the fact that that while the market is different, my neuroses are pretty much the same. I find myself agonizing over inconsequential choices in my cover letters: Should this be a comma, a period, or a semi-colon? Which will impress the committee most, Arial or Times New Roman? I convince myself that nobody will want to interview me. I convince myself that I’ll have to choose from five great offers. I wonder when I should buy plane tickets to the conference. I wonder when the search committees will meet. I wonder if I should call the department chair and ask when the committee will meet, so I know whether to buy plane tickets. I wonder if I can afford to live in Boston/San Francisco/Chicago/DC/San Diego. So for those of you thinking that the wounds left by many years on the academic market are easily healed, it may not be so.

Another similarity became apparent during a recent phone interview with Progressive Preparatory School, a great private school in _________. The interview went great (I think), and I hope to make the on-campus phase, but towards the end of the conversation, the interviewer mentioned that the school had received two hundred applications. At first I took this as good news – if a school as good as Progressive Prep dug my application out of so deep a pile, I must be doing something right. But then I realized that this also means that the competition for the good prep school jobs is no less fierce than the competition for a tenure-track college or university position. (In fact, there were fewer than a hundred applicants for the tenure-track job I have now, so in purely quantitative terms things are even worse.) As disconcerting as this is, it’s important to note that numbers don’t tell the whole story. As my interviewer noted, many of the other applicants are 23 year-old college graduates, and thus in a different category than a forty-something PhD. This is not to say that someone with a PhD is a better candidate – the degree will chase away some schools – but that schools will read your application differently.

On a final note, I’d like to suggest that anyone contemplating the PhD to Prep School route have a look at Brent Whitted’s article “Why I Teach in an Independent School,” published in 2001 in the journal Profession. Brent briefly discusses his decision to jump from a Canadian university to a prep school in Los Angeles, and outlines the ups and downs of prep school teaching. He points out that the pace of teaching is radically different – classes meet daily, after all – but he also emphasizes the joys of working with smart, ambitious students. If you have access to JSTOR, have a look. If you don’t, drop me a note, and I’ll see if I can find a PDF.

The On-Campus Marathon



You're going to need more than this to survive.

 Why is it that all on-campus interviews for tenure-track academic positions have to be complete nightmares? Most last a couple of days but let's say you're lucky and only have to be on campus for one day. It's still going to be a marathon. Survival of the fittest!

The entire experience could go down like this (assuming your flight isn't delayed or cancelled):
You fly in, presumably the night before the main event, and are immediately whisked off to dinner with multiple people. Sometimes they keep you out pretty late, depending on what time your flight landed and how long it took to get from the airport to the restaurant, and by the time you reach the hotel it's 10pm or later. You've got less than 8 hours before you need to wake up and wow everyone. So you make some calls to loved ones, unpack, lay out your interview outfit, go over your job talk, etc. and then finally pass out at 12am.

When the alarm goes off at 6am or earlier, you spring into action, get ready, and then anxiously look over your schedule for the day, which looks something like this:

7:30 AM Breakfast with grad students
8:30AM Interview with search committee
9:30AM Meeting with HR (where they tell you a bunch of crap--> all irrelevant unless you get the job)
10:30AM Meeting the Department Chair
12:00PM Lunch with Department Members (TBA)
1:00PM Meeting the Dean and/or Vice Provost
2:00 PM Campus Tour
3:00PM Job Talk
4:30PM Meet & Greet with Department
5:30PM Exit meeting with search committee
7:00PM Dinner

The interview day is guaranteed to last over 12 hours, but if you add the time spent going out to dinner at the end of the day, you're looking at a 15 hour day. That's 15 hours straight spent trying to be amazing, polite, witty and coherent; 15 hours where you're "on" non-stop, trying desperately to make a good impression on the 30-50 people you may come into contact with. Yikes! Not to mention time spent impressing during the dinner the night before or at the breakfast the next day or on the long trip to the airport.

The whole process amounts to an exhausting, painful whirlwind. And the worst thing is the waiting period once you've returned home and all the questions that run through your mind 24-7. How many days or weeks will go by before I hear something? Will I ever hear from them again? Did they like me? Was I the best candidate? Should I have answered that question in a different way? Why did I get the spinach salad at lunch?! I should have brought floss in my bag! Idiot!!

While you're waiting to hear back about the results of campus marathon #1, you're invited to interview at a different university. Oh joy! But this time they want you to interview for two days and give both a job talk and a teaching presentation. So you've got two back-to-back 12 hour days to look forward to and less than 10 days to throw together a new talk (because they asked for something entirely different than the first school) and a teaching presentation on a randomly assigned topic. You hope they won't notice that you're wearing the same interview outfit throughout the entire visit.

By the time you get back from visit #2, which was even more tiring than the first, you've got another email inviting you to a 3rd interview at faraway university and you've learned on the academic jobs wiki that the first school has already offered the position you coveted to someone else. Ouch! Bummer! Thus the marathons continue until, finally, there are no more invitations. You're spent and the job possibilities have dried up. Now you wait and hope and wait and wait and wait. The next thing you know it's spring, you're still unemployed, and you've gotten shit all done since January. You've spent the entire semester trying to find a tenure-track position only to come up broke, empty handed, behind in your research, and pissed off.

Welcome to the world of the academic job seeker!!

Guest Post: A Broken System

If I had time, I'd actually teach you something!

A guest post by *Kate Kohler

A student I mentor confided in me recently that one of her tenured professors this term (FYI: I am an adjunct) told a class that she would be “spot grading” their papers. She was simply “too busy” and had “too many students” to grade all her students’ work. (The professor is teaching 2 classes with a total of 79 students – I checked.)

My student was rightly dismayed and, despite the fact that she is an above-average and conscientious student, felt unmotivated to excel in the course if her work was not to be taken seriously, or even read. A series of scenarios went through my head: Perhaps the professor should outsource the papers to India to be graded?
(http://chronicle.com/article/Outsourced-Grading-With/64954/)
Perhaps the professor should assign less writing? (http://chronicle.com/article/Writing-Assignments-Are-Scarce/125984/?inl). Perhaps the university should hire me full-time with salary and benefits since I make the time to carefully evaluate the work I assign students as an important part of my job?(http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/01/20/study_documents_pay_gap_faced_by_adjuncts)

I quickly realized I was once again stuck between the proverbial rock and a hard place: not only did I need to advise my student with politic discourse (god forbid an adjunct trash a tenured professor) but I had to explain to myself at least why the university system is so broken that a tenured professor, who not only is under less pressure to publish but gets time off from teaching to do her research and writing, can assign undergraduates course work with no firm promise of mentorship or evaluation.

The reasons why the system is broken are myriad. They involve change through time (also known as history), as well as current economic and cultural realities. As a doctor of philosophy in history I find I can appreciate the change through time ironies quite well. I earned my PhD in the wrong time and place. Born in 1971, a decade that saw the beginning of the end of the post-war boom, I earned my doctorate in 2009 amidst reports of the crises in the universities and economic woes world-wide. My hope to follow in my grandfather’s footsteps as a professor in terms of job placement, salary, and prestige had become an anachronism.

Here is how I see the problems and a solution. Higher education has historically been a privilege of certain groups – early on clergy who had the time and institutional support to live a life of scholarship followed by social elites who again, had the time and financial support to devote at least a few years to academic pursuits. (Keep in mind one definition of academic is: “hypothetical or theoretical and not expected to produce an immediate or practical result,” which works for both social elites and the scholary in that order). This set the
tone for higher education.

The opening of higher education to a broader community in the twentieth century had myriad benefits for society: first by allowing minority and working-class folk into the hallowed halls where many of them used the education they gained for both practical and scholarly purposes, allowing a necessary breath of fresh air in tired academic power-structures and trends. Second, the opening of the universities also allowed a wider population to gain the kind of “critical thinking” skills so lauded – rightly so – by the powers-that-be as beneficial to economics, politics, and society.

Critical thinking allows just what it promises – “careful evaluation and judgment” of past, present, and future choices by cultures and societies. Problems arose however – critical thinking requires time and money -- to support a growing population of students and professors. It also created an educational bubble that is now untenable. Higher education became focused on raising revenue and maintaining prestige (which equals money) rather than academics and critical thinking skills. In terms of teaching this often meant that faculty were put between that rock and a hard place I mentioned – focusing on their traditional role as scholars and sometimes mentors or acting as excellent teachers of a broader student population.

The truth is that in the opening of the universities a larger population of students came ill-prepared for self-direction in academic studies or simply lacked the motivation and skills necessary to succeed in academic pursuits. This is not a slam on minority groups or students in general. Everyone should have the opportunity for higher education but we, as a global community, need to decide what higher education should entail, how to prepare students for that education, and how we can provide it given the “publish or perish” culture of tenure-track positions in U.S. universities.

I could write a long-winded dissertation on the ins-and-outs of higher ed (in fact, I did) but I want to get back to my main concern here: if tenure-track professors don’t have time to teach (and part of teaching is evaluating student work and helping students reach new levels of scholarship), what can we do? As an adjunct who had planned on becoming tenure track but has since swallowed the bitter pill of reality and is now quite content with a part-time adjunct position (my husband works full-time with great benefits) at a branch of a well-known state school, I have given solutions a bit of the critical thinking I was taught to apply to problems.

Here are my two-cents: At present about 70% of teaching faculty in the United States is made up of adjuncts who work part-time, piece-meal, and most often with low pay and no benefit. This creates a culture of “fast-food work” in college teachers and courses, although many adjuncts are both excellent scholars and teachers. Adjuncts are typically either trained professionals in a specific field or hold a PhD in their teaching
subject. The other 30% of faculty are tenured – which today usually means they have published enough peer-reviewed scholarly work in their field to be considered senior scholars. Aside from the problems inherent in scholarly publishing (http://chronicle.com/article/We-Must-Stop-the-Avalanche-of/65890/) and(http://chronicle.com/article/Pricey-Cost-per-Page-Hurts/48257/), research is important in keeping academics active and relevant to each new generation as well as creating more -- and often more advanced – knowledge.

It is not a surprise that many professors who are working toward tenure or prefer a life of research don’t feel they have the time and energy it takes to be a great teacher. Teaching, however, is one of the most important goals of higher education. One of my favorite quotations by G. M. Trevelyan sums this up: "Since history has no properly scientific value, its only purpose is educative. And if historians neglect to educate the public, if they fail to interest it intelligently in the past, then all their historical learning is valueless except in so far as it educates themselves." You can fill in your discipline, but the message holds true: what good is advanced or new knowledge if it is not applied to and shared with society at large? That is the role of a good teacher – to know and understand the scholarship and be willing and able to share it with a broader audience – an audience who does not have the time or skill set to decipher disciplinary trends and jargon. A good teacher will also teach students to find the time and create the skill-set of life long critical thinking.

Here is my proposal. Keep 70/30 split, hire professor-teachers (aka most adjuncts) with a contract and benefits, and keep the 30% of researchers to push academic fields ahead. Renew these positions with professionals and scholars but allow them to choose which track they enter and, if necessary, to switch tracks. In order to keep both professor-teachers and professor- researchers in touch with each other as well as the communities they serve, university-wide scholarly conferences could be held on each campus or system in which teachers and researchers would meet to share knowledge and pedagogy. Researchers could potentially work with graduate students as well to train them in the rigors and details of research and publishing.

Of course this plan has kinks, and economic woes would slow its development for now. I think my campus is moving toward this solution, however, and suspect many other will as well as adjuncts demand their due, students demand teachers, and scholarly publishing opportunities continue to dwindle. As a recent piece argued, however, universities should offer both practical and academic resources and strive toward both as goals. (http://chronicle.com/blogs/worldwise/saturday-night-live-floor-wax-and-the-life-of-the-mind/27745?sid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en)

*Kate Kohler (a pseudonym to protect the innocent and the adjunct) teaches history at a major state university branch campus. She loves teaching history that is useful, fun, and interesting to those who hated high school history classes.

We Will be OK

A friend of mine brought this great Salon thread to my attention today, "If I don't succeed in academe, I'll die!" and I wanted to pass it on to anyone who stumbles across this site.

http://www.salon.com/life/since_you_asked/index.html?story=/mwt/col/tenn/2011/01/23/academe

In a letter seeking advice from columnist Carry Tennis, a failed anthropology PhD seeking tenure-track employment has come to the following, heart-breaking realization: "I've given it everything, and I want it more than anything, but it looks like it will never happen." Ouch.

I can really relate to her predicament and self-imposed drama and feelings of inadequacy. We've all been there. This particular PhD and ex-academic is wallowing in despair, asking herself over and over again: Why, oh why, did I F--K up my life and waste more than 15 years pursuing something pointless? I should have just moved to L.A. and tried to become an actress, like I wanted to back in high school. Of course, her parents told her then that acting was an impossible industry to break into and that she would never be able to support herself. A PhD in anthropology, on the other hand, promised to lead to a rewarding and realistic career as a professor. NOT.

Intellectually she knows the race for tenure-track employment is over but she just can't let her dream die. Or, rather, she refuses to allow herself to move on and find joy in life. She refuses, on many levels, to accept the reality of her situation:

"The problem is that emotionally, I can't drop it. It's like having a painful sore in my mouth that I keep poking with my tongue -- all day, every day, I'm angry, bitter and heartbroken. I resent my husband so much for having what I can't get that I can barely stand to be in the same room with him, I'm so consumed with jealousy. The workload of a professor is far more brutal than many realize -- 60-hour workweeks are the norm, and actually you don't stop working over the summer, you just stop getting paid -- so my husband naturally has little time and energy left over for any housework, which naturally falls on my shoulders. And this ENRAGES me -- it's like I'm not just unable to get my dream job, I'm doomed to 1950s housewife drudgery while my husband does the important stuff. My resentment toward my husband is on the verge of causing me to leave -- and it's not his fault."

So what does the wise Cary Tennis have to say in response? In a nut shell:

"You are not one-dimensional. Of course you have academic talent as well as other talents. Of course you have a good mind and many skills. But where is your power? Where is your center of gravity? . . . You must be a free human being. That is your first priority. You do not have to be a professor. . . . You know what the situation is. You just have not yet marshaled enough concrete evidence, on a consistent basis, to counter these core beliefs that are ruining your life. I think you can do it. I think you can undertake to undo this set of beliefs, and that will free you to be a human being who can choose whether she wants to be an academic or wash pots and pans.


I assure you, nothing terrible will happen to you if you do not become an academic. To know this is literally to get your life back. . . . That is the most valuable thing of all, to know that we can be OK. That is priceless. That is my wish for you, that you will find a way out of this terrible, stifling belief that you must be an academic, that you will regain the freedom to dance and sing and fling elaborate gestures to the crowd."


I'd say this is pretty good advice; although it's a shame he didn't offer any perspective on the husband-housework dilemma.

The Private School Option

What you may be up against.

Interested in leaving the ivory tower and teaching at a private high school? Wondering if Ph.D.'s are desirable candidates for prep school teaching positions or if making the switch would make you happy? Concerned that prep school kids will be little rebellious punks? Look no further.

Check out my latest Inside Higher Ed column, "The Private High School Option":
http://www.insidehighered.com/advice/on_the_fence/woolf_on_careers_in_private_schools

*I'd love to respond to your questions and comments, so please feel free to leave them either at IHE or here at the blog.

Prep School Applications: The Cover Letter

Guest Post by Benjamin Harrison

Once you’ve rewritten your CV for an audience of prep school teachers and administrators, you need to do the same with your cover letter. As with your CV, your prep school cover letter should be half as long as your college/university cover letter – between 1 and 1½ pages is ideal. As with all letters of this sort, it is an art, rather than a science, so what I offer here is just one way of selling yourself.


Part I: Who are you and why are you writing to them? This is not unlike the opening of your higher education letter. Who are you and where are you from? For what job are you applying? It is also here that you need to start explaining why you want to jump to a secondary school. Your fancy degree is well and good, but your reader will be curious, wary, or even suspicious of your motives. Does he really want to teach in a college but can’t find a job? Did she fail to get tenure? No school wants to be your Plan B, so you have to convince them that they’re Plan A. (It helps to convince yourself of this first, but that’s for a different post.)

Part II: Why do you want to teach at a prep school? I believe that this is perhaps the most important paragraph in your letter, and is the first point of divergence from the higher ed letter. You’re fundamentally unlike most applicants new to the prep school market. These folks, bright and shiny with their newly minted Bachelor’s degrees, finished college and decided to teach at a prep school. You, on the other hand, finished college and decided not to teach at a prep school. Why have you changed your mind? Nobody gets a doctorate so they can teach prep school, so what gives?

Part III: Why should they hire you? Here you need to make clear how your experience in grad school and/or on the tenure track has prepared you for teaching at a prep school. What classes can you teach? Why is your approach to teaching well-suited for prep schools in general and their prep school in particular? (You will want to look closely at the school’s mission website for this. A department chair at a college might not know what the mission statement is, but you should assume that the headmaster at a prep school does.) Other than an extremely detailed knowledge of pre-colonial leather-working practices of the Tuareg, what do you have to offer?

Part IV: Closing. Nothing too fancy here. Some people include the extracurricular activities that they are interested in advising, which might not be a bad idea. There is a rather strange idea floating around that prep schools require their teachers to coach. Simply put, this is not true. Some private schools have very good athletic programs, and they didn’t get that way by asking people with no knowledge or interest in sports to design a third-down blitz package. What schools will want, however, is service outside the classroom. Want to advise the science club? The student paper? Now is the time to let them know, but remember that the important part is demonstrating that you know about this requirement and are willing to do your part.

*Next up, the personal statement!

Putting together a Prep School Application: The CV

Public domain image

Guest Post by Benjamin Harrison

Perhaps the biggest mistake that you (a Ph.D. hoping to make the jump to prep school teaching) can make is to neglect revamping your application materials. Many prep schools are suspicious that a candidate with a Ph.D. is applying out of desperation rather than any real desire to teach at the high school level. An application that seems more appropriate for a position in higher education will only confirm that suspicion.

While many top private schools look like high-end colleges, this does not mean that you should apply with the same set of materials. No matter how much a school looks like a small New England college, it’s still a high school, and they’re looking for high school teachers. In short, when crafting a CV, cover letter and personal statement, you need to start from scratch. Remember that the underlying goal of all your materials is to make clear that your interest in teaching at the secondary level is genuine. You signal this implicitly when you put together your vita, and explicitly when you write your cover letter and personal statement. If you cannot provide a good explanation for making this move, they aren’t going to help you make it.

As a rule of thumb, everything you submit to a prep school should be half as long as it would be for a university position: Your CV and personal statement each should fit on two pages, and your cover-letter on one. My vita includes the following sections, in order:

1. Teaching and advising experience. This is a twist on the “Employment History” section of your old CV. The difference is that you don’t simply list the positions you have held. Rather, explain how what you’ve done at the collegiate level is appropriate for the high school level. Emphasize your contact with students in smaller classes, and any experience you might have as a mentor. For example:

Visiting Assistant Professor, Small Town College, Small Town, USA

• Taught classes of 15-25 students on _______, _____ and _____ with emphasis on ____, ___ and ______.

• Identified failing students early in the semester and worked with them individually to ensure their success.

• Advised College poetry club and oversaw publication of Small Town College Poetry Review.

2. Education. Keep it brief. Omit the names of your advisor and dissertation committee, and the title of your dissertation. To be blunt, they have never heard of Professor Bigname, and don’t care about the subject or historiographical significance of your research.

3. Courses Taught. Just provide a list.

4. Other Experience. Have you done any work with high-school age kids? Were you a camp counsellor? Did you volunteer through Big Brothers/Sisters or coach a little league team? Here’s where you can tell them.

5. Publications. Some might argue with including them at all, but I do. When the list of new faculty goes out to Mom and Dad, the administration will be happy to say, “Dr. Harrison’s book on the nature of presidential power will be released by Fancy University Press in the fall.”

6. References. Just a list here. If you are using Carney Sandoe or another placement firm, you won’t have to worry about arranging to have them sent, but include the names and contact information here.

*Next up – your personal statement!

Introducing "Benjamin Harrison": Regular Guest Contributor

My name is "Benjamin Harrison" (a pseudonym), and I’m jumping off the tenure track. For the last few years, I’ve been an assistant professor in the humanities at a non-flagship state university. I was one of about a hundred applicants, so when I got the job I felt lucky. I moved my family here, and we thought I/we could be happy, but it has turned out otherwise.

The largest issue is family. I just can't raise my kids here. The state is incredibly insular: the top grads from the top high schools go to, not Harvard, or Berkeley, or Williams or anywhere else that requires an essay portion on the application, but to Huge State University because they have a famous football team and are the only school on anyone's radar.

There are also financial issues. I have not received a raise in four years, and none are on the horizon. (When I earn tenure, that raise will be about 5%, so I'll get back a bit less than inflation has taken away.) There is little institutional money for archival research, and nowhere near enough for a trip overseas - which is where my archives are. While my children could attend the university at which I teach at a 50% discount, I would pay full-freight to send them to a university in the same system.

Obviously I am far from alone in this situation. The good news for most third-tier institutions such as mine is that the majority of humanities faculty have concluded that the sacrifices are worth it. They may not be happy with their current situation but if that is the only way to stay in academe, they are willing to do what it takes.

I have come to a different conclusion: In the coming academic year I will search for a job teaching at the secondary level, and blog about my experience here. My goal is to provide some insight into the process for other Ph.D.s and A.B.D.s who are considering a similar move, and perhaps a forum for discussion.

Private/Public School Teaching: Interest is out there

This post is from 2009 but for anyone considering a career teaching in a private/public school, you may want to check out the following blog maintained by a high school history teacher. He (was) is specifically looking for Ph.D.'s to apply to open positions at his school and offers some advice and words of wisdom to prospective applicants.

http://cwmemory.com/2009/02/11/are-you-a-newly-minted-phd-in-history-looking-for-a-position-in-a-private-school/

An even older post (2004), by a former public high school teacher/blogger, offers a critical look at the current certification process in the U.S. public school system. While Ph.D.'s may be great teachers, we're hampered by the requirements imposed upon the educational system at both the state and federal level. Interesting food for thought . . .

http://www.ilovephysics.com/2004/10/12/wanna-be-a-teacher-your-phd-is-no-qualification/

Alternate Careers Part I: Private/Public School Teaching

Colored Pencils by Petr Kratochvil

So, let's say you're an A.B.D. or newly minted, perhaps even less than fresh, Ph.D. or M.A. thinking about seguing into private or public teaching at the secondary school level. Where do you begin? There are a number of questions you should be asking yourself:

• For starters, have you ever actually worked with middle or high school students? (Teaching, tutoring, volunteering, substituting, etc.?) If not, what, then, is your underlying motivation? A love of teaching? Need for a job? Cluelessness? Can you persuade yourself and others that you're really serious?
• Have you thought about how teaching high school sophomores, for example, might differ from teaching college freshmen? What pedagogical strategies do you have up your sleeve for the under-18 subset? Can you begin to answer these questions?
• Are you ready for long, intense days of teaching and copious amounts of grading during the evenings and on weekends? 
• Are you willing to supervise an after-school club or coach a sports team? If not, how will you "fit in" and contribute to the school's teaching/admin team? In other words, do you have enough rah-rah team spirit to work in a public or private school environment?
• Should you go private or public? If you'd prefer working for a public or charter school, are you ready and willing to gain additional teaching credentials? This could take 1-2 years and cost you $$.
• How should you go about retooling your application materials? What are search committees at high schools/middle schools looking for? [Tip: it isn't research prowess!]
• Finally, can you say goodbye to research and focus almost exclusively on teaching 24-7, minus summers, without burning out? Can you, the former wanna-be professor, adapt to the professional life of a secondary school teacher?

For those of us without a great deal of experience working in middle or high school classrooms, these are not the easiest questions to answer. Frankly, how will you know if you'd enjoy and excel at private or public school teaching if you have only ever taught in a university setting? Well the answer is: you won't. This is why it is absolutely critical to consider the questions above AND gain some solid secondary level experience before taking the plunge. Schools will be hesitant to hire someone whose commitment appears lukewarm at best.

Most importantly, there is a huge difference between teaching at a public school vs. teaching at an independent school. The vast majority of private schools don't require their teachers to be certified, and elite institutions like having Ph.D.'s as faculty members. (FYI: doctoral and master degrees make for impressive selling points to the parents of potential students.) Accordingly, private school teaching has proven increasingly attractive to Ph.D.'s who like to teach yet are seeking employment outside the ivory tower.

"Secondary-school teaching has long been an obvious alternative for humanities Ph.D.'s and A.B.D.'s who don't land the college teaching jobs they want. But increasingly, people with doctorates are viewing elite private-school teaching as a rewarding career in its own right, rather than a watered-down version of college teaching or an undesirable backup plan," writes Gwendolyn Bradley at the Chronicle of Higher Education. [For the rest of the article, "Careers for Ph.D.'s at Private Schools," click here: http://chronicle.com/article/Careers-for-PhDs-at-Priv/46265/] 

For more on making the transition to high school teaching, see also " Ask the Administrator: What About Teaching High School?" from Dean Dad at Inside Higher Ed: http://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/confessions_of_a_community_college_dean/ask_the_administrator_what_about_teaching_high_school

The interview and search process is described here as well: "Back to high school": http://chronicle.com/article/Back-to-High-School/45223/

BUT, before you get too excited, consider this sobering fact: Getting picked up by an elite private school is, unfortunately, no easy task these days, as numerous humanities Ph.D.'s and A.B.D.'s can attest. The market is saturated and we are still in the midst of an economic slowdown, which means fewer openings and more applicants. Check out these NYTimes pieces if you don't believe me, "Teachers Facing Weakest Market in Years": http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/20/nyregion/20teachers.html and "Teaching: No Fall Back Career": http://roomfordebate.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/19/teaching-no-fallback-career/

Moreover, many private schools filter their applications through large search firms, like Carney, Sandoe & Associates (www.carneysandoe.com/); and Carney, Sandoe and the like are known to turn down qualified Ph.D.'s for no other reason than lack of classroom experience.

Still interested? Where, then, should you begin? I would advise the following:

1. Network with former or current public/private school teachers and conduct informational interviews

2. Pour over your CV and stock job letter and make sure they are addressing the proper audience

3. Make sure your references know about your search and are willing to talk in depth about your teaching abilities

4. Attempt to gain some solid classroom experience: volunteer; tutor; teach a workshop; substitute teach; register as a contingent faculty member at a private school in your area; observe others at work

5. Search the job listings board at the National Association of Independent Schools: www.nais.org/ to get a sense of what schools are looking for right now. (FYI: The hiring season for 2010-11 is obviously over at this point, but you still have more than enough time to prepare your materials for the 2011-12 season.)

6. Contact Carney, Sandoe & Associates, or a similar firm, and ask for representation, but only after you have completed steps 1-5. Attend a private school job fair/recruitment conference. These are held throughout the year. CS&A hosts their own job fairs, for instance.

"CS&A hosts five conferences in Atlanta, Boston, New York City, San Francisco, and Washington D.C. throughout the late winter and early spring of every year. The purpose of these events is to facilitate teaching job interviews between our job-seeking candidates and hiring-school representatives. Candidates and schools are able to interview with each other in a single location efficiently and cost-effectively."

For specific CS&A 2011 conference dates and more info., read the rest of the page here:

http://www.carneysandoe.com/recruitment-conferences

See also:
The Education Group: http://www.educationgroup.com/
Search firm for private schools. Free to apply. Also runs job fairs.

Public job fairs, organized by state, are listed here:
http://www.wanttoteach.com/newsite/jobfairs.html

*Additionally, here's a first-person Chronicle of Higher Ed piece about a Ph.D. who attended a job fair in 2003:
"Navigating the Alternative Teaching Market," http://chronicle.com/article/Navigating-the-Alternative-/45358/

FINAL NOTE: Anyone else want to offer any additional pointers? I'd love to hear from those who have successfully made the transition. Contact me if you'd like to write a guest blog post or be included in a future "On the Fence" column at Inside Higher Ed.